LXXIX. The third error committed in making experimental observations,
although it is not so common as the two first, is pretty often incurred.
If he for example, who on account of his having used some violent
exercise, drinks small liquors to excess, and afterwards finds himself
feverish, imputes his being so, as is very frequently the case, to his
having drank such liquids to excess; the generality of men, seldom
reflecting upon any excesses, but those of the appetite; but with all
this, violent exercise is much more likely to inflame the blood, and
disturb the humours, than drinking to excess of small liquids, and
therefore it would be much more rational, to impute the fever to the
violence of the exercise, than to drinking small liquids to excess.
LXXX. I believe that from the blunder of mistaking two effects of the
same cause, the one for the cause, and the other for the effect, arose
the opinion, which is so common among medical people; that all fluxions
wherever they fall, the gout not excepted, descend from the head; and it
being very common, for those who are affected with acrid fluxions that
fall on any part of the body, to feel pains and heaviness in their heads;
I suppose that from thence sprung the notion, that all fluxions originate
in, and are derived from the brain; but there are not a few modern
physicians who are of a contrary sentiment, and in my opinion they are
right.
LXXXI. In the first place, I do not know why the vicious humours, from
whence the matter of fluxions are derived, should make the grand circuit
through the head, before they fall on any particular part that is at a
distance from it; as they could, by being mixed with the blood in their
circulation through the veins and arteries, be derived immediately from
them, on any member or part of the body.
LXXXII. Secondly, if such a vast quantity of humour, as is discharged by
some fluxions, was to be lodged in the brain, it seems to me that it must
render a man quite stupid, and that organ incapable of exercising any of
its functions.
LXXXIII. Thirdly, it is not easy to point out the channel, through which
the humour passes from the interior part of the head. Many pretend to
say it passes through the Ethmoides, or Os Criboso; but Sneider denies
this, for that you cannot find any cavities or perforations in this
bone, through which those humours could flow, and especially if they are
pituitous and clammy, as the antients supposed them to be; and to this we
may add, that this bone is entirely covered or lined by the meninges, and
the interior tunic of the nose. It is true, as Doctor Matinez observes
in his treatise on anatomy, that its upper part is very porous, and that
from thence it came to be called the os criboso, or spungy bone; but as
these spungy pores do not pervade the whole bone, and are not pierced
through it, setting aside the obstacle it would meet with from the
membranes or tunics that surround it, the humour could not pass that way.
If it is insisted, that it flows through the nervous ducts, I ask how it
comes not to be attended with obstructions, that must produce dangerous
consequences?
LXXXIV. Fourthly and lastly, that through whatever channels you suppose
the humour to pass; how does it happen, that neither in them, nor the
parts immediately connected with them, it does not excite any sensations,
but that sore feelings, are only perceived at the part where it vents
itself? Is it not totally incredible, that a very acrid humour derived
from the head, and which flows to the stomach, to the breast, to the
intestines, and even to the extremities of the feet, should produce no
sensations in the intermediate parts between the head, and the place on
which it falls? This difficulty, which occurred to me many years ago, I
have often mentioned to medical people, but never could get any solution
of it that was satisfactory to me.
LXXXV. If by way of objection to what I have here advanced, the argument
we have mentioned before is urged, that defluxions on any part of the
body are generally attended with a pain in the head; I answer, that it
cannot be inferred from thence, that the humour descends from the head.
In the first place, for I have observed it many times with regard to
myself, these fluxions are often not attended with any pain in the head
at all; and to make the inference just, they should always be attended
with one. Secondly, although a pain in the head should constantly
accompany a defluxion, the objection made would easily be removed, by
saying, that this appearance is fallacious, for that both the pain and
the defluxion, are effects of the same cause, and not one the cause of
the other. In fact, reason tells us this is the case; for the acrid
humour, which when separated from the mass of blood, falls on, and
discharges itself at this or that place, while it continues in the
circulation, has nothing to hinder it from venting some portion of its
poison on the head, and exciting pain there; and especially, as it is
generally supposed, the nidus of the humour which flows in defluxions,
is in the glands, and the brain holds the first place in that class; for
which reason, Hippocrates and Wharton, call it the great and principal
gland.
LXXXVI. If it is replied to this, that in every defluxion which is
somewhat violent, although we do not feel what may be properly called
pain in the head, we at least perceive a heaviness in it; which renders
that organ unfit for its operation. I confess that this is so, but to the
confession, shall beg leave to add two remarks. The first is, that this
is not a symptom peculiar to fluxions, for that the same thing happens in
many other disorders; but the generality of physicians do not conclude
from hence, that those diseases originate in the head. Secondly,
neither is this heaviness or inaptitude, peculiar to the head, for upon
observation, you will find that fluxions and many other disorders also,
have the same effect upon the other members of the body. Whoever is
affected with a violent defluxion, either on the throat, the breast, the
stomach, or any other part, will find that his whole body, and every
member of it, is more heavy and listless, than when he is in good health;
and that all his limbs are less fit for action; and that they all with a
very little exercise of them, become soon tired. Thus we have no reason
to attribute a heaviness as peculiar to the head, in the attacks of
fluxions, when we see it is common in those attacks, to all the other
members of the body; and it has been for want of making this reflexion,
that the world have conjectured all defluxions were derived from the
head.
A DISPLAY of the INTELLECTUAL FACULTIES OF THE VARIOUS PEOPLE, With
REMARKS on the TALENTS of the DIFFERENT ONES.