Let us conclude from all these considerations, that all mucous hemorrhages, whether active or passive, are real exhalations. Hence you see that there is not so great a difference as might be thought, between the first and inflammation. In fact, in one there is an accumulation of blood in the capillary system, then the passage of this fluid by the exhalant vessels, that are continuous with this system. In the other, there is only the first phenomenon. Undoubtedly the signs, the circumstances, &c. are wholly different, because the modifications the organic sensibility undergoes are not the same; but the state in which the small vessels and the blood are respectively found, is not less analogous. One proof that in active hemorrhages, it is the organic sensibility which, differently modified, opens or closes the passage to the blood by the exhalants, is this, that almost always there are previous symptoms which continue for some time, and which evidently declare the disturbance that the vital forces, the organic sensibility in particular, experience in the part; we know the itching, the forerunner of nasal hemorrhages, the tickling and sometimes sense of heat which precede the pectoral. Sometimes, according to the varieties of alteration it undergoes, the organic sensibility at first permits serous fluids to pass, then bloody; this is what we see in menstruation, in which the exhalants oftentimes pour out serum for some minutes, then true blood. In passive hemorrhages, the organic sensibility is without doubt diminished, as well as the tone or insensible organic contractility. We might say, that the small vessels were not able then to contract sufficiently to retain the blood; it is as in our injections which ooze from the mucous surfaces, because life no longer opposes their passage. Observe that when these hemorrhages are produced by an organic disease, it is almost always that portion of mucous surface nearest the organ, that is influenced by it. Thus in the last stages of disease of the heart or the lungs, the patients often spit blood; they pass it by stool, towards the termination of those of the liver, or even throw it up by vomiting, &c. The whole mucous system never loses its forces so as to pour out blood everywhere; it is only in a determinate part that it is weakened. What disposes the mucous exhalants more than all the others to pour out blood? It appears to be because the capillary system whence they arise is constantly entered by blood, and the course is very short from this fluid when present in the capillaries to the mucous surfaces. This is so true, that those portions of the mucous system that have but little of this fluid in a natural state, as those of the sinuses of the face, of the ear, &c. are less subject to hemorrhages. I am confident, that if there were exhalants upon the muscles to pour out constantly a fluid upon the exterior of these organs, hemorrhages would be very frequent in them.