Essays on pathology and therapeutics: being the substance of the course of lectures (Volume 1).

  • Dickson, Samuel Henry, 1798-1872.
Date:
1845
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Essays on pathology and therapeutics: being the substance of the course of lectures (Volume 1). 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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    one or more of the functions; but such aberration, it must be admitted, is in itself a mere symptom, an eiFect—resulting from a cause; the effect external and cognizable—the cause internal and occult; and as we know in very few instances, the intimate na- ture and mode of action of this cause, we can know very little of the indispensable condition upon which disease depends, and which indeed forms an essential part of the meaning of the term; nay, although as I have said above, a cognizable irregularity is so uniformly implied in the state of disease, the doctrine is not without apparent exceptions; as for example Avhen an exposed subject has become infected by contagion or malaria. During the latent period that ensues, as also in the apyrexia of some in- termittent fevers, and in the intervals of certain recurrent affec- tions, gout, epilepsy, neuralgia, he seems to enjoy his usual health, without any sensations of discomfort or disturbance of function that can be detected or described ; but in this state of inevitable predisposition to some impending malady, it would be absurd indeed to regard him as in a sound or physiological condition of body. As then we always comprise in our consideration of dis- ease not only the aberration of function in which it might at first view be supposed to consist, but also some reference to the source or origin of the disturbance, the first step to the proper understanding of our subject must be an inquiry into the Causes of disease. This will suggest and lead on to a careful observa- tion of the parts upon which these causes act, and whose move- ments they disorder, and thus we shall find ourselves engaged in the question as to the Seats of diseases. The Phenomena or symp- toms which result from the efficient impression of the various causes of disease upon the parts which they affect, will of neces- sity engage our notice in this connection; and here we shall de- rive much advantage from the investigations and discoveries of pathological anatomy, a department of our science hitherto too little cultivated in our schools, but now fast attaining its proper standard of estimation. Hence we shall proceed to the consideration of the Effects of disease, or the changes wrought upon the system by its presence, its characteristic influences or its protraction. Thus we shall learn the modes and circumstan- ces of death, that event which is destined to terminate all orga- nic existence, but which assumes so awful an aspect in its rela-