INFLAMMATORY EXUDATION. 431 



that must in accordance with the commonest experience 

 be necessarily drawn from all this is, that changes must 

 have occurred in the composition of the cellular 

 elements altering their natural functional power. 

 Such changes, when they occur after the application of 

 stimuli which are not powerful enough to destroy the 

 parts at once, or to exhaust their functional power, are 

 only possible when the stimuli are either nutritive or 

 formative. And in fact this conclusion is confirmed by 

 what occurs in inflammation. For now-a-days we find 

 the view is already pretty generally spread, that in inflam- 

 mation we have in the main to deal with a change in the 

 act of nutrition, nutrition being here indeed regarded 

 as embracing the formative and nutritive processes. 



If therefore we speak of an inflammatory stimulus 

 (irritament), we cannot properly intend to attach any 

 other meaning to it, than that, in consequence of some 

 cause or other external to the part which falls into a 

 state of irritation, and acting upon it either directly or 

 through the medium of the blood the composition and 

 constitution of this part undergo alterations which at 

 the same time alter its relations to the neighbouring 

 parts (whether they be blood-vessels or other structures) 

 and enable it to attract to itself and absorb from them a 

 Larger quantity of matter than usual, and to transform 

 it according to circumstances. Every form of inflamma- 

 tion with which we are acquainted, may be naturally ex- 

 plained in this way. With regard to every one, it may be 

 assumed that it begins as an inflammation from the mo- 

 ment that this increased absorption of matters into the 

 tissue takes place, and the further transformation of these 

 matters commences. 



This view accords to a certain extent, as you no doubt 

 see, with that which has been maintained by the up- 

 holders of the vascular theory, according to which the 



