The Huxley lecture on recent advances in science and their bearing on medicine and surgery : delivered at the opening of the Charing Cross Hospital Medical School on October 3rd, 1898 / by Rudolf Virchow.

  • Virchow, Rudolf (Rudolf Ludwig Karl), 1821-1902.
Date:
1898
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Huxley lecture on recent advances in science and their bearing on medicine and surgery : delivered at the opening of the Charing Cross Hospital Medical School on October 3rd, 1898 / by Rudolf Virchow. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    these cases there is only the realisation of a possibility of formation which is present in the matrix in general. At the same time each of these cases illustrates the law of the vita propria of the tissues and of their activity linked to this life. It is not without great scientific and practical interest to reflect that these observations illustrate another ancient doc- trine, the doctrine of parasitism. This doctrine also is trace- able back to Paracelsus, who wished to have disease in general regarded as a parasite. One century after another spread this theory abroad, or at least kept its memory green, although there is a fundamental error of logic in assuming the universality of parasitism. For if the living organism is constituted by separate and independent living parts, each of which nourishes itself, and of which most can propagate themselves and perform their special functions, each one of these individual parts must occupy the position of a parasite with respect to the others : it lives on and lessens the com- mon stock of nourishment. The generally-accepted view re- garding parasitism postulates at the same time the harmful- ness of this condition. In reality, every part is endowed with individual life so that it can act prejudicially on the re- mainder of the organism if its activity becomes excessive or defective. A nsevus that becomes a sarcoma can assume a really hurtful significance. Hence it is requisite to remove the sarcoma but it is not advisable to remove every n^vus. Only an excess of caution can lead to an operation which finds its sole excuse in the possibility that a nsevus can con- duce to the formation of a sarcoma. In like manner every excessive proliferation (luxuriation) can act harmfully; it may then be described as malignant. But many prolifera- tions are useful, benign or even salutary, as, for instance, the scars which cover a loss of substance. It is just for the sake of a trustworthy prognosis that one must be extremely careful in the application of designations which group whole categories of morbid processes under a common aspect. The idea of parasitism which we have here discussed in regard to the relation between difi'erent parts of the same organism fits in much better where living organisms of a dif- ferent variety or species enter into an organised corporation, and continue their special life in commensalism. The animal parasites, which exist as entozoa in man and other animals, have been longest known. Since the end of the last century our acquaintance with these entozoa has greatly broadened. Many structures which were formerly regarded as mere blad- ders (cysts) have been recognised as cestoid worms (entozoa cystica). The trichinae, apparently sexless animals living in the interior of muscles, were first discovered in this century at Edinburgh; later experimental research succeeded in proving that after the consumption of infected meat these little worms
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