343 



to prevent anchylosis, than the various resolvent remedies which are com- 

 monly employed, as plasters of soap, vigo, cicuta, drabotanum, diachylon, 

 pumping, bathing, and fumigations, which, however, should be used in 

 combination with a moderate exercise of the limb, in order to obtain the 

 most complete success. 



The gout affects those joints whcih are most subject to motion, and on 

 which there is the greatest pressure. The first attacks, as Sydenham 

 observes, come on in the joint of the great toe with the first metatarsal 

 bone, an articulation which bears the weight of the whole body, and 

 which is most called into action, in the various motions of progression. 



The muscles which pass over the joints give them much greater secu- 

 rity than the lateral ligaments. In fact, if the muscles become palsied, 

 the mere weight of the limb stretches the ligaments, which give way be- 

 come elongated, and allow the head of the bone to escape from its gle- 

 noid cavity. It is, in this manner, that a loss of motion, and atrophy of 

 deltoid muscle, are attended with a luxation of the humerus: the orbicu- 

 lar ligament of the articulation of this bone with the scapula, being in- 

 capable of retaining its head within the glenoid cavity. The spinal 

 column, when dissected and deprived of all but its ligamentous attach- 

 ments, gives way under a weight much smaller than that which it would 

 have supported, before being stripped of the muscles which are connect- 

 ed with it. 



CLXXX. Of standing. This is the name given to the action by which 

 man holds himself upright on a solid plane. In this erect position of all 

 our parts, the perpendicular line passing through the centre of gravity* 

 of the body, must fall on some point of the space measured by their soals 

 of the feet. Standing is most firm when on prolonging the line of the 

 centre of gravity of the body, it falls on the base of sustentation (I call 

 thus the space defined by the feet, whether close or apart;) but this line 

 may tend to exceed it, without our necessarily falling, the muscular ac- 

 tion soon restoring the equilibrium which is deranged by the altered di- 

 rection of this line. But if the lower extremity of the line, by being pro- 

 longed, should fall without the limits of the base of sustentation, a fall is 

 unavoidable on the side towards which this line inclines!. 



If the body is inclined backwards, so that there is a danger of a fall on 

 the occiput, the extensor muscles of the leg contract powerfully, to pre- 

 vent the thigh from bending, while other powers bring forward the up- 

 per parts, and give to the prolonged line of the centre of gravity a differ- 

 ent direction; and if in proportion as the extensors of the leg are brought 

 into action, its inclination be increased to such a degree that nothing is 

 capable of keeping up the body, which its own weight tends to bring to 

 the ground, these muscles, by a motion proportioned to the quickness of 

 the fall, will increase their efforts to prevent it, and may be able, in that 

 violent contraction, to snap asunder the patella, as I have explained in a 

 Memoir on the fractures of that bone. 



* The centre of gravity, in the adult, is situated between the sacrum and pubis. 



f ' ' Quotiescitmque linea propensionis coi^poris humani ccu<:t t>xtra WMIS peitis innixi 

 plantam, out extra yuadrilaUrum, comprehension a ditabus plantis pedum, impediri ndna, 

 a q-uocumquK musculorwn coaatu, non potest." Borelli. Prop. 140. 



The firmness of the attitude, in standings, depend, therefore, in part, on the breadth 

 of the feet and on their distance ; hence, it is much more tottering when we stand on 

 one foot, and we are, under such circumstance, obliged to be perpetually struggling-, 

 to prevent the centre of gravity from falling out of the narrow limits of the base of sus- 

 tentation Author's Note, 



