AMERICAN EDITION. 



years ago, when, in that very place where fpafm, rcaftlon, and vis med- 

 Icatrix nature were flourifhing in full vigour, under the afliduous culti- 

 vation of CULL EN, they were nipped and cropped in the blofTom, and 

 nearly eradicated as noxious, by the improving hand of BROWN. 

 From the intimate acquaintance which BROWN, or BRUNO, as he 

 called himfelf, had with the publifhed writings, and probably with the 

 private opinions of CULL EN ; from his academic habits, his erudition 

 and knowledge of every thing palling at the Univerfity of Edinburgh, 

 he mud have had great opportunities, as well of learning all that was 

 printed in phyfic, as of ftudying the defecls, and detecting the weak- 

 Eefs of that profefibr's doctrines. He told the writer of this preface, 

 that he ventured one day to talk to CULLEN on the incomprehenfible 

 ideas of atony and fpafm exifting in the fame veflels of the body at 

 the fame time ; and thereby provoked him to manifed figns of impa- 

 tience and difpleafure. A coolnefs took place immediately, which 

 increafed at lad, by fucceflive and mutual aggravations, to rooted 

 averfion and deep oppofition. And to this irritated date of BROWN'S 

 mind, indignant with the fenfe of unbecoming treatment, is to be af- 

 cribed no fmall portion of that refolution and energy with which he 

 laboured out a Sydem of Medical Philofophy, which, though not free 

 from errors, borrows, however, none from CULLEN, 



On the publication and contents of the fird edition of the Elementa 

 Medicinas of this author I mall be a little particular, on account of 

 the fcarcity of the work, and of the gratification it may afford to an 

 enquiring mind to learn the progrefs of ufeful difcoveiies. 



It was publifhed in 1780, and was dedicated to Sir JOHN ELLIOT ; 

 but this dedication was withheld from the fecond edition. After 

 dating his twenty years labour in learning and teaching phyfic, he 

 obferves, it was not until the fourth ludrum that fome dawning of 

 light broke in upon him. 



.The opinion that in the phlegmafias of nofologids, local afFeclion 

 was not the caufe of pyrexia, but on the contrary, a fymptom confe- 

 quent upon a previous general excitement of the whole constitution, 

 appears to have been early adopted by him ; and from his own perfon- 

 al fufferings in eryfipelas, cynanche toniillaris, catarrh, and fynocha, 

 and from his perulal of whatever had been written by MORGAGNI, 

 TRILLER, and other candid authors on thefe fubjecls, and on pneu- 

 monia, he was confident his idea was right. 



He, at this time propofed the doclrine of ccld predifpofing the 

 body to be operated upon in a powerful manner, and to a morbid de- 

 gree, by fubfequent heat ; which indeed may be regarded as one of 

 the mod important practical truths in medicine. 



He calls in queition the propriety of forming opinions of the nature 

 of difeafes by their fymptoms merely, and boldly adopts the method 

 of judging from the *' Ixdentia and juvantia." 



He <.fFers well founded criticifm on nofological arrangement, and 

 {hews wherein, through want of diitinclion between univerfal and local 

 difeafes, a number of thefe had been clafTed wrong. 



On examining the phlogidjc exanthemata he contends, that in 



mealies 



