OF ELEMENTARY PRACTICAL PHYSIOLOGY, BY M. FOSTER, M.D., F.R.S., PRÆLECTOR IN PHYSIOLOGY AND FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, ASSISTED BY J. N. LANGLEY, M.A., FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. NEW EDITION. London: MACMILLAN AND CO. 1882. S [The Right of Translation is reserved.] PREFACE. EVER since I began teaching Practical Physiology in University College, London, I have been in the habit of distributing among my students a syllabus to guide them in their work. By the introduction of fuller details what was at first a Syllabus has been changed into a Practical Course, which I now venture to publish in the hope that it may be found useful to others. I fear that its use will be much restricted by the fact that in it Histology and Physiology are closely combined instead of being separated into two or more distinct courses. Although, in practice at least, I stand alone, I believe, in this matter, continued experience makes me more and more convinced that the plan which I adopt is, though troublesome, the safest one. Histological work, unless it be salted with the salt either of physiological or of morphological ideas, is apt to degenerate into a learned trifling of the very worst description; and students are generally only too ready to spend far too much of their time in the fascinating drudgery of cutting sections and mounting stained specimens. In morphological questions the physiologist has but an indirect interest; and details of microscopic structure ought only to occupy his attention in so far as they serve as a basis for physiological deductions. The reader in looking through this little book |