Complete document - The Humboldt Digital Library

32
each other, that it is easy to confound them at first sight. But before we examine the question, whether we
shall one day discover, in the real cinchona, in the cuspa of Cumana, the cortex angusturae, the Indian
swietenia, the willows of Europe, the fruits of the coffee tree and uvaria, a matter uniformly diffused, and
exhibiting, (like starch, caoutchouc, and camphor) the same chemical properties in different plants, we
may ask in general, whether, in the present state of physiology and medicine, a febrifuge principle ought
to be admitted. Is it not probable, rather, that this particular derangement in the organization, which is
known under the vague name of the febrile state, and in which both the vascular and the nervous systems
are
1809. Renard ueber inland. Surrogate der Cinarinde, Mainz, 1809. Decandolle, sur les Propriétés
médicales des Plantes, 1816, p. 73, 129, 138, 142, 165, 171, 179. Rogers, on the Properties of the
Liriodendron tulipifera, Philad. 1802.) It is the bark of the roots, that is used iu the tulip tree, as in
the quassia. Eminent febrifuge virtues have equally been found at Loxa, in the cortical part of the
roots of the cinchona condaminea; but it is happy, for the preservation of the species, that the roots
of the real cinchona are not employed in pharmacy. Chemical researches are yet wanting upon the
very powerful bitters contained in the roots of the zanthoriza apiifolia, and the actaea racemosa:
the latter have sometimes been employed with success against the epidemical yellow fever in New
York.