Excerpt from The Medical Herald, 1895, Vol. 14: A Practical Monthly Journal of the Medical Sciences The difficulty that has hitherto arisen in providing this explanation, is in some measure due to the isolated manner ih' which the prostate has been studied. It has suffered, if i may be allowed to say it, by being too much specialized, and a tendency has naturally arisen to regard it as an individual and independent organ, and not in the light of a component part of a system of never-ceasing activity. Analogies, when based upon correct interpretations, are often of much assistance in the study of some apparently abstruse laws governing patho logical processes. How absolutely impossible, for instance, it would be to understand or explain hypertrophy of the heart or those local changes which occur in some of the blood vessels, unless those parts were regarded not as so many chambers or tubes but as component portions of a single circulatory system, and it is in this way that the interpretation of the func tion and pathology of the prostate has to some extent suffered. It has been urged that though the prostate is, in some measure, engaged in the process of micturition, the fact that it is used for this purpose half a dozen times or so in the twenty-four hours is hardly sufficient to account for its own growth. This, l would emphasize, is merely the casual part the organ plays in what we generally regard as a voluntary act. Such a limited view as this implies is, in a large measure, due to the habit we have acquired of taking our ideas of the living organ from the condition it presents after death, when removed from the body in a more or less contracted state, somewhat resembling a Spanish chestnut in shape. This is no more like the living prostate than the dead heart resembles the one in full vigor and activity. The prostate assumes, i believe, no such appearance during life. Except on the rare occasions when the bladder is absolutely empty, but on the contrary, the muscular fibres of which it is so largely composed are spread out like a funnel, so as to furnish a contractile support for the bladder, as well as its varying contents. This disposition is probably best appreciated by examination by the rectum when the patient is in the erect and semi-erect positions, with the bladder empty, as well as in various degrees of repletion. 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.