PART IV.
ESSAYS AND CASES.
ARTICLE V.
PHYSIOLOGY AND PATHOLOGY
OF
INTERMITTENCE.
BY CHARLES COWAN, M.D.E. M.D.P.
Bath
WHETHER we contemplate the organic or inorganic
world, we must admit that both are exposed to influences
which are permanent in their application,
and to others by which they are only temporarily
controlled. No rational doubt can be entertained,
that matter, from the first moment of its existence,
has continued to manifest physical properties identical
with those it at present possesses, while its vital
attributes have been gradually accumulating through
the ascending scale of organization. The powers
of gravitation, affinity, cohesion, &c. are essential
to the very existence of both, and their slightest
interruption would entail inextricable ruin and confusion
upon the whole system of the natural world.
Vitalized beings are not only dependent, as material
compounds, on the permanence of the laws to which
