380 INFLAMMATION. 



lumps become unfit for producing new elements, and are sus- 

 pended in a liquid, viz. : serum, derived from the blood which con- 

 stitutes suppuration proper. Pus, as is known, is destined to 

 perish. 



The facts above enumerated lead to the conclusion that a 

 cellular pathology, according to the theory of Virchow, cannot be 

 maintained, for in the tissues of the animal body there are no 

 "individuals, 77 no "cells," and consequently can be no isolated 

 " cellular foci of disease." 



Tissues are composed of living matter and its derivations. In 

 the center of the tissue-unit the living matter remains unchanged, 

 while at the periphery the living matter is infiltrated with basis - 

 substance. The continuity of living matter is nowhere inter- 

 rupted ; the detrimental influence, therefore, which acts upon the 

 central body will also directly or indirectly reach the whole tissue- 

 unit, and vice versa.* 



The changes which occur in the inflammatory process consist, first, 

 in a dissolution or liquefaction of the basis-substance, and, secondly, 

 in an increased production of the living matter of its own kind. As 

 I have previously demonstrated (see page 46), each lump of 

 living matter, no matter how minute, is capable of producing 

 its kind, consequently to grow and form a new element. This 

 is true of isolated particles as well as of masses of living matter 

 combined into tissues and organs. 



It yet remains to be proved whether or not certain "free" 

 exudations of the animal body contain a number of extremely 

 minute, isolated lumps, which have been torn from connection 

 with the diseased tissues, and whether or not such lumps, under 

 certain conditions, are still viable and endowed in any degree 

 with the capacity for reproduction. Together with the emigra- 

 tion of colorless blood-corpuscles, such lumps may, perhaps, be a 

 source of the enormous new formation of pus-corpuscles. 



It is always only the living matter within a tissue which is 

 subject to disturbances of nutrition, whether it is surrounded by 

 an interstitial liquid or by an interstitial solid basis-substance. 

 The non-living basis substance may undergo different changes, 



* Later researches have proved that the changes may take place under 

 certain conditions, first in the tissue-unit, before any change in the plastid has 

 yet occurred. Even a portion of the plastid may exhibit inflammatory 

 changes, while the remaining portion continues in a nearly unchanged condi- 

 tion. (See article " Caries of Teeth, especially of Cemeiitum.") 



