E-text prepared by Robert Shimmin, Greg Alethoup, Keith Edkins,
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
()
| Transcriber's note: | A few typographical errors have been corrected. Theyappear in the text like this, and theexplanation will appear when the mouse pointer is moved over the markedpassage. |
OR,
OF
AUTHOR OF THE BOTANIC GARDEN.
Principiò cœlum, ac terras, camposque liquentes,
Lucentemque globum lunæ, titaniaque astra,
Spiritus intùs alit, totamque infusa per artus
Mens agitat molem, et magno se corpore miscet.—Virg. Æn. vi.
Earth, on whose lap a thousand nations tread,
And Ocean, brooding his prolific bed,
Night's changeful orb, blue pole, and silvery zones,
Where other worlds encircle other suns,
One Mind inhabits, one diffusive Soul
Wields the large limbs, and mingles with the whole.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR. J. JOHNSON, IN ST. PAUL'S CHURCH-YARD.
1796.
CONTAINING
DISTRIBUTED INTO
WITH THEIR
AND WITH
Hæc, ut potero, explicabo; nec tamen, quasi Pythius Apollo, certa ut sint et fixa, quæ dixero; sed ut Homunculus unus e multis probabiliora conjecturâ sequens.—Cic. Tusc. Disp. l. 1. 9.
All diseases originate in the exuberance, deficiency, or retrograde action, of the faculties of the sensorium, as their proximate cause; and consist in the disordered motions of the fibres of the body, as the proximate effect of the exertions of those disordered faculties.
The sensorium possesses four distinct powers, or faculties, which are occasionally exerted, and produce all the motions of the fibrous parts of the body; these are the faculties of producing fibrous motions in consequence of irritation which is excited by external bodies; in consequence of sensation which is excited by pleasure or pain; in consequence of volition which is excited by desire or aversion; and in consequence of association which is excited by other fibrous motions. We are hence supplied with four natural classes of diseases derived from their proximate causes; which we shall term those of irritation, those of sensation, those of volition, and those of association.
In the subsequent classification of diseases I have not adhered to the methods of any of those, who have preceded me; the principal of whom are the great names of Sauvages and Cullen; but have nevertheless availed myself, as much as I could, of their definitions and distinctions.
The essential characteristic of a disease consists in its proxi