142 Circulation of the Blood 



arteries, nor other parts of living animals. Some 

 speak of corporeal, others of incorporeal spirits : and 

 they who advocate the corporeal spirits will have the 

 blood, or the thinner portion of the blood, to be the 

 bond of union with the soul, the spirit being contained 

 in the blood as the flame is in the smoke of a lamp or 

 candle, and held admixed by the incessant motion of 

 the fluid ; others, again, distinguish between the spirits 

 and the blood. They who advocate incorporeal spirits 

 have no ground of experience to stand upon ; their 

 spirits indeed are synonymous with powers or faculties, 

 such as a concoctive spirit, a chylopoietic spirit, a pro- 

 creative spirit, &c. they admit as many spirits, in short, 

 as there are faculties or organs. 



But then the schoolmen speak of a spirit of fortitude, 

 prudence, patience, and the other virtues, and also of a 

 most holy spirit of wisdom, and of every divine gift ; 

 and they besides suppose that there are good and evil 

 spirits that roam about or possess the body, that assist 

 or cast obstacles in the way. They hold some diseases 

 to be owing to a Cacodsemon or evil spirit, as there 

 are others that are due to a cacochemy or defective 

 assimilation. 



Although there is nothing more uncertain and 

 questionable, then, than the doctrine of spirits that 

 is proposed to us, nevertheless physicians seem for 

 the major part to conclude, with Hippocrates, that 

 our body is composed or made up of three elements, 

 viz. containing parts, contained parts, and causes of 

 action, spirits being understood by the latter term. 

 But if spirits are to be taken as synonymous with 

 causes of activity, whatever has power in the living 

 body and a faculty of action must be included under 

 the denomination. It would appear, therefore, that all 

 spirits were neither aereal substances, nor powers, nor 

 habits ; and that all were not incorporeal. 



But keeping in view the points that especially inter- 

 est us, others, as leading to tediousness, being left 



