Page:A History of the Medical Department of the University of Pennsylvania.djvu/172

 upon the operations of the several organs of the body, and was disposed to attribute the effects of medicines to the operation of sympathy. In the elaborate exposition of his doctrines by his biographer, Dr. Thomson, we are informed that he was aware of the consensual operation of organs through the medium of the nervous system. It was known that sensation and motor power belonged to the nerves, and through them the brain issued its mandates. It was supposed that the ganglionic system controlled the functions of organs, and presided over nutrition; but with all the exercise of ingenuity of Robert Whytt, of Unzer and of Prochaska, of John Hunter and Bichat, nothing had been accomplished towards the development of the true doctrine of sympathy, the determination of the specific functions of the individual nerves, and the agency which special portions of the brain and spinal system exert over them.

The advocacy of pure vitalism, and of the predominance of sympathetic association in the vital operations of the economy, with a dependence for their activity upon the nervous system, characterized the school of Montpellier, first in the teachings of Bordeu, and more particularly in the writings of Barthez. The latter author separated the sympathies into general and particular. To the general were referred associations which exist between the organs to maintain their functions (synergies), as well as mechanical and functional relations. A particular sympathy, he conceived, is shown to exist between two organs “whenever an affection of one occasions sensibly and frequently a corresponding affection of the other, without its being possible to refer the succession of affections to casual coincidence, to the mechanical action of one organ upon another, or to the synergy or co-operation of several organs in the performance of some particular function, or in the production of some disturbance of the living body. Such sympathy ought not less to be recognized, although it cannot be submitted to constant and general laws; and we are unable to state in what way the modification of an organ primarily affected is necessary for the production of such sympathetic effect; why the sympathy of two