Page:The Harveian oration - delivered at the Royal College of Physicians, London, June 24, 1870 (IA b22307643).pdf/51

 progress can be made by the ready accep- tance of every proposition, however distin- guished the source from which it emanates. The parasitic origin and nature of epidemics may be true, but it has yet to be proved. As a hypothesis, it admits of proof or dis- proof, and so has further claim upon the industry of those who have put it forward as a suggestion. Without going to the length which this hypothesis demands, we must admit, however, that we know enough to guide us much further than we have yet gone in the practice of prevention.

To leave these discursions, and in a few words to conclude my task, I would repeat that the distinction of Medicine, as a study, lies in its comprehensiveness. The student of pliy- sical science admits that he has to deal with but one-half of that truth which is expressed in man. The student of medicine cannot so limit himself. The facts of sensation, whether pleasurable or painful; the in- fluence of the mental emotions, whether exciting or depressing; the dominion of