OF THE MUSCLES, 77 



particular disposition of the muscles which we describe by 

 the name of antaijonist muscles. And they are according- 

 ly so disposed. Every muscle is provided with an adversa- 

 ry. They act like two sawers in a pit by an opposite pull; 

 and nothing: surely can more strongly indicate design and 

 attention to an end than their being thus stationed ; than 

 this collocation. The nature of the muscular fibre being 

 what it is, the purposes of the animal could be answered, by 

 no other And not only the capacity for motion, but the 

 aspect and symmetry of the body is preserved by the mus- 

 cles being marshalled according to tliis order, e. g. the 

 month is held in the middle of the face, and its angles 

 kept in a state of exact correspondency, by two muscles 

 drawing against, and balancing, each other. In a hemi- 

 plegia, when the muscle on one side is weakened, the mus- 

 cle on the other side draws the moutii awry. 



III. Another property of the muscles, which could only 

 be the result of care, is their being almost universally so 

 disposed, as not to obstruct or interfere with one another's ac- 

 tion. I know but one instance in which this impediment 

 is perceived. We cannot easily swallow whilst we gape. 

 This, I understand, is owing to the muscles employed in 

 the act of deglutition, being so implicated with the muscles 

 of the lower jaw, that whilst these last are contracted, the 

 former cannot act with freedom. The obstruction is, in 

 this instance, attended with little inconveniency ; but it 

 shows what the effect is, where it does exist ; and what 

 loss of faculty there would be, if it were more frer^uent. 

 Now when we reflect upon the number of muscles, not fewer 

 than four hundred and forty-six in the human body, known 

 and nanved,* how contiguous they lie to each other, in lay- 

 ers, as it were, over one another, crossing one another, 

 sometimes embedded in one anotlier, sometinjes perforating 

 one another, an arrangement, which leaves to eacii its liberty 

 and its full play, must necessarily require meditation and 

 counsel. 



IV. The following is oftentimes the case with the mus- 

 cles. Their action is wanted where their situation would 

 be inconvenient. In which case the body of the muscle is 

 placed in some commodious position at a distance, and 

 made to communicate with the point of action, by slender 

 strings or wires. If the muscles, which move the fingers, 

 had been placed in the palm or back of the hand, they 



* KeiU's Anat. p. 295, edit. 3. There are. however, five hundred and 

 twentv-seven muscles described by more modern anatomists. Paxton. 



H 



