198 THE LAWS OF ORGANIC 



those that produce, and those those that expend, we 

 shall find an easy solution of the seeming difficulty. 



From the irregular and imperfect manner in 

 which the vital fluid has for some timebeen prepar- 

 ed for the purposes of the system, every function 

 is more or less disordered ; and, among the rest 

 that of the capillaries belonging to the surface of 

 the body. These have not the same capability 

 as formerly of evolving caloric : the consequence 

 is, that even a diminished production of heat ap- 

 pears to present an augmentation, because the 

 powers that expend are greatly inferior to those 

 that produce. The truth of this may be observed 

 in the dry and burning state of the skin. Dr 

 CURRIE, in his Medical Reports, gives several re- 

 markable cases of this condition of the surface, 

 attended by restlessness and great fever, that 

 was almost immediately removed by affusion or 

 sponging of the body, and followed by the re- 

 establishment of health, or the amelioration of the 

 general symptoms. The benefit is not to be re- 

 ferred to the lessened generation of animal heat, 

 but to its lessened accumulation. 



CCXXIII. If we believe that every assimilative 

 process is accompanied by the disengagement of 

 heat, which is certainly a plausible opinion, but 

 of which there is no direct proof, it must be con- 

 sidered extraordinary, unless the above view be 

 received as correct, that the system should, in 

 such a case, possess a temperature much higher 



