Excerpt from The Simplicity of Life: An Introductory Chapter to Pathology Before discussing the clear and lucid theory of Fletcher, who reduced all morbid actions to one, and the same law or general expression, it appears desirable that the terms which Fletcher employs when speaking of vital action should be explained and as vital action implies life this subject first demands attention. For pathology being merely a branch of physiology, any doctrine of the former must be consistent with the more general laws of vital action, or with physiology. Health and disease are the same states differing only in degree. All pathology then must be consistent 'with our knowledge of the nature of vital actions in health, or physiology in its more restricted sense.'l' About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.