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III. " Preliminary Account of an Inquiry into the Functions of 

 the Visceral Nerves, with special reference to the so-called 

 ( Inhibitory System/ " By JOSEPH LISTER, Esq., F.R.C.S. 

 Eng. & Edin., Assistant Surgeon to the Royal Infirmary of 

 Edinburgh ; in a Letter to Dr. Sharpey, Sec.R.S. Received 

 August 13, 1858. Communicated by Dr. SHARPEY. 



MY DEAR SIR, The fact that the irritation of visceral nerves 

 sometimes causes arrest of the movements of organs supplied by 

 them, as shown by Edward Weber's experiment of stopping the action 

 of the heart by stimulating the vagus, and by Pfliiger's more recent 

 observation that the application of galvanism to the splanchnic nerves 

 produces quiescence of the small intestines, appears to me to have 

 an intimate bearing upon the question how inflammation is deve- 

 loped through the medium of the nervous system at a distance from 

 an irritated part ; and as the nature of the inflammatory process 

 has lately engaged my especial attention, I have been led to make 

 an experimental inquiry into this "inhibiting" agency, the true in- 

 terpretation of which is, as you are aware, still sub judice, I now 

 propose to state the principal results at which I have arrived, re- 

 serving further details for a more extended communication which I 

 hope soon to offer to the Royal Society. 



The view which has been advocated by Pfliiger*, and I believe 

 very generally accepted, viz. that there is a certain set of nerve-fibres, 

 the so-called "inhibitory system of nerves" (Hemmungs Nerven- 

 system), whose sole function is to arrest or diminish action, seemed 

 to me from the first a very startling innovation in physiology ; and 

 you may possibly recollect my mentioning to you in conversation, 

 when in London last Christmas, my suspicion that the phenomena 

 in question were merely the effect of excessive action in nerves pos- 

 sessed of the functions usually attributed to them. On further 

 reflection upon the subject, the consideration of the contraction pro- 

 duced in the arteries of the frog's foot by a very mild stimulus, as 

 compared with the relaxation of the vessels caused by stronger irri- 

 tants acting through the same nerves, confirmed my previous notions. 



* Eduard Pfliiger ueber das Hemmungs Nervensystem, 1857. 

 VOL, IX. 2 C 



