INFLAMMATIONS. 123 



manifestly affections of the same system (DXX. and DXXIL). 

 This leads us to seek for an explanation of the whole of the dis- 

 ease in the laws of the nervous system, and particularly in the 

 changes which may happen in the balance of its several parts. 



" Of the several pyrexise, which are diseases of the sanguifer- 

 ous system, some are with, and others without a considerable af- 

 fection of the nervous system : pyrexia and neuroses, therefore, 

 are necessarily and unavoidably mixed more or less with one 

 another. Of those which are mixed, gout is a principal instance, 

 in so far as it is an inflammatory disease ; like rheumatism, it is 

 placed among the pyrexiae ; but it is among the limits between 

 pyrexia and neuroses, and shews more than any other pyrexia 

 does of an affection of the nervous system." 



DXXXII. My third observation is, that the stomach, which 

 has so universal a consent with the rest of the system, is the in- 

 ternal part that is the most frequently, and often very consider- 

 ably affected by the gout. The paroxysms of the disease are 

 commonly preceded by an affection of the stomach (DVII.) ; 

 many of the exciting causes (DI V.) act first upon the stomach ; 

 and the symptoms of the atonic and retroccdcnt gout (DX. and 

 DXXII.) are most commonly and chiefly affections of the same 

 organ. This observation leads us to remark, that there is a ba- 

 lance subsisting between the state of the internal and that of 

 the external parts ; and, in particular, that the state of the 

 stomach is connected with that of the external parts (XLIV.), 

 so that the state of tone in the one may be communicated to the 

 other. 



DXXXIII. These observations being premised, I shall now 

 offer the following pathology of the gout. 



In some persons there is a certain vigorous and plethoric 

 state of the system (CCCCXCVI.) which, at a certain period 

 of life, is liable to a loss of tone in the extremities (CCCCXCIX. 

 to DVL). This is in some measure communicated to the whole 

 system, but appears more especially in the functions of the 

 stomach (DVII.). When this loss of tone occurs while the 

 energy of the brain still retains its vigour, the vis medicatrix 

 naturae is excited to restore the tone of the parts, and accom- 

 plishes it by exciting an inflammatory affection in some part of 

 the extremities. When this has subsisted for some days, the 



