222 



me the common or assimilating ones: hence, if the former continue 

 when blood ceases to be poured into the ventricles, we must infer 

 that the latter also are not extinct; and that if it is allowable to con- 

 elude the functional properties independently of the volume, &c. of 

 blood, it is, by parity of reasoning, allowable to infer of ihe com- 

 mon ones a similar independence. But the truth is, that a positive 

 inference is justified in neither case; for, as the heart continues its 

 motions after the circulation has ceased, or after all the blood has 

 been abstracted, so if these motions are admitted to prove that the 

 powers of the heart are independent of the presence of blood in the 

 ventricles, they must also be allowed to prove that its powers are 

 independent of the blood altogether, whether in the ventricles o* 

 in the coronary arteries, which is not the fact. 



10. We are here (as in the case where the independence of the 

 beart of the nervous centres is inferred from the results of the 

 division of its nerves) brought back to the conclusion that the heart 

 retains its life, or is endowed with a certain quantum of it; or rather 

 that its assim latiou is peculiar, by which its phenomena continue to 

 be exhibited under an absence of the regular circumstances which 

 are essential to its permanent action.* 



11. As then there is no small disagreement, or rather confusion, 

 among the facts already noticed; and as the facts, if less confused, 

 are generally of a kind so loose and distant as hardly to apply with 

 correctness to any argument for which they have been cited ; we must 

 on these accounts seek for evidence from some other quarter, and of 

 another kind. 



12. I have seen it somewhere stated that the beart is paralyzed 

 by ligature on the coronaries. This fact, if it is one, appears at first 

 sight to be conclusive in regard to the source of the heart's assimila- 

 tion, &c. It is however liable to these objections: 1st, that the 

 injury inflicted might destroy, by communication, the function of 

 the heart; 2nd, supposing this not to be the case, and that the 

 function depends upon the blood in the coronaries, as upon a source; 

 a similar dependence cannot be inferred with respect to the assimi- 

 lating life, because this latter would cease from a cessation of 

 functional operations, without any dependence upon that cause, the 

 privation of which renders the muscular properties of the heart 

 extinct. This circumstance also remains to be reconciled with the 

 fact that the heart will continue to act after the circulation has 

 ceased, or even when removed from the body. To extend therefore 

 a little further the discussion, 



13. Venous blood, it is pretty well known, will not maintain 

 life; that is, the spirit cannot assimilate or produce itself from venous 

 blood. As none but venous blood circulates through the right 

 cavities of the heart, it is to be inferred, in consonance or analogy 



* It is possible that this peculiarity may consist iti a power of assimilation 

 both of the common and the functional properties, from the blood which 

 pervades the structure of the heart, although it may be in a state of rest ; and 

 that this assimilation proceeds, as long as this blood contains elementary lite. 



