A lecture introductory to the theory and practice of midwifery : including the history of that science; with a view of its several branches, and the proper means of attaining a perfect knowledge of the whole. Also animadversions on the qualification and deportment of an accoucheur: publicly delivered at his theatre, in Craven-Street, London / by John Leake ...

Date:
M,DCC,LXXXII. [1782]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A lecture introductory to the theory and practice of midwifery : including the history of that science; with a view of its several branches, and the proper means of attaining a perfect knowledge of the whole. Also animadversions on the qualification and deportment of an accoucheur: publicly delivered at his theatre, in Craven-Street, London / by John Leake ... Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    only circulation without fenfation, it refembles the growth of vegetables, and, like a parafite plant, germinates and ftrikes root in the womb. The folids of a foetus, even the bones themfelves, were once In a fluid ftate, and void of all fenfation; being derived from the common elements of matter taken into the body for nourifhment; and it appears highly probable, at leaf to me, that the extroardinary property refiding in matter, called Irri- tability ^ is the Jirfl inflrument which Nature employs towards the produBion of animal life. ’Tis owing to this, that the fenfitive plant fhrinks from the touch, and the flefh of flaughtered animals palpitates and trembles after death. Hence then, the embryo may be confidered as an organized body which advances to maturity by flow and infenflble de- grees : At firft it admits the circulation of fluids through its de- licate vafcular fyftem, and foon as it becomes Irritable; the pun Bum fanguineum faliens > the primum vivens and ultimum moriens, fo beautifully defcribed by the immortal Harvey, puts the animal machine in motion. In procefs of time, the diminutive being is endowed with life, motion and fenfation; and at lafl, when arrived at its utmoft] period of perfedlion in the adult, becomes poffeifed of thofe fublime mental faculties which do honor to human nature. Such once 4 were