Address to the Sub-section of physiology, British Association, Birmingham, 1865 / delivered by the president, Henry W. Acland.

  • Acland, Henry W. (Henry Wentworth), 1815-1900.
Date:
1865
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Address to the Sub-section of physiology, British Association, Birmingham, 1865 / delivered by the president, Henry W. Acland. 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.

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    0 known and acknowledged. There can he no just ground of objection to conclusions based on hypothesis so long as the promoters are ready to accept, on proper and reasonable evidence, new elements of calculation. I spoke also of the Passive prejudices of mankind in respect of Biology. A curious chapter might be written on the slowness with which physiological principles have been generally received (I cannot say they are even now accepted by us) as the basis on which to secure public and private health. England is but even now awakening to these questions. The Registrar-General, the Army and Navy Departments, the Health Department of the Privy Council, the various Drainage Commissioners and Committees, and many other bodies are all engaged in collecting, disseminating, and in using physiological Imowledge under various aspects. It it must be admitted that evidence as to what is and what is not favourable to the correct performance of the functions in men and other animals is even now often conflicting. It was said just now that the pure Physiologist is too apt to disregard the processes u preeparantes ad mortem j” so also he is too apt to look on Health Questions as problems of Practice or Art, and not of Science. Yet the highest scientific qualities are requisite for determining with precision any problems affecting, for instance, Nutrition, and the consequent Capa- city for labour of a population, viewed as a whole or as individuals: witness the investigations of your last year’s President (now, happily, employed by the Govern- ment), and many of the important papers in Mr. Simon’s valuable yearly Reports, and such memoirs as that of Professor Haughton of Dublin on Work. In such cases, I will not say Theory, but knowledge precedes, and regulates, and compels practice. Similar considerations apply to the relation of Physiology to Practical Medicine. This art or science is undergoing revision under the influence of Physiology, a re- vision somewhat indeed retarded by popular prejudice, but certain. In looking back on the history of medicine we are at a loss to say which is the more curious, the sagacity of the older physicians and surgeons, considering the scantiness of their physiological knowledge, or their folly, considering the extent of it. The explanation lies in the intermixture of empirical (that is, of accepted, traditional, unquestioned) belief with really ascertained fact; and we are not now-a-days without danger of undervaluing the eminent artistic power and great practical shrewdness of former physicians, in the presence of our more precise, but sometimes also less practically valuable scientific knowledge. Dr. Stokes, the eminent Dublin Professor, has lately spoken on this topic in a timely and earnest way. The business of Physiology and of an Association like this, as I just now said, is therefore not only to add new knowledge, but to destroy incorrect or imperfectly cor- rect statement and belief. The incorporation of advancing Physiology with Medicine every year adds certainty to the latter, while it furnishes data as well as tests to the former. Experiment properly applied in Medicine under trained physicists and chemists will not only eliminate gradually all remaining error, but will make more definite the properties of therapeutical agents. In illustration it is sufficient to refer to some of the investigations of Claude Bernard, from whose great skill, combined with philosophic power, much may be expected. Yet it may be doubted if the importance of this alliance between Science and Medicine to the community at large is yet fully understood by the Legislature. Under the recent Medical Act, the whole expense of constructing a National Pharmacopoeia was thrown by Parliament on the existing Practitioners of Medicine, and the cost of its future maintenance was charged on the Students of Medicine: the national funds are to contribute nothing towards the great benefit, a benefit accruing to every one at some period of life, of a genuine and philosophical revision of known, or the discovery ol new, curative agents. Experiment alone can decide conclusively on the mode of operation of various agents on the human body and on animals. These experiments are always difficult, often costly. The Government, as I said, do not acknowledge the duty of providing funds. Perhaps the Medical Council might. It is indeed charged with the administration of the only Public Funds that are applicable to keeping on a level with modern science the National Catalogue of Remedial Agents and the