Volume 1

Elements of physiology : for the use of students, and with especial reference to the wants of practitioners / Tr. from the German, with additions by Robert Willis.

  • Wagner, Rudolph, 1805-1864.
Date:
1841-2
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Elements of physiology : for the use of students, and with especial reference to the wants of practitioners / Tr. from the German, with additions by Robert Willis. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    matter of doubt with the considerate observer, that the unity of PLAN which forms the substratum as it were of the vast variety of phenomena occurring throughout creation, must also be cogniza- ble here. The grand features, the chief results, would indeed pre- sent themselves simply, and might be announced in few words. But, as no organic process can be comprehended isolatedly in its essence; farther, as that which we in the sequence name with Goethe, primary or fundamental jjhenomenon, cannot be shown from the empirical mode of contemplating an object in itself, but only with the assistance of another cognizant active power, viz. the mind; and finally, as our purpose is to give a theory of orga- nic LIFE, following from and based upon a careful observation of the elementaiy phenomena which make up its sum, it is evi- dent ih.?it a. general vieiv of generation, or the theory of gene- ration, can only be in place in our last Book, which comprises the General Physiology. At present, for example, it would be impossible for us, still unacquainted with the process of nutrition, to reduce the genesis of the human embryo to universal laws. A long series of prehminary queries, calculated to shed great light on the essence of the generative process, also requires to be an- swered; but these, too, upon the plan we have laid down, can only be taken into consideration in the general physiology ; among the number of queries now alluded to, the following, to select a few, present themselves : to determine the relations of the organism of the parents to the progeny; the hereditary transmis- sion of corporeal forms, of mental aptitudes, and of liabilities to disease; the mode in which monstrosity originates; the numerical relations of the sexes; the resemblance in intimate structure of the objects composing both organic kingdoms, and so forth. These are all obviously subjects for our after consideralion Upon many of the relations just named, see the excellent article Genera- tion, of Dr. Allen ITiomson, in Todd's Cyclopaedia of Anatomy and Physiology, I may be allowed to observe here, that I participate in the greatest degree in the thorough scepticism of the writer upon many points ; for example, that the ima- gination of the mother produces any permanent bodily impression upon the pro- geny ; that transitory states, such as that of intoxication, during the sexual act, can exert any influence on the corporeal or mental development of the being which is its result, &c. ; by far the greater number of the data adduced in supjjort of this popular belief will not bear investigation; and others admit of ex])lanations very different from those usually given; 'it is otherwise, however, with regard to the transmission of the bodily and mental peculiarities which are stamped upon the parents; these, as we shall see at a future period, afford most im- portant strong holds in framing a theory of generation, precisely as a general survey of the realm of organization teaches us to refer the genesis of organic bodies to universal and invariable laws.