572 
for 1743. It subsequently went through several editions, and was 
translated into French and German. Though time has rendered a 
great part of this work obsolete, it still merits a distinguishing mark 
in the history of science, since Dr Black has left it recorded, that it 
was the controversy between Whytt and Alston respecting the most 
solvent kind of lime-water, which led him to the examination of 
calcareous earth, magnesia, the alkalies, and fixed air, whence he 
obtained conclusions that placed chemistry within a short period of 
their date on a wholly new and extended footing. 
Whytt’s next work, published in 1751, “ On the Vital and other 
Involuntary Motions of Animals,” fixed the attention of physiologists 
throughout Europe on its author. His more practical work “ On 
the Sympathy of Nerves and on Nervous, Hypochondriac, or Hysteric 
Disorders/' published in 1764, is a commentary on the former, and 
a practical illustration of its doctrines. Whence in the present 
summary both works are considered together, though in the Memoir 
itself each work is separately treated of. 
The first object of the Memoir, under this head, is to show by suf- 
ficient proofs that Whytt was not a follower of Stahl, — that he was 
no more an Animist or Semianimist, than the major part of physio- 
logists at the present moment, — that while Whytt conceived it more 
conducive to simplicity to represent his sentient principle as a part 
of the soul, he expressly declares it to be superfluous to dispute 
with any one who holds doubts thereon, because all his views are 
independent of that idea, and possess the same truth, whether the 
sentient principle be or be not accounted a part of the soul. Further, 
that this sentient principle being destitute of reason, intention and 
consciousness is really nothing but a physiological force, united with 
the nervous centre, susceptible of being so far excited by impres- 
sions brought by the afferent nervous fibrils, as to communicate 
motor force to the efferent nervous fibrils which proceed to con- 
tractile organs. That such is exactly the light in which Cullen 
places Whytt’s doctrine, referring to Whytt’s own expression, that 
under the appropriate impressions, the power is as certainly deter- 
mined to bring about these motions, “ as is a scale which, by mecha- 
nical laws, turns with the greatest weight.” That notwithstanding 
the denial of any consciousness in the case, it is true that the term 
sentient, and the quality of ungratefulness ascribed to the impressions 
concerned, create a confusion of ideas ; but that that difficulty had 
