RATIONALE OF SYMPATHY. 1089 



sure to cold, after the body has been weakened 

 by over exertion in the hot sun, they are owing 

 to sympathy with the skin, &c. 



But the word sympathy, as employed by patho, 

 logists, is merely an asylum ignorantite. Sir 

 Charles Morgan observes, that " it is a primi- 

 tive law of organization which admits of no other 

 explanation than that which shall unfold the 

 mystery of life itself." (Philosophy of Life, p. 

 244.) 



The modus operandi of what is called morbid 

 sympathy, may be illustrated by the following 

 facts. In the first place, when the feet have been 

 exposed for some time to the influence of cold 

 and moisture, the temperature of the whole body 

 is gradually reduced by the abstraction of caloric, 

 which is brought to them in combination with 

 the blood, causing more or less torpor of the 

 general circulation : so that if the lungs are in a 

 feeble state, they become still further paralyzed, 

 until congestion or inflammation is established, 

 as in pneumonia and bronchitis, which are the 

 usual forerunners of consumption. But as the 

 blood is formed, renovated, and purified in the 

 lungs, it is evident that its free circulation through 

 them must be greatly retarded, respiration dimi- 

 nished, and its vital properties impaired;* so 



* I have often observed that blood drawn from the arm during 

 the advanced stages of pneumonia, bronchitis, and pleurisy, was 

 so far dissolved as to require from thirty minutes to an hour to 



