108 Dr. A. P. W. Philip oti ike 



motion, hich are as excitable by artificial stimuli after, as be- 

 fore the removal of these organs. 



It would, at first view, appear a legitimate inference from the 

 foregoing facts, that the power of the muscular fibre is every 

 where independent of the nervous system. The opponents of 

 the doctrine of Haller, however, have objected to this inference, 

 because, although in such experiments the muscle is prevented 

 from receiving more nervous influence, it is not deprived of that 

 already bestowed on it, either forming a necessary part of the 

 fibre itself, or dispersed through its substance, in nerves too 

 small to be removed ; and this objection appears to be greatly 

 strengthened by the circumstances already mentioned, that 

 after a muscle is separated from the body it soon loses its ex- 

 citability, and that those muscles whose functions are supported 

 by stimuli peculiar to themselves, are notwithstanding supplied 

 with nerves. It occurred to me, that this question could only 

 be determined by some experiment which should ascertain 

 whether the excitability of muscles is maintained by the 

 influence they receive from the nervous system, or impaired, 

 as it is found to be ^by other stimuli ; for if, on the one 

 hand, it can be proved that the permanency of their excita- 

 bility is unimpaired by cutting off all supply from the nervous 

 system ; and, on the other, that the influence of that system 

 exhausts it as other stimuli do ; a doubt, I conceive, cannot 

 remain, respecting the dependence of muscular power on the 

 constitution of the muscular fibre itself. The thirty-second ex- 

 periment, related in the Experimental Inquiry just referred to, 

 appears to answer these questions in the affirmative, and there- 

 fore to prove the independent power of that fibre. 



An inference from the facts which have been laid before the 

 reader, in which we cannot be deceived, is that, contrary to the 

 opinion of Haller, the heart may be directly influenced through 

 either the brain or spinal marrow ; and this position, we shall 

 afterwards find, may be as easily illustrated by the effect of 

 much less powerful agents on these organs, as by the experi- 

 ments above referred to. The same observation, we shall 



