Presidential address at the opening of the third session, Nov. 2, 1876 / by Mr. Serjeant Cox.
- Edward William Cox
- Date:
- 1876
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Presidential address at the opening of the third session, Nov. 2, 1876 / by Mr. Serjeant Cox. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![our senses—that the earth revolved round the sun; and the man who so asserted had a narrow escape from being burned alive for his audacity. But now the whole world accepts this impossible theory, so contrary to common sense and universal experience, as an undoubted fact. Harvey was persecuted almost to death for affirming the circulation of the blood in the body. “ Every man,” said his opponents, “ who has ever lived knows that it is not so ; he could not have a stream running through his body at such a rate without feeling it—besides, it is contrary to the known laws of nature that a liquid should run uphill—we can prove by argument that it cannot be and common sense pronounces it impossible.” Stephenson was told by the Scientists of his time that it was impossible a priori, and contrary to common sense, that wheels should carry a heavy load over an iron tram at a rapid rate; they would not bite and could only revolve without advancing. When the phenomena of Somnambulism were asserted within living memory, they were denied and their assertors denounced as fools or rogues, impostors or dupes, because those phe- nomena were sti’ange, impossible, contrary to common sense and common experience, and Dr. Elliotson was hounded to his ruin for declaring them to be realities. And now these very phenomena, within my own memory so vehemently denounced, and for exhibiting which prosecutions were threatened and persecutions were practised without stint, are admitted by all physiologists to be true, and find their place as facts in every Treatise on Mental Physiology, and are proclaimed by learned Professors from the platform of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. This Society is established to deal with Psychological science in the same manner as Physical Science has been dealt with, and to which its astonishing progress is due— by collecting all facts bearing on it from all reliable sources, by observing and recording all alleged phenomena haviug relation to it: from those facts to trace the laws by which the [152]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22443915_0008.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
