SPASMODIC AFFECTIONS. 44,7 



as a species of dropsy, and is to be treated by the same remedies 

 as the other species of that disease. 



The Dyspnoea pinguedinosa, sp. 6., is in like manner to be 

 considered as a symptom or local effect of the Polysarcia, and is 

 only to be cured by correcting the general fault of the system. 



MCCCLXXII. From this view of those idiopathic cases of 

 dyspnoea, which are perhaps all I could properly arrange under 

 this title, it will readily appear, that there is little room for 

 treating of them here ; but there is still one case of difficult 

 breathing, which has been properly distinguished from every 

 other under the title of Asthma ; and, as it deserves our partic- 

 ular attention, I shall here separately consider it. 



CHAP VI. OF ASTHMA. 



MCCCLXXIII. The term of Asthma has been commonly 

 applied by the vulgar, and even by many writers on the Prac- 

 tice of Physic, to every case of difficult breathing, that is, to 

 every species of Dyspnoea. The Methodical Nosologists, also, 

 have distinguished Asthma from Dispnoea chiefly, and almost 

 solely, by the former being the same affection with the latter, 

 but in a higher degree. Neither of these applications of the 

 term seems to have been correct or proper. I am of opinion, 

 that the term Asthma may be most properly applied, and should 

 be confined, to a case of difficult breathing that has peculiar 

 symptoms, and depends upon a peculiar proximate cause, which 

 I hope to assign with sufficient certainty. It is this disease I am 

 now to treat of, and it is nearly what practical writers have ge- 

 nerally distinguished from the other cases of difficult breathing, 

 by the title of Spasmodic Asthma, or of Asthma convulsivum ; 

 although, by not distinguishing it with sufficient accuracy from 

 the other cases of dyspnoea, they have introduced a great deal 

 of confusion into their treatises on this subject. 



MCCCLXXIV. The disease I am to treat of, or the Asth- 

 ma, to be strictly so called, is often a hereditary disease. It 

 seldom appears very early in life, and hardly till the time of pu- 



