NOTE VI.
Contractility of Broussais.
Page 126. He assigns it to every tissue, and, like them, he explains every thing by means of it.
He assigns it to every tissue. Haller attributed this property to the muscles alone, “but it is a common property of the tissues.”[207]
He explains every thing by means of it: every thing, even innervation itself. But he is constrained to add: “Doubtless something more occurs in the interior of the nervous tissue; doubtless we are unacquainted and ignorant as to how that other thing is connected with the motions in question, and how it may employ them in the act of innervation,” &c.[208]
So we perceive, in the first place, contractility explains innervation; and then, that something more is wanting. And as nervous contractility is nothing but a mental fiction (a nerve never moves, never contracts, when it is touched) the whole matter tapers down to this something more, or to that other thing.
See how very far from being rigorous are those who construct systems.