182 
ON THERAPEUTICS. 
they can possibly restore healthy tone in defiance of natural 
laws, will be desirable. The agent selected will depend upon 
the amount of prostration. Dilute mineral acids, with a 
vegetable bitter, are very efficacious in restoring tone to the 
digestive system. During anaemia” following inflammatory 
affections, the sesqui-carbonate of iron, with gentian and some 
cardiac stimulant, as ginger or pimenta, at once improves the 
digestive power and furnishes material for the colouring matter 
of the blood. Anaemia, associated with effusion, is appro¬ 
priately treated by tonics and diuretics combined; thus 
taraxacum and carbonate of iron, or gentian ; sulphate of 
copper and nitrate of potash, may be exhibited. The last 
formula, although not consistent with chemical laws, is not 
objectionable on that account, as no important modification 
of action will result from the formation of nitrate of copper 
and sulphate of potash. For “ grease,’'’ or chronic oedema, 
we have found the compound to be very effective. 
When prostration is very extreme, stimulants may be found 
necessary before tonics can be advantageously exhibited ; in 
those instances mentioned during our discussion upon stimu¬ 
lants where the power of assimilation is entirely lost, tonics 
would share the fate of other matters, and either be expelled 
unchanged or remain to produce local irritation. The tempo¬ 
rary excitement which will follow the employment of 
stimulants may tend to assist the appropriation of the other 
medicines, and hence in treating such extreme cases tonics 
will be judiciously combined with diffusible stimulants, winch 
present themselves in the convenient forms of strong ale, 
out, or wines. 
In extreme debility we have found vegetable tonics to be 
more readily appropriated than mineral: and small doses 
are, beyond question, more effective than large ones, which 
frequently defeat our intentions bv causing immediate 
derangement, including loss of appetite, which is in itself a 
most serious consequence at a time when our treatment will 
owe its success to the improvement of the assimilative 
functions. As the tone of the system is gradually restored, 
the mineral agents may be added, if necessary, still keeping in 
mind the importance, under all circumstances, of so propor¬ 
tioning the dose that as little interference as possible may be 
occasioned to the organism. It cannot be too often insisted 
upon, that the grand object in exhibiting medicines is to 
introduce them into the system as quietly as may be ; the 
fondness for energetic and immediate effects cannot but be 
deplored, as it leads us to estimate agents frequently accord¬ 
ing to the amount of disturbance which follows their exhi¬ 
bition. 
