608 PRACTICE OF PHYSIC. 



We can throw them into the body in much larger proportion, 

 and in consequence of this and of their suffering a more inti- 

 mate mixture with our fluids, the vegetable acids are most power- 

 ful antisceptics. From their want of concentration they may 

 fall short indeed in correcting putrescency in the primae viac ; 

 but as far as we want an alteration on the mass of the blood, it 

 can be obtained by the vegetable acids only in large quantities. 

 From their ready diffusion over the whole system they are the 

 only acids which have been employed to promote sweating. The 

 acid of vinegar has been so employed, and it is very favourable 

 for promoting the determination to the surface which we so often 

 desire to excite, and also the urinary secretion. 



" It is proper here also to take notice of the native vegetable 

 acid, as it occurs in acid and acescent fruits. These fruits com- 

 bine the advantages of the acids, but may also be considered as 

 alimentary, as entering into the composition of our fluids. They 

 are moreover useful laxatives, and perhaps the only laxatives 

 properly employed here, besides glysters, for obviating cos- 

 tiveness." 



CXXXV. Another set of refrigerants are the Neutral Salts, 

 formed of the vitriolic, nitrous, or vegetable acids, with alkalies, 

 either fixed or volatile. All these neutrals, while they are dis- 

 solving in water, generate cold ; but as that cold ceases soon af- 

 ter the solution is finished, and as the salts are generally ex- 

 hibited in a dissolved state, their refrigerant power in the ani- 

 mal body does not at all depend upon their power of generating 

 cold with water. The neutral chiefly employed as a refrigerant 

 is Nitre ; but all the others, compounded as above mentioned, 

 partake more or less of the same quality. 



" Before I dismiss the consideration of acids and neutrals, I 

 have a singular fact to mention. Both acids and neutrals are 

 found, upon occasions, to irritate the lungs by being carried to 

 the mucous glands of the bronchia and exciting cough. This 

 is particularly observed from the muriatic acid, but also from 

 the vegetable acid. Chenot observes, that he employed vine- 

 gar in large quantities in the plague, and that it was sometimes 

 observed to have the effect of exciting cough. The fact is not 

 so obvious with regard to neutrals, but from a,remarkable in- 

 stance with which I have met, I cannot doubt of their general 

 tendency also. I knew an asthmatic physician, who could not 



