An introduction to medical literature, including a system of practical nosology : intended as a guide to students, and an assistant to practitioners. Together with detached essays, on the study of physic, on classification, on chemical affinities, on animal chemistry, on the blood, on the medical effects of climates, on the circulation, and on palpitation / by Thomas Young.

Date:: 1823

Credit: An introduction to medical literature, including a system of practical nosology : intended as a guide to students, and an assistant to practitioners. Together with detached essays, on the study of physic, on classification, on chemical affinities, on animal chemistry, on the blood, on the medical effects of climates, on the circulation, and on palpitation / by Thomas Young. 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.

590/700 page 556

It was accidentally observed that alkalis, taken internally, were beneficial in cases of stone, and that vegetable acids favoured the production of such as depeuded on uric acid. But it is often impossible to diminish the quantity of acid secreted, by the use of alkalis ; and I have in vain attempted to remove a morbid excess of alkali by giving acids. In a gouty person of middle age, the urine was turbid and alka- line, containing the earthy phosphates in suspension. I gave him sulfuric acid, without effect; and afterwards phosphoric acid, but the excess of alkali remained, until the dose was so increased as to have a cathartic effect; the secretion then became acid, and deposited uric acid, as long as the cathar- sis continued, but resumed its morbid state when this effect subsided, although the dose of the acid remained the same. I afterwards tried vinegar, but with no greater success. Brande has lately attempted to show the inefficacy of alkalis on the uric calculus. Dr. Henry, finding that the urates do not form a precipitate with the muriate of magnesia, and concluding that the urate of magnesia must be a soluble salt, advised a trial of this earth, which, according to Braude’s report, has completely succeeded, so that after 15 or 20 grains of magnesia had been taken morning and even- ing for a fortnight, all the superfluous uric acid was carried off, and the patient was completely cured. Vauquelin has examined the nature of the seminal fluid ; it gradually deposits [crystals of] bone earth, which are probably a product of its decomposition. Its characteristic substance, which was at first viscid, becomes in a short time fluid, even when the air is excluded ; and instead of being alkaline, it becomes acid. [In the first state it is insoluble in water, and is hardened by boiling, afterwards it is soluble, and not coagulable by heat. Afh. III. 10.] In the soft roes of fishes, examined by Fourcroy and Vauquelin, a remarkable substance was found, insoluble both in water and in alcohol, affording, by distillation in close vessels, phosphorus, partly uncombined, and partly dissolved in the

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