THE 



HUMAN BODY. 



CHAPTER I. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Opinions of the ancients concerning the human body. Summary of general 

 anatomy. Substance of the body or organized ?natler. Anatomical 

 elements. Nutrition. Fluids. Tissues. 



IT has been said with truth, that the human mind, which 

 can survey the heavens and calculate the motion and density 

 of the stars, finds itself confounded when, returning from 

 these distant journeyings, it enters its own proper dwelling- 

 place. Man's own organization is still among those mysteries 

 of nature which he is least able to penetrate, in spite of his 

 incessant efforts to lift the veil which hides it. In all ages 

 he has sought to know himself; in all times he has studied 

 the relations between his own existence and that of the 

 world; and those universal influences which, though evident 

 to him, are nearly all inexplicable in their action upon living 

 beings. 



Carried by their imagination into this way of comparing 

 the human body with the rest of creation, Aristotle and some 

 other philosophers saw in man an epitome of the wonders 

 of the universe. He was for them the microcosm, the dimi- 

 nutive and summary of the entire world. 



Paracelsus and the astrological doctors developed from 

 their stand-point the ideas of the Greek philosophers, and 

 pushed to its extreme limits the doctrine of sidereal influence 



