Me die me. 281 



and the analysis of the atmosphere by Schekle and 

 Lavoisier, at that period, gave a new aspect to 

 many doctrines of the animal economy, both in its 

 healthy and diseased state. When the composition 

 of the atmosphere, its influence in the function of 

 respiration, and the constitution of animal matter, 

 were ascertained, it was natural to suppose that 

 many of the gases received into the lungs in breath- 

 ing might become powerful remedies. M. Four- 

 CROY took the lead in this inquiry, and was soon 

 assisted by the exertions of Dr. Girtanner. Dr. 

 Beddoes was the first who introduced tlie pneu- 

 matic practice into Great-Britain, where it appears 

 to have been more assiduously cultivated, and ap- 

 plied to a greater variety of medical purposes than 

 in any other country. The names of Davy, 

 Thornton, and Townshend are also to be men- 

 tioned among the most enterprising cultivators and 

 improvers of this practice. The sanguine expec- 

 tations of those who first proposed this mode of 

 applying remedies seem hitherto scarcely to have 

 been answered: but how far industry and inge- 

 nuity may hereafter vary and improve the prac- 

 tice, must be left to the decision of time. 



The methodical arrangement of diseases, called 

 Nosology, had its birth in the eighteenth century. 

 This consists in a systematic distribution of dis- 

 eases into classes, orders, genera, and species, on 

 the plan of natural history. This scheme of ar- 

 rangement was first conceived by Sydenham, and 

 afterwards by Baglivi, towards the close of the 

 seventeenth century. For the first actual attempt 

 the world is indebted to Francois Boissier de 

 Sauvages, an eminent Professor of Medicine at 

 Montpelier, who published his laborious work in 

 the early part of the eighteenth century. After 

 Sauvages, this subject was cultivated by Linnaeus, 

 to whose genius tor arrangement every branch of 



aO 



