The liver, then, is the central chemical laboratory in the body as well as its most important detoxicator. It is so important that man can live only a few hours without it. For this reason surgeons are inclined to eye it warily and seldom touch it except for the removal of an occasional tumor, abscess or cyst. Anyone who has studied the liver extensively knows that its manifold activities are so complicated and numerous that one could lose oneself in its labyrinths.
Dr. Henry G. Bieber refers to the role of the liver the body’s second line of defense against disease, just as digestion is the first line.