PATHOLOGY. 
Dr. Darnin's fyftem of nofology, publifhed indeed 
fome years before Dr. Crichton’s, is founded, not on 
fymptoms, but on theory. The author of Zoonomia was 
a man of great genius, daring imagination, and extenfive 
reading. Seep. 43. Unfortunately for him, he was per¬ 
petually ftung with a defire of diftinguifhing himfelf by 
feeing things, weighing things, and combining them, in 
a manner different from every one elfe. All his works 
give proof of this; and fliow evidently that he would at 
any time rather think wrong with himfelf than think 
right with other people. His nofological fyftem is 
founded upon his phyiiological principles; which, ftripped 
of extraneous matter, may be told in few mords, fo far 
as they are applicable to the prefent fubjeCf. The brain, 
as a collective organ, is the fountain of life and fenfation, 
and fends forth fibres of different kinds and for different 
purpofes; which are excited, and communicate percep¬ 
tions to the organ whence they originate, by four diffe¬ 
rent claffes of ftimuli, thofe of Ample irritation, of fen¬ 
fation, of volition, and of aflociation; every part of the 
animal frame having a greater or lefs degree of influence 
upon every other part, and operating this influence by 
the medium offympathy; in confequence of which, Dr. 
Darwin was defirous that his own theory fttould take the 
name of the fympathetic. “ Every idea," fays he, “is a 
contraction, or motion, or configuration of the fibres which 
conftitute the immediate organ of fenfe;” and hence it 
feems difficult for the friends of Dr. Darwin to repel the 
charge, that ideas, under this explanation, mult be ma¬ 
terial fubftances. Health he contemplated as confifting 
in the natural correfpondence, and degree of correfpon- 
dence, of the various organs of the body to their respec¬ 
tive ftimuli, and difeafe as an effed produced by any, even 
the flighted, deviation from fuch correfpondence in any 
part. Hence every fuch effed, in his opinion, conftituted 
a difeafe; and what is commonly fo denominated, and 
which confifts of a combination of fymptoms, as a fever 
or a colic, he regarded as a group or bundle of dileafes; 
a fort of Pandora’s box, where they mufter their fecret 
or collective ftrength, and whence they iffue fimulta- 
neoufly. In forming his nofological arrangement, he 
made thefe effects, and the parts or organs in which they 
manifeft themfelves, conftitute his genera and fpecies; 
while he derived his claffes and orders from their proxi¬ 
mate (or rather what upon his theory are fuppofed to be 
their proximate) caufes, and the peculiar characters which 
thefe caufes exhibit; the number of the clafles being 
four, derived as may be eafily conjeCtured from the four 
fpurces of ftimulation juft referred to. “ I have taken,” 
fays Dr. Darwin, “ the proximate caufe for the claffic cha¬ 
racter. The characters of the orders are taken from the 
excefs, or deficiency, or retrograde aCtion, or other pro¬ 
perties, of the proximate caufe. The genus is generally 
derived from the proximate effed. And the fpecies gene¬ 
rally from the locality of the difeafe in the fyftem.” 
By proximate caufe, however, Dr. Darwin does not 
mean what is generally underltood by this phrafe, namely, 
the molt ltriking or charaCteriftic fymptom of a difeafe ; 
but what Ihould feem to be the proximate caufe upon his 
own theory, and which in every inftance mufi be a differ¬ 
ent and often a direCtly oppofite thing. Thus in nicti¬ 
tation, the proximate caufe, in the common fenfe of the 
term, is a “ rapid and vibrating motion of the eye-lid,” 
which ought, therefore, to conftitute the character of the 
diforder. In the vocabulary of Dr. Darwin, however, 
this, inftead of being the proximate caufe, is the proximate 
effed ; while his proximate caufe is “increafed irritation,” 
which is the remote caufe, as the phrafe is commonly ex¬ 
plained. We are not now inquiring which is the more 
correCt ufe of the terms caufe and effeCt, but only pointing 
out the variance and the confufion that hence neceffarily 
enfue. The perplexity hereby produced rnuft have been 
an effectual bar, had there been no other, to Dr. Darwin’s 
fyftem ever becoming popular. Unfortunately there are 
many others, and of as formidable an afpeCt. The en¬ 
tire bafis is theoretical; in feveral parts vifionary : the 
whole may, therefore, prove hereafter to be unfounded ; 
a confiderable portion of it evidently is unfounded at 
prefent. But the direCt death-warrant of the fyftem con¬ 
fifts in his making every Angle proximate effed (in com¬ 
mon language proximate caufe, or fymptom) a diftinCl 
difeafe ; for, as the fame proximate effeCt, or fymptfc>m, 
may be produced by feveral, or by each, of what Darwin 
calls proximate caufes, and which conftitute his claffes, 
it follows that the very fame fpecies or fpecific difeafe 
mu ft in fuch cafes belong equally to fome order or other 
of feveral or of all the clafles of his fyftem. And fuch, 
to the ftudent’s embarraffment and furprife, lie-will find 
upon examination to be the real faCf. Thus while Va- 
liola (fmall-pox) is arranged under cl. ii. ord. 1. gen iii. 
Eruptio Variolas (fmall-pox eruption) occurs under cl. 
iv. ord. 1. gen. ii. So Hydrophobia appears firft in i. 3. 
i. and afterwards in iii. 1.1. Diabetes in i. 3. ii. and again 
in iv. 3, 1. Palpitation of the heart in i. a. i. and again 
in i. 3. iii. being twice in the lame clafs: and fo of many 
others. 
Such perplexity fets all the ordinary laws of method at 
defiance ; yet it is eafily accounted for from the nature of 
the primary divifions. While, to make the fyftem ftill 
more defective‘and incapable of practical ufe, its author 
has given us neither his fpecific nor his generic definitions, 
excepting, indeed, occafionally ; confining himfelf en¬ 
tirely to his Latin and Engliffi names ; and fending us 
for their deferiptions to “ the Nofologia Methodica of 
Sauvages, and the Synopfis Nofologise of Dr. Cullen, and 
the authors to which they refer.” But fuch an appeal 
can be of no poffible fervice : the difeafes in Darwin’s 
fyftem do not run parallel with thofe referred to, and 
the deferiptions will icarcely in any inftance apply. 
In the very excellent Medical Dictionary of Dr. "Parr, 
which has now been about twelve years before the public, 
the reader will find, under the article Nosology, a fyl- 
tematic arrangement of difeafes which ought by no means 
to pafs without notice. 
In laying down the outline of his fyftem, Dr. Parr had 
his eye chiefly directed to the nofological method of Selle, 
and the botanical method of Juffieu. It follows, there¬ 
fore, that his primary divifion would confift not of claffes, 
but of what he intended to be natural orders, or families. 
Thefe orders are twelve, whofe names are taken from the 
clafles or orders of Sauvages or Cullen, with the excep¬ 
tion of one, Suppressor.ii, which is borrowed from Lin¬ 
naeus. 
Here again, therefore, we have a great and noble aim, 
whatever be the fuccefs of its accomplifhment. But, as 
a natural fyftem, even in botany, is to the prefent hour, 
and perhaps always will be, a theoretical rather than a 
practical idea, there feems very little expectation that it 
can ever be realifed in medicine. On the part, therefore, 
of Dr. Parr, the attempt was a bold one ; and his arrange¬ 
ment will ffiow that, if he has not been altogether fuc- 
cefsful, he has exhibited a very confiderable degree of 
ingenuity. This arrangement is as follows: 
Pyrexia, Fevers. 
Phlegmafia, Inflammations 
Eruptiones, Eruptions. 
Profluvia, Fluxes. 
Supprejj'orii, Suppreffions. 
Spajmi, Spafms. 
Adynamia, Debilities. 
Paranoia, Alienations. 
Cachexia, General Diforder. 
Intumefcentia, Tumours. 
Edopia, Protrufions. 
Pluga, Wounds. 
Between moftof thefe we can trace, in the feries of their 
defeent, a verbal connexion ; and between feveral of them 
a connexion of a more fubftantial kind. It holds nomi¬ 
nally in the firft three orders, but feems to flip from us 
in the three that follow ; and is occafionally recovered in 
the remaining. Yet, when we examine the genera and 
fpecies of the refpeCtive orders, we fliall find the con¬ 
nexion is too commonly nothing more than verbal. 
Phlegmasia has a manifeft relation to Pyrexia ; but 
in Caeliaca, Leucorrhcea, Leucorrhois, (difeharge of white 
mucus 
