An essay on the organic diseases and lesions of the heart and great vessels / from the clinical lectures of J. N. Corvisart ... ; published, under his inspection, by C. E. Horeau ... ; translated from the French, with notes, by Jacob Gates.

  • Corvisart des Marets, Jean Nicolas, Baron, 1755-1821.
Date:
1812
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An essay on the organic diseases and lesions of the heart and great vessels / from the clinical lectures of J. N. Corvisart ... ; published, under his inspection, by C. E. Horeau ... ; translated from the French, with notes, by Jacob Gates. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    until experience has regulated the only principles which they should preserve, and obliterate from their memo- ries the deceptive impressions of the imagination, and bring their reason under the safe direction of experience and observation. I intended also to prove that the knowledge of moral- ity, namely, of the human heart, is as necessary to the physician as that of the body, for the purpose of often avoiding another order of numerous mistakes. With more leisure and taste for abstraction, I could have supported this part of my discourse with metaphy- sical considerations and proofs borrowed from the best authorities : but I have gained my point, if I have said enough for readers of reputation. As it is not sufficient to have established the sources of ignorance or inattention to organic diseases ; let us prove why they must be frequent. First, authors in general have thoughtlessly disregard- ed the alteration and lesion of our organs as to their action. To say that our organs must be wasted or altered, accor- ding to the duration, intensity, and irregularity of their action, is as they thought, to stop at trivial considerations; it is to compare the human body to a machine, and to confound it with the unstable productions of the mechan- ic arts. These reproaohes, having been always exaggera- ted, and often rendered ridiculous, have diverted the attention of physicians from correct observation : and the imagination being continually fixed on the abstract study of the principle of life, its nature, laws, its repara- tive and preservative power, &c. they neglected to notice the successive or accidental derangements which obtain- ed in the human machine. Indeed, I am far from withholding the just tribute of applause which the efforts of powerful geniuses deserve for partially elucidating the obscurity which involves the nature of the principle which enlivens animals, supports the functions of their organs, and ever repairs, as far an it 29 possible, the loss occasioned by their action, or by destructive agents both internal and external! This