EDITORIAL OBSERVATIONS. 
675 
serious studies imposed upon medical men, can only date 
from the moment when it became obligatory for the student 
to penetrate the secrets of life, by contemplation of the in¬ 
ward structure of the living animal. Physiologists will tell 
you, that the only certain means of becoming acquainted 
with the functions belonging to each organ, is to surprise them 
while actively employed, and in full movement of vitality. 
We are not compelled to believe them upon their assertion 
alone. But if it be recognised, after examination, as correct, 
then are we bound, not only to accept as a painful necessity 
the means whereby they arrive at the result, but even while 
proclaiming ourselves protectors of the very animals upon 
which they practise their experiments, to contribute our 
share of praise and encouragement to those efforts, the aim 
and result of which are of such paramount interest to 
physiological science, and consequently of the utmost im¬ 
portance to the well-being of every living creature. 
There is no need to insist upon that elementary truth so 
long and so often unrecognised, that the study of man can 
alone lead to the proper government of human things. 
Now, the study of man is precisely the science which we 
term physiology. And, without seeking to attack certain 
questions which might be considered out of place here, we 
shall run no risk of contradiction by affirming that the 
functions of the nervous system, for example, have a decided 
influence over the determination of the human race. 
We cannot pause to pass in review before us all the divers 
points of physiology which have been brought to light by 
experiments made upon the living animal. It would be a 
work of time and labour, and, moreover, intolerably tiresome, 
to those w 7 ho take no direct interest in the science. 
There are certain facts which we must not endeavour to 
over-prove. All those who are acquainted with the progress 
made by physiology during the last thirty years, know well 
to what degree of precision and exactitude we have arrived 
in the knowledge of the successive functions, by which we 
are enabled to digest the aliments indispensable to the pre¬ 
servation of existence. They are aware, also, of the use 
which has been made by pathologists in the study of the 
divers diseases which impede the exercise of these important 
functions. In short, they have learnt how, physiology 
having reduced the faculty of digestion to a series of purely 
chemical actions, doctors have been enabled to determine 
with the greatest exactness the nature of the means which 
may be successfully opposed to the disorders occasioned by 
the morbid influences incidental to the human frame. 
