108 PRACTICE OF PHYSIC. 



CHAP. XIV. OF THE GOUT. 



CCCCXCII. The Gout, not only as it occurs in different 

 persons, but even as it occurs in the same person at different 

 times, is a disease of such various appearance that it is difficult 

 to render the history of it complete and exact, or to give a cha- 

 racter of it that will universally apply. However I shall en- 

 deavour to describe the disease as it most commonly appears, 

 and to mark the varieties of it as well as I can. From such a 

 history I expect that a general character may be given ; and 

 such I think is the following, as given in the last edition of our 

 Nosology : 



GEN. xxin. PODAGRA. Morbus haereditarius, oriens sine 

 causa externa evidente, sed praseunte plerumque ventriculi af- 

 fectione insolita, pyrexia, dolor ad articulum, et plerumque 

 pedis pollici, certe pedum et manuum juncturis, potissi- 

 mum infestus ; per intervalla revertens, et ssepe cum ven- 

 triculi, et aliarum internarum partium affectionibus alternans. 



" I imagine that the history of the disease is as fully deliver- 

 ed by Dr. Sydenham as can well be done : he laboured under 

 the disease himself for eighteen years before he wrote ; and 

 there is no doubt but that he was particularly attentive to it in 

 many other persons. Nothing surprises me more than the di- 

 versity of facts supported by physicians. A physician of very 

 great rank, and in high reputation in the learned world, Dr. 

 Martin Lister, says that the most part of Sydenham's history of 

 this disease, is a bella et lepida Jictio. So strong an opposition 

 must tend to raise some doubts, but I say we must disregard 

 it ; and were I to express my sentiments, it would be to say, 

 that the author of whom I speak, notwithstanding his high 

 character and works, is entitled to no regard in physic, what- 

 ever reputation he may have as a natural historian. It is 

 well that I can add, in favour of Dr. Sydenham, the testimony 

 of almost all the physicians. Dr. Hoffmann, instead of giv- 

 ing his own account, transcribes the history of Sydenham ; 

 Boerhaave does no other ; and Dr. Warner owns that he could 



