Electricity, then, according to its variety and method of administration, is both a stimulant and a sedative; but although these words may be used as convenient distinctive terms, there is no doubt that it is something more, and that it possesses an influence quite _sui generis_, dependent, perhaps, upon its modification of the natural state of the electricity of the human body. [SN: Restorative power of Voltaic Current.] The Voltaic current enjoys a remarkable restorative power, for it has been found that its prolonged action upon a nerve immediately after death will preserve its irritability for a length of time, and that even in a dead nerve the lost irritability may be again established. [SN: Electricity in Fatigue Diseases.] Dr. Poore has particularly studied this restorative or refreshing effect of the Voltaic current, especially in its application to a class of diseases (termed by him “fatigue diseases”), and of which writer’s cramp is a type, chiefly characterized by an intense feeling of fatigue upon any attempt being made to execute certain muscular movements. This tired feeling is at once removed by the application of the Voltaic current, either to the muscles affected or to their nerves, and this result Dr. Poore believes to be explained by an increase in the susceptibility of the muscles to the stimulus of the will. Be this as it may, such an application is often most comforting, and it is not unusual for the patient to experience immediate and most grateful relief, and to beg for its repetition. Many electro-therapeutists will attribute this relief to the production of, as it is termed, a condition of electrotonus, about which, and its importance in electro-therapeutics, a great deal has been written and disputed. [SN: Electrotonus.] Electrotonus is simply a name given to signify the state of a nerve while it is being traversed by an artificial Voltaic current. The effects of such an application, of course, depend chiefly upon the power of the current. If sufficiently powerful complete functional destruction of the nerve would result, as by a lightning flash; and as the tension of electricity is greater at one pole than the other, we naturally, with currents of a certain strength, discover modifications of irritability in the nerve when specially influenced by either pole. The irritability is increased in the half nearest to the negative pole (Katelectrotonus), decreased in the half nearest to the negative pole (Anelectrotonus), and unchanged at a point midway between the two poles (point of indifference). The production of the general electrotonic state is of importance. I believe these lesser variations of anelectrotonus and katelectrotonus to be practically of little moment, and I advise you to disregard them in therapeutics. [SN: Impotence.]