1S13.] 0?i Faccinatim. 13? 



nation. Hence it has been concluded, that even after apparent 

 success, vaccination may be the source of chronical diseases 

 inore or less severe^ and that it may leave the seeds of them in 

 the body. 



5. Finally, from comparing some facts in which the inocula- 

 tion for the small-pox has been the epoch of a fortunate revolu- 

 tion in the health of some individuals, with the inconveniences 

 which have been considered as the consequences of the cow-pox^ 

 some persons have thought, that even allov^ing both to be equally 

 efficacious as preservatives against the small-pox, yet the small- 

 pox inoculation has the advantage of often proving an efficacious 

 remedy for several disorders over which the cow-pox has no 

 influence. 



Such are the strongest objections which have been made 

 against vaccination. The other objections, being of less mo- 

 ment, will be considered more briefly. The first objection, to 

 which we shall turn our attention in the first place is, in our 

 opinion, the most feeble, reposing entirely upon a pathological 

 theory. It may be comprehended under the following question. 



FIRST GUESTION. 



Do the fever and the general eruption which follow the inocu^ 

 lation for the small-pox, hit do not appear after vaccina- 

 tion, constitute a necessary purification of the system, the 

 want of which may lead to dangerous consequences P 



The theory which admits, in a great number of acute and 

 even of chronic diseases, a movement destined to produce 

 evacuations more or less considerable, and by that means to 

 throw out of the body a foreign matter which has given birth 

 to the disease — this theory has been contrived in order to ex- 

 plain certain phenomena, which appear in succession during 

 the course of some acute diseases, and the regular order in 

 which these phenomena succeed each other, and terminate in 

 the cure of tlie disease. The progress of several maladies is 

 well adapted to this theory, nor can it be denied that the phe- 

 nomena of the small-pox, whether natural or from inoculation, 

 accord very easily with the principles upon which this theory 

 has been built. 



A quantity of the pus of small-pox, scarcely perceptible to 

 the eye, introduced under the epidermis by the point of a 

 lancet, soon produces inflammation and a local eruption. la 

 six or seven days the symptoms of a general disease make 

 their appearance, a fever comes on ; and three days after, this 

 fever terminates by a more or less plentiful eruption of small- 

 pox on all parts of the body. These pustules resemble exacts 

 Ij that from which the matter for inoculatioa v^^as taken, and 



