392 Proceedings of Philosophical Societies. [Xov. 



capable of producing a remarkable disturbance, and which re- 

 quires to be expelled by a movement similar to that which 

 results from inoculation : that the eruptions which sometimes 

 appeared at first were not owing to the cow-pox matter ; but to 

 other circumstances, in the midst of which these vaccinations 

 were performed : 



That the unfortunate results which sometimes occurred were 

 owing to causes altogether foreign, which made their appearance 

 during the course of vaccination, and owing entirely to the state 

 of the patients : 



That the disorders following vaccination, when not owing to 

 pre-existing diseases, have been very particular cases, depending 

 upon circumstances peculiar to individuals ; and that their 

 number bearing no proportion to the immense number of obser- 

 vations exempt from accidents of any kind, no general conse- 

 quence can be drawn from them : 



That the unfortunate results, even supposing them incon- 

 testible, are more than compensated by the numerous instances 

 of chronical and obstinate diseases which have been completely 

 removed by vaccination ; examples which, when compared with 

 similar effects from inoculation, especially if we take into consi- 

 deration the greater danger of inoculation, leave the superiority 

 greatly on the side of vaccination : 



Finally, that the preservative virtue of vaccination, when the 

 virus has been properly taken, and the pock has proceeded pro- 

 perly, is fully as great as that of small-pox inoculation : while it 

 possesses the immense advantage of circumscribing small-pox 

 epidemics, and affords reasonable hopes of finally annihilating 

 this dreadful scourge of humanity. * 



M. Portal has published a new edition of his treatise on 

 asphyxias ; a work printed and circulated by order of govern- 

 ment, for the instruction of the people, and which has probably 

 saved the lives of thousands of citizens, since it has been circu- 

 lated in France, and in all the rest of Europe, by the numerous 

 translations that have been made of it. 



INI. Dumas, correspondent and Dean of the Faculty of Medi- 

 cine at Montpellier, has published a considerable work, entitled 

 General Doctrines of Chronical Diseases, in which he considers 

 this important subject in the most general point of view. Not 

 confining himself to the external forms of these diseases, he 

 ascends to the principles of their phenomena, determining by 

 analysis, the simple affections of which they are composed, nod 

 which may be considered as their elements. An accurate com- 

 parison of acute and chronic diseases induces him to conclude 

 that there is no constant character which separates these two 



* This important paper will b» found in Nos, II. aud IV. of our Journal. 



