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On Vitality. 34$
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
judgment : ail its infirmities seem to be corporeal infirmities , or those arising from ignorance , ldiotism does not appear ever to be in the mind ; for on removing' the corporeal impediment , the mind again manifests its former energies . That there should be this difference between the two
we cannot be surprised at when we consider the difference of their composition - the whole corporeal developement manifests the fleeting nature of the materials of which it is formed . It is diseased when any particle of it is not passing away : detention for a moment beyond its due time is the commencement of all the maladies of
life : such an ever-passing cause cannot possibly be more than an instrument to the enduring and ever-improving principle of vitality , the seat of consciousness and . knowledge , the mind or morejustly the mnn , as being the only part that can feel happy in its own identity , and conscious of its past and present existence .
That organization is only the instrument of vitality , and that the peculiar principle of vitality has a seat or throne of action from whence by its energy , through the instrumentality of the organized system , it rules the whole animal fabric , is evident from the uses of the two
sets of nerves , the cerebral and the sympathetic . In animals without vertebrae , the sympathetic appear to be the only nerves , and the sole conduits of the action of vegetable life . It is by them absorption , digestion , circulation , secretiou and nutrition are carried , on without the interference of
the will . To them it is supposed that the numerous diseases received by impression may be referred , whilst the peculiar point or theatre of vitality is exclusively the iscat of thought , consciousness , determination in id action .
In the animal system , the sympathetic nerves exteud from the base uf the skull to the lower part of the sacrum , and are nourished by all the nerves of the spinal marrow from
which they receive branches ; numerous ganglions , considered by some us little brains , divide them into systems , in which ganglions , or bulgings , is elaborated the fluid they transmit to' the nerves . The numerous filaments of these nerves are
Untitled Article
endowed . with the most acute sensibility ; and as they regulate all the offices of the viscera ,, such is their sensibility that bruises , wounds and disorders in the epigastic region will
sometimes occasion such an intensity of pain , as not only to disorder the whole functions of life , but even to extinguish the vital powers . It is through them that life depends not on the fickleness of the mind : the
heart , the stomach , the viscera , &c . &c , are all independent of the will . Wherever they unite with the cerebral nerves , there , and only there , the mind has , according to such union , power over the nervous action : when internal inflammation
takes place , the irritation is conveyed to the brain , and from the brain by an internal nervous sensation to the heart , and the organs of respiration . Wherever there is intensity
of pain in any part of the body , the knowledge of it is conveyed by the sympathetic nerves to the cerebral , and by the cerebral to the seat of consciousness . By a pressure sufficient to deaden the action of the
sympathetic nerve in the part affected , though the disorder is not abated , the sensation of the existence of the disorder ceases , by the pain being immediately stopped , and p-roves by this consequence , that life is not actually
present , if I may so express it , through all parts of the body , though its action extends to all parts . If it was universally present , it must be at all times and under every circumstance in a state of consciousness , but it is evident from this circumstance ,
that when the communication with the affected part is interrupted , its consciousness respecting what passes in that part ceases . Nerves therefore are not mind , but instruments for its
use . It has been proved by numerous experiments on animals , that whilst the spinal marrow is not injured , life is not destroyed even by the removing of all the intestines , but you destroy or rather paralise all below
the vertebra above which you cut the spinal marrow , beginning from the last vertebra , and ascending one by one to the top : the circulation remains iu the parts below , the remaining nerves and muscles exist , but consciousness is gone . The com-
On Vitality. 34$
On Vitality . 34 $
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1817, page 343, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2465/page/23/
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