and Nervous Filaments into Motive and Sensitive. 73 



The nerves have a triple destination as they minister (1.) to voluntary 

 motion, (2.) to sensation, (3.) to the vital energies — secretion, digestion, 

 &c. Albinus seems to acquiesce in the doctrine, that the Brain-proper is 

 the ultimate organ of the first and second function, the After-brain, of 

 the third. 



Nerves, again, are of two kinds. They are either such in which each 

 ultimate fibril remains isolated in function from centre to periphery (the 

 cerebro-spinal nerves) ; or such in which these are mutually confluent 

 (the sympathetic or ganglionic nerves.) 



To speak only of the cerebro-spinal nerves, and of these only in rela- 

 tion to the functions of motion and sensation ; — they are to be distin- 

 guished into three classes according as destined, (1.) to sense, (2.) to mo- 

 tion, (3.) to both motion and sensation. Examples — of the first class are 

 the olfactory, the optic, the auditory, of which last he considers the portio 

 mollis and the portio duris to be, in propriety, distinct nerves ; — of the 

 second class, are the large portion of those passing to muscles, as the 

 fourth and sixth pairs ; of the third class, are the three lingual nerves, 

 especially the ninth pair, fibrils of which he had frequently traced, part- 

 ly to the muscles, partly to the gustatory papillae of the tongue, and 

 the subcutaneous nerves, which are seen to give ofF branches, first to the 

 muscles, and thereafter to the tactile papillas of the skin. The nervous 

 fibres which minister to motion are distinct in origin, in transit, in ter- 

 mination, from those which minister to sensation. This is manifest in 

 the case of those nerves which run from their origin in separate sheaths, 

 either to an organ of sense (as the olfactory and optic), or to an organ 

 of motion (as the fourth and sixth pairs, which go to the muscles of the 

 eye) j but it is equally, though not so obtrusively, true, in the case 

 where a nerve gives off branches partly to muscles, partly to the cuta- 

 neous papillaj. In this latter case, the nervous fibrils or fistulas are, from 

 their origin in the medulla oblongata to their final termination in the 

 skin, perfectly distinct. The medulla oblongata is a continuation of the 

 enccphalos, made up of two columns from the Brain-proper, and of two 

 columns from the After-brain. Immediately or mediately, it is the origin, 

 as it is the organ, of all the nerves. And in both respects it is double : 

 for, one part, the organ of sense, afTords an origin to the sensitive fibrils, 

 whilst another, the organ of motion, does the same by the motory. In 

 their progress, indeed, after passing out, the several fibrils, whether 

 homogeneous or not, are so conjoined by the investing membranes as to 

 exhibit the appearance of a single nerve ; but when they approach their 

 destination they separate, those for motion ramifying through the mus- 

 cles, those for sensation going to the cutaneous papillre or other organs 

 of sense. Examples of this are afforded — in the ninth pair, the fibres of 

 which (against more modern anatomists) he holds to arise by a double 

 origin in the medulla, and which, after running in the same sheath » 

 separate according to their different functions and destinations j — and 

 in the seventh pair, the hard and soft portions of which are respectively 



