Volume 1

The principles of pathology / by J. G. Adami and A. G. Nicholls.

  • Adami, J. George (John George), 1862-1926.
Date:
1910-11
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The principles of pathology / by J. G. Adami and A. G. Nicholls. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    35/1080 (page 27)
    these chapters, upon the special pathology of the different organs, the reader is indebted to our colleague, Professor A. G. Nicholls. The Principles of Pathology.—One more word before einl)arking upon onr course. What we have already said will have indicated that we have no narrow conception of the scope of our subject. The time has pa.ssed when morbid anatomy and morbid histology could be regarded as the sum and substance of pathological teaching, and when “to name his tools’’ was what was, in the main, demanded of the student. In the evolution of every science there arc three stages to be recognized: The first, that of its dawn, when, from the ob.servations of a few' facts, the wide po.ssil)ilities of the .science imj)re.ss tliem.selves upon the worker and stimulate the Imagination, .so that forthwith he j)roceed.s to indulge iu wide hypothe.ses. The.se, in their turn, form the basis of further obser- vations in order that they be tested, with the result that time and again they are found either erroneous or inadequate. With this, a second (reactive) stage becomes manifest, in which it is ap])reciated that before any sound generalizations or laws can be establi.shed the facts and data of the .science must be carefully accumulated and marshalled. It is when this has been accompli.shed that the .science can enter upon its third (complete) stage, in which an ade<iuate knowledge of the factors involved permits the estat)lishment of general laws. Needle.ss to say these three stages are aj)t to overlap. At an early pei'iod sufficient facts may be at hand, or some clear-sighted ob.server may arise, to lay down with precision one or more .secure generalizations, and so certain broad princi{)les may be developed perfect at the very beginning, born complete, like Venus out of the ,sea foam. And, on the other hand, when, after much study and accumulation of facts, some other ])iinciple or law becomes established, its very establi.shment leads us to further possibili- ties, to the study and recording of yet other phenomena. For knowledge is progressive, and, while one department of .science may have reached its third stage, other de])artments may .scarcely have entered upon the first. A stndy of the history of medical .science—of patliology—amply bears out this statement. Galen, indeed, may be taken as the archetype of those who, con.scientiously .systematizing the known facts of a subject, proceed to develop a .system which is unavoidably false, becau.se tlie facts on which it is based are too few. lie is at the .same time a striking illustration of the value of even such ]tece.s.sarily iin])erfect work as he accompli.shed- for it cannot be denied that his efforts created a medical science, and that for a period of fifteen hundred years he and his .system dominated the medical world. With the medical renai.s.sance in the sixteenth century the gaining of new facts from ex])crimental observa- tion led to the df)wnfall of the Galenistic j)hilo.sophy—it was tested and found wanting—and led forthwith to a succe.ssion of hypothe.ses, as one .series of ob.servations followed another. The new develoj^ment of mechanics and ])hysics led to Borelli’s investigations nj)on animal movements and the ap])earance of the iatroincclmnical .school, which explained animal activities on a purely mechanical or physical basis, d'lie remarkable ex])eriinental ability and genius of van Ilehnont led to