The sweating cure : the physiological basis and curative effects of the Turkish bath / by John Balbirnie.

  • John Balbirnie
Date:
1864
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The sweating cure : the physiological basis and curative effects of the Turkish bath / by John Balbirnie. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    and fill intermecliate parts, and back again from the extremitips. <^c., to the centre-;, of power. 2nd, from its immense superficies—constituting it tlie Urgest drain or waste pipe of the body. 3rd, and lastly, from its being nn organ bot'i everywhere patent to observation, and capable, without ininry, of standing a little rough treatment when necessary. But a still more interesting point of view of the functions of thesKtN, than even anything embraced in these comprehensive details—remains now to be developed. De'-uratiox, of which (as we have s<^en) it is a principal orgnn, is very jrrand work, and takes the precedence even of nutrition in the rank of importance to life. But the highest, the first, the most indispensable function of nnimals, the skin shares in common with the henrt and lungs. It justly boasts to be a coadjutor with them in the prime faculty of circulating ihh: blood. Without cutaneous exhalation, there C'vld he no motio i of the fluids ! The vital ctirrent would Come to an almost instMUtaneous stand. So that, however great our adm ration may be of the ec()non)v of the skin, as the chief eliminator of the carbon and lactic ar-id of the system, our ideas of its supreme utility and impoitance will rise still higher, when we view it as an o -gan quite as essential as either the heart or lungs to the circulation of the blood ! This is a point of view many are not prepared for. Itevertheless it is the truth. It is ground that, so far as we know, has not yet been o<;cupied by the expounders of this Oriental question and it is, moreover, ground that is decisive. On this alone the whole merits of the Turkish Bath may be safely based. Its partizans need seek no other Herein al ne rests its all-sufficient defence. Some of the facts on which the true philosophy of the Turkish Bath is based may be easily comprehended, and very briefly summed up. The blood, as is well understood, describes a twofold circuit in the body. 1st, that through the lungs ; 2nd, that through the general system The heart, a double organ, and as a great force-pump for each circle,is placed at the junction bet.veen the two. But, mark well, the propulsive power, or force-pump function, of the heart, extends only a comparatively small way in the route the blood has to travel, i.e., only through the more capacious trunks, and palpable vessels. When we come to the ca- illary circulation (which is by far the greater moiety of the whole) we find supplementary local forces invoked to aid the transit of the vital fluid. We say nothing here of the alleged influence of the ganglionic nerves—of the contractile power of the capillaries—of the atiinities and reactions existing between the vessels and their contents. These may be good hypotheses, but they are not demonstrahle agents. The grand motor power we have now to introduce, viz , cutaneous and PULMONARY TRANSPIRATION, is demonsti^able and point blank. There is an exact analogy and co-relation between the functions of the leaf in plants, an-.l those of the skin and lung- of animals. [The lungs may be likened to an extended inward skin, rolled u{) into folds or convolu- tions, honeiicomh-Kise, lor ihe purpose of close-packing.] Now the force, or iiifiueccc, which promoter tlw flrscem of tlio sap in plants, vii., t]Mi