Popular Lectures on Zoonomia Part 12

If we examine separately the different exciting powers which act on the body, we shall find abundant confirmation of this law. Besides the exciting powers which act on the body, which I mentioned; viz.

heat, food, and air, there are several others, such as light, sound, odorous substances, &c. which will be examined in their proper places. These powers, acting by a certain impulse, and producing a vigorous action of the body, are called stimulants, and life we shall find to be the effect of these and other stimulants acting on the excitability.

The stimulus of light, though its influence in this respect is feeble, when compared with some other external powers, yet has its proportion of force. This stimulus acts upon the body through the medium of the organ of vision. Its influence on the animal spirits strongly demonstrates its connexion with animal life, and hence we find a cheerful and depressed state of mind in many people, and more especially in invalids, to be intimately connected with the presence or absence of the sun. Indeed to be convinced of the effects of light we have only to examine its influence on vegetables. Some of them lose their colour when deprived of it, many of them discover a partiality to it in the direction of their flowers; and all of them perspire oxygen gas only when exposed to it; nay it would seem that organization, sensation, spontaneous motion, and life, exist only at the surface of the earth, and in places exposed to light. Without light nature is lifeless, inanimate, and torpid.

Let us now examine if the action of light upon the body is subject to the law that has been mentioned. If a person be kept in darkness for some time, and then be brought into a room in which there is only an ordinary degree of light, it will be almost too oppressive for him, and will appear excessively bright; and if he have been kept for a considerable time in a very dark place, the sensation will be very painful. In this case, while the retina or optic nerve was deprived of light, its excitability acc.u.mulated, or became more easily affected by light: for if a person go out of one room into another, which has an equal degree of light, he will perceive no effect.

You may convince yourselves of the truth of this law, by a very simple experiment; shut your eyes, and cover them for a minute or two with your hand, and endeavour not to think of the light, or what you are doing; then open them, and the daylight will for a short time appear brighter.

If you look attentively at a window for about two minutes, then cast your eyes upon a sheet of white paper, the shape of the window frames will be perfectly visible upon the paper; those parts which express the wood work appearing brighter than the other parts. The parts of the optic nerve on which the image of the frame falls, are covered by the wood work from the action of the light; the excitability of these parts will therefore acc.u.mulate; and the parts of the paper which fall upon them must of course appear brighter.

If a person be brought out of a dark room where he has been confined, into a field covered with snow, when the sun s.h.i.+nes, it has been known to affect him so much as to deprive him of sight altogether.

This law is well exemplified when we come into a dark room in the day time. At first we can see nothing; but with the absence of light the excitability acc.u.mulates, and we begin to have an imperfect glimpse of the objects around us; after a while the excitability of the retina is so far acc.u.mulated, and we become so sensible of the feeble light reflected from the surfaces of bodies, that we can discern their shapes, and sometimes even their colours.

Let us next consider what happens with respect to heat, which is a uniform and active stimulus in promoting life. The extensive influence of heat upon animal life is evident from its decay and suspension during winter, in certain animals, and from its revival upon the approach and action of the vernal sun.

If this stimulus is for some time abstracted from the whole body, or from any part, the excitability acc.u.mulates, or, in other words, if the body has been for some time exposed to cold, it is more liable to be affected by heat afterwards applied. Of this also you may be convinced by an easy experiment. Put one of your hands into cold water, and then put both into water which is considerably warm: the hand which has been in the cold water will feel much warmer than the other. If you handle some snow in one hand while you keep the other in the bosom, that it may be of the same heat with the body, and then bring both within the same distance of the fire, the heat will affect the cold hand infinitely more than the warm one. This is a circ.u.mstance of the utmost importance, and ought always to be carefully attended to. When a person has been exposed to a severe degree of cold for some time, he ought to be cautious how he comes near a fire, for his excitability will be so much acc.u.mulated that the heat will act very violently, often producing a great degree of inflammation, and even sometimes of mortification. This is a very common cause of chilblains, and other similar inflammations. When the hands, or any other parts of the body, have been exposed to a violent cold, they ought first to be put in cold water, or even rubbed with snow, and exposed to warmth in the gentlest manner possible.

The same law regulates the action of food, or matters taken into the stomach: if a person have for some time been deprived of food, or have taken it in small quant.i.ty, whether it be meat or drink, or if he have taken it of a less stimulating quality, he will find that when he returns to his ordinary mode of life it will have more effect upon him than before he lived abstemiously.

Persons who have been shut up in a coal work, from the falling in of the pit, and have had nothing to eat for two or three days, have been as much intoxicated by a bason of broth, as a person in common circ.u.mstances with two or three bottles of wine.

This circ.u.mstance was particularly evident among the poor sailors who were in the boat with Captain Bligh after the mutiny. The Captain was sent by government to convey some plants of the bread fruit tree from Otaheite to the West Indies: soon after he left Otaheite the crew mutinied, and put the captain and most of the officers, with some of the men, on board the s.h.i.+p's boat, with a very short allowance of provisions, and particularly of liquors, for they had only six quarts of rum, and six bottles of wine, for nineteen people, who were driven by storms about the south sea, exposed to wet and cold all the time, for nearly a month; each man was allowed only a teaspoonful of rum a day, but this teaspoonful refreshed the poor men, benumbed as they were with cold, and faint with hunger, more than twenty times the quant.i.ty would have done those who were warm and well fed; and had it not been for the spirit having such power to act upon men in their condition, they never could have outlived the hards.h.i.+ps they experienced. All these facts, and many others which might be brought forward, establish, beyond dispute, the truth of the law I mentioned; viz. that when the powerful action of the exciting powers ceases for some time, the excitability acc.u.mulates, or becomes more capable of receiving their actions, and is more powerfully affected by them.

When the legs or arms have for some time been exposed to cold, the slightest exertion, or even the stimulus of a gentle heat, throws the muscles into an inordinate action or cramp. The glow of the skin, in coming out of a cold bath, may be explained on the same principle.

The heat of the skin is diminished by the conducting power of the water, in consequence of which the excitability of the cutaneous vessels acc.u.mulates; and the same degree of heat afterwards applied, excites these now more irritable vessels to a great degree of action.

On this principle depends the supposed stimulant or tonic powers of cold, the nature of whose action has been much mistaken by physicians and physiologists. Heat is allowed to be a very powerful stimulus; but cold is only a diminution of heat; how then can cold act as a stimulus? In my opinion it never does; but its effects may be explained by the general law which we have been investigating. When a lesser stimulus than usual has been applied to the body, the excitability acc.u.mulates, and is then affected by a stimulus even less than that which, before this acc.u.mulation, produced no effect whatever. The cold only renders the body more subject to the action of heat afterwards applied, by allowing the excitability to be acc.u.mulated. No person, I believe, ever brought on an inflammation, or inflammatory complaint, by exposure to cold, however long might have been that exposure, or however great the cold; but if a person have been out in the cold air, and afterwards come into a warm room, an inflammatory complaint will most probably be the consequence.

Indeed coming out of the cold air into a moderately warm room generally produces a lively and continued warmth in the parts that have been exposed.

The second general law is, that when the exciting powers have acted with violence for a considerable time, the excitability becomes exhausted, or less fit to be acted on; and this we shall be able to prove by a similar induction.

Let us first examine the effects of light upon the eye: when it has acted violently for some time on the optic nerve, it diminishes the excitability of that nerve, and renders it incapable of being affected by a quant.i.ty of light, that would at other times affect it.

When we have been walking out in the snow, if we come into a room, we shall scarcely be able to see any thing for some minutes.

If you look stedfastly at a candle for a minute or two, you will with difficulty discern the letters of a book which you were before reading distinctly. When our eyes have been exposed to the dazzling blaze of phosphorus in oxygen gas, we can scarcely see any thing for some time afterwards, and if we look at the sun, the excitability of the optic nerve is so overpowered by the strong stimulus of his light, that nothing can be seen distinctly for a considerable time.

If we look at the setting sun, or any other luminous object of a small size, so as not greatly to fatigue the eye, this part of the retina becomes less sensible to smaller quant.i.ties of light; hence when the eyes are turned on other less luminous parts of the sky, a dark spot is seen resembling the shape of the sun, or other luminous object on which our eyes have been fixed.

On this account it is that we are some time before we can distinguish objects in an obscure room, after coming from broad daylight, as I observed before.

We shall next consider the action of heat. Suppose water to be heated to 90 degrees, if one hand be put into it, it will appear warm; but if the other hand be immersed in water heated to 120 degrees, and then put into the water heated to 90 degrees, that water will appear cold, though it will still feel warm to the other hand: for the excitability of the hand has been exhausted, by the greater stimulus of heat, to such a degree as to be insensible of a less stimulus.

Before we go into a warm bath, the temperature of the air may seem very warm and pleasant to the body, even though exposed naked to it; but after we have remained for some time in the warm bath, we feel the air, when we come out, very cool and chilling, though it is of the same temperature as before; for the hot water exhausts the excitability of the vessels of the skin, and renders them less capable of being affected by a smaller degree of heat. Thus we see that the effects of the hot and cold bath are different and opposite; the one debilitates by stimulating, and the other produces stimulant or tonic effects by debilitating. This seeming paradox may, however, be easily explained by the principles we have laid down; and though the hot and cold bath produce such different effects, yet it is only the same fluid, with a small variation in the degree of temperature; but these effects depend on the temperature of our body being such, that a small decrease of it will produce an acc.u.mulation of excitability, while a small increase will exhaust it.

I shall next proceed to examine the effects of the substances taken into the stomach; and as the effects of spirituous and vinous liquors are a little more remarkable than those of food, I shall first begin with them.

A person who is not accustomed to take these liquors, will be intoxicated by a quant.i.ty that will produce no effect upon one who has been some time accustomed to take them; and when a person has used himself to these stimulants for some time, the ordinary powers which in common support life, will not have their proper effects upon him, because his excitability has been, in some measure, exhausted by these stimulants.

The same holds good with respect to tobacco and opium; a person accustomed to take opium, or smoke tobacco, will not be affected by a quant.i.ty that would completely intoxicate one not used to them, because the excitability has been so far exhausted by the use of those stimulants, that it cannot be acted on by a smaller quant.i.ty.

That tobacco or opium act in the same manner as wine or spirits, scarce needs any ill.u.s.tration. In Turkey they intoxicate themselves with opium, in the same way that people in this country do with wine and spirits; and those who have been accustomed to take this drug for a considerable time, feel languid and depressed when they are deprived of it for some time; they repair to the opium houses, as our dram drinkers do to the gin shops in the morning, sullen, dejected, and silent; in an hour or two, however, they are all hilarity. This shows the effects of opium to be stimulant. Tobacco intoxicates those who are not accustomed to it, and in those who are, it produces a serene and composed state of mind by its stimulating effects. Like opium and fermented liquors it exhausts the excitability, and leaves the person dejected, and all his senses blunted, when its stimulant effects are over.

That what is more properly called food acts in the same way as the substances I have just examined, is evident from the fact which I mentioned some time ago, that persons whose excitability has been acc.u.mulated, by their being deprived of food for some days, have been intoxicated by a bason of broth.

These facts, with innumerable others which will easily suggest themselves, prove, beyond doubt, the truth of the second law, namely, that when the exciting powers have acted violently, or for a considerable time, the excitability is exhausted, or less fit to be acted on.

Besides the stimulants which I have mentioned, there are several others which act upon the body, many of which will hereafter be considered: but all act according to this law; when their action has been suspended or diminished, the excitability of the organ on which they act becomes acc.u.mulated, or more easily affected by their subsequent action; and, on the contrary, when their action has been violent, or long continued, the excitability becomes exhausted, or less fit to receive their actions.

Among the stimulants acting on the body, we may mention sound, which has an extensive influence on human life. I need not mention here its numerous natural, or artificial sources, as that has been fully done in a preceding lecture. The effect of music, in stimulating and producing a state of mind approaching to intoxication, is universally known. Indeed the influence of certain sounds in stimulating, and thereby increasing, the powers of life, cannot be denied. Fear produces debility, which has a tendency to death. Sound obviates this debility, and restores to the system its natural degree of excitement. The schoolboy and the clown invigorate their trembling limbs, by whistling, or singing, as they pa.s.s by a country churchyard, and the soldier feels his departing courage recalled in the onset of a battle, by the "spirit stirring drum."

Intoxication is generally attended with a higher degree of life or excitement than is natural. Now sound will produce this effect with a very moderate portion of fermented liquor; hence we find persons much more easily intoxicated and highly excited at public entertainments, where there is music and loud talking, than in private companies, where no auxiliary stimulus is added to that of wine.

Persons who are dest.i.tute of hearing and seeing, possess life in a more languid state than other people; which is, in a great degree, owing to the want of the stimulus of light and noise.

Odours have likewise a very sensible effect in promoting animal life.

The effects of these will appear obvious in the sudden revival of life, which they produce, in cases of fainting. The smell of a few drops of hartshorn, or even a burnt feather, has frequently, in a few minutes, restored the system from a state of weakness, bordering upon death, to an equable and regular degree of excitement.

All these different stimuli undoubtedly produce the greatest effects upon their proper organs; thus the effect of light is most powerful on the eye; that of sound on the ear; that of food on the stomach, &c. But their effects are not confined to these organs, but extended over the whole body. The excitability exists, one and indivisible, over the whole system; we may call it sensibility, or feeling, to enable us to understand the subject. Every organ, or indeed the whole body, is endowed with this property in a greater or less degree, so that the effects produced by any stimulus, though they are more powerful on the part where they are applied, affect the whole system: odours afford an instance of this; and the p.r.i.c.k of a pin in the finger, produces excitement, or a stimulant effect, over the whole body.

From what has been said, it must be evident that life is the effect of a number of external powers, constantly acting on the body, through the medium of that property which we call excitability; that it cannot exist independent of the action of these stimuli; when they are withdrawn, though the excitability does not instantly vanish, there is no life, no motion, but the semblance of death. Life, therefore, is constantly supported by, and depends constantly on, the action of external powers on the excitability; without excitability these stimulants would produce no effect, and whatever may be the nature of the excitability, or however abundant it may be, still, without the action of external powers, no life is produced.

From what has been said, we may see the reason why life is in a languid state in the morning: It acquires vigour by the gradual and successive application of stimuli in the forenoon: It is in its most perfect state about midday, and remains stationary for some hours: From the diminution or exhaustion of the excitability, it lessens in the evening, and becomes more languid at bed time; when, from defect of excitability, the usual exciting powers will no longer produce their effect, a torpid state ensues, which we call sleep, during which, the exciting powers cannot act upon us; and this diminution of their action allows the excitability to acc.u.mulate; and, to use the words of Dr. Armstrong,

"Ere morn the tonic, irritable nerves Feel the fresh impulse, and awake the soul."

LECTURE X.

THE LAWS OF ANIMAL LIFE, CONTINUED.

In the last lecture I began to investigate the laws by which living bodies are governed, and the effects produced by the different exciting powers, which support life, upon the excitability, or vital principle. The facts which we examined led us to two conclusions, which, when properly applied, we shall find will explain most of the phenomena of life, both in health, and in disease. The conclusions alluded to, are these: when the exciting powers have acted more feebly, or weakly, than usual, for some time; or when their action is withdrawn, the excitability acc.u.mulates, and becomes more powerfully affected by their subsequent action. And, on the contrary, when the action of these powers has been exerted with violence, or for a considerable time, the excitability becomes exhausted, and less fit to receive their actions.

A number of facts were mentioned in proof of these conclusions, and a great number more might have been brought forwards, could it have served any other purpose than to have taken up our time, which I hope may be better employed.

This exhaustion of the excitability, by stimulants, may either be final, or temporary. We see animals, while the exciting powers continue to act, at first appear in their greatest vigour, then gradually decay, and at last come into that state, in which, from the long continued action of the exciting powers, the excitability is entirely exhausted, and death takes place.

We likewise see vegetables in the spring, while the exciting powers have acted on them moderately, and for a short time, arrayed in their verdant robes, and adorned with flowers of many mingling hues; but as the exciting powers, which support their life, continue to be applied, and some of them, for instance heat, as the summer advances, become increased, they first lose their verdure, then grow brown, and at the end of summer cease to live: because their excitability is exhausted by the long continued action of the exciting powers: and this does not happen merely in consequence of the heat of the summer decreasing, for they grow brown, and die, even in a greater degree of heat than that which in spring made them grow luxuriantly. In some of the finest days of autumn, in which the sun acts with more power than in the spring, the vegetable tribe droop, in consequence of this exhausted state of their excitability, which renders them nearly insensible of the action, even of a powerful stimulus.

These are examples of the final or irreparable exhaustion of the excitability; but we find also that it may be exhausted for a time, and acc.u.mulated again. Though the eye has been so dazzled by the splendour of light, that it cannot see an object moderately illuminated, yet if it be shut for some time, the excitability of the optic nerve will acc.u.mulate again, and we shall again be capable of seeing with an ordinary light.

We find also that we are not always equally capable of performing the functions of life. When we have been engaged in any exertion, either mental or corporeal, for some hours only, we find ourselves languid and fatigued, and unfit to pursue our labours much longer.

If in this state several of the exciting powers are withdrawn, particularly light and noise, and if we are laid in a posture which does not require much muscular exertion, we soon fall into that state which nature intended for the acc.u.mulation of the excitability, and which we call sleep. In this state many of the exciting powers cannot act upon us, unless applied with some violence, for we are insensible to their moderate action. A moderate degree of light, or a moderate noise, does not affect us, and the power of thinking, which very much exhausts the excitability, is in a great measure suspended. When the action of these powers has been suspended for six or eight hours, the excitability is again capable of being acted on, and we rise fresh and vigorous, and fit to engage in our occupations.

Sleep then is the method which nature has provided to repair the exhausted const.i.tution, and restore the vital energy. Without its refres.h.i.+ng aid, our worn out habits would scarcely be able to drag on a few days, or at most, a few weeks, before the vital spring would be quite run down: how properly therefore has our great poet called sleep "the chief nourisher in life's feast!"

From the internal sensations, often excited, it is natural to conclude, that the nerves of sense are not torpid during sleep, but that they are only precluded from the perception of external objects, by the external organs being in some way or other rendered unfit to transmit to them the impulses of bodies during the suspension of the power of volition; thus the eyelids are closed, in sleep, to prevent the impulse of light from acting on the optic nerve; and it is very probable that the drum of the ear is not stretched; it seems likewise reasonable to conclude, that something similar happens to the external apparatus of all our organs of sense, which may make them unfit for their office of perception during sleep.

The more violently the exciting powers have acted, the sooner is sleep brought on, because the excitability is sooner exhausted, and therefore sooner requires the means of renewing it: and, on the contrary, the more weakly these powers have acted, the less are we inclined to sleep. Instances of the first are, excess of exercise, strong liquors, or study; and of the latter, an under or deficient proportion of these.