LINN^US. 309 



himself to his lectures^ which were copious and 

 highly interesting. 



In pathology, or rather in nosology, by which 

 latter term is meant the systematic arrangement 

 and precise definition of diseases, his merits are very 

 considerable. His practice was no doubt too limit- 

 ed, and of too short duration, to enable him to 

 form, from his own experience, correct ideas of all 

 the ailments to which man is liable ; but it was suf- 

 ficient to render him capable of methodizing the ob- 

 servations of others ; and it requires little penetra- 

 tion to perceive, that one man may learn more in 

 three years than another in fifty. The several classi- 

 fications of diseases which have been given to the 

 world, possess various degrees of accuracy. Dr Cul- 

 len of Edinburgh, whose Synopsis Nosologise Me- 

 thodicse has been almost universally acknowledged 

 as one of the most successful attempts to reduce to 

 order the complicated phenomena of morbid action, 

 -considers the Genera Morborum of Linnaeus as the 

 most important work on the subject, next to that of 

 Sauvages. It was first published in 1759 as an aca- 

 demical dissertation, and afterwards as a separate 

 work. 



In the system now mentioned he arranges the ge- 

 nera of diseases under eleven classes, as follows : — 



I. ExANTHEMATici. Fcvcrs attended widi eruptions 

 on the skin. 



II. Cbitici. Critical fevers. 



III. Phlogistici. Fevers from local inflammation. 



IV. DoLOROsi. Painful diseases without fever. 



V. Mentales. Diseases in which the functions of the 

 mind are disturbed. 



