136 THE LAWS OF ORGANIC 



CXLIV. The system of the adult having 

 been thus powerfully acted upon, and the surface 

 of the body being less vascular at this period of 

 life, it cannot be expected that external warmth 

 will immediately solicit the return of the san- 

 guineous fluid ; the degree and continuance of 

 its application must be proportionate to the con- 

 ditions of the cause to produce a beneficial re- 

 sult. 



CXLV. It is demonstrated by experiment, that 

 when an animal has been cooled several times to 

 a point beneath the regular temperature of the 

 body, it becomes more difficult to re-establish 

 the usual degree of heat, and this is what we 

 should have anticipated from a knowledge of the 

 very principles propounded. If we suppose a 

 young animal to have been repeatedly, and at 

 short intervals, exposed to a severe refrigerating 

 influence, the blood is every time determined to 

 the internal organs, and the means which we 

 subsequently employ, to overcome the conse- 

 quences induced, imperfectly restore the func- 

 tions of the body ; and if these means be sus- 

 pended, and cold again be applied while the 

 system has but partially regained its energies, a 

 similar but more serious effect follows, as the 

 heart and the lungs are successively oppressed by 

 new difficulties before they had risen superior to 

 those occasioned in the first place. The repeated 

 application of cold places the constitution of a 



