CONSERVATIVE DESIGN OF ORGANIC DISEASE. 173 



but even the color of the exterior presents the same unvarying uni- 

 formity of shade. The spots on the leopard and on the hutlerfly's 

 wing, the speckles and stripes on the reptile, the scales of the fish, the 

 plumage of the bird, and the fur of quadrupeds, are tinted so pre- 

 cisely alike in diflerent individuals of the same species, age, etc., that 

 we find it difficult to detect the slightest variation. Any appreciable 

 deviation from the standard type must always be attributed to the 

 action of some unusual cause disturbing the normal course of evolu- 

 tion, unnumbered instances of which appear among domesticated ani- 

 mals, where, in fact, uniformity is the exception and variety quite 

 common. 



Now, to go back to pathological evolution, we find the three quali- 

 ties of yraduality, latency, and uniformity of type, to belong also to 

 it, i. e,, when it has followed its undisturbed typical course. We ob- 

 serve, however, that graduality slowness of organic change is com- 

 mon only to so-called chronic pathological changes ; in acute organic 

 diseases (those that we have seen destroy life) the change of tissue is 

 rapid ; hence an organ undergoing pathological modification that be- 

 comes the seat of an acute process (of an acute inflammation) can no 

 longer be said to have followed its designed typical course, and we 

 can no longer anticipate the same attaining of the pathological evolu- 

 tion to its designed conservative, typical completion. The acute dis- 

 ease is accompanied with fever, hence with rapid wasting and reduced 

 assimilation of food; it leaves the whole organism reduced in vital 

 power, and there remain behind inflammatory products which require 

 to be removed ; the normal progress of the gradual pathological de- 

 velopment has been arrested ; the vitality of the part has been weak- 

 ened ; there is set up in it a tendency to degeneration or local death. 

 Indeed, time would fail us to enumerate all the injurious consequences, 

 immediate and remote, general and local, that are liable to follow 

 even a single acute inflammatory attack. No wonder, when such 

 attacks occur more than once, or are repeated over and over again, 

 that the pathologically developing organ fails of reaching its designed 

 conservative termination ; it need never surprise us, under such cir- 

 cumstances, that the final result is degeneration and death instead of 

 preservation and repair. 



In the several instances (very simjDle ones) of admitted conserva- 

 tive modifications of structure previously mentioned, we observed that 

 time was an important element. The enlargement of anastomosing 

 arteries that took place after the main vessel had been tied, did so by 

 slow degrees ; so did the hypertrophy of the heart that followed more 

 general arterial obstruction; so did the transformation of mucous 

 membrane into skin when exposed to air ; and so do all conservative 

 modifications of structure when they have been allowed to pursue, 

 undisturbed, their designed typical course. 



Secondly, when typical pathological evolution follows its designed 



