Page:Advice to young ladies on their duties and conduct in life - Arthur - 1849.djvu/107

Rh are destined to die before the prime of life is reached. That this is most generally the case is certainly true; but we do not believe that the result follows as an absolute consequence of the hereditary predisposition, but from an abuse of health, by which latent causes are excited into active causes. On this subject, it may be useful to quote the remarks of a French medical writer by way of authority. He says, “Besides the occasional causes of chronic pneumonia, (consumption,) which are all the agents that excite, stimulate, or irritate the organs of respiration, and consequently the same as those of acute pneumonia, there are predisposing causes. Predisposition consists in a peculiar irritability of the lung, which renders it more sensible to the impression of irritating agents, and, consequently, more apt to contract irritation. There is no age, no sex, no temperament, which may not be affected with pneumonia; but experience has demonstrated that the predisposition, the peculiar irritability of which we speak, is most frequently found among individuals who have the constitution which has been named phthisical, the characters of which are the following: narrow chest, long and small neck, slender limbs, a tall, thin stature, delicate skin, circumscribed redness of the cheek, the lymphatico-sanguine