MYOPATHY 161 



developments of the voluntary musculature, and the 

 muscle plate or terminal motor nervature, the nutritional 

 medium or vehicle by which these sources of supply are 

 made available for the material wants of that musculature, 

 each of the muscle discs or sarcous units of which it is 

 composed having conveyed to it, along with the necessary 

 functional energy, the material elements on which it lives 

 and by which it acts ; the functional energy and activity 

 and the material nutrition of the muscular system thus 

 owing a common origin in and emanating alike from the 

 inner recesses of the central nervous system, and exhibiting 

 an indissoluble blending of functional intent and structural 

 contrivance. 



This intimate blending of the systemic motor nervature 

 and voluntary musculature in structure and function is due 

 to the persistence of an epi-blastic continuity of texture and 

 a oneness and sameness of functional role^ and represents an 

 inter-dependence of an absolutely essential and unbroken 

 nature for the complete realisation of voluntary and reflex 

 mobile necessities between the nervous and muscular 

 systems. 



We may take it, also, that a like intimacy of union 

 characterises the blending of the involuntary or sympa- 

 thetic nervature with its related involuntary musculature 

 in structure and function. 



Moreover, we are, we think, further warranted in infer- 

 ring that a like, or at least a kindred, blending subsists 

 between the related, but in some respects independent, 

 systemic and sympathetic nervous systems. We would 

 remark still further that the central nervous system, with 

 its related peripheral, motor, and sensory nervature, is 

 united centrally, as between its two halves, by a somewhat 

 like bond of union in structure and function. 



A continuity of histological development and an inter- 

 dependence of function, therefore, may be said to prevail 

 throughout the entire nervous system, with its related 

 voluntary and involuntary musculatures, by which is 

 secured a reliable tenure of the lease of life, by the har- 

 monious working of its varied but component parts along 

 the lines of least resistance and consequent minimum 

 expenditure of force, and the obviation of overlapping in 



