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Between the years 1789 and 1806, at which latter date the German army met with a disastrous defeat at the hands of the French (battle of Jena), the almost constant warfare brought all official university work to a stop. But Reil was not idle during this long period, for it was at this time that he devoted himself chiefly to laboratory research work with reference to the anatomy and physiology of the brain and nerves. The products of this work are recorded in the Archives of Physiology which Reil published in 1796 in association with Autenrieth, and they are pronounced by Sudhoff to be masterly. One of the cerebral structures which Reil was the first to describe is that known to all anatomists as “the island of Reil.”

Another important series of studies which were made by Reil were published by him under the title: “On the Diagnosis and Treatment of Fevers” (Halle and Berlin, 1799–1816; 3d edition, 1820–1828).

Finally, mention should be made of a memoir on “Vital Force” which Reil published in the first volume of his Archives, in July, 1795; an essay which—according to Sudhoff—should be read with very close attention, for it, more than all his other published writings, has carried Reil’s name (and will continue so to carry it in the future) triumphantly through the history of the science of biology. The author states his final conclusion as to the nature of vital force in the following words: “Every part of an organism accomplishes its work through its own inherent power, and the latter is a characteristic phenomenon that is dependent upon the manner in which the material of which it is composed is mixed and also upon the form that it takes.” Dezeimeris gives a slightly different rendering of this passage, viz., “It is absurd to search for the source of life (vital force) elsewhere than in the tissues themselves, and in them the vital phenomena vary partly according to the manner in which their elements are mixed and partly according to the form in which they are arranged.” Farther on in this volume, as I shall show, Claude Bernard, the distinguished French biologist, furnishes a third definition of “vital force.”