166 
J. LAW. 
true remarks: “ As much of our exact knowledge of the phe¬ 
nomena of healthy life, or physiology, has been obtained by ob¬ 
servation on the lower animals, true scientific pathology, or a 
knowledge of the phenomena of disease, must be based upon the 
study of diseases and morbid processes occurring in other animals 
besides man. It is a recognition of this fact that has led to the 
proposed establishment of a chair of general and comparative 
pathology at Oxford, a university which has been foremost in pro¬ 
moting the science of biology. There are many reasons why ani¬ 
mal pathology and medicine should precede or accompany the 
study of human medicine. Living under more simple conditions— 
conditions more approaching those of nature—the transition from 
a state of health to a state of disease is more easily traced, and 
diseased processes are more simple in the lower animals than man- 
The student of animal pathology and medicine is able to com¬ 
mand the circumstances of disease to an extent quite unparalleled 
in the case of man. Both the individual and his environment are to 
a greater extent under the control of the observer, and by vary¬ 
ing the condition of life he is able to modify the course of the 
disease. There is thus afforded to him an opportunity of calling 
into play, of varying or of removing the conditions which appear 
to produce disease, and thus to determine the essential factors of 
morbid processes. In the human subject one of our greatest dif¬ 
ficulties is that conditions cannot be repeated or varied at will, 
and thus arises the uncertainty which hedges in the study of med¬ 
icine, however indefatigable and sincere may be the student. 
Again, in the lower animals morbid processes can be studied in 
all stages of their progress, for the victim of disease can at any 
moment be destroyed. In this way essential and early changes 
can be differentiated from those which are secondarv and mere 
«/ 
complications. It is the privilege of our office to prolong human 
life to the utmost limit, and hence we are unable to employ the 
scalpel and the microscope, or the test tube to the dead body, till 
such time as the original morbid processes have become greatly 
obscured, if not completely effaced. Such knowledge is necessa¬ 
rily one-sided; for by studies prosecuted on the dead, we are 
often unable to discover the subtle and delicate point on which is 
