174 ON THE NATURE AND PRINCIPLES OF 



will be reconciled, and a new lustre will be reflected 

 on that glorious discovery, without which, these 

 disorders must ever have remained vital and unin- 

 telligible mysteries. 



So far, then, as relates to the study of the nature 

 of inflammation, any further remarks on the present 

 occasion would perhaps be unnecessary ; but it is 

 impossible to leave this subject without alluding to 

 congestion, a local disorder of tlje circulation, ad- 

 mitted to bear a close resemblance to, but at the 

 same time considered essentially distinct from, in- 

 flammation. In the literal acceptation of the word, 

 congestion is evidently synonymous with hyperannia ; 

 and, as this latter state also exists in inflammation, 

 pathologists seem to have been not a little puzzled 

 to lay down any clear and satisfactory method of 

 distinguishing the two affections. And it will not, 

 I think, be found a very difficult task to show that 

 these two disorders of the capillary circulation are 

 different forms of the same pathological condition ; 

 the distinction between them being founded on the 

 degree of intensity, and not on any material variety 

 in the nature, of the abnormal state constituting the 

 disease. 



For the sole characteristic phenomenon now relied 

 upon by pathologists, as affording the means of dis- 

 tinguishing between inflammation and congestion, 

 is the absence of fibrinous exudation in the latter 

 morbid state, while it is represented as being an 

 invariable accompaniment of the former. And in 

 proof of the accuracy of this representation of the 

 prevalent opinion on the question, it is only neces- 



