86 SKIN NOT TO BE 



the whole. From this appears the fallacy of those 

 who select the derangements of any one organ as 

 the origin and source of all existing diseases. Some 

 functions are no doubt more important, and their 

 disorders exercise a wider influence over the gene- 

 ral health than others ; but no one who knows the 

 structure of the human body and the relations of its 

 parts, or has carefully observed the phenomena of 

 disease, can be satisfied with such exclusive reason- 

 ing. The stomach, the bowels, the liver, and the 

 nervous system have each had their patrons, and 

 the derangement of each has been specially held 

 out as the grand fountain of human misery. Each 

 doctrine, too, has been demonstrated, by cases and 

 cures, to be superior to all the rest, and each has 

 proved successful in its turn, where the others had 

 been tried and failed. Far, however, from proving 

 the propriety of exclusiveness in favour of any one 

 argan, such facts, rightly considered, demonstrate 

 the reverse, and show that successful practice re- 

 quires views and remedies founded on a careful 

 examination of every function ; and afford a strong 

 presumption that the man who traces every illness 

 to the liver, the stomach, or the nerves will be at 

 least as often strikingly wrong, as strikingly right. 



In saying, therefore, that attention to the state of 

 the skin is influential in preserving and restoring 

 health, we wish to represent it as an important, but 

 by no means exclusive condition, and to ascribe to 

 the means used for invigorating its functions their 

 due share of action upon other organs and functions. 

 Sailing, for example, is useful in pulmonary com- 

 plaints, not only because its accompanying nausea 

 causes a healthful flow of blood from the internal 

 parts to the surface, but because the gentle and 

 constant exercise occasioned by the movement of 

 the ship is admirably adapted to a debilitated state 

 of the system, when other exercise cannot be taken 

 without hurrying the breathing or inducing fatigue ; 



