Page:The Harveian oration 1903.djvu/38

 any clear conceptions as to the nature of disease; but what was of far greater influence was the lack of any systematic observations on the appearances presented after death, anything that in short might be looked upon as a knowledge of morbid anatomy. Hence it was that the notions respecting disease and its workings were, if possible, more fanciful than those held in connection with the healthy body and were retained for long after the latter had been diverted on to right lines. Although isolated records of post-mortem examinations were made from time to time, it was not until the latter half of the eighteenth century that Morgagni laid the foundations of a scientific Pathology by his work De Sedibus et Causis morborum (1780), upon which a goodly superstructure was soon erected. "It stands most clearly revealed," says Virchow," in the history of Pathology that the division of the body first into the larger regions (head, breast, abdomen, etc.), then into organs, then into tissues, and finally into cells and cell territories, was the first step which opened up to us the comprehension of disease." There is good ground for thinking that this comprehension