A general system of toxicology, or, A treatise on poisons, found in the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms : considered in their relations with physiology, pathology, and medical jurisprudence / abridged and partly translated from the French of M.P. Orfila ... by Joseph G. Nancrede.

  • Orfila, Matthieu Joseph Bonaventure, 1787-1853.
Date:
1817
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A general system of toxicology, or, A treatise on poisons, found in the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms : considered in their relations with physiology, pathology, and medical jurisprudence / abridged and partly translated from the French of M.P. Orfila ... by Joseph G. Nancrede. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    PREFACE OF THE AUTHOR. OF all the branches of Medicine, the study of Toxico- logy is, without contradiction, that which excites the most general interest. Allied as it is by numberless relations to almost all the natural sciences, it has occupied the atten- tion of all philosophers, who are zealous of contributing to the progress of human knowledge. The Naturalist, placed in the midst of a multitude of poisonous substan- ces, attentively examines the varied forms which they pre- sent, their distinguishing characters and their mode of developement, and arrives easily at a method of pointing them out. The Physiologist, inflamed with the desire of unveiling the most secret mysteries of our organization, seeks to explain the mode of action of the most energetic poisons, the deleterious influence which they exert, and the immediate cause of the sudden death they occasion. The Medical Practitioner, aware of the fatal and instanta- neous effects, produced by the poisons of the three king- doms of Nature, constantly directs his attention to the search of means capable of destroying at once their fatal action, and of re-establishing the different functions of the animal economy in their natural order. The Chemist, shocked at the horrid crime of homicide, brings to perfec- tion the process necessary for establishing the case of poi-