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Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. 



1834, Jan, 20. — Sir Thomas Makdodgall Brisbane, K.C. B 

 President, in the Chair. At this meeting the following com- 

 munication was read : — 



On the Principle of Vital Attraction and Repulsion, with 

 some applications to Physiology and Pathology. By Dr 

 Alison. 



The object of this paper was, to state and estimate the scientific 

 value of a variety of facts, which have been recorded bv various phy- 

 siologists ; and many of wliich have been verified by personal obser- 

 vation, in proof of the proposition, — That the fluids of living bodies, or 

 in immediate contact with them, are in many instances liable to 

 movements, — dependent on the vitality of those bodies, but inde- 

 pendent of any vital contractions of their solids — and which can 

 hardly be conceived to be effected otherwise than by certain attrac- 

 tions and repulsions, peculiar to the living state. 



Five classes of observations, perfectly distinct from one another, 

 were stated in proof of this general proposition. 



I. Tlie first are those made on the regular progressive movements 

 of juices (made visible by whitish globules) in many kinds of vege- 

 tables, to \\'hich the name of Rutctlion has been given in the case of the 

 cellular plants, such as the Cliara and Caulinia, and that of Cyclose 

 in the case of cellular plants with emitting juices, such as the differ- 

 ent species of Ficus, — movements which go on nearly uniformly, under 

 considerable variations of temperature, and of other external circum- 

 stances, while life continues ; and which are not only unattended 

 with any visible contractions of the parietes of the cells or vessels 

 containing the fluid, but are of such a nature, as no contractions of 

 these parietes appear capable of producing, as appears particularly 

 from the elaborate inquiries of Schultze, Amici, Nisbet, and Cassini. 

 This conclusion is the more important, as it is probably applicable to 

 nearly all the movements, peculiar to life, in the fluids of vegetables, 

 although the observations on which it rests can be satisfactorily made 

 on those only which contain opaque globules. 



II. The second set of facts are those connected with the visible 

 currents, which take place in water, in contact with many living 

 bodies ; as ascertained, y/ri^ By the observations of Dutrochet and of 

 Dr Grant on living sponges ; secondly, By those of Dr Sharpey, M. 

 Quillot, and M. Raspail, on many aquatic animals, chiefly mollusca 

 and the larvae of reptiles ; and, lastly, By those of M. Raspail, and 

 of many others, on certain animalcules, chiefly of the genus Vorti- 

 cella. In all these instances, facts seem to be established, which are 

 altogether inconsistent with the supposition of the movements de- 

 pending merely on contractions or vibrations of any living solid tex- 

 tures. 



III. The third class of facts adduced on this subject consists of 

 those which show, that, in the fecial state of animals, different part* 



