Volume 8
A dictionary of practical medicine, comprising general pathology, the nature and treatment of diseases, morbid structures and the disorders especially incidental to climates, to the sex, and to the different epochs of life. With ... prescriptions, ... bibliography ... formulae / [James Copland].
- James Copland
- Date:
- 1832-1858
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A dictionary of practical medicine, comprising general pathology, the nature and treatment of diseases, morbid structures and the disorders especially incidental to climates, to the sex, and to the different epochs of life. With ... prescriptions, ... bibliography ... formulae / [James Copland]. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![cularly in the ganglions in connection with the grey organic fibres, and in the muscular fibriles, both involuntary and voluntary. But, whether these corpuscles are formed before the large nerv- ous masses connected with sensation, volition, &e. or contemporaneously with these masses, is of little consequence. The most important question is — What is the function performed by these corpuscles? When we recollect that these bodies are found dis- seminated through the albuminous and otherwise almost inorganised structure of polypi, and through- out the tissues of others of the lowest animals, which manifest irritability as their most important function, and when we know that these animals are capable of being multiplied by division, and that parts cut off from them have separate exist- ences, itseems highly probable that the vital func- tions they display — that irritability proceeds from this peculiar organisation. Having further ob- served these granulated corpuscles disseminated through other tissues, in an abundance propor- tionate to the amount or grade of vital function — having detected these corpuscles in great numbers within the delicate membrane investing the primi- tive fasciculi of voluntary muscular fibriles, and in the flattened fibriles of involuntary muscular parts, —having seen still greater numbers of them com- prised in the structure of the organic nervous fibres, and constituting the chief part of the gan- glia, — and having moreover found them giving origin to the grey and solid filaments of organic nerves, as well as comprised in or embraced by these filaments, it may be inferred that they are mainly concerned in the production of the various grades of irritability or contractility manifested by the tissues in which they * are thus disseminated, and to which they are thus supplied. 6. The views which I published in 1820, 1824 and 1829, respecting the constitution, connections, and functions of the organic or ganglial nervous system, have been more recently (from 183] till 1840) confirmed by the researches of Rerzius, Gitray, Miurer, and Vatentin. ‘The organic, or grey nerves, do not consist, as the motor and sensitive nerves of the spino-cerebral axis do, of parallel tubes containing a liquid matter ; but are altogether homogeneous, pale, almost transparent, and peculiar in their form, distribution, and con- nections. They are intimately connected with the granulated or nucleated corpuscles disseminated throughout the tissues, and they either enclose, or are otherwise associated with, these corpuscles or globules in great numbers, both in the ganglia and in the plexuses and ramifications. The grey, or ganglial nerves, thus seem to arise from the organic globules just described, especially from those con- tained in the ganglia. The ganglia should there- fore be regarded as the central organs of the or- ganic nervous system ; and the white fibres which run to and through them, especially in the lateral chords of sympathetic gangha, without having any * SCHWANN and more recent microscopic observers and physiological writers, both foreign and British, suppose that these granulated corpuscles are merely the nuclei of the cells from which, according to him, all the tissues are aeveloped. That this, however, is not the case, and that these corpuscles are intimately connected with the per- formance of important functions, are shown by their higher and more complex organisation, and by the cir- cumstances of their constituting the principl part of the composition of the ganglia and of the organic nerves, J would therefore denominate them the organic corpuscles. 601 The organic, or grey portions of the nervous sys- tem, and more especially of those parts of it lodged in the abdominal, thoracic, and cervical regions, preside over the organic and truly vital functions ; and their connections with the cerebro-spinal centres are such as evidently show that they are ra- mified thither in order to endow these centres with the organic nervous power in common with other parts of the ceconomy ; nerves proceeding from these centres also being ramified to the ganglia to supply them with the sensitive and motor influences. The nervous connections or ramifications between the ganglia and cerebro-spinal axis thus consist of the solid or homogeneous grey fibres of organic nerves conveying the strictly vital or vegetative influence to the brain and spinal chord, and of the whitish tubular fibres of motor and sensitive nerves trans- mitting the influence of these organs in various degrees to the viscera engaged in the strictly vital operations. In those parts which perform complex functions, as the organs constituting the face, mouth, throat, &c., and the organs of generation, which are endowed with the functions of secretion, sensation, and motion, the nerves proceeding thither consist both of the grey fibres of organic life, and the white tubular fibres of sensitive and motor nerves. 7. From what has been here stated,—from the most recent researches,—‘and from the conforma- tion detected by microscopic observation, the results of my own investigations many years since, as pub- lished in the works already referred to, have been fully confirmed, namely, that the organic or gang- lial nervous system presides over the strictly vital functions, and that all the grades and manifest. ations of irritability or contractility proceed from this source. It is extremely probable that the organic or nucleated corpuscles disseminated throughout the structures,and particularly in fibrous and contractile parts, bestow a certain share or grade of contractility upon them, and that an ad- ditional or even a principal share of this property is contributed by the ganglia and organic nerves distributed to them. Indeed this is shown by nu- merous observations made by me in 1812 and 1813, when it was proved that the hearts of fishes continued to contract for a considerable time after they were removed from the animals, and from all the nervousstructures external to themselves; whilst influence of the ganglia on the involuntary muscles was proved by the application of powerful stimuli peristaltic movements of the intestines that conti- nued for some time. (See a notice of these expe- riments in my “‘ Notes,” &c., already referred to.) 8. In the organic muscles, which possess either a power of almost continued action, or a certain rhythm of action, as the heart and alimentary canal, the organic nerves are plentifully distri- buted, and abound with the organic corpuscles above described; showing that the unexhausted irritability of these parts is chiefly owing to this organisation. ‘The facts and arguments adduced so many years since by me, in proof of the de- pendence of irritability upon the organic nervous system, have been very recently urged with little variation by Dr, FLercner and by several German](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b33285330_0008_0127.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
