cians were twenty-eight quacks, and it is also true, that Molière had very good reason to turn them into ridicule. It is also certain that nothing can be more absurd than to behold a crowd of silly women, and men, not less feminine in their habits, whenever they are satiated with eating, drinking, gambling, and late hours, calling in a physician for every trifling headache; consulting him as though he were a divinity, and praying for the miraculous gift of combined health and intemperance. It is nevertheless true, that a good physician in a hundred cases may preserve life and limb. A man falls down in an apoplectic fit, it will neither be a captain of infantry or a privy councillor that will relieve him. A cataract obscures my vision; my neighbouring gossips will not restore my sight; for here I make no distinction between the physician and the surgeon. For a long time the two professions have been inseparable. Men who would make it their study to restore health to their fellow-creatures on the sole grounds of humanity and benevolence, should be considered greater than the greatest man upon earth, and bordering upon divine attributes, for preservation and restoration stand next in rank to creation. The Romans were for upwards of five hundred years without physicians. Their people, continually employed in killing, thought but little of the preservation of life; what did they do when they were attacked with a putrid fever, a fistula, a hernia, or a pleurisy ?—They died.

MEDICINE OF THE CHINESE.

THIS singular people possess works on medical science which they trace as far back as three thousand years, and chiefly written by two of their emperors, Chin-nong and Hoang-ti. It has been asserted that they received the early elements of the science from the Egyptians, but it is more probable that they derived their information from their constant intercourse with the Bactrians, whose arts and sciences were flourishing at the period of Alexander's conquests, and the Chinese historians in support of this probability, state that several learned physicians came from Samarcand to establish themselves amongst them. Moreover, the doctrines of Erasistratus bear much resemblance to those of the Chinese.

The superstitious regard shown to the bodies of the departed,

must naturally have materially retarded the progress of anatomical pursuits, although this people assure us that 2706 years before our era they possessed a work on this subject, entitled Nim Kin. Howbeit it seems probable, from their extreme ignorance of the structure of the human body, that this important branch of the science of medicine has remained stationary ever since the publication of the aforesaid treatise.

The Chinese physicians divide the body into a right and left portion, and three regions. The upper one, comprising the head and the chest, a middle one, extending from the lower part of the thorax to the umbilicus, and an inferior region, comprising the hypogaster and lower extremities. They admit twelve viscera as the sources of life, but they do not appear to have any distinct notion of the division, uses and conformation of the muscles, nerves, vessels, and the various tissues of the human economy. Their ignorance equally extends to the construction of animals.

They consider that man is influenced by two principles, heat and humidity, the harmony of which constitutes life, which ceases when their equilibrious state is destroyed. Vital moisture resides in the heart, lungs, liver, spleen, and kidneys, while vital heat pervades the intestines, the stomach, the pericardium, the gall-bladder and the ureters. These two principles are transmitted through the medium of the vital spirits and the blood by twelve canals, one of which carries a fecundating moisture from the head to the hands; another from the liver to the feet; a third from the kidneys to the left side of the body; and a fourth from the lungs to the right division.

In addition to these channels of vital transmission, they imagine that the state of our internal organs can be ascertained by the appearance of various parts of the head, which they consider as indicative sympathies of the action of the internal viscera. For instance, the head corresponds with the tongue, the lungs with the nostrils, the spleen with the mouth, the kidneys influence the ear, the liver acts upon the eyes, and thus they consider that they can form a correct idea of the nature of internal maladies by, the complexion, the state of the eyes, the sound of the voice, the taste, and the smell of the patient.

The Chinese physiologists also consider the human body as a harmonic instrument, of which the muscles, tendons, nerves, arteries, &c. are vibrating chords, producing various sounds and modulations, and the pulse their chief guide in ascertaining the nature of disease, is but the result of a modification of these sounds as the chords are more or less extended or relaxed.

In addition to these singular views of the human economy, they imagine that the body is influenced by five elementary agents, earth, minerals, water, air, and fire.

Fire prevails in the heart and the thoracic viscera, which bear an astronomic relation with the south.

The liver and the gall-bladder are under the influence of air, which is in relation with the east, whence the winds arise, and it is towards spring that these organs are generally affected.

The kidneys and ureters are ruled by water, astronomically associated with the north-hence winter is the usual season of the maladies in these parts.

The stomach and spleen are regulated by earth, and are placed in connexion with the centre of the firmament, between the five cardinal points, and affections of these parts are observed in the third month of each quarter.

Diseases are distinguished by their vicinity to or their distance from the central part of the body, the heart and lungs, and are usually occasioned by vicissitudes in the atmospheric constitution-varying with cold, heat, and moisture.

The minuteness of their division of maladies is as great as the mechanical precision which all their labours exhibit: for instance, they admit no less than forty-two varieties of the smallpox; according to the shape, colour, situation of the pustules, which they compare to the cocoons of the silkwormto strings of beads-chaplets of pearls-and lay equal stress on their being flat or round-black, red, or violet. This disease has, indeed, been described by them with much accuracy and judgment, as regards its benign or its confluent character; and there is no doubt that inoculation was practised among them from time immemorial, as I have already shown in the article on that head. Equally accurate have they been in detailing the various symptoms of gout, scurvy, elephantiasis, and syphilis, which also scourges the "Celestial empire."

The chief guide, however, in their diagnosis and prognosis, is the state of the pulse, and a very curious work, called "The Secrets of the Pulse," and said to have been written two centuries before our era, by Ouang-chou-hó or Vam-xo-ho. The pulse is divided into the external, the middle, and the deepproducing nine different pulsations called Heon, and the arterial beats were formerly sought for in the joint of the big toe; this custom is now abandoned, but they still follow the strange practice of taking up the right wrist in women and the left in

men.

The external pulse, called Piao, is subdivided into several varieties.

1. The superficial P. in Féou, which yields to the slightest

pressure.

2. The hollow P. Kong, which announces that the artery is empty when pressed 'upon.

3. The slippery P. Hang, which slides under the fingers, like the beads of a necklace.

4. The full P. Ché, striking against the fingers with a full caliber of blood.

5. The tremulous P. Hien, vibrating like the chord of a musical instrument.

6. The intermittent P. Kin, vibrating by starts, like the instrument called Kin.

7. The regurgitating P. Hong, the strong pulsation of a full and distended vessel.

These seven characters are considered much more favourable than the eight which follow, and which, arising from a deeper action, require a more forcible pressure.

1. The deep P. Tehin, only discovered by a firm pressure. 2. The filiform P. Ouei, a threadlike pulsation.

3. The moderate P. Ouan, slow and languid.

4. The sharp P. Soe, producing the sensation of a cutting or sawing instrument.

5. The slow P. Tehis, when the pulsations follow each other with languid intervals.

6. The sinking P. Fou, when the pulse, although pressed hard, sinks under the finger.

7. The soft P. Sin, which feels like a drop of water one might

press upon.

8. The weak P. Yo, which yields the sensation of feeling like a worn-out texture, and ceases to be observed when pressed upon for any time.

To these are added nine other varieties, called Tao.

1. The long P. Tehang, full, smooth-feeling like a full tube.

2. The short P. Toan, presenting a pointed surface, that seems indivisible.

3. The empty P. Hin, insensible under moderate pressure. 4. The tight P. Tsou, which the finger feels with difficulty. 5. The embarrassed P. Kié, languid and occasionally stopping. 6. The intermittent P. Tai, when several pulsations appear to be missing.

7. The slender P. Sié, so slow and weak, that it feels like a hair. 8. The moving P. Tong, that one might compare to stones under water.

9. The tense P. Ké, feeling like a distended drum-head.

But as many Chinese doctors were not satisfied with this confusion in the classification of pulses, and, like practitioners in other countries, sought to render darkness still more visiblethey sought to strike out a new career by increasing the multiplication, and introduced the following addenda :

1. The strong pulse, Ta, filling the vessel, yet yielding to

pressure.

2. The precipitate P. Son, in which the pulsation was rapid in succession.

3. The scattered P. San, soft, slow, and non-resisting.

4. The stray P. Li-king, strong-not pulsating three times in each inspiration.

5. The firm P. Tun, consistent and resisting.

6. The lively P. Ki, pulsation rapid in succession.

7. The skipping P. Teng, pulsation unequal, sudden, and frequent.

In this minute attention to the many variations of the pulses, the Chinese aided their study, by attending to age, sex, stature, constitution, the seasons, the passions, and the comparative state of health and disease.

In a person of high stature, the pulse was full-concentrated in diminished individuals-deep and embarrassed in fat subjects-long and superficial in the meager-soft in the phlegmatic temperament-tremulous in the lively and the activeslower in man than in woman, excepting when threatened with disease-full and firm in the adult-slow and feeble in old age— soft and vivacious in infancy.

The rhythm of the pulse was affected by the passions, though chiefly in a transient manner:-moderately slow, in joy-short, in grief-deep, under the impression of fear-precipitate and regurgitating, in anger. In the spring, they maintained that the pulsation was tremulous-replete, in summer-spare and superficial, in autumn-dry and deep, in winter. Much mysterious ceremony was observed by the Chinese physicians in this investigation; they felt the pulse with four fingers, which they alternately raised or dropped on the vessel, as if playing on a musical instrument.

In this profound study, they attributed to every disease a peculiar state of the pulse by which it could be recognised and ascertained, and at the same time it enabled them to form a