oubtless an example. After his blood was heated and his circulation
quickened, he laid himself down on his back, his head not raised.
Attention to the workings of such a piece of apparatus as might be made,
would have shown the fatal effects of such a position at such a time.
[4] A young physician, whom I paid for correcting the proofs, was not
successful in preventing mistakes, especially in regard to numbers.
[5] I had just been reading Cuvier, to see whether he believed in the
Harveian theory of the circulation. I found he did not. "The circulation
vortex," says he, "is sometimes simple, sometimes double and even triple
(including that of the vena porta); the rapidity of its movements is
often _aided_ by the contraction of a certain fleshy apparatus
denominated hearts." Thus showing that my theory gave to the heart all
the prominence that was given to it by this great philosopher, who had
not, however, advanced any opinion as to the cause of the circulation.
[6] One of them, my lamented niece, Jane Porter Lincoln, at my request,
immediately wrote an account of the experiment, which is now in my
possession.
[7] These physicians gave certificates of their witnessing and assisting
at this memorable experiment, which were published in the _Boston
Medical Journal_, February 1852.
[8] Dr. Cartwright also reported the case in a letter which was
published in the _Boston Medical Journal_, September, 1852. This
resuscitation was more wonderful than those detailed in my published
work on "Respiration." All cases of life thus restored are proofs _a
posteriori_ of the truth of this theory of the arterial circulation.
[9] Good systems of exercise have been made in some respectable
institutions for health, openly formed on the principles of this theory.
Such is that by Dr. Hamilton, of Saratoga.
[10] When the time shall come that, the truth of my discovery being no
longer denied, its originality shall be contested, it will be a
significant fact that, in the _Nashville Journal_, of September, 1854,
is an article against it from a physician signing himself "Justicia,"
which he thus heads, "The Willardian Notion." In evil report, it was
indisputably mine. This article also shows, that the Harveian theory is
still maintained by the opposers of mine.
[11] See Draper's Physiology, p. 142.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Theory of Circulation by Respiration, by
Emma Willard
*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENB
|