316 THE LAWS OF ORGANIC 



ertion, have a tendency to determine the blood 

 to the internal organs. Exercise, as long as it 

 was continued with vigour, maintained the na- 

 tural state of the circulation ; but the necessary 

 repose consequent on excessive exercise deprives 

 the system of those stimuli that previously sus- 

 tained the equality of the circulation throughout 

 the body ; and the absence of these, conjoined 

 with the above depressing feelings, speedily pro- 

 duce an overcharged state of the lungs and heart. 



SECT. II. An examination of the causes which oc- 

 casion Syncope by changing the ordinary course or free- 

 dom of the circulation. 



CCCLX. Structural alterations in the heart, 

 or in parts contiguous to it, are among the most 

 frequent causes of syncope ; but having, in the 

 chapter on Palpitation, treated at considerable 

 length of those organic changes which predispose 

 to that affection, it is unnecessary to repeat the 

 same as tending to give rise to the disease we 

 now investigate. The proximate cause of the 

 two diseases is the same, the only difference be- 

 tween them is in the degree and not in the na- 

 ture of it. 



CCCLXI. Syncope is most generally witness- 

 ed in the simple operation of bleeding. From 

 the sensibility of the patient, it sometimes pre- 



