^2 DISEASE. 



was the consequence ; if it yielded to the influence of nature, 

 it became expelled from the economy during the crisis or 

 evacuation. Chemical science introduced the doctrine of 

 the thickness, solidity, acidity, excess of alkali, &c., of the 

 fluids. The Greek horse-doctors, Aphyrtis, Eumalis, Pe- 

 lagonius ; the Homan agriculturists, Varro and Columella, 

 and afterwards, Virgetius ; in later times, the French veteri- 

 narians, Colleysel, Garsault, Lagueriniere, Saulnier, Latopa 

 fils, and Vitet ; last of all, the founder of veterinary schools, 

 Bourgelat, and his pupils, Chabert, Flandrin, Gilbert; all 

 these adopted the humoral pathology ; the latter making a 

 droll mixture of the Hippocratic doctrine with that of the 

 grand humorists^ Galen and Boerhaave. 



The knowledge possessed by the ancients concerning the 

 structure of an animal body was imperfect : it led them to 

 suppose, when they beheld any morbid matter produced 

 under the operation of disease, that it was the result of 

 a vitiation of the fluids, by them called the humours : a 

 doctrine to which moderns have applied the appellation 

 of humoral pathology. Above all, the blood was viewed as 

 an extensive source of mischief: it was considered to be 

 either too thick or too thin ; or else to be in a state of 

 fermentation, or even putrefaction. These were the tenets 

 at the time our earlier works on farriery were written; 

 whence the humoral pathology has met with such advocates 

 in grooms and farriers ;. whose descendants, even of the 

 present day, discourse with sagacity on the subject of 

 '*■ humours,^^ holding a faith in their ebbing and flowing, 

 and breeding, and requiring expulsion, quite as strong as 

 could possibly have possessed the minds of the patriarchs of 

 medicine. Progressive improvement has diverted attention 

 to the solids ; which, in their turn, so completely engross all 

 interest, that the fluids have become nearly discarded from 

 pathology. Singular as it may appear, the influence of the 

 fluids — at least of the blood — in disease, is once more 

 beginning to be acknowledged, in an equal degree to that 

 * of the solids themselves. After all, we shall probably find 

 most truth between the two extremes. 



