

INFLAMMATIONS. 25 



an internal cause, it is from an acrimony poured out on the sur- 

 face of the skin under the cuticle. In the phlegmon, an_acri- 

 mony is not commonly evident. 



" What is the peculiar circumstance which causes phlegmon 

 and determines it to the interior surface of the skin and the cel- 

 lular membrane subjected to it, is difficult to explain, especially 

 when we consider that it occupies only a small portion of that 

 membrane, that it is fixed to one place, and the tumour circum- 

 scribed ; but when we recollect its remote causes, extraneous 

 bodies and various modes of external violence, we can easily 

 see how they will rather produce phlegmon than erythema." 



CCLXXVI. These differences in the seat and causes of the 

 phlegmon and erythema being admitted, it will be evident that, 

 when an erythema affects any internal part, it can take place in 

 those only whose surfaces are covered with an epithelion, or 

 membrane analogous to the cuticle. 



CCLXXVII. The same distinction between the seat and 

 causes of the two diseases will, as I judge, readily explain what 

 has been delivered by practical writers, with respect to the 

 cure of these different cutaneous inflammations. But I shall 

 not, however, prosecute this here, for the reason given above 

 (CCLXXV.) ; and, for the same reason, shall not say any 

 thing of the variety of external inflammation that might other- 

 wise be considered here. 



CHAP. III. -OF OPHTHALMIA, OR INFLAMMATION 

 OF THE EYE. 



CCLXXVIII. The inflammation of the eye may be con- 

 sidered as of two kinds; according as it has its seat in the 

 membranes of the ball of the eye, when I would name it OPH- 

 THALMIA MEMBRANAEUM ; or, as it has its seat in the sebace- 

 ous glands placed in the tarsus or edges of the eye-lids, in 

 which case it may be termed OPHTHALMIA TARSI. 



These two kinds are very frequently combined together, as 

 the one may readily excite the other ; but they are still to be 

 distinguished, according as the one or the other may happen to 

 be the primary affection, and properly, as they often arise from 

 different causes. 



