Life, its nature, origin and maintenance : an address delivered to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, at its meeting at Dundee, in September, 1912 / by E.A. Schäfer.

  • Edward Albert Sharpey-Schäfer
Date:
1912
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Life, its nature, origin and maintenance : an address delivered to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, at its meeting at Dundee, in September, 1912 / by E.A. Schäfer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    pilgrimage.' David, to whom, before the advent of the modern statis- tician, we owe the idea that seventy years is to be regarded as the normal period of life,* is himself merely stated to have 'died in a good old age.' The periods recorded for the Kings show a considerable falling-off as compared with the Patriarchs ; but not a few were cut off by violent deaths, and many lived lives which were not ideal. Amongst eminent Greeks and Romans few very long hves are recorded, and the same is true of historical persons in mediaeval and modern history. It is a long life that lasts much beyond eighty; three such hnked together carry us far back into history. Mankind is in this respect more favoured than most mammals, although a few of these surpass the period of man's existence.! Strange that the brevity of human life should be a favourite theme of preacher and poet when the actual term of his ' erring pilgrimage' is greater than that of most of his fellow-creatures ! The modern applications of the principles of preventive medicine and hygiene are no doubt operating to lengthen the average life. But even The end of life ravages of disease could be altogether eliminated, it is certain that at any rate the fixed cells of our body must eventually grow old and ultimately cease to function; when this happens to cells which are essential to the life of the organism, general death must result. This will always remain the universal law, from which there is no escape. * All that lives must die, passing through nature to eternity ! ' Such natural death unaccelerated by disease—is not death by disease as unnatural as death by accident ?—should be a quiet, painless phe- nomenon, unattended by violent change. As Dastre expresses it, 'The need of death should appear at the end of life, just as the need of sleep appears at the end of the day.' The change has been led gradually up to by an orderly succession of phases, and is itself the last manifestation of life. Were we all certain of a quiet passing—were we sure that there would be ' no moaning of the bar when we go out to sea'—we could anticipate the coming of death after a ripe old age without apprehension. And if ever the time shall arrive when man will have learned to regard this change as a simple physiological process, as natural as the oncoming of sleep, the approach of the fatal shears will be as generally welcomed as it is now abhorred. Such a day is still distant; we can hardly say that its dawning is visible. Let us at least hope that, in the manner depicted by Diirer in his well-known etching, the sunshine which science irradiates may eventually put to flight the melancholy which hovers, bat- like, over the termination of our lives, and which even the anticipation of a future happier existence has not hitherto succeeded in dispersing. * The expectation of life of a healthy man of fifty is still reckoned at about twenty ^^T'Hominis sevum ceeterorum animalium onanium superat praeter admodum paucorum.'—Francis Bacon, Historia vitcz et mortis, 1637. UNWIN BBOTHEBS, LIMITBD. THE OBE8HAM PBB88, WOKINQ AND LONDON.
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