A dissertation on the mixed fever, delivered June 30, 1789 : at a public examination for the degree of Bachelor in Medicine, before the Rev. Joseph Willard, S.T.D. president, the medical professors, and the governors of the university at Cambridge in America / by William Pearson.

  • Pearson, William, 1768-1795.
Date:
[1789]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A dissertation on the mixed fever, delivered June 30, 1789 : at a public examination for the degree of Bachelor in Medicine, before the Rev. Joseph Willard, S.T.D. president, the medical professors, and the governors of the university at Cambridge in America / by William Pearson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    There is no difeafe fo untverfal as Fever, whether ] ... we confider it in reference to the fpecies, or to the indi- vidual. It attacks mankind pretty equally in every quarter of the globe, and every period from infancy to old age is liable to it. Fever does not attack one part, or one organ of the body, but every part: It affe£b the head, thorax, abdominal vifcera, mufcles, blood veffeis, lungs, and indeed every part of the fyftem. In the commencement of every art or fcience, men ifelecT: only fome of the moft obvious diftincYions : Thus in very ancient times when a man was feizcd with fever he was faid to be taken with JlCf, fire, hence the name XIt/f«ro>, a fever. At length when they obfetved that ex- traordinary heat did not always accompany fever, they added another diftincYon—viz, increafed velocity of the blood; and thefe diftincYions obtained till the time of Pr. Boerhaave. He taught, that fever was infeparably connected with inflammation, . and to have a juft notion of the caufe of it, he thought it neceflary to choofe from the innumerable fymptoms that occur in all the variety of fevers, fome that are common to all; then from the confideration of thefc, the individual and fpecific nature of the fever is to be found out. The quicknefs of the pulfe was with Boerhaave the pathogno- monic or infeparable fign of a fever. Dr. Frederic Hoffman improved upon the Pathology of Boerhaave, who fuppofed that djjeafei arofe from altei Uttlons in the fluids merely, and taught that the greateft part