Of the spleen, its description and history, uses and diseases, particularly the vapors, with their remedy. Being a lecture read at the Royal College of Physicians, London, 1722. To which is added some anatomical observations in the dissection of an elephant / [William Stukeley].

  • Stukeley, William, 1687-1765.
Date:
1723
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Of the spleen, its description and history, uses and diseases, particularly the vapors, with their remedy. Being a lecture read at the Royal College of Physicians, London, 1722. To which is added some anatomical observations in the dissection of an elephant / [William Stukeley]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    dow’d with the fame mufcular force, perfectly adapted to exert their con- ftringing faculty, beginning from the outiide and prefling inwards in aCiion: effectually bringing the whole body of the vifius into a lefs fpace, as the hand does a fponge by embracing it on all Tides: fo that its fuperficial di- menfions are reduc’d without wrinkling. This is the evident conference of its ttruCture, and no other. No poffible pretence for any excretory velfels after the nature of a gland, nor any fluid that can pafs or repafs into thefe interftices but blood, befide that of the animal fpirits into its little mufcles, whereby they perform this aCtion as other mufcles, and for the fake of which fo large branches of nerves are beflow’d on the part. For it’s not fufficient that the fpleen fliould barely fuck up any fluid, or that the blood fhould only run out and in thro’ it, which too wTould not have been without its ufe, and mult have been the cafe was its compolition blood- veffels alone; or as Malpighi compares it, that thefe fibres fhould only like iron cramps in a building,fuftain and conned this foftand vafcular bag of the fpleen: But further it’s necelfary that it be matter of a power of aCtion, of giving an impetus to the blood, of receiving one from it again, by the com¬ plicated contradions and relaxations of its mufcular fibres. Like the fyjlole and diajlole of the heart, to which Malpighi compares it, Bhil. tranfimmb. 71. p. 2170. where he firmly demonttrates, the little pillars in the fpleen, that form the network and cells thereof, to be really camous and mufcular fibres, contrading the Tides and body of the fpleen, exadly after a iimilar manner with the ventricles and auricles of the heart. And fcarce any au¬ thor that has wrote upon the part but fpeaks of them, fo obvious they be As Blafius in a dog, Borrichius in the civet-cat, &c. And hence the Ancients deriv’d their famous vis expultrix which enables it to fqueeze out the atra bilis. Malpighi takes particular notice of a membrane in the fpleen dittind from the propagations of the venular capfula. This is deriv’d from the proper or inward coat of the fpleen, and doubles it felf upon the entring veins and arteries, and accompanies all their ramifications on one hand, on the other it perpetually fends its fine films and expanfions from all the conca¬ vity of its inward furface upon the fibrous pillars and cells and cavities, and fo probably meets the expiring extremities of the arterial pipes. And all this feemsof vaftufe in defending the veins, arteries, nerves and fibrous pil¬ lars from abrafions and injuries, refulting from its frequent aCts of contracting and fqueezing the blood backwards and forwards. This likewife as was ob- ferved of the venular capfula is cut thro’ and thro’ with many holes, fome- time forms pipes like the other veffels, and fometime caverns and cells. And in this, many of the fibrous columns are implanted, from this many of them arife, as they traverfe all manner of ways the body of the vifeus. “ Glijfon, p 721. makes it a great queftion to what purpofe are its mufeu- “ lar fibres, fo peculiar to the part, every thing elfe of its contents be- “ ing common. And concludes that it mutt be of fome publick ufe “ to the body, and that ufe mutt be deduc’d from what is peculiar to “ it, as the gall-badder fliows at once the intent of the liver, the ureters “ of the kidneys, the afpera arteria of the Lungs, &c. But we may go a little further than Glijfon, and enforce the argument with double ttrength. For if the mufcular fibres in the penis, in the lungs, in the ventricles and auricles of the heart, in the ovaria of females are mott evidently defign’d for contraction and relaxation in their refpeCtive organs, we may reafona- bly conclude the fplenic fibres, which are perfectly the fame, are defign’d for