[Republished from the North American Medico-Chirurgical Review for September, 1868 A 
A BRIEF NOTICE OF DR. MARTYN PAINE’S WORK ON 
THE “INSTITUTES OF MEDICINE;” WITH SOME RE- 
MARKS ON THE THEORY OF THE CORRELATION OF 
THE PHYSICAL AND VITAL FORCES. 
J. A. M. 
No one can read the volume whose title is recorded above without 
being filled with respect, and even admiration, for the profound erudition, 
the pains-taking and systematic research, and the laborious reflection ex- 
hibited so abundantly in its pages. With careful and discriminating 
hands, Dr. Paine has gathered together, from the writings of both the 
earlier and cotemporary physiologists, the numerous important facts and 
details which constitute the subject-matter, the crude material, so to 
speak, of his favorite science, and arranged and built them up into a 
stately edifice—the Institutiones Medicinm—whose great corner-stones are 
Physiology, Pathology, and Therapeutics. Years ago the accomplish- 
ment of such a task would have required comparatively but little time 
and labor. At present, however, when the granaries of physiological 
science are fairly groaning with the golden grains of observation and ex- 
periment, gathered in by those industrious reapers and gleaners,—the ex- 
perimental physiologist, the vivisector, the organic chemist and physicist, 
—the task has become an herculean one, demanding an extent of unin- 
terrupted leisure, an amount of reading, and a degree of patient, perse- 
vering labor and mental application, to which few men in the medical pro- 
fession can lay claim. Moreover, habits of close observation and an unusual 
degree of the generalizing power are qualifications essentially necessary 
to the undertaking. But, unfortunately, the rarity of these qualifications 
is equalled only by their importance. It is not to be wondered at, there- 
fore, that the various attempts to establish a truthful, thoroughly philoso- 
phical, and satisfactory system of medical Institutes, should have proved 
abortive. A cursory examination of the history of physiology will suffice 
to show that these failures have naturally resulted from the narrow and 
restricted method employed in studying the operations of Nature. From 
time to time, as the different branches of science, under the guidance of 
some bold and masterly inquirer, made rapid advances in the acquisition 
of positive and reliable facts, Physiology received a peculiar bias in its 
direction. To this cause may be traced the iatro-mathematical, iatro- 
chemical, and other schools, each of which had its able and enthusiastic 2 
Paine’s Institutes op Medicine. 
supporters, and in each of which the same fundamental error was com- 
mitted—that of hasty generalization based upon isolated groups of phe- 
nomena, and the application of vague and limited laws to the explanation 
of the functions of the entire economy. In course of time, the array of 
observations and facts presented by these schools became so confused and 
conflicting, and appeared so incapable of elucidating function, that many 
physiologists, abandoning them entirely, went to the extreme of ignoring 
physical and chemical action altogether, and making the physics of the 
body wholly subservient to a mysterious force, power, or quality, which 
was unlike anything else in Nature, and which ruled the whole organism, 
seated king-like upon some special organ whence it issued its imperative 
mandates. Such was the vitalistic school in which the anima was every- 
thing; mechanics, physics, and chemistry nothing. “We are told,” says 
Dr. Bostock, in his History of Medicine, “that the anima superintends 
and directs every part of the animal economy from its formation ; that it 
prevents or repairs injuries, counteracts the elfects of morbid causes, or 
tends to remove them when actually present, yet that we are unconscious 
of its existence ; and that while it manifests every attribute of reason and 
design, it is devoid of these qualities, and is, in fact, a necessary and un- 
intelligent agent.” The majority of the physiologists of our own imme- 
diate day belong to what may be called the physico-chemico-vital school. 
They occupy a middle ground, between the pure vitalists and physicists 
of former times, assigning, with true eclecticism, some of the phenomena 
of life to a peculiar vital agent, and others to the action of physical forces 
belonging to’ organic in common with inorganic matter. 
To this eclectic school, and to all the advocates of the chemical and 
physical theories of life and its manifestations, Dr. Paine is a most deter- 
mined and vigorous opponent. In his Preliminary Remarks, after defining 
the scope of his work, explaining the legitimate objects and relations of 
physiology, pathology, and therapeutics, and animadverting upon the doc- 
trines of the chemical, vital, and chemico-vital schools, he boldly throws 
down the gauntlet in favor of vitalism, declares himself a confirmed and 
thorough vitalist, discountenances, in toto, the labors of the modern organic 
chemists, and finally assails, with controversial warmth, Liebig, the great 
leader of the chemical school, Carpenter, Prichard, Roget, Fletcher, and 
others who differ from him as to the nature, properties, and relations of 
the vital principle. Hear him speak in his own emphatic language : 
“ Chemical and mechanical philosophy, as we have already seen, are strangers 
to the philosophy of medicine. There is a natural conflict between the subjects 
of each. They have no relationship, no sympathies, but carry on a perpetual 
hostility. The organic being is forever converting to its own uses the inorganic, 
and changing its very nature into its own. The inorganic is fruitless in resist- Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
3 
ance and in assault, till the former is passive. It then lays waste the fabric by 
which it had been wrought into a great system of designs, and degrades the whole 
to its own level. Chemistry, therefore, begins where physiology ends ; and phy- 
siology begins with organic influences upon the elements of matter, or where 
chemistry leaves off. No department of medicine has anything to hope from 
chemistry beyond its power of analysis. 
“ And yet do the labors of chemists aspire at a substitution of the ever-fluctu- 
ating principles of chemical science for all that has been hitherto founded upon 
the phenomena of life and disease. Their oft repeated effort to carry a science 
which is mainly analytical and mechanical into that which is eminently intel- 
lectual and overflowing with the most sublime institutions, and distinguished by 
the most profound principles and laws of Nature, and therefore seductive to an 
ambition which is restif under the practical manipulations of the laboratory, 
would raise no inquiry as to motive, or end, did not the proper guardians of the 
science not only abandon their old and rich domain at the very approach of the 
enemy, but, with most unnatural distrust of self, invite the destroyer. 
“The late publication of Liebig’s ‘Animal Chemistry’ has abundantly proved 
the truth of what I sufficiently established in the ‘Medical and Physiological 
Commentaries’—that the recent application of chemistry to physiology and medi- 
cine is not a partial, but a complete substitution of that science. In justifica- 
tion of all this, we are now told that the means of investigation, of analysis, and 
of creation, have received an extension of which our predecessors had no know- 
ledge. Such, however, has always been the pretext of chemistry for its invasions 
upon the science of life. Take, for example, the words of Fourcroy, who wrote 
more than sixty years ago, and who, like Liebig and his school, attempted to sub- 
stitute chemistry for physiology, and to rear up a fabric of medicine upon that 
imaginary foundation; and this, too, in the case of either of the masters, with- 
out having ever read a medical book, or having ever prescribed for a disease. 
The language of Fourcroy is exactly such as we now hear from the lips of Liebig 
and his followers; who cheerfully allow that nothing flowed from the labors of 
Fourcroy to illuminate the dark ways of organic life. ******* 
“I have said, in the Commentaries, that ‘a prosperous harvest’ was promised 
from Fourcroy’s reformation. But again I reiterate, where is the evidence ? since 
which time, also, chemistry has made greater advances than any other science, 
has had its unmolested sway, and Fourcroy’s example has been followed with a 
corresponding diligence. Can you point to a solitary instance in which organic 
chemistry, except in a negative sense, has advanced the science of life or disease ? 
Do not the very chemists of this day incidentally allow the perfectly abortive na- 
ture of their science in relation to physiology and medicine ? Consult the quota- 
tions in section 350, etc. Or take the affirmations of the distinguished Mulder, 
which go, with the rest, to establish the truth of my former assertion, that 
1 chemistry has been a perfect incubus upon medicine; and the time is not dis- 
tant when it will have proved, by its own showing, its want of relation to our 
subject, if it have not done so already. *********** 
“ The reader should never lose sight of the foregoing hypothesis and admis- 
sions (of Liebig.) They should be ever ready to chasten his credulity as to the 4 
Paine’s Institutes op Medicine. 
chemical interpretation of every organic compound. They stamp the whole 
‘ science of organic chemistry,’ in its synthetical aspects, as one of pretensions, 
and unworthy the confidence of an intelligent mind.” 
Nearly one-half of the volume before us is devoted to the consideration 
of physiology proper, under the various heads of the composition and 
structure of the human organism, the vital principle, irritability, sensi- 
bility, mobility, vital affinity, vivification, nervous power, mind, instinct, 
the functions, etc., together with general remarks upon the philosophy of 
life and death, vital habit, age, temperament, the races of men, the rela- 
tions of organic beings to external objects, unity of design in physiology, 
etc., etc. 
The details concerning the differences between organic and inorganic 
bodies, and the structure and composition of organic beings, a knowledge 
of which is necessary to a thorough comprehension of the great and im- 
portant laws which guide and control the actions of man in health and 
disease, are all clearly and concisely set forth in a series of propositions 
naturally and logically successive, and almost aphorismic in their charac- 
ter. Nevertheless, their perspicuity is impaired, and their relation to and 
dependence upon each other obscured, by the polemical digressions in 
which the author so frequently indulges. These digressions, it is true, 
exhibit, to a considerable extent, the logical and argumentative powers of 
Dr. Paine, and show how well he has mastered the literature of his sub- 
ject ; but, while they render his writings racy and attractive to the ad- 
vanced student who has already acquired a certain familiarity with the 
subject, they are, nevertheless, obnoxious to the objection that the tyro 
in physiology, for whose instruction the book is also intended, is led too 
far from his direct path, and lost in the thicket of controversy. In his 
really valuable remarks upon the composition of organic beings, he ap- 
pears as a judge in open court, and summons before him various eminent 
witnesses, such as Liebig, Tiedemann, Miiller, Hunter, Roget, Carpenter, 
Prichard, Prout, Bichat, Paget, Montgomery, and others, and cross- 
questions them so minutely and searchingly, that the student, dipping for 
the first time into this work, is like the novice in court, utterly mystified 
by the examination and the replies elicited. He even quarrels with the 
geologists about the amount of light which our globe enjoyed in the earlier 
periods of its existence, and hurls at them the grave charges of material- 
ism and infidelity. This we regret to see; for although, with the thinking 
few, such charges, unless well sustained, fall unheeded to the ground, yet, 
with the thoughtless masses, who are ever as the times are, they are simply 
dangerous and prejudicial. In fact, whenever, in a work which professes 
to be purely scientific, we find such charges preferred by the author 
against his opponents, we are always strongly inclined to think that there Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
5 
is some fallacy or weak point in his argument, of which he is aware, and 
which he desires to conceal; and we make bold to say, that upon close 
examination, we have not unfrequently found such suspicion to be amply 
confirmed. 
Our author’s observations upon structure, especially in its diseased re- 
lations, will amply repay an attentive perusal. He takes strong, and we 
think, in the main, just ground, against the utility of the microscope in 
physiological research. We have long been of the opinion, and this 
opinion we have already freely expressed in another place, that physiology 
cannot expect much elucidation from minute anatomy. Nevertheless, we 
are by no means prepared to give our full assent to the following language, 
which we find on pp. 59, 60 : 
“It has already been stated, that a knowledge of the minuteness of structure 
which is supplied by the microscope is practically useless, while the deceptions 
of that instrument have led to many important errors in physiology and patho- 
logy. It cannot be depended upon, especially in exploring soft structures. If 
it lead to unimportant facts, it is equally liable to betray us into error and falla- 
cious hypotheses. The whole history of that instrument, so far as physiology is 
concerned, has gone to confirm the foregoing conclusions, which were originally 
advanced in another work, and has conclusively sustained the opinion of one of 
the most profound observers of the present age. 
“ Microscopical information, so far as correct, goes to the amount of human 
knowledge, and to the perfection of science, though it may not contribute to use- 
ful ends. But experience shows us that we may not depend, as it respects the 
microscope, upon the vision of others, especially where a high magnifying power 
is required. Each must observe for himself; and, as allowed by Ehrenberg, long 
practice alone can assure him of any general accuracy. The laborious student 
may attend to this accomplishment. But, vita brevis, ars long a; and he will 
be likely to live the subject of deluded sense rather than of enlightened under- 
standing. 
“When we consider, therefore, the constant deceptions of the microscope, 
especially in all explorations of soft substances, and the absolute uselessness of 
any knowledge it may convey as to the recesses of organization, it may be reason- 
ably expected that the time is not distant when all this lumber will be excluded 
from practical works on physiology, and turned, at least, into a channel by 
itself.” 
The third division of the physiological part of the work is occupied 
with the consideration of the “ Properties or Powers of Life.” Here it is 
that the positive—we are free to say too positive—vitalistic tendencies of 
Dr. Paine exhibit themselves in all their force. 
“A vital, or peculiar governing principle or power, in organic beings, has been 
recognized by all the most distinguished medical philosophers at all ages of the 
science. It is the fundamental cause of growth, nutrition, and of all other phe- 
nomena of organic beings. It is, in all but the vulgar acceptation, synonymous 6 
Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
with the term life ; and life, therefore, is a cause, and not an effect, as has been 
assumed by many distinguished physiologists.” 
And, again, after discussing the views of the ancients and of the lead- 
ing physiologists of the present day, concerning the vital principle, he 
proceeds:— 
“ There is not, indeed, in the whole range of medical literature, one author, 
however devoted to the physical and chemical views of life, who does not evince 
the necessity of admitting a governing vital principle as a distinct entity, dis- 
tinct from all other things in nature. I say, there cannot he produced one 
author of any consideration, who does not summon to the aid of his discussion 
a vital principle whenever he touches upon the abstract phenomena of life. And 
this I have abundantly shown by an extensive range of quotations in my various 
publications.” 
Now, fifteen years ago, or four years before the first edition of Dr. 
Paine’s Institutes was issued, there appeared in London, from the press 
of William Pickering, a learned work in two volumes. This work was 
not so much one of original research as of original reflection and extra- 
ordinary generalization ; though it did not add one new fact to the sum 
of human knowledge, yet it embodied the results of the most laborious 
and protracted thought applied to the examination of all the leading and 
well-established facts of physical, chemical, and physiological science, 
with the view to harmonize such facts, to show their true relations, and to 
deduce from these relations a great system of natural philosophy, physio- 
logy, pathology, and therapeutics—a comprehensive, philosophical theory, 
in short, of the universe. 
This work was spoken of by the editor of the London Medical Gazette, 
as one which “bears the unquestionable stamp of genius, and carries with 
it, at the same time, evidences of learning, various and extensive, and of 
such laborious research as can be successfully achieved only by minds of 
the noblest order in pursuit of sacred truth. And truly, we make bold to 
say, that we have never met with an effort so sustained, and we add with 
confidence, so successfully made, to raise the veil from the shrouded statue 
of Isis.”* In another place, he assures us that it is a work “whose like 
comes from the press only at rare and distant intervals—a work, indeed, 
of sublime scope, and, rightly taken, of the noblest tendency. It is the 
truest specimen, and most successful achievement of that which the late 
Earl of Bridgewater had in view, when he left a sum of money for the 
purchase and publication of a series of treatises illustrative of the wisdom 
and goodness of God in creation. But it has the great advantage over 
any treatise which could be obtained under such circumstances, that it is 
not ‘written to order.’ It is the spontaneous effusion of the gifted mind, 
* March 17, 1844, p. 229. Paine’s Institutes oe Medicine. 
7 
brimful of knowledge, and tinctured with the hallowed fire of poetry.”* 
And again, in a foot-note at the close of his translation of Wagner's Phy- 
siology, Dr. Willis particularly refers to this remarkable work. The 
translator of Dumas and Boussingault’s Organic Chemistry bore testi- 
mony to the originality, profundity, and comprehensiveness of its views in 
every branch of physical and medical science. The British and Foreign 
Medical Review, though entirely opposed, as we shall presently see, to 
the doctrines of the author, was forced to conclude that the “impartial 
and intelligent reader can feel no doubt that the foundation of his system 
embodies a vast extent of valuable and undoubted truths.” The journals 
of our own country, also, lauded the book, as we might readily show by 
extracts therefrom, did our limited space permit. The late Dr. Caldwell, 
the friend and former preceptor of the author, eulogized the work most 
enthusiastically, while Dr. Condie, in the American Journal of Medical 
Sciences, for January, 1846, spoke of it as “evidently the production of 
an original mind, well versed in the natural sciences, and habituated to 
close and laborious investigation.” (p. 133.) 
Now this London book, in two volumes, which at first threatened to fall 
still-born from the press, and which saw the light after years of patient 
toil, after years of privation, suffering, and penury, cheerfully endured by 
its American author, that he might avail himself of the facilities for study 
and investigation afforded by the libraries of the British metropolis, was, 
after all, but the elaboration of a smaller work; an essay,f in fact, of 158 
pages, read by the same author before the New York Lyceum of Natural 
History in 1833, and dedicated to Joseph Delafield, then president of the 
Lyceum, Subsequently, the views contained in this publication were 
somewhat extended in several spirited articles upon life, contributed by 
our author, while residing in New York, to the Knickerbocker Magazine, 
(1834-35.) Since the publication of “Caloric,” though he wrote and 
studied much, we believe he published nothing more. 
Need we say that the writer to whom we allude is the late Dr. S. L. 
Metcalfe, formerly of Kentucky, and for some years prior to his death a 
resident of this city, (Philadelphia.) For several years he was our neigh- 
bor and friend, with whom we were at all times happy to commune upon 
matters touching the science of life, and it became our painful duty at 
last to announce to the world, through the medium of the public papers, 
the news of his death, transmitted to us by telegraph, on the 17th of July, 
* June 21, 1844. 
f The reader will find a lengthy synopsis of this essay in Hinton’s History and 
Topography of the United States. Boston, 1834. Yol. ii. p. 477. 8 
Paine’s Institutes or Medicine. 
1856, about a week after be had left the city, in the vain hope of being 
invigorated and restored to health by the sea-breezes of Cape Island. 
This notice of Dr. Metcalfe and his writings has been introduced here 
as affording at once the best and most singular refutation of the state- 
ments embodied in the italicised sentences contained in the paragraphs 
above quoted from Dr. Paine. With the exception of the words “vital 
principle,” the italics are our own. Indeed, it is rather remarkable that 
we cannot find in the Institutes any Reference to the writings and the pe- 
culiar views of our departed friend. And yet these writings bear internal 
evidence that their author had been ploughing in the same great field 
as Dr. Paine, and, singularly enough, in the same city, and at about 
the same time.* These writings, moreover, employ, in a most logical 
manner, not a few of the same facts as those used in the Institutes, and 
many others of a wider scope, to substantiate the great fundamental prin- 
ciple for which their author contended most determinedly to the day of 
his death ; the existence of a substantive vital principle not distinct from 
all other things in nature, but, on the contrary, identical with the essentia 
caloris ; the oval a aiOipoq, or subtle fiery ether, which Pythagoras regarded 
as the “principle of life, animating the whole system of nature;” which 
Heraclitus held to be the “primordial principle of the generation of all 
things;” which Plato taught “to be the immediate natural agent, or ani- 
mal spirit, to cherish, to warm, to enlighten, to vegetate, to produce di- 
gestion, circulation, secretion, and organic motion in all living bodies, ani- 
mal and vegetable;” which Hippocrates speaks of as the “cause of motion, 
change, growth, diminution, etc.,” and to which Newton was inclined to 
ascribe far more efficiency as a primal and powerful causative agent than 
his biographers and critics appear to be willing to admit. 
In the appendix which closes his Institutes, Dr. Paine devotes a few 
pages to the discussion of the rights of authors. “Upon all questions of 
priority that concern the advancement of science and art,” says he, “there 
is, doubtless, a general understanding that the principle should not only 
be sacredly observed, but that, whenever violated, there should be a com- 
mon effort to repair the injury. This is alike due to the individual, to the 
principle, and to the common good.” Our hearty concurrence with this 
opinion impels us, in connection with the above remarks, to raise here a 
question as to the claim of originality put forth a few years ago by Pro- 
fessors Grove and Carpenter, in reference to the doctrine of the correla- 
tion of the physical and vital forces. 
* Tlie New York Journal of Medicine for Sept. 1845, contains a review of Met- 
calfe’s work, in which, on p. 205, distinct reference is made to the different views 
entertained by Drs. Metcalfe and Paine, concerning the nature of the vital principle. Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
9 
Dr. Metcalfe’s essay, entitled a “New Theory of Terrestrial Magnet- 
ism,” and published in 1833, contains the following paragraphs, which 
show how far his active mind had anticipated both Grove and Carpenter 
in their speculations concerning the convertibility of the physical forces 
into each other, and the correlation of these with the vital forces. 
“It will be our first object in this essay, to trace some of the most striking 
analogies of caloric and electricity; to show that they are radically the same 
subtle, imponderable, and all-pervading element; and that its unequal distribu- 
tion throughout nature, is the cause of all the various powers and attractions of 
ponderable matter with which we are acquainted, (p. 7.) * * * * It (ca- 
loric) is the source of life and motion throughout creation, (p. 8.) * * * * 
We are not authorized to predict a primary distinction (between caloric and elec- 
tricity) until fully acquainted with all the different states and affections of caloric 
under different circumstances; for example, in its combinations with different 
substances, in a solid, fluid, gaseous, or imponderable state—as with the matter 
of light—its diffusion, concentration, compression, &c. (p. 15.) * * * * 
There is not a greater apparent difference between any of the forms of caloric 
and electricity, than between the electricity in the atmosphere and in an exhausted 
receiver, (pp. 15, 16.) * * * * Before caloric combines with, and expands 
water into atmospheric vapor, it is universally acknowledged to be sensible heat; 
after it enters into the water and converts it into transparent invisible vapor, its 
state is changed; and, when greatly accumulated in this state, it exhibits electri- 
cal phenomena. To say, however, that its elementary nature is changed, would 
be as unphilosophical as to contend that the latent caloric of water is specifically 
different in its nature from the same caloric when set at liberty by pouring water 
on calcined lime; or that it is distinct from the caloric which moves a steam- 
engine by its expansion; or that the galvanic fluid is distinct from the electricity 
of a Leyden jar, because it moves with less velocity, (p. 16.) * * * * Had 
philosophers attended more carefully to the great changes which take place in 
the states of caloric, produced by its various modes of combination with other 
matter in different forms, they would probably have been led to discover more 
clearly, if not the identity of caloric and electricity, at least that they are insepa- 
rable, and that without caloric there could be no electricity, (p, 17.) * * * * 
One of the most decisive proofs that caloric and electricity are convertible into 
each other is, that during all condensation of serial vapor, whether into rain or 
snow, during winter or summer, caloric is given out in very large quantities, (p. 
19.) * * * * Caloric, electricity, and galvanism have hitherto constituted 
a separate and distinct triad of imponderables, perfectly incomprehensible; all 
the phenomena of which are quite intelligible, if we refer them to the agency of 
one grand, primary, universal element, (p. 27.) * * * * That there is a 
subtle, vivifying principle disseminated throughout nature, and which is inti- 
mately connected with caloric, would appear from the effect of cold on the vari- 
ous tribes of animal and vegetable existence, (p. 46.) * * * * One thing 
is certain, that innumerable forms of life spring from, or at least accompany the 
presence of caloric; while its absence is always attended by the entire extinction 
of life. Hence it would appear unphilosophical to call in the aid of some other 10 
Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
unknown imponderable aura as a vital principle, when the agency of caloric, 
united (though we know not precisely in what manner) to the various forms and 
combinations of matter, explains the phenomena quite as well. (p. 48.) * * * * 
The states and affections of caloric are infinitely diversified by the various modes 
of its combination with ponderable matter, (p. 49.) * * * * * Does not ca- 
loric answer to the subtle ether of Sir Isaac Newton? Does it not extend from 
the centre to the circumference of the universe ? Is it not the cause of all the 
motions and transmutations of terrestrial matter? of decomposition and recombi- 
nation? of secretion, nutrition, growth, &c.? Is it not the semperviving energy 
of universal nature?” (p. 52.) 
These passages we have selected at random, from the first part of Dr. 
Metcalfe’s essay, not for the purpose of claiming for him the merit of 
originality in the enunciation of the correlation doctrine, as applied to the 
physical forces; for this, as will be presently seen, we cannot accord to him ; 
but to show that in 1833 he was not only perfectly familiar with the great 
doctrine in question, but contended forcibly for it in the essay above-men- 
tioned, in which the reader will find, if he take the trouble to refer to it, 
not a few of the arguments employed by Grove, thirteen years afterwards, 
to substantiate the same great generalization. Whether Dr. Metcalfe ar- 
rived at these views independently of the writings of others, and simply 
by reasoning upon the well-known facts of science, we have never been 
able to determine; but that he was not the first to announce the correla- 
tion doctrine, we are very certain; for we have in our possession a thin 
octavo volume of ninety-one pages, published in Philadelphia in 1821, by 
Gardner Yanuxem, a Philadelphian, and entitled “ An Essay on the Ulti- 
mate Principles of Chemistry, Natural Philosophy, and Physiology.” 
On page twenty-eight of this work, we find the following clear and un- 
mistakable proposition, the last of five conclusions which the author states 
to be “in conformity with the facts presented by chemistry and natural 
philosophy,” and which he supports with abundant argument, and in a 
masterly manner. 
“ There exists but one kind of repulsive matter, as will be shown, exhibiting 
four different states convertible into each other, not only accordingly as it is 
acted upon by particles, or groups of particles forming masses, but according to 
the kind of particles and masses. These states of repulsive matter are caloric, 
light, electricity, and magnetism.” 
And again, on page thirty, he says ; 
“ As all our experiments prove that caloric, electricity, magnetism, and light 
are convertible one into another, according to the relationships or quantities of 
repellant and attractive matter, it seems to me that their existence as four dis- 
tinct fluids, or kinds of ethereal matter, is inadmissible; for this conversion, or 
change of characters, is analogous to what are called the properties of bodies, 
and not to the bodies themselves.” Paine’s Institutes oe Medicine. 
11 
In 1831, four years after the publication of Metcalfe’s essay, Dr. Samuel 
Jackson, the learned Professor of the Institutes of Medicine in the Univer- 
sity of Pennsylvania, delivered and published an able Introductory Lec- 
ture, from which we quote the following paragraph : 
“ Physical phenomena, according to the class they belong to, are referred to a 
few simple laws, as gravity, caloric, affinity, galvanism, electricity, magnetism ; 
all of which, it can now be scarcely doubted, are modifications of one great force. 
The force producing physiological or organic phenomena may be no more than a 
modification of the same ruling power displaying its activity in organized matter.” 
In his Bakerian Lecture for 1845, the celebrated Professor Faraday 
wrote as follows : 
“ I have long held an opinion almost amounting to conviction, in common, I 
believe, with many other lovers of natural knowledge, that the various forms 
under which the forces of matter are made manifest have one common origin; 
or in other words, are so directly related and mutually dependent, that they are 
convertible, as it were, one into another, and possess equivalents of power in their 
action. In modern times the proofs of their convertibility have been accumu- 
lated to a very considerable extent, and a commencement made of the determina- 
tion of their equivalent forces.” 
Upon pages seven and eight of the first edition (1846) of his treatise 
on the “ Correlation of the Physical Forces,” Professor Grove thus speaks : 
“ The position which I seek to establish in this essay is, that the various im- 
ponderable agencies, or the affections of matter which constitute the main objects 
of experimental physics, viz., heat, light, electricity, magnetism, chemical affinity, 
and motion, are all correlative, or have a reciprocal dependence. That neither, 
taken abstractedly, can be said to be the essential or proximate cause of the 
others, but that either may, as a force, produce or be convertible into the other; 
thus heat may mediately or immediately produce electricity, electricity may pro- 
duce heat, and so of the rest.” 
Here is, indeed, a remarkable coincidence, not only in ideas, but also 
in the language in which these ideas are clothed. The acute reader will 
also discover certain curious and remarkable differences and inconsisten- 
cies. These we intend to consider in detail in a future and more extended 
article. 
In 1843, after ten years of constant application to it, Dr. Metcalfe pub- 
lished, in London, his larger work, entitled “ Caloric, its Mechanical, 
Chemical, and Vital Agencies in the Phenomena of Nature.” Here we 
find him piling fact upon fact with wonderful precision and skill, to prove 
that caloric, intimately combined with, and acting through organic mat- 
ter as a peculiar medium, is the cause of all the complex phenomena of 
life; is, in fact, converted into the vital principle. Our space permits 
the introduction of the following quotations only;— 12 
Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
“ The prevalent doctrine of modern physiologists, that the phenomena of life 
are 'wholly distinct from those of inorganic matter, has arisen from our imperfect 
knowledge in regard to the primary physical cause of motion throughout nature; 
and is refuted by the fact that the organizing power of the earth, like all the me- 
chanical and chemical transformations that modify its surface, is directly in pro- 
portion to the quantity of caloric which it receives from the sun. (p. 507.) * * 
-x- * * That the power of living bodies to renew their composition by assimi- 
lation, and to reproduce their species by generation, is governed by the emphatic 
agency of caloric, is evident from the fact that the power of nature to multiply 
organic forms is directly in proportion to the temperature of the earth from the 
equator to the polar circles, (p. 530.) Having shown this, I proceed to prove 
that the organizing power of animals, and the activity of their respective func- 
tions, are directly in proportion to the quantity of the same active principle de- 
rived from the atmosphere by respiration.” (p. 561.) 
If the reader who may have followed us attentively will refer to page 
one hundred and sixty-seven of the second edition of Dr. Carpenter’s 
‘‘Principles of General and Comparative Physiology,” published in 1841, 
and to page fifty-six of the first edition of his “Principles of Human Phy- 
siology,” published in 1842, he will there find that Dr. C. at that time 
taught that “all the actions manifested by living beings are dependent 
upon two sets of conditions—an organized structure, possessed of certain 
properties which are termed vital, as being distinct from the physical pro- 
perties of inorganic matter, and certain agents, whose presence is neces- 
sary to call these properties into operation, and thus to produce the mani- 
festations of life. That a seed which remains unchanged during a period 
of many centuries, and at last vegetates, when placed in favorable circum- 
stances, as if it had been ripened but the year before, is not alive, but is 
possessed of the property of vitality, or the power of performing vital ac- 
tions, when aroused to them by the necessary stimuli—such as warmth, 
moisture, oxygen, etc. Its condition resembles that of the human being 
in profound sleep; he is not then a feeling, thinking man, but he is ca- 
pable of feeling and thinking when he is aroused from his slumber, and his 
mind is put into activity by the impression of external objects.” 
The attention of our readers is next directed to the eighteenth article 
of the British and Foreign Medical Review for October, 1844. This 
article is a review of Dr. Metcalfe’s work on caloric, and has been at- 
tributed, by report, to the pen of Dr. Carpenter. Indeed, we have been 
informed by a friend of ours, residing in London at the time to which we 
are now alluding, that this review was written in Bristol, by the author of 
several physiological works. The works of Dr. Carpenter above referred 
to are dated from Bristol, where he then resided. Although we cannot 
vouch for the truth of this report, nor the accuracy of the information, we 
are free to say that the style and language of the review, and the physio- Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
logical ideas inculcated therein, closely resemble those of Dr. C., as will 
be seen from the following paragraph, which we find on page five hundred 
and nineteen, and which the reader is requested to compare with the pas- 
sages above quoted:— 
“ Our readers are doubtless familiar with our views on this subject, which we 
may here briefly recapitulate. We hold it absurd to deny that both physical and 
chemical powers are at work in the living organism, and have a large share in the 
production of its actions; but it appears to us equally certain that there is an- 
other set of powers also concerned—those to which we give the name of vital. 
These last are exhibited only by organized tissues, possessing a certain chemical 
composition, and a peculiar arrangement of their structure, which no artificial 
means can produce; and in all instances the generation of a fabric capable of 
exhibiting vital phenomena is dependent upon the action of a previously existing 
organism. Now the manifestations of these phenomena depend upon certain 
conditions, the failure of one of which is a total preventive of them. Thus, a seed 
requires for its germination not only heat, but moisture and oxygen; and if the 
seed have lost its vitality, no amount of these other agents can excite the action 
in question. It appears, then, that the vital property of the seed, acting under 
the conditions in question, is the source of the act of germination; or perhaps it 
might be urged that they are all concurrent causes, equally concerned in pro- 
ducing the effect, because it could not take place in the absence of any one of 
them. But we cannot single out any one of the physical agents just alluded to 
as more important than the rest, since germination can no more take place with- 
out oxygen or moisture than it can without heat. Hence we deem it very unphilo- 
sophical to assert, as Dr. Metcalfe does, that caloric is the efficient cause of the 
vital actions of living beings, since it is only one of several causes which must 
concur to produce the results in question. And while different actions may be 
performed under extremely wide varieties of condition, in regard to caloric, oxy- 
gen, etc., they all agree in being immediately dependent upon those peculiar pro- 
perties which an organized being can alone furnish.” 
The writer of this review calls Dr. Metcalfe an enthusiast and system- 
maker, accuses him of hasty generalization, and opposes in toto all his sci- 
entific views. On page five hundred and eighteen he expressly discoun- 
tenances the attempts of Dr. M. to prove the identity of caloric and elec- 
tricity, or rather that they are modifications of the same universal element; 
and declares that, although their analogies are strong, their differences 
are “ still stronger, requiring that, for the present at least, their pheno- 
mena should be referred to a distinct category.” 
Six years after the appearance of this review, (June 20, 1850,) Dr, 
Carpenter read before the Royal Society a paper “ On the Mutual Rela- 
tions of the Vital and Physical Forces,” which was published in the Phi- 
losophical Transactions of that Society. Though bearing date of 1850, 
the fundamental views therein promulgated were really announced by Dr. 
Carpenter more than two years earlier, in a review of Pareira’s edition of 14 
Paine’s Institutes of Medicine, 
Matteucci’s “ Lectures,” contributed to the British and Foreign Medico- 
Chirurgical Review, for January, 1848, p. 235. Earlier than this we 
have not been able to detect in the writings of Dr. C. any positive evidence 
of his acceptance and support of these views. On the third page of his 
paper just referred to, (p. 129 of the Society’s volume,) he speaks of the 
doctrines set forth in the passages quoted above from his excellent works 
upon Human and Comparative Physiology, and from the review of Met- 
calfe’s book, as the “current idea” among physiologists, and as the “doc- 
trine of those (including himself, of course,) who have most clearly ex- 
pressed themselves upon the relation of the ‘vital stimuli’ to the ‘vital 
properties’ of organized bodies.” He declares, furthermore, that he “has 
not been able to find, in physiological writings, any indication of a more 
intimate relationship between the physical forces and vital phenomena 
than that just stated, save on the part of those who have vaguely identi- 
fied heat or electricity with the ‘vital principle,’ with about the same 
amount of philosophical discrimination as that which was exercised by the 
iatro-chemists and iatro-mathematicians of the sixteenth and seventeenth 
centuries.” We may here remark, intercurrently, that this sweeping asser- 
tion, embodying as it does a positive claim to originality, based, to a 
certain extent, upon a negation of the claims and labors of antecedent 
writers, has induced us to make this exposition, just as the singularly 
positive and erroneous assertion of Dr. Paine, mentioned above, led us 
in the first place, to refer to the writings of Dr. Metcalfe. The reviewer 
of Dr. M.’s work, in the early part of his article, (p. 511,) says that as 
“much as he respects his author’s industry and zeal, and as much 
as he desires to serve him to the best of his ability, he respects the 
sacred interests of truth much more,” etc. We also respect these in- 
terests, hence our present inquiry. In his valuable paper, Dr. C. pro- 
ceeds to assure us that the conviction of the very intimate relationship 
of the physical forces has been gradually increasing in strength in the 
minds of philosophical inquirers during the whole of the present century, 
and that he regards these forces “as so many modi operandi of one and 
the same agency.” The reviewer just referred to is certainly not one of 
these “philosophical inquirers,” for, as we have just seen, he assigns the 
phenomena of caloric and electricity to entirely different categories. Dr. 
Carpenter ascribes to Grove the merit of first formularizing the “entire 
series of the mutual relations of these forces,” and endeavors to show 
“that the same relation exists among the several vital forces, whose opera- 
tion may be traced in living bodies, as exists among the physical, and that 
the vital and physical forces are themselves connected by a similar rela- 
tio'nship.” Finally, he urges the necessity for a certain material sub- 
stratum, as the medium through which this relationship is manifested. Paine’s Institutes op Medicine. 
15 
But the reader will find in the Essays of both Yanuxem and Metcalfe, that 
the importance of the medium, through which the forces act, is distinctly- 
dwelt upon. Dr. Carpenter, in the third section of his paper, (p. 141,) 
tells us that the “organizing forces are so completely dependent upon the 
continual agency of heat, that they may be considered as the manifesta- 
tions of the action of heat upon organized fabrics.” The author of the 
review so frequently referred to, in the Brit, and For. Med. Rev. for Oct. 
1844, on the other hand, writes as follows :—“ That the energy and 
rapidity of vital action depend in great degree upon the temperature at 
which it takes place, is a fact which is familiar to all physiologists; and 
in the large amount of facts which Dr. Metcalfe has collected in support 
of this position, we recognize little or nothing that was not previously well 
known.* That caloric is the immediate and operating source of these 
actions, however, seems to us to be a mere hypothesis, by no means justi- 
fied by the premises. We see constant indications in Dr. Metcalfe’s book 
of his tendency to grasp at facts which support his peculiar views, and to 
leave all others out of consideration,” etc. Now, if our readers will peruse 
attentively the Essay of Dr. Carpenter on the Vital and Physical Forces, 
* This injudicious remark shows how incapable the writer was of appreciating the 
work he was reviewing. Had he read his author attentively, he would have discovered 
that the novelty was not in the facts, nor yet in the theory, but in the masterly and 
truly extraordinary manner in which Dr. M. attempted to support a leading doctrine 
of antiquity with the recorded facts and observations of modern science. Dr. M. 
troubled himself about the accuracy only, and not about the novelty of his facts. 
Selecting those which were long known, well established, and not to be gainsayed, 
he attempted to assign to them a new value and significance, by exhibiting their 
true and exact relations. The language which Dr. Carpenter appropriates to him- 
self in the latter part of his Essay, applies with far more force and justice to Dr. 
Metcalfe. “The author has not sought,” says he, “to increase the knowledge of 
existing facts, so much as to develope new relations between those already known. 
He has preferred, in fact, rather to build upon the foundation afforded by the gene- 
rally admitted facts of physiological science, than to go in search of phenomena, his 
account of which might be questioned by those indisposed to admit his leading 
ideas.” Had Dr. Metcalfe been less bold and decided in his views; had he con- 
structed his work more in conformity with the style adopted in the standard text- 
books of Natural Philosophy and Physiology, and bestowed upon it some such name 
as the “Principles of Natural Philosophy, Chemistry, and Physiology, and their ap- 
plications to Pathology .and Therapeutics,” instead of the startling and theoretical 
title of “Caloric,” etc., we verily believe that his labors would have been crowned 
with success, and his book, instead of proving a failure, instead of being ignored and 
slighted, would have been praised and consulted. And had Dr. M. been less sensi- 
tive and dogmatic, and had he mingled more extensively and more cordially among 
the members of his profession, instead of shutting himself up so much in his closet, 
he would probably not now be sleeping in his lonely grave, the victim of a brain 
worn out with anxious, protracted, and thriftless study. 16 
Paine’s Institutes of Medicine, 
and compare it as carefully as we have with the earlier and later writings 
of Dr. Metcalfe, especially the second volume of his “Caloric,” he will 
soon discover that, while Dr. C. and the British and Foreign Medical 
Review were industriously teaching that “vital force exists in a dormant 
condition in all matter capable of becoming organized,” and only requires 
the action of certain external stimuli, such as light, heat, moisture, etc., to 
arouse it to activity, Dr. Metcalfe was boldly proclaiming to the world 
not only the close relationship of the physical forces and their dependence 
upon each other, but their, absolute identity as modifications of one all- 
pervading force; not only the relationship of these to the vital forces, but 
also the identity of the essentia caloris with the color vitalis, the vital 
principle. He will find that Dr. M. supported this proclamation, not with 
as little “philosophical discrimination as the iatro-chemists and iatro- 
mathematicians of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries,” but with all 
the important and well-known facts recorded in the standard, chemical, 
physical, and physiological works of the time in which he wrote. Finally, 
the reader will perceive, from the following language of Dr. Carpenter, 
employed on pp. 151-2 of his Essay, that, at length, seven years after the 
publication of Metcalfe’s book, he adopts and enunciates essentially the 
same views. He says:— 
“ The views of Prof. Grove strike at the root of the notion of latent force of 
any description whatever; all force once generated being, in his estimation, per- 
petually active under one form or other; and its supposed ‘latency’ being a hypo- 
thetical condition, the idea of which is quite unnecessary when the force which 
has ceased to manifest itself is recognized under some other form. Thus, in his 
view, when iron is rendered magnetic by an electric current, the development of 
the magnetic force is rather to be looked on as the result of the conversion of the 
electric by the instrumentality of the iron, than as a case of the excitation of one 
force previously dormant, by another which is expended in thus evoking it. Such 
an analogy should rather lead the physiologist to look for some extraneous source 
of the organizing force; and to suspect that when organizable materials are ap- 
plied to the extension of a living structure, and are caused to manifest vital forces, 
some agency external to the organism is the moving spring of the whole series of 
operations. And thus, according to the view here advocated, the vital force 
which causes the primordial cell of the germ first to multiply itself, and then to 
develope itself into a complex and extensive organism, was not either originally 
locked up in that single cell, nor was it latent in the materials which are progres- 
sively assimilated by itself and its descendants, but is directly and immediately 
supplied by the heat which is constantly operating upon it, and which is trans- 
formed into vital force by its passage through the organized fabric that manifests 
it. The facts already cited, which show how completely dependent the process 
of germ-development, both in plants and animals, is upon the constant agency of 
heat, and how precisely its rate may be regulated by the measure of that force 
supplied to it, appear to the author to be so much better accounted for upon this Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
17 
view than upon either of the others, that he ventures to think that they demon- 
strate it almost as fully as the nature of physiological evidence will admit. 
“Having thus contrasted the doctrine for which he is contending with those 
which are current among physiologists, the author thinks it well to point out that 
he no more regards heat as the ‘vital principle,’ or as itself identical with the 
‘vital force,’ than it is identical with electricity or with chemical affinity. Nor 
does he in the least recognize the possibility that any action of heat upon the 
inorganic elements can of itself develope an organized structure of even the sim- 
plest kind. The pre-existence of a living organism, through which alone can 
heat be converted into vital force, is as necessary upon this theory, as it is upon 
any of those currently received among physiologists. And it is the speciality 
of the material substratum thus furnishing the medium or instrument of the meta- 
morphosis, which in his opinion establishes, and must ever maintain, a well-marked 
boundary-line between the Physical and the Yital forces. Starting with the ab- 
stract notion of Force, as emanating at once from the Divine Will, we might say 
that this force, operating through inorganic matter, manifests itself in electricity, 
magnetism, light, heat, chemical affinity, and mechanical motion; but that, when 
directed through organized structures, it effects the operations of growth, develop- 
ment, chemico-vital transformation, and the like; and is further metamorphosed, 
through the instrumentality of the structures thus generated, into nervous agency 
and muscular power. If we only knew of heat as it acts upon the organized 
creation, the peculiarities of its operation upon inorganic matters would seem as 
strange to the physiologist as the effects here attributed to it may appear to 
those who are only accustomed to contemplate the physical phenomena to which 
it gives rise.” 
Now, it is very evident, from this quotation, that Dr. Carpenter be- 
lieves,—1. That there is no such thing as a latent or dormant vital prin- 
ciple. 2. That “the moving spring of the organic operations is some 
agency external to the organism.” 8. That heat is, in fact, that agency. 
4. That heat is something more than a mere stimulus. 5. That “ heat is 
transformed into vital force by its passage through an organized fabric.” 
6. That the peculiar material substratum in which this transformation 
takes place is the “medium or instrument of the metamorphosis.” From 
these premises the conclusion is irresistible that heat and the vital force 
or principle are identical. And yet Dr. C., remarkably enough, expressly 
declares that he considers heat and the vital principle as distinct forces. 
This looks to us very much like trifling with both language and truth. It 
is saying one thing to the ear, and another to the mind. It is holding 
two doctrines, like the ancient philosophers—one esoteric, for the learned 
few, the other exoteric, for the ignorant many. In view of these state- 
ments, are we not forced to conclude that Dr. C. is either very uncertain 
about the correlative theory, seeing it through a glass darkly, or, having 
a wholesome dread of the “ odium theologicum,” he is unwilling to brave 
openly the unenlightened and mistaken prejudices of those who are so 
bitterly opposed to all the physical theories of life and organization ? 18 
Paine’s Institutes of Medicine. 
In concluding these remarks, we must say, in justice to ourself, that 
we have been actuated in making this exposition purely by our love for 
“fair play and authors’ rights.” We have the highest respect for Dr, 
Carpenter and his well-deserved reputation as a physiologist. For a 
number of years we have consulted his various excellent works on physi- 
ology with equal delight and profit, and we have constantly recommended 
these works to our students as able and well-digested compendia of the 
science. 
The history of the rise and growth of the doctrine of correlation is a 
very curious and interesting one. We have devoted considerable atten- 
tion to it, and, in the foregoing remarks, have anticipated a paper on the 
“Physical and Teleological Theories of Life and Organization,” which we 
have been long preparing, but which our manifold duties have thus far 
prevented us from completing. In that paper we purpose to analyze criti- 
cally the correlation theories of Yanuxem, Grove, and Carpenter, and to 
notice particularly the doctrines set forth in Mayer’s Treatise upon “ Or- 
ganic Movements in their Relations to Material Changes,” (1845;) Tras- 
tour’s pamphlet, entitled “ Caloric, Origin, Matter, and Law of the Uni- 
verse,” (1841;) the essay on the “Identities of Light and Heat, of Cal- 
oric and Electricity,” (1848,) from the pen of our esteemed friend, Dr. C. 
C. Cooper; Burnett’s “Philosophy of Spirits in Relation to Matter,” 
(1850 ;) Radcliffe’s “Philosophy of Vital Motion,” (1851;) and the ela- 
borate volume of Z. Allen, on the “Philosophy of the Mechanics of Na- 
ture,” (1852,) with which, and other kindred works, we have long been 
familiar. In the mean time, we earnestly hope that our distinguished 
friend, the American editor of Carpenter’s “Human Physiology,” will, in 
the next reprint of that work, do justice to the scientific claims of Van- 
uxem and Metcalfe, as he has already emphatically done to those of the 
present eminent incumbent of the chair of physiology in the University 
of Pennsylvania. 
Dr. Paine dwells at considerable length upon the vital principle, ex- 
amining carefully and profoundly its various properties; its remarkable 
analogies with the soul and with the principle of instinct; the history of 
its vicissitudes with medical philosophers; the different opinions advanced 
from time to time concerning it; the phenomena by which its existence 
and laws are adequately attested; its nature and its inseparability from, 
and relation to, living organic matter. He discusses its indivisibility, 
mutability, and creative power; contends that it is essentially the same in 
plants and animals; is independent of chemical action; resists chemical 
agencies; presides over organic processes and results ; and is, in fact, the 
fundamental cause of all the phenomena of organic beings. He thinks, 
also, that its mutability, though designed for useful purposes, is the essen- Paine’s Institutes oe Medicine. 
19 
tial cause of disease; that its nature has been altered in man since his 
creation; that it is subject to extinction, and becomes its own destroyer 
in virtue of its formative action, and that it is a bond of union between 
mind and matter. He attempts, furthermore, to explain how it combines 
the elements of matter in plants; how it modifies and appropriates or- 
ganic compounds in animals, and rearranges their elements ; how far it is 
creative; how it influences growth, and the development of the germ, 
and generates motion. 
The second division of the Institutes is devoted to Pathology; under 
which head, Dr. P. treats of remote and pathological or proximate causes, 
symptoms, morbid anatomy, inflammation, fever, venous congestion, 
humoralism, etc. The third part, consisting of nearly 250 pages, is an 
extended treatise upon Therapeutics. 
Dr. Paine is an extreme solidist. Disease of the fluids is with him in- 
variably the result of diseased solids. He rejects as inaccurate and use- 
less all the chemical analyses of the blood and fluids which the chemists 
have, from time to time, placed upon record. He denies the possibility 
of the blood becoming a cause of disease, and ascribes the abnormal 
states of this fluid to deranged conditions of the nervous system. In the 
direct and reflex actions of the nervous system he finds an explanation of 
all the phenomena of pathology and therapeutics. He disbelieves in the 
direct action of drugs upon the blood, and thinks that their influence is 
exerted upon the solids, and that remedies operate like morbific causes, 
giving rise to a series of pathological conditions. 
A valuable appendix, in which, among other topics, are discussed the 
progress of physiological and pathological chemistry, absorption and cir- 
culation in plants, the possibility of artificially reducing the quantity of 
blood circulating in the brain, etc., and two very copious and systematic 
indices of 175 pages, complete the volume before us. 
However much we might desire to do so, our limits, already trans- 
gressed, prevent us from giving our readers a complete analysis of the 
peculiar views of Dr. Paine. We hasten, therefore, to conclude our re- 
marks by earnestly recommending his work to the careful perusal and 
study of every one interested in physiology, whether in its aspect as 
a pure or an applied science. Though it contains many inaccuracies of 
detail, and much that is vague and merely controversial, yet the breadth 
and comprehensiveness of many of its doctrines, the great questions in 
which it abounds, and the consummate skill and learning with which these 
are generally treated, stamp it as a valuable treatise which should find a 
place in every philosophical library, and be consulted by every physician 
who practices his profession as a science and not as an empirical art.