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upon these combinations. The state of life is in general pretty uni- 

 form, but in instances which have been remarked in our physiology, 

 properties before latent are developed, as in the case of puberty, and 

 stilllife assimilates. 



17. A change of the combination of constituent properties 

 produces the phenomena of disease: life assimilates under this state; 

 and as long as this assimilation continues, the state of disease is 

 maintained. 



18. But progressive causation may be going on amons these 

 constituent properties, the result of which, in the state of disease, 

 must be either to exhibit other symptoms in a series, or a return to 

 the former assimilating state of health, or a termination in death. 



19. One particular agent may have such a relation with the 

 existing diseased state of life, as to determine its series of processes 

 towards the restoration of health. This depends upon the relations 

 of integral properties with the agent, and their relations with each 

 other, under the modifications produced by the agent. To this class 

 of agents belong the specifics, mercury, sulphur, and all single 

 remedies for a disease. 



20. But many remedies may have the property of restoring 

 health by a common relation ; as when the existing state of the 

 principle is a diseased one, which will continue, if left to itself, to 

 assimilate in this state, and hence, as long as this state continues 

 disease may in this way be maintained: but this state may be 

 changed or superseded by a variety of agents, by any which have a 

 causative relation with it; to produce a change is a common effect 

 of many agents, and this change having taken place, the further 

 series of combinations is determined by the relations of constituent 

 properties, which obtain under this new state. The tendency under 

 any state is either to a return to the previous state of disease, 

 when the operation of the agent has ceased, or to additional symp- 

 toms which might be called a deterioration of disease, or to recovery, 

 or death. Hence, as every remedy must be productive of one or 

 other of these events, so these events must respectively have a com- 

 mon relation with many remedies. 



21. Particular remedies, or specifics, produce a state under 

 which exclusively the relations of integral properties with the new 

 state of the principle, or the remedial change, is to terminate their 

 series of processes in the recovery of health. 



22. General remedies agree in producing a change of the 

 existing state of the principle, and the result of the change is liable 

 to the four alternatives just specified. 



23. General remedies may produce a change in the seat of the 

 diseased principle, either by an operation upon this seat, or by an 

 agency upon a related- seat : thus, disorder of the head may be 

 cured by bleeding from the temporal artery, by long-continued purge- 

 ing, or by nauseating doses of antimony, &c. or by an issue, perhaps, 

 in the leg. They have the common property of changing the existing 

 state of disease, which would maintain itself by assimilation, or of 



