Principles and practice of hygeio-medical science / by Geo. H. Taylor and Chas. F. Taylor.
- George H. Taylor
- Date:
- 1857
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Principles and practice of hygeio-medical science / by Geo. H. Taylor and Chas. F. Taylor. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)
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![2. Sensational life—the power of perception through the senses, and embracing also all impressions capable of producing actions. 3. The Intellectual life, or the manifestations of the reasoning powers. The Hygeio-Medical Art consists of such means as serve to promote these several ends, each in accordance with its natural wants. I. Okganio Life is promoted by attention to the following particu- lars, viz.: (1.) By furnishing the growing parts with just the materials their growth requires, and embraced in the constituents of proper food and air. (2.) By being equally scrupulous in rejecting all matters, of what- ever name or kind, that do not properly belong to food. [Drugs an- tagonize the organic force, and subtract from it, by the amount of their chemical value.} (3.) By avoiding a disproportion in the relation of the different con- stituents of food. (4.) By excluding from the body all effete matters, chiefly by means of respiration. (5.) By allowing the body to part with its heat, either constantly (as in the open air), or by special exposures (as bathing), or by exercise, so as to induce respiration to an extent sufficient to free the system from impediments to its action. [Respiration is always in the ratio of the abstraction of heat, hence bathing is an efficient means of increasing it.] (6.) By repressing excited action (irritability), by («) supplying vari- ations of temperature, with proper restrictions; (b) by special move- ments (Kinesipathy),; (c) by the use of the bath of compressed air. II. Sensational Life.—The functions of the nervous system require special attention in the invalid. The natural and most wholesome incentive to nervous power is the impression that is constantly received by the whole sensory surface viz., a temperature below its standard. The amount of heat the body loses meets with frequent variations from natural causes, and can easily be varied at will through the instrumentality of bathing. Tempera- ture has a relation to nearly every function of the body, hence they are all subjective to its influence through the nervous system. We avoid producing that unnatural sensibility of the nervous system](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21158174_0006.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
