Physiological researches on life and death / by Xavier Bichat ; translated from the French, by F. Gold.

  • Xavier Bichat
Date:
[1815]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Physiological researches on life and death / by Xavier Bichat ; translated from the French, by F. Gold. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    249/300 (page 237)
    terious substance be violent, it kills before the action of the black blood can have produced much effect, if weak, it is the black blood, which is principally the cause of death. The asphyxiz then, which are produced by the gasses, differ only, in consequence of the nature of the deleterious substance, which varies ad- infinitum. In some of the aeriform fluids indeed it is supposed to be known, but in the greater number of them itis not so: I shall notice therefore in a general way the effects, which result from the action of the deleterious substance, remarking at the same time, that the symptoms by which they are displayed, are strongly or weakly marked, according to the age and tempera- ment of the individual. * Deleterious substances introduced into the lungs, to- gether with the mephitic vapours of which they form a part, can act only in two ways. Ist, by affecting the nerves of the lungs, which re-act on the brain. 2d lly, by passing into the blood, and exercising their in- fluence, by means of the circulation on the various organs of the system. | IT can easily believe that the simple action of such a substance on the nerves of the lungs, may have a very marked effect on the econemy, and be capable of troubling the functions of the sytem very sensibly ; much indeed in the same way as with some individuals a mere odour, or the sight of a hideous object, will occasion syncope, in the same way that an irritating enema wil] suddenly awake the system into life, or the introduction of certain substances within the stomach, will be felt throughout the body, before such sub- stances can have passed into the circulatory torrent. We meet at every moment with examples of these very’. remarkable Fos produced by the simple im- j pressions