nexion with those furnished by physiological investigations. I have thus, I trust, vindicated myself against an imputation which was, as I conceive unjustly, thrown out against my paper, viz.-" that I had endeavoured to deduce a theory of the disease from experiments upon the lower animals, among whom it is unknown"-for, in truth, I had only sought in physiological investigation for such aid as would the better enable me to interpret the phenomena of the disease, and without which I felt that it would be impossible to form right conclusions respecting the origin, nature, and relations of the various symptoms and lesions which together constitute its clinical history. And I may add, that my theory of the proximate cause of the disease was not propounded until it had been mutually affirmed by the results of both clinical and physiological researches.

I would further add, with reference to physiological inquiries generally as applied to practical medicine, that I have never regarded them in any other light, or resorted to them otherwise, than as strictly auxiliary to clinical research; and, whenever the subject under investigation would admit of being explained without them, no one would deprecate a resort to them more than myself. But whoever will reflect upon the obscurity in which much that related to the pathology of phlegmasia dolens was involved when I commenced these inquiries, and the failure of

even the best endeavours to unravel it by clinical study alone, must admit that without some other light and guidance, our prospect of arriving at a correct knowledge of its true nature and pathology was very slight; and I but sought for that assistance in the investigations I undertook, which could not otherwise have been obtained.

Moreover, if the state of our knowledge respecting the nature and etiology of phlebitis, at the time I began this investigation, be compared with what it is at present, it will be found to amount to little short of a revolution in medical science; and it is a source to me of extreme satisfaction to know that the pathological views I ventured to put forward respecting it, as deduced from my own personal inquiriesand which were directly opposed to those current— have been very generally confirmed by subsequent investigations, and are now accepted by some of the highest authorities in the profession. In the present lectures, I have endeavoured to place the whole subject in a much clearer light than I was enabled to do from the limited space at my command in my published paper, and by omitting all extraneous and experimental details, to bring the essential points of the inquiry into greater sequence and connexion.

It will be seen that I have throughout carefully avoided entering upon anything like professional or personal controversy. I have felt that to prove others to be in the wrong, would in no way tend to prove

myself to be in the right; and I entertain too much respect for the eminent obstetricians who have preceded me in the investigation of this subject, to desire to detract in the least from the merit of their labours. It is sufficient for me to avow, that I have had but one object in view in the prosecution of this subject, and that is the attainment of truth. The investigations of others I have in no way sought to disparage or repudiate; on the other hand, I have fully accepted all their substantiated facts: and I claim for myself no other merit than that of having carried our knowledge respecting them a little further, and of having thus worked out a theory of the disease more in accordance with its general history; and at the same time more suggestive of the true principles upon which its treatment, both preventive and curative, should be conducted.

11, Chester Place, Ilyde Park Gardens, London,

March 1862.

MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN,-I have selected the pathology and treatment of phlegmasia dolens as the subject for the present course of lectures, from a conviction that it is one peculiarly adapted to the purpose for which they were instituted, and the auditory to which they are to be addressed. For whilst, on the one hand, the subject is eminently obstetrical, and indeed of the highest obstetrical importance, it is yet one, on the other, the interest of which is not limited to the sphere of obstetric practice, but is equally extended to every branch of pathology and every department of medical practice. For I need scarcely observe that this disease, at one time regarded as the exclusive "apanage” of the puerperal state, is now found, with the progress of medical science, to have a much wider relationship, and to occur in connection with various morbid and diathetic conditions, not only in the non-puerperal female, but in persons of the opposite sex; and I venture to express my belief that there is scarcely

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a febrile movement capable of being inaugurated in the economy with which, under certain circumstances, it may not be identified. Regarded, therefore, with reference to its special obstetrical, as well as to its general pathological interest, it has appeared to me to be a subject well suited for a course of obstetrical lectures, to be addressed to a body of gentlemen engaged, not alone in obstetrical, but in every department of medical practice, and together constituting a medical society at once the oldest and the most catholic in the metropolis.

But I may add that I have not been guided exclusively by these considerations in the selection of my subject. Beyond the obstetrical and general interest which is attached to phlegmasia dolens, there is yet another circumstance which has influenced me in selecting it for the subject of these lectures; viz., the fact that I have devoted much time and labour to the investigation of its pathology, and have reason to believe that I have been thus enabled to enlarge our knowledge of its nature, and extend our practical resources in regard to its treatment. An outline of these researches was published in the thirty-sixth volume of the Medico-Chirurgical Transactions; but their entire bearing upon the disease in general, its prevention and cure, was but cursorily and dimly portrayed; and I gladly avail myself of the privilege conferred upon me by the council to submit them in a more complete and comprehensive form through these lectures to this Society, and through this Society to the profession at large. And I venture to do so with the greater confidence, because all subsequent experience has confirmed me in the conviction of their general accuracy, and at the same time has enabled me to extend very widely their practical application.