“…For Virchow 'the inflammatory process derives frorn the increased activity (nutritive irritability) of the cell to find the appropriate source of food in the surrounding tissues; in such a way, the inflammatory reaction is consequence of an excessive intake by interstitial cells, of food provenient from the liquid part of the blood, filtering through the vessel wall' [1]. A great support to such a view was the demonstration by ARNOLD (1875) [4] of the phenomenon of diapedesis. I dare say that this approach to the inflammatory reaction is still very dear to our biochemists, in a certain way opposite to that sponsored by Cohnheim and his pupils, who stated in 1873: 'I consider indisputable (note how easy it was to explain anything in science, when there were only few people investigating), that the cause of inflammation must be found in the vessels themselves, everything that occurs outside of the vessels gives the impression of secondary phenomena' [2].…”