An address delivered before the Suffolk District Medical Society, at its second anniversary meeting, Boston, March 28, 1851 / by Samuel Parkman.

Date:
1851
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An address delivered before the Suffolk District Medical Society, at its second anniversary meeting, Boston, March 28, 1851 / by Samuel Parkman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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

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    classify those that resemble each other; that it may be able definitely to predict future occurrences and their conditions. Now of some of these groups of phenomena the laws are easily discovered; we know clearly the re- lation which each bears to the other; the effects are all referred to their causes, and all the causes are known. Such a knowledge is called a complete or exact science. These sciences thus completed arc few, and of them astronomy may be considered the type. The opposite of this may be taken, by way of example, as the science of the weather. No one doubts that rain and sunshine succeed each other by distinct laws; that the storm of to-day is the result of all the meteorological changes since the world began; and that it, in its turn, must have its own indncncc upon all relative phenomena until time shall he no more; and yet we have not advanced bevond the rudest laws. But between these two extremes, there exists a great niimher of subjects for science, the laws of which we arc enabled partially to explain. In many, our knowledge is sufficient for much practical nsefnlncss, and of it we daily avail ourselves, it being always understood that we arc liable to he deceived in onr expectations by the oc- currence of unforeseen events. Thus we know' most of the laws regulating the ebb and flow' of the tides, and w'e can predict their condition at any place and time with a proximate degree of certainty. Onr cal- culations wall differ somewhat from actual occurren- 1*