Clinical papers on surgical subjects / by Herbert W. Page.

  • Page, Herbert William.
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Clinical papers on surgical subjects / by Herbert W. Page. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Leeds Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Leeds Library.

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    The time at my disposal allows me to refer to these elementary matters in only the most fragmentary way, but it seems to me of some importance towards the elucidation of my theme that I should remind you of the intricate complexity and elaboration both of structure and function throughout the nervous system, and of the close relationship which subsists between processes which are purely physical and those which belong to the altogether different and higher sphere of the intellect and mind. Nor must we forget to take account of the close relationship of the nervous system with the processes of organic life, and of the intimacy which is thereby established between the very highest attributes of the cerebral cortex, and these the lowest, albeit most indispensable parts of the animal economy. Although it is true that the ordinary work of animal life goes on without conscious acquaintance with the various steps of each process, it is none the less a fact, which must never be lost sight of in the consideration of disorders of nervous function, that each vital process, whatever it may be, of digestion, of circulation, or the still more wonderful mechanism of heat production, whether it lie in the muscles or elsewhere, linds repre- sentation, and thereby regulation, in the higher regions of the cerebral groups of cells. That these processes are not ever forcing themselves into conscious promi- nence is indeed a cause for thankfulness ; but it is practically certain, nevertheless, that the mood of every hour is very largely determined by the unconscious influence which the animal functions have upon cerebral cells, and the sense of well-beino-