Page:The Harveian oration 1903.djvu/34

 difficulty that has existed in obtaining a precise knowledge of the actual structure of the organs which subserve the function. Even at the present day, great as are the advances that have been made, I think I should be correct in saying that less is known of the minute anatomy of the nervous centres than of any other organs in the body. Whilst it may be said that with the present means at our command a knowledge of the histology of many of the tissues has reached or almost reached its limits, the precise disposition of the multiplicity of nerves and cells that constitute the brain and spinal cord as well as the ultimate termination of the nerve fibrils in the tissues and in the centres are yet to seek. Hence it is that whilst during the period of Harvey and immediately subsequent the study of the several functions to which I have referred began to emerge from the erroneous and fanciful notions by which they were surrounded, and their investigation to be started upon lines that have been followed to the present day, the phenomena of the nervous system for some time remained enveloped in the mystic obscurity that had enshrouded them with growing intensity from the earliest times, an obscurity that was if possible made greater by the lengthy and unintelligible phrases in which they were described.

The main divisions of the brain were