[ 388 ] 

 XLIX. Proceedings of Learned Societies. 



ROYAL SOCIETY. 



[Continued from p. 31 7-] 

 June 18, 1868. — Lieut. -General Sabine, President, in the Chair. 

 HE following communications were read : — 



T 



An attempt to apply Chemical Principles in explanation of 

 the Action of Poisons." By W. H. Broadbent, M.D. 



The starting-point in the inquiry has been the two following pos- 

 tulates : — 



1 . That there must be some relation between the substance admi- 

 nistered and the animal organism, on which the effects depend. 



2. That, so far as the substance is concerned, the basis of the 

 relation can only be its chemical properties, using the term in its 

 widest sense. 



From these postulates follow certain corollaries : — 



1 . That the physiological and therapeutic action of the same sub- 

 stance must be similar in kind. 



2. That the action of food, remedies, and poisons must be capable 

 of explanation on the same principles. 



3. That substances chemically allied should have similar physio- 

 logical and therapeutic actions, or any diversity found to exist should 

 be capable of explanation on chemical grounds. 



The second of these deductions is taken as a guide in the present 

 inquiry. Something is known as to the uses of the various classes 

 of foods in the economy, and of the mode in which they subserve 

 these uses ; this knowledge may be applied in the endeavour to as- 

 certain the mode of action of poisons. 



The operations taking place in the animal organism may be di- 

 vided into two great classes : — (a) for maintenance of structure, (/3) 

 for evolution of force. While mutually interdependent, they are 

 distinct, and in character essentially antagonistic — structural and 

 chemical elaboration on the one hand, oxidation or disintegration on 

 the other. 



The two great classes of food, organic and mineral, are in close 

 relation with these. The organic foods build up the tissues, but ulti- 

 mately undergo oxidation and yield force. The inorganic foods take 

 a subordinate part in the composition of the textures ; they do not 

 yield force by oxidation, but they influence the nutritive processes. 

 So also the organic remedies and poisons affect the evolution of force, 

 mineral substances the organic processes. 



(The action of mineral matters has been noticed elsewhere.) 



The force evolved in the animal organism takes the form of heat, 

 motion, and nervous action ; but there are very important points of 

 difference between heat on the one hand and nervo-muscular action 

 on the other, both as to the part they take in the vital processes, 

 and in the conditions of their evolution. 



It is through their action on the nervous system that the power- 

 ful organic poisons destroy life ; and in order to understand this 



