INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 
619 
Physiology has to do "with a living organism, and to a great 
extent it must therefore be learned from the writings of our 
best authors, conjoined with the expositions of your teachers. 
It is, perhaps, the most inviting of all sciences; for, while 
some of its laws are fixed and certain and easy of compre¬ 
hension, others allow of the greatest range of the human 
intellect for their solution. General or minute anatomy, 
physiology, and organic chemistry are so intimately united 
and blended together, that the one cannot be thoroughly 
investigated without the aid of the other. 
So much of what we may be permitted to call common¬ 
place physiology, it is right that you should become early 
acquainted with ; but you must be careful to avoid the study 
of the abstruse points of the science until you have made 
considerable progress in anatomy and general chemistry. 
For instance, all should know at once that it is the office of 
the stomach to digest the food—of the liver to form the bile 
—of the heart and vessels to circulate the blood—of the 
lungs to support the breathing—and, indeed, be familiar with 
the ordinary functions of every portion of the frame : but the 
way in which these several offices are performed, and the 
part that life or organic chemistry takes in their production, 
must be left for future study. 
Sufficient has already been said to show to you that che¬ 
mistry is indispensable as another of the sciences for your 
investigation. Nothing has done so much for the improve¬ 
ment of the modern veterinary surgeon as his knowledge of 
chemistry. Without it, he was yet ignorant of many of the 
functions of the body in health—of the changes wrought by 
disease—of the means to satisfy himself that death arose 
from natural causes—of the composition, properties, and 
even doses of the agents he employed ; in fine, deprived of 
this knowledge, he could not be considered either a profound 
physiologist or a safe and sure pathologist. A study of this 
kind and importance will of necessity make a great demand 
on your time; but if this is rightly economized, it need 
not to interfere with your other duties. The truths of 
chemistry are so captivating, its phenomena so striking and 
beautiful, and its results so important, that the danger 
often is that pupils will be eager to dive into its subtilties 
before they are proficient in its elements. You require, then, 
the same caution here as has just been given with reference 
to your study of physiology. 
Connected with chemistry, as collateral branches, are 
materia meclica and therapeutics—sciences which treat of the 
agents and the manner of employing them in the treatment 
