LIFE AND WRITINGS OF ROBERT WHYTT, M.D. 103 



method of dissolving stone by injections. It is included in the German transla- 

 tion of Whytt's works, which was published at Leipsic soon after his death, in 

 two parts, the one containing his practical, the other his theoretical writings. 



Whytt's treatment of stone consisted in administering soap and lime-water 

 to the extent of an ounce daily of Alicant soap, and three wine pints or more of 

 lime-water. There -is no reason to doubt that good results occasionally followed 

 this treatment ; but the benefit must have arisen from such effects as the correc- 

 tion of acidity and the sedative influence of the lime-water, rather than from any 

 solvent power either in the soap or in the lime-water. In Whytt's time, no dis- 

 tinction had been established among the several kinds of urinary concretions. 

 He however remarked, that some of the concretions which he met with were not 

 equally affected out of the body by lime-water, so that, while he says such in- 

 stances must be extraordinary, he limits his original conclusion by saying, that 

 lime-water is, at least, a pretty universal solvent of calculous concretions. The 

 concretions on which he generally experimented, must have come under the head 

 of uric acid concretions; and in one of his experiments he hit on the most perfect 

 solvent of that kind of concretion ; for he put some grains of a calculus into a 

 mixture of potass (carbonate of potassa) and quicklime, when he found the con- 

 cretion to be entirely dissolved. He is even able, in the third edition of his 

 work, to give an explanation of the result in the following terms : — ' The quick- 

 lime takes the air (the carbonic acid) from the potass, and thus it is rendered 

 much more caustic, and therefore fit completely to dissolve the concretion ; but 

 in the like proportion, the solvent is rendered too caustic for use in the living 

 body." 



It was not till ten years after Whytt's death that Scheele discovered the 

 most frequent constituent of urinary concretions to be a concrete acid soluble in 

 alkaline ley, namely, the uric acid, so as to lay the foundation of all that has 

 been since ascertained with regard to the chemistry of such bodies. The reputa- 

 tion of other solvents has rendered the claims of lime-water obsolete in the pre- 

 sent day, yet as these new remedies cannot act as solvents within the body any 

 more than lime-water, it is possible that the beneficial effects of the latter may 

 have been attended to of late less than they deserve. Whytt had much corre- 

 spondence respecting the cases of some persons of high rank affected with this 

 disease ; among these are Mr Walpole, afterwards Lord Walpole of Wolterton, 

 the younger brother of Sir Robert Walpole, and Dr Newcome, Bishop of Llan- 

 daff, &c., whose cases, along with many others, are reported in his works. 



Dr Rutty* of Dublin, in 1741, had communicated a paper to the Royal So- 

 ciety of London, on the solvent power of soap lees and lime-water over urinary 



* Rutty on Joanna Stephens' Medicine for the Stone, 2d edit., London, 1745. 

 VOL. XXIII. PART I. 2 F 



