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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.
directions, stagnation and stink have no chance of setting in, but if the free flow of the living, health-giving waters from the fountain-spring of life is interfered with in any particular corner or part of the body, it at once becomes transformed into heat, converting the tissues and structures involved into a sort of battle-ground of two opposing kinds of forces, the one of radiation from the centre and the other of obstruction at the seat of trouble. In consequence of the presence and operation at one and the same time of these two opposite kinds of forces, heat is engendered, and it begins its work of destruction by consuming the living tissue. Just as electricity is converted into the destructive heat by friction, so are the radiations of life transformed into a force of destruction in consequence of the friction caused by the tension of nerves and contraction of muscles. The heat generated in the operation tends to dry up the moisture of the body, thus making the tissues dry, rigid and non-elastic, and the bones and their joints stiff, unmoving and unwieldy. The organs of digestion and recuperation all require a certain amount of fluid for their proper working, so that when they have to carry on their work without the requisite quantity of water, they become deranged and perform their functions tardily. This is the commencement of decrepitude and old age. With the impairment of the digestive apparatus the remaining organs also suffer deterioration, with the result that their vitality is vitiated, and they can no longer be relied on to resist the onslaught of harmful diseasebearing germs from without, which even when they do not cause immediate death, lower the power of resistance
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