208 LETTERS TO BROTHER JOHN. 



petual disorganization and reparation. The dis- 

 organization goes on as usual ; but the reparation 

 (that is, its nutrition) does NOT go on as usual : its 

 nutrition is imperfectly performed. The capillary 

 arteries entering into the structure of its elemen- 

 tary tissue are filled with a blood, from which the 

 nutritious particles, necessary to repair the waste 

 which it perpetually undergoes, cannot be separated 

 in sufficient abundance : its structure, therefore, 

 becomes flaccid, and its energies consequently en- 

 feebled. If this state of the nerve go on increasing 

 if these little black specks go on multiplying and 

 increasing in size, until they form but one black 

 speck that is, complete darkness you then have, 

 at once, the disease called amaurosis, " blindness," 

 resulting from palsy of the optic nerve. 



Imperfect hearing, and ringing in the ears, are 

 also very common symptoms of indigestion. These 

 arise from a condition of the nerves of hearing 

 the auditory nerves similar to that which I have 

 just described as incidental to the nerve of vision. 

 All the nerves of the body, with the questionable 

 exception of one, arise from the brain and spinal 

 marrow ; and all are liable to be thus injuriously 

 affected by venous congestion in the elementary 

 tissue of these two organs. It is to this condition 



