Page:A Treatise on the Membranes in General, and on Different Membranes in Particular.djvu/93

Rh of secreting and consolidating fibrin, instead of calcareous phosphate.

Now the serous membranes do not seem to have a distinct nutritive matter; they are not in this respect, an organ sui generis; they are only formed in the mould, on the basis of others, and not penetrated with a matter which characterizes them. Being all formed of the cellular tissue, they differ only from this tissue in its common form, by a certain degree of condensation, and by an approximation and union of the cells, which are loose and separated in the ordinary state.

123. On the following proofs rests the reality of this mere cellular texture, which I attribute to the serous membranes: 1. there is identity of nature, where we find identity of functions and of diseases. Now it is evident, that the uses of these membranes and of the cellular tissue, relative to the continual absorption and exhalation of lymph, are absolutely the same, and that the phenomena of different dropsies, are common to them, with the single difference of effusion in the former and infiltration in the latter. 2. The inflation of air into the tissue subjacent to these membranes, nearly reduces them to a cellular state, when it succeeds and is pushed to some length. 3. Maceration, as Haller has well remarked, always produces the same effect, but in a manner still more sensible. 4. The various cysts, hydatids, etc., whose aspect, texture, and even nature, are absolutely the same as in the serous membranes, as will be seen, always originate in the midst of the cellular tissue, in-