THE CENTRAL SENSORIUM. 601 



vasomotor action, sneezing, coughing, etc. that have been 

 located in the medulla oblongata. True, local disease or trau- 

 matism point to the "bulbar" areas concerned as "centers." 

 But if the bulb is given the role which we believe it to fulfill, 

 one which, perhaps, may allow us to call it a consociating organ, 

 it will become apparent that any lesion capable of blocking 

 the multitude of afferent and efferent impulses that traverse 

 it at all times and which represent the aggregate of the organ- 

 isms inciting and governing energy must necessarily compro- 

 mise life or the functions of an organ to which the blocked 

 nerves are distributed. 



We have expressed the belief that there are but two gen- 

 eral subdivisions of the nervous system, and that both of these 

 have the posterior pituitary body as their general center. This 

 view has not only been sustained by our analysis of the func- 

 tions of the various organs, but it seems to us to fully coincide 

 with established facts. 



As Regards Efferent (Motor) Impulses. It has been experi- 

 mentally determined that all fibers that originate from roots in 

 the anterior portion of the cord are efferent: i.e., transmit motor 

 impulses from the cord to the periphery. Section of these 

 fibers causes: in muscles, paralysis; in glands, cessation of 

 secretion; in vessels, dilation. 



Interpreted from our standpoint, these morbid phenomena 

 are accounted for as follows: As the active functional state of 

 any organ is brought on by constriction of its arterioles beyond 

 the limits of tonic constriction (that attending the passive 

 functional state), section of the nerve transmitting the con- 

 strictive impulses brings on the opposite of active function, 

 i.e., paralysis, or, if distributed to a gland, arrest of secretion. 

 Although the same impulses serve to incite and govern the 

 cellular activity of the organ, paralysis, muscular or glandular, 

 is not due to the loss of these two functional attributes, since 

 section of vagal efferent nerves, which only incite and govern 

 the active functional state beyond tonic contraction, does not 

 cause paralysis. The immediate cause of the latter is slowing 

 of the blood-stream: i.e., reduction of the supply of oxidizing 

 substance. The cellular elements lose their mechanical energy 

 and can no longer be incited to action and governed. The 



