Electro-physiology and electro-therapeutics : showing the best methods for the medical uses of electricity / By Alfred C. Garratt.

CHAPTER VI. HYPERESTHESIA, —EXALTED NERVE ACTIONS AND PAINS. " General Principles " as regards the Nerves in Health and in Disease. Our knowledge of the exact functions of the different parts of the nervous system, — of nerve batteries, nerve telegraphs, gan- glia stations, and other curious nerve arrangements, — we must confess, is, on the whole, scanty and imperfect. Some certain- ties, it is true, we positively do possess ; and some strong proba- bilities, also, which almost amount to certainties. There is a pathological range of evidences from the brain, spinal cord, and the nerves, (omitting the great sympathetic nerve and its rami- fications, for we know but little of its disorders,) that is fairly made out, and is well understood by some, at least; and wc are at present in the right way for increasing our knowledge of this intricate subject by the greatly increased facilities for accurate research, and from the more careful collection of facts, and rigid induction of particulars, which will lead us, or those who follow us, to a safe and useful generalization. But, perhaps, adopting, as I do, the views and language of Dr. Thomas Watson, in the main, without expounding such views upon these intricate mat- ters, it would be impossible for me to explain, as it would be for others to clearly understand, the reasoning I entertain respecting many of the manifest deviations of nerve functions, and of the diseases of the brain, spinal cord, and the nerves. We find that we are perpetually asking ourselves, when we see the ordinary healthy functions of the nerves disordered, Is this disorder the result of disease in any part of the nervous matter itself ? or is it merely sympathetic of disease or derangement in other parts ? For there are few diseases of any kind which do not, in some