OXYGEN AS A THERAPEUTIC AGENT. 
95 
idea held by some, that an over supply of oxygen to any part 
necessarily induces an inflammatory condition. 
The carbon dioxide, which is always found in much larger 
proportion in venous than arterial blood, is the result of the de¬ 
composition of the cell tissue ; this is retrograde metamorphosis 
and is a condition that continues without interruption! from 
birth until death. Therefore, imperfect or impeded metamor¬ 
phosis is disease, while arrested metamorphosis is death. 
Oxygen is the chief, and decidedly the most important ele¬ 
ment, in the process of tissue building. It is a fact that cannot 
be successfully controverted, that oxygen is a constructive agent 
rather than a destructive, as taught by many. Any one who 
has given this subject that careful consideration to which it is 
entitled, must arrive at the inevitable conclusion, that the pri¬ 
mary action of oxygen contributes directly toward constructive 
rather than destructive metamorphosis. 
Instead of continually breaking down tissues by oxidation, 
as many suppose without thinking, the fact is that oxygen, and 
oxygen only, by supplying in itself an essential element toward 
such repair, and by stimulating and correcting at every step the 
assimilative process, is the only agent that can bring about and 
consummate the reparative process. While this is true, yet it 
is also true that oxygen is the chief agent in the work of de¬ 
structive, retrograde metamorphosis ; this is its secondary action 
within the economy. In order to fully understand the physio¬ 
logical and pathological conditions that obtain within the econ¬ 
omy, it is of the utmost importance that we fully understand 
and realize the true action of oxygen, and the part it plays in 
relation to the problem we designate as life and death. 
What is life, and how is it sustained—and what is death ? 
These are questions that might be properly discussed in this 
connection, but as a discussion of these points would be purely 
metaphysical and of no practical value to either the physician 
or surgeon, we pass them by and confine our remarks to that 
which is practical. Oxygen and carbon dioxide both exist in 
the blood ; in arterial blood, in the proportion of about i to 2 
