Our acquaintance with the _gastro-enterite_, is a key to the whole pathology of this Professor, who has taken a great lead in Paris, and formed a school of his peculiar doctrines. He considers that all the essential fevers of authors are only various forms of sympathetic phenomena, arising out of a gastro-enterite; that all the pretended nervous affections of the stomach are the result of a chronic gastrite; that the various dangerous disorders of the brain, for the most part, owe their origin to the state of the digestive passages, irritated with chronic disease; that in all the febrile phlegmasiæ, the stomach and small intestines are irritated in the commencement, if not during the whole progress of the malady; that the gout depends commonly on a chronic _gastro-enterite_, “which prepares and supports the irritation of the joints.” He considers that _gastrite_ rarely exists alone, and that it is almost constantly joined with an inflammation of the small intestines. He does not admit that there is any essential difference in the nature of gout and rheumatism. This is a very concise epitome of the doctrines of M. Broussais, and is offered only as an outline. The practice which is founded on this view of most of the diseases of the body is remarkably simple, and may be almost included in the free and repeated application of leeches to the most affected part of the abdomen; the use of fomentations and poultices to the seat of irritation; of emollient lavemens; of tisanes calculated to allay irritation; of the mildest nutriment, as veal broth with rice; also the greatest care is used to avoid every irritating material, whether medicinal or dietetic; and, to favour all these means by entire repose and time. The gravest fevers of the East and of the West; the plague itself; the fevers of our own country, continued or intermittent, typhoid or inflammatory, and the phlegmasiæ, appear to be all arranged under the same general principle of treatment. From the observations which I had the opportunity of making at the hospitals in Paris, and from the attention I have since devoted to the examination of these doctrines, I am far more inclined to borrow, occasionally, from the opinions of M. Broussais, than implicitly to follow his theory or practice.