434 



sensibility, frequently exhibit it with all these characteristics. Often? 

 however, they have something of good looks, the extreme preponderance 

 of the nervous system still allowing a moderate developement of the lym- 

 phatic. Spasmodic affections are not uncommon among them ; and 

 when it is observed that, on the other hand, the athletic constitution, di- 

 rectly opposite to the nervous temperament, predisposes to tetanus, may 

 we not say, that the two extremes meet, or produce the same effects? 



Anti-spasmodics are employed, with success, in the treatment of their 

 diseases, which partake always, more or less, of the temperament. Sti- 

 mulants, on the contrary, are very suitable to those of pituitous or lym- 

 phatic temperament. The nervous temperament, like the melancholic, 

 is not so much a natural constitution of the body, as the first stage of a 

 disease. This temperament, like the nervous affections which are the 

 result of it, has never shown itself but among societies brought to that 

 state of civilization, in which man is th farthest possible from nature. 

 The Roman ladies became subject to neivous affections, only in conse- 

 quence of those depraved manners which marked the decline of the Em- 

 pire. These affections were extremely common in France, during the 

 eighteenth century, and in the times preceding the fall of the monarchy. 

 Of that epoch, are the works of Whytt, Raulin, Lorry, Pomme, &c. on" 

 nervous affections. Tronchin, a Genevese physician acquired great 

 wealth and reputation by the treatment of these diseases. His whole se- 

 cret consisted in exercising to fatigue, women habitually inactive, keep- 

 ing up their strength, at the same time, by simple, healthy, and plentiful 

 food. The two most remarkable men of the eighteenth century, Vol- 

 taire and the great Frederick, may be given as instances of the nervous 

 temperament; and the history of their brilliant and agitated life, shows, 

 sufficiently, how much the circumstances in which they lived, contribu- 

 ted to develope their native dispositions. 



I shall finish this article on temperaments by observing, that in truth, 

 we bring with us into the world these particular dispositions of body: but 

 that from education, manner of life, climate, acquired habits, they are 

 altered, ov altogether changed. Further, it is exceedingly rare to find 

 individuals, who show, in their purity, the characters assigned to the 

 different temperaments: the descriptions given are drawn from an as- 

 semblage of individuals, much resembling one another. Their charac- 

 ters are pure abstractions, which it is difficult to realize, because all men 

 are at once sanguine and bilious, sanguine and lymphatic, Sec. In this 

 instance, physiologists have imitated the artist, who united in Che image 

 of the goddess of beauty, a thousand perfections which he saw separate 

 in- the most beautiful women of Greece*. 



It is an observation that the sanguine constitution is directly opposed 

 to the melancholic, and never combines with it ; that it is the same with 

 the bilious and lymphatic : though it may happen that a man sanguine 

 in youth, shall become melancholic after a lapse of time : for, as I have 

 said before, man never remains such as he came from the hands of Na- 

 ture ; fashioned by all that surrounds him, his physical qualities, at dif- 

 ferent periods of his life, are as much changed as his character. 



* It is thus that, in the arts of imitation, the ideal grows up ; now, from the exaggera- 

 tion of features, now, from the union of qualities which Nature has produced separate. 



