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OF ARETÆUS, THE CAPPADOCIAN, ON THE CAUSES AND SYMPTOMS OF CHRONIC DISEASE
BOOK I.
[p. 305]
CHAPTER VII. ON PARALYSIS
Apoplexy, Paraplegia, Paresis, Paralysis, are all generically the
same. For they are all a defect of motion, or of touch, or
of both; sometimes also of understanding, and sometimes of
other sense. But apoplexy is a paralysis of the whole body,
of sensation, of understanding and of motion; wherefore to
get rid of a strong attack of apoplexy is impossible, and of a
weak, not easy. But paraplegia is a remission of touch and motion,
but of a part, either of the hand or of the leg. Paralysis
for the most part is the remission (paresis) of motion only, and
of energy.
It is difficult to find an appropriate
word either in the Latin or
English for the term πάρεσις. It
would seem to be particularly applied
to "a partial loss" either of
sensibility or of motion. Alexander,
however, makes little or no
distinction between it and paralysis,
x. 2.
But if the touch alone is wanting--(but such a
case is rare)--the disease is called Anæsthesia rather than paresis.
And when Hippocrates says, "the leg on the same side was
apoplectic," he means to say that it was in a death-like, useless,
and incurable state; for what is strong apoplexy in the whole
body, that he calls paraplegia in the limb. Paresis, properly
speaking, is applied to suppression or incontinence of urine in
the bladder. But distortion of the eye-brows, and of the
cheeks, and of the muscles about the jaws and chin to the
other side, if attended with spasm, has got the appellation of
Cynic spasm. Loss of tone in the knees, and of sensibility
for a time, with torpor, fainting, and collapse, we call lipothymia.
Wherefore, the parts are sometimes paralysed singly, as one
eye-brow, or a finger, or still larger, a hand, or a leg; and
sometimes more together; and sometimes the right or the left
