An inaugural dissertation on absorption / by Goodridge Wilson, of Virginia.

  • Wilson, Goodridge
Date:
MDCCXCVII [1797]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An inaugural dissertation on absorption / by Goodridge Wilson, of Virginia. 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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    As it is found impossible to make any tiling inj into the Vessels of the Mother, pass into (hose of th'J Fetus in Utero, or, vice versa, it is very rationally conclud- ed, that their communication is kept up by Absorption in the Placentaij and as no vessels but arteries and veins are known to exist there, it is infered that, either the one or the other must do the office of Absorbents, and the veins are the most likely of the two to do it. Wf, should not wonder, if this doctrine of Venom Absorption, so well supported by analogy, argument, and experiment, met with a very general acceptance. Ac- cordingly we find it adopted, and supported, by a num- ber of Writers, whose names and authority in Medi- cine, are second to none. Medical Philosophy in its progress to perfection, seems to keep pace with improvements in Anatomy ; of this our present subject affords a striking instance. In the year 1622, Asellius* an Italian, discovered vessels on the Mesentery of some quadrupeds that he was disse&ing alive, which [vessels] contained a white fluid: he thought they terminated in the liver, and said that they absorbed chyle from the intestine?, and carried it into the blood, therefore called them Vasa Lactea. Though he never saw the lacleals in the human subject, yet he believed from analogy, that they existed, and asserted it roundly. NOTE. * De Lactibus, sive de venis Lacteis Dissert.