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Untitled Article
long continued elevated temperature on the circulation of the blood in man is highly curious and instructive . It stimulates the whole external surface of the body , and determines a large quantity of blood to the capillary vessels of the skin . Long continued cold , on the contrary , constringes these vessels ; checks the circulation through them , propels the current to the interior of the body , and causes it to flow
principally in the organs placed in the internal cavities . In this climate , therefore , we all have a different circulation in summer and in winter . In summer the mass of the blood is flowing on the external surface of the capillaries of the skin . In winter the mass of the blood is flowing in the internal viscera , in the capillaries of the thoracic and abdominal organs . The circulation in the summer is essentially external ; in the winter essentially internal . And by this arrangement ,
the generation of animal heat is husbanded , and the great mass of the blood is placed where the external cold can least affect it . And this also explains why alterations of temperature are so injurious ; why just when spring is succeeding to winter , autumn to summer , and winter to autumn , colds , inflammations , fevers are so prevalent ; because a few mild days of spring fill the capillary vessels of the skin as though it were summer , and then comes back suddenly a winter ' s cold with a summer circulation /
To these evils , only to be avoided by proper clothing , the young are particularly liable . 4 young of all animals are peculiarly susceptible to cold . The extent to which it obstructs their temperature and proves fatal to them is greater than could have been conceived without positive evidence of it . But it is proved by direct experiment , both in birds and on different
species of mammalia , that a degree of cold which will cause the temperature of an adult to fall about 1 ° or at most l £° , will cause that of the young of the same species to fall 20 ° ; and consequently that a degree of cold which will only stimulate and invigorate the healthy adult , will prove rapidly fatal to the young . And this is perhaps even more true of the young of the human being than of that of any other animal . '
From the last lecture , in which the different stages of life were enumerated , we make the following extracts , forming a part of what was said on infancy , childhood , and adult , or mature age . 4 The second epoch of infancy extends from the seventh month to the end of the second year ; at the commencement of this period , the first dentition is completely begun , and it is completed at its termination . The changes proceeding in the different organs and functions
during the first epoch advance rapidly in this . The brain becomes more and more developed , and its functions more and more active and extended . Sensation becomes more exact , and embraces a wider range ; perception becomes more perfect , and phenomena of mind appear ; speech and voluntary motion commence ; passions , emotions , affections are formed and manifested—new powers , the introduction of which into the economy exercises over it a prodigious influence for good or for evil , for health or for sickness , for pleasure or for pain .
' And now is the period for the formation and direction of moral habits . Moral habits indeed will be formed 6 r rather confirmed , for their forrnation m > fi commenced long before this—but now they will
Untitled Article
204 Dr . Southwood Smith on the Animal Economy ,
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1833, page 204, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2610/page/60/
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