286 BRITISH PHYSICIANS. I strenuously recommend to all persons engaged, in scientific pursuits, vvlietlier physical or moral, I have often been able to ascertain the order of phenomena, and to catch new links which have gone some way towards completing the whole chain of causes and effects. " Under these circumstances, I have been able to record a considerable number of dissections, together with nearly seven hundred illustrative cases, which chiefly serve as the basis of my in- tended work. " Far, however, am I from looking back on my professional life without considerable self-reproach and regret. How often have opportunities been neglected of ascertaining points essential to the discovery of inestimable truths, for which my re- cords are now searched in vain ! It may, perhaps^ be some excuse, that the error is common to me with many others of mankind, who at an early period of experimental investigation are ignorant of what is wanting to the advancement of the science which they profess." The work to which allusion is here made was a System of Pathology and Therapeutics, which Dr. Parry had contemplated from an early period of his professional life. Dissatisfied with many of the principles which regulated the usual practice, and with the want of success which loo frequently attended their adoption, he rejected many of the doctrines of the schools, and determined to rely upon his own observation and judgment. In his first inquiries respecting the nature and affections of the nervous system, he discovered much ob- scurity, and much gratuitous assumption, which
