ON MATTER AND FORCE. 77 



advance, but renders further progress more 

 certain and more easy. 



I will take the first and greatest question in 

 pathology to illustrate the importance of the 

 change in our views regarding the union and 

 conservation of ponderable matter and force. 



Inflammation, according to our unchanged 

 ideas, is an increase of heat, redness, swelling, 

 and pain, caused by an excess amounting to 

 tumult in the nutritive changes in the inflamed 

 part. 



The dilatation of the smallest arteries and 

 veins; the retardation of the current of the 

 blood ; the disappearance of the layer of serum 

 which lines the vessels; the piling up of the 

 colourless globules in the veins ; the stoppage 

 in the capillaries, all these are produced by a 

 direct or reflex paralysis of the contractile 

 textures of the small arteries and veins. 

 (Cohnheim, Virchows Arehiv, Sept. 1867.) 



In other words, excess of nutrition in the 

 inflamed part is considered to arise from a loss 

 of energy. 



This is directly opposed to the principle of 

 the conservation of energy. Let us apply this 

 principle to inflammation in parts free from 



