374 Dr. Philip on Stimulants and Sedatives. [Nov. 



relaxation prevails, and the limb which we wish to keep steady 

 begins to tremble. 



There is another species of debility of the living fibre of a veiy 

 different nature from the exhaustion we have been considering, 

 which appears to bear no relation to any previous excitement ; but 

 to be the direct effect- of agents ; for while some agents increase, 

 others lessen, the action of this solid. The former have been 

 called stimulants, the latter sedatives. 



It has been maintained, indeed, that as exhaustion is the 

 effect of moderate excitement, the species of debility we are now 

 considering is always the consequence of excessive excitefhent ; 

 and, therefore, that, like exhaustion, the sedative effect is never 

 the direct effect of the agent. And this opinion seems at first 

 view to be countenanced by the fact that stimuli act as sedatives 

 when applied in excess. Thus a moderate quantity of distilled 

 spirits received into the stomach produces excitement, which, 

 within certain limits, is greater in proportion to the quantity 

 taken ; but if a very large quantity be suddenly received into the 

 stomach, it produces no degree of excitement, but immediate 

 debility, or even death. 



It is surely a strained explanation of the latter effects, how-, 

 ever, to suppose them the consequence of excessive excitement, 

 no symptom of which appears. The supposed existence of this 

 excitement rests wholly on the preconceived opinion, that 

 exhaustion, in consequence of previous excitement, is the only 

 debility which can arise from the operation of agents on the 

 living fibre. It has, therefore, been maintained, that however 

 imperceptible the excitement produced by large quantities of 

 distilled spirits for example, we must suppose that their first 

 effect is excitement, and their debilitating effect, consequently, 

 only secondary. And so much has this idea laid hold of the 

 minds of many, that in an account of the above Inquiry, lately 

 published in a journal of great respectability, my opinion of the 

 nature of inflammation is opposed on the ground that the opera- 

 tion of agents in producing this disease must, in the first instance, 

 be stimulant ; and the debility of the vessels, which it is admitted 

 exists in inflamed parts, the consequence of previous excitement ; 

 and this is maintained without questioning the accuracy of my 

 experiments, from which it appears, that none of this previous 

 excitement could be perceived with the aid of powerful micro- 

 scopes. Now I may surely be allowed to maintain that where 

 no increased action can be perceived, none should be supposed. 

 We must not substitute hypothesis for plain-matter of fact. 



But if this argument, which is of all the most conclusive, 

 were out of the question, there is another, which, as far as I can 

 judge, would be unanswerable, to which even the supporters of 

 the hypothesis in question must listen. It must be admitted, 

 even by them, that if the tendency of different agents to produce 

 debility arises from the degree of excitement occasioned by their 



