Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 1.djvu/56

 with appearances which, occurring after death, have no necessary connexion with the vital actions which preceded it. On this subject M. Andral's excellent treatise on pathological anatomy affords much valuable and precise information. A brief epitome of his views in this respect, will best convey what I here wish to advance.

In all organized living matter, three great fundamental actions are uninterruptedly going forward, namely, capillary circulation, nutrition, and secretion. In man, and in those animals occupying a place near him in the zoological scale, a fourth action, derived from the nervous system, is superadded, which exercises a powerful influence and control over the others. The materials of nutrition and secretion being derived from the blood, the qualities of this necessarily exercise also a great influence over both processes. Hence M. Andral, in investigating the various morbid alterations to which the several structures of the body are liable, considers them under five heads, according as they involve, respectively, lesions of circulation, nutrition, secretion, the blood, and innervation. Lesions of circulation, to which, alone, I mean here to advert, he divides into two classes, according as blood is excessive or deficient in the capillary vessels, distinguishing the first by the term hyperæmia, the second by that of anæmia. Hyperæmia, or preternatural accumulation of blood, he sub-divides into four species, active or sthenic hyperæmia, produced by irritation; passive or asthenic, resulting from diminished tone in the capillary vessels; mechanical, from an obstacle to the venous circulation; and cadaveric, or post