The Hopkins memorial lecture, delivered before the Chemical Society on February 19th, 1948 / by Sir Edward Mellanby.

  • Mellanby, Edward, Sir, 1884-1955.
Date:
[1948?]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The Hopkins memorial lecture, delivered before the Chemical Society on February 19th, 1948 / by Sir Edward Mellanby. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Reprinted from the Journal of the Chemical Society, 1948. The Hopkins Memorial Lecture, Delivered before the Chemical Society on February 19th, 1948. By Sir Edward Mellanby, G.B.E., K.C.B., M.D., F.R.S. While I feel greatly honoured in finding myself in the position to-night of giving a memorial lecture to Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins, I am conscious that this is a challenge and an oppor¬ tunity which demand qualities to which I can make no special claim. A man who can be regarded as one of the greatest scientists and, in his own sphere, the greatest scientist of his time, is very rare. A man who is esteemed by everybody and regarded with affection by all his friends, colleagues, and pupils, is by no means common. The combination of both these qualities in one person presents us with a man of such outstanding individuality that the degree of know¬ ledge, skill, judgment, and sympathy required to give his biographic lecture is almost un¬ attainable. I can only promise to do my best. Most of this lecture will be taken up by an account of Hopkins’s scientific work, but before beginning this subject I should like to place on record some of his personal qualities, although I imagine that many here are familiar with these. Indeed, one of the thoughts that first passed through my mind in preparing this lecture was the large number of men who could with more justification be called upon to give it. There are few men with whom one would rather have had a personal chat than Hopkins. This was because, in all conversation, he was kind, unselfish, gentle, sympathetic, and thought¬ ful, and yet a man of great sense and knowledge. He had a remarkable power of sending a man away much happier than when he came, and, if the subject of discussion was one of scientific research, especially after some depressing experience, a man was much more prepared to carry on with his labours and forget his trouble. This was certainly my experience and must have been common to most other men who had the good fortune to be associated with him in the laboratory. Hopkins had a great stimulating power on young people. A particular instance of this kind happened at an early stage of my undergraduate career at Cambridge, when he introduced to a class taking the Tripos in physiology a discussion on the volume of blood in the body. He succeeded in rousing in me a state of enthusiasm sufficient to make me confine my whole attention to this problem for a fortnight to the detriment of my other work, in order to find a method to decide whether the blood volume was one-thirteenth or one-twentieth of the total body weight. This was an exaggerated reaction of the kind with which I was con¬ stantly affected in the few years in which I was intimately associated with him in the laboratory. So long as Hopkins had a small class or a small audience, he had this same power of making them feel pleased with themselves and sending them away happy. With large audiences these qualities were not apparent, because of the smallness of his voice. A good instance of Hopkins’s method of talking, either to individuals or to small groups, can be seen in the opening words of a lecture he gave to the Public Analysts of the country in 1906, a discourse which has often been quoted, since in it he outlined the discovery of what came to be known as vitamins. Every¬ body knows that he had been trained as a chemical analyst and that later he had medically qualified, and that in the year 1906 he was already a Fellow of the Royal Society and a man of real distinction, lecturing before a group of people who were, for the most part, ordinary analysts and medical men. He began this lecture with the words : “ Seldom I imagine has this learned society welcomed a visitor less obviously entitled to occupy its time.” He then proceeded : “ I came to the conclusion that the only real qualifications I had for coming before you were those possessed by an individual who, having been trained for your own profession and having acquired some knowledge of its aims and claims, sought later a training in the profession of medicine and so gained similar knowledge with regard to it. I am, of course, very far from standing alone in this experience but, unlike many who, with the same double training, have practised one or other of these professions with distinction, and still more unlike those who have contrived to practise both, it has been my fate never at any time to practise either.” Hopkins, in these few words, stated the exact position but stated it so modestly that most people in the room must have had a feeling of superiority, and yet at that time he had gone a long way to having demonstrated that he was a combination of the ablest analyst and the ablest medical man in the country. I have thought it well to say these few words of introduction about Hopkins, because nobody could fail to appreciate these remarkable qualities, which were present even when he had reached the highest point of activity and also of fame.