Page:The Harveian oration - delivered at the Royal College of Physicians, London, June 24, 1870 (IA b22307643).pdf/36

 that intention is fulfilled. Together with these innate arrangements, it would appear that habit and education can induce new capacities of a similar kind upon us. From anatomical proof, as well as from actual ex- perience, it would seem that the nervous tissue is highly plastic. Not only is it capable of receiving and registering the im- pressions made upon it, but of acquiring an instinct for complicated acts.

This, the physical basis of education, and even of morals, though not overlooked, is too little regarded in daily practice. We may therefore congratulate the College that the Gulstonian lecturer of this year has taken up this difficult and important subject, and treated it so ably.

By quitting all abstract considerations, and limiting the inquiry to the secondary conditions upon which depend the mental operations, we open a mine rich in practical wealth. Medicine yet owes it to society to demonstrate more fully those secondary con- ditions whereby a healthy mental activity