Imatges de pàgina
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OF THE

AMERICAN

PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY,

HELD AT

PHILADELPΗΙΑ,

FOR PROMOTING

USEFUL KNOWLEDGE.

VOLUME III.

PHILADELPHIA

PRINTED AND SOLD BY ROBERT AITKEN & SON, NO. 22;

MARKET STREET.

M.DCC.XCUI.

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INTRODUCTION

TO VOL. THE THIRD.

By

An Essay on those inquiries in Natural Philofophy, which at present are most
beneficial to the UNITED STATES OF NORTH AMERICA.
DR. NICHOLAS COLLIN, Rector of the Swedish Churches in
Pennsylvania.

Read before the Society the 3d of April, 1789.

PHILOSOPHERS

HILOSOPHERS are citizens of the world, the fruits of their labours are freely distributed among all nations; what they fow is reaped by the antipodes, and blooms through future generations. It is, however, their duty to cultivate with peculiar attention those parts of science, which are most beneficial to that country in which Providence has appointed their earthly stations. Patriotic affections are in this, as in other instances, conducive to the general happiness of mankind, because we have the best means of investigating those objects, which are most interesting to us. In the present circumstances of the United States fome problems of natural philosophy are of peculiar importance; a furvey of these may contribute to the most useful direction of our own inquiries, and those of our ingenious fellow citizens. I submit, gentlemen, my reflections on this subject to your candid indulgence and enlightened judgment.

1. ARTICLE, Medical Enquiries.

All countries have fome peculiar diseases, arifing from the climate, manner of living, occupations, predominant paffions, and other causes, whose separate and combined influence is but imperfectly known. In North America we may count five-nervous disorders, rheumatism, intermitting fevers, loss of teeth, and colds. It is remarkable that nervous complaints are at present more frequent in Europe than they formerly were. They spring in a great measure from the indulgencies of a civilized life; but in America these fiends infest with lefs difcriminati.

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on the dwellings of industry and temperance. Proteus-like they assume every shape, and often baffle the best physicians. Their baneful effect on the mind requires the serious attention of legislators, divines, and moral philosophers: I have myself often seen their amazing influence on religious sentiments. When extreme, they derange the whole system; obfcure the intelects, bewilder the imagination; prevent the natural order and operation of all the passions: the foul vibrates between apathy and morbid sensibility: she hates when she should love; and grieves when she ought to rejoice: she resembles a difordered clock, that after a long filence chimes till you are tired, and often instead of one strikes twelveThese extremes are indeed rare; but the more general degrees are still analogous, and produce a great fum of evil.

Slight rheumatic pains are almost epidemic in some seasons of the year. Yet, these are scarcely worth mentioning in comparison to the severe fits that afflict a great number of perfons, even in the earlier parts of life, growing more frequent and violent with age; not feldom attended with lameness, and contraction of limbs..

Fever and ague is here, as in other countries, the plague of marflay and fenny situations, but what is fingular, it also visits the borders of → limpid streams. The leffer degree of it. generally called dumb ague, is not rare in the most salubrious places during the months of September and October. Through all the low countries from north to fouth this disease rages in a variety of hideous forms; and chiefly doth the fury quartan with livid hue, haggard looks, and trembling skeleton-limbs, embitter the life of multitudes: I have known many to linger under it for years, and become so difpirited, as not even to seek any remedy. It is a foul fource of many other diseases; often terminating in deadly dropfies and confumptions.

Premature lofs of teeth is in many respects a severe misfortune. By impairing maftication, and confequently digestion, it disposes for many disorders. It injures the pronunciation; and is a particular disadvantage in a great republic, where for many citizens are public speakers. It exposes the mouth and throat to cold, and various accidents.. It di minishes the pleasure of eating, which is a real though not fublime,. pleasure of life; and which I have heard fome persons very emphatically regret. Finally, it is a mortifying fstroke to beauty; and as such deeply felt by the fair sex! Indeed that man must be a stoic, who can without pity behold a blooming maiden of eighteen afflicted by this infirmity

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of old age! This confideration is the more important, as the amiable affections of the human foul are not less expressed by the traits and motions of the lips, than by the beaming eye. I have not mentioned the pains of tooth-ach, because they are not more common or violent in this country than in some others, where loss of teeth is rare; many perfons here lofing their teeth without much pain, as I have myself experi

enced.

The complaint of catching cold is heard almost every day, and in every company. This extraordinary disorder, little known in some countries, is also very common in England. An eminent physician of that country faid that "colds kill more people than the plague"... Indeed many fevere diforders originate from it among us: it is probably often the fource of the before mentioned chronic diseases. When it does not produce such funest effects, it is nevertheless a serious evil; being attended. with loss of appetite, hoarseness, fore eyes, head-ach, pains and swellings in the face, tooth and ear-ach, rheums, listless langour and lowness of spirits : wherefore Shenftone had fome reason to call this uneasiness a checked perspiration. Great numbers in the United States experience more or lefs these symptoms, and are in some degree valetudinarians for one third of the year.

Eminent medical authors have indeed treated of these distempers; and some American physicians deserve applause for their theoretical and practical exertions. Still, it is devoutly to be wished that these national evils may draw a more pointed attention. The limits of my design permit only a few additional remarks.

These distempers frequently co-exist in the most unhealthy parts of the country; and not feldom afflict individuals with united force. Compaffion for fuffering fellow citizens ought in this case to animate our investi. gation of those general and complicated local causes. The extreme variableness of the weather is universally deemed a principal and general cause of colds, and of the disorders by them produced; the fall and rise of the thermometer by 20 a 30 degrees within less than four and twenty hours, disturbing the strongest constitutions, and ruining the weak. A most important defideratum is therefore the art of hardening the bodily system against these violent impressions; or, in other words, accommodating it to the climate. The general stamina of strength support it under the excesses of both cold and heat. The latter is, however, the most oppressive as we can less elude it by artificial conveniencies. We fu fer, efpccially

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