Cfonian Lectures on the Colon, 161 



conclusions, even in the able hands of Bellini, of Pitcairn, of Borelli, 

 and of Keil. Forg^etting the modifications and changes produced 

 by the vital powers, they applied their mechanical ideas to the 

 living as to dead and inert matter ; hence the contradictions in 

 their philosophical computations. For example, we are told by 

 Borelli, that the heart overcomes a weight equal to 180,000 pounds 

 in propelling the blood through the arteries ; by Hales, to no more 

 than 51 pounds ; while Keil makes the resistance only equal to 

 one pound, although he computes the fluids in the human body to 

 be five times more in quantity than Borelli. The same conclusions, 

 alike repugnant to fact and to experience, are di*awn respecting the 

 quantity of bile secreted by the liver ; and yet they all appeal to 

 mathematical demonstrations for proof; for example, Borelli first 

 measures the diameter of the ductus communis choledochus, which 

 he finds to be the 225th part of the diameter of the vena cava, just 

 before its entrance into the right auricle of the heart ; supposing 

 the whole mass of blood to be 20 pounds, and to circulate 16 

 times every hour, there would circulate 7680 pounds of blood in 

 24 hours ; hence Borelli infers, that if 7680 pounds of blood pass 

 through the vena cava in 24 hours, the 225th part of this quantity, 

 i. e. 34 pounds of bile, must, in the same space of time, be trans- 

 mitted through the hepatic ducts, (Perciral's Essays;) but mark 

 how a plain fact puts down all this mathematical reasoning about 

 the quantity of bile. Reverhorst ascertained by experiment, that 

 if a tube be inserted into the gall-duct of a large-sized dog, the 

 bile flows at the rate of about two drachms every hour, making six 

 ounces in 24 hours ; hence he calculated, that with man, who is of 

 greater bulk of body, with a larger liver, and, consequently, with 

 more numerous vessels for the secretion of bile, there would flow 

 in 24 hours about nine ounces, instead of 34 pounds. (Disser- 

 tatio Anatomico-medica deMotii Bilis.) This mechanical doctrine, 

 which served more to gratify philosophical pride than to afford 

 useful instruction, bids fair to be revived in the passionate propen- 

 sity which at present exists for explaining everything from the 

 appearances in morbid dissections. Soon after the publication 

 of Morgagni's Adversaria, and of his work De Sedibus et Causis 

 Morborum, evincing a mind indeed gifted with high talents, and 

 capable of patient and laborious investigation, the mechanical mode 

 of inquiring into and accounting for disease made great progress ; 

 and iu this country additional interest has been given to these 

 pursuits by the publications of the late justly-esteemed and lamented 

 Dr. Baillie. The path which he had tracked has been since 



JAN.— MARCH, 1828, M 



