SECTION II.
THE LAW OF COMPLETION IN WEEKS.
CHAPTER I. THE WEEK IN RELATION TO THE PERIODICITY OF VITAL PHENOMENA.
PERIODICITY IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF INSECTS, FISHES, BIRDS AND MAMMALIA.-PERIODICITY
IN THE GROWTH AND FUNCTIONAL ACTIVITY OF MANKIND IN HEALTH AND IN DISEASE.
THE birth, growth, maturity, vital functions, healthy revolutions of change,
diseases, decay and death, of insects, reptiles, fishes, birds, mammals,
and even of man himself, are more or less controlled by a law of completion
in weeks.
The hatching of the ova of insects occupies in a large number of cases,
intervals varying from two to six weeks. Their continuance in the caterpillar
or larva condition is seldom less than seven days, and varies from this
period to four weeks, six Weeks, or longer periods. The exuviation, or
change of skin, Which occurs during this larva state, frequently takes
place at intervals of seven days. Animals are similarly regulated by a
law of weeks. So are the periods of the laying of eggs, and of incubation,
in many birds. The common hen, as is well known, sits three weeks; the
pigeon two, after having laid eggs also for two Weeks. The seal calves
on the rocks, and suckles its young for two Weeks, when the calf casts
its coat and goes into the Water.
The ova of salmon are hatched in 140 days, or twenty weeks; arid those
of the aquatic salamander in two Weeks or fifteen days. But the habits
and physiology of fishes and reptiles are comparatively little known or
observed, so that few confirmatory facts, can be drawn from this department
of the animal kingdom.
The periods of utero-gestation in many of the mammalia, and of incubation
in numbers of birds, have been accurately and carefully noted. Out of
one hundred and twenty-nine species observed by Dr. Laycock, sixty-seven
had periods which were an exact number of weeks or months, twenty-four
were so within a day, and only four were exceptions to the rule, as far
as could be ascertained.
And it is well known that when we mount still higher in the scale of animated
existence, and study the entire system of vital periodicity impressed
by its great Creator on the human family, this law of limitation by weeks
becomes conspicuous and all-pervading. From the cradle to the grave, and
from before the cradle, from the day of conception to the day of death,
every man, woman and child of our race, is strangely amenable to it. Consciously
to one sex, unconsciously, but none the less really to the other, there
is an alternate loss and gain of physical substance, every four weeks.
In the human family, the period of utero-gestation, is accurately forty
weeks, nor do differences of age, climate, or circumstances, cause any
variation in this period. It is the rule, though it has of course exceptions.
Dr. Denman, in his work on midwifery, states, "The common time of
utero-gestation is forty weeks.
. . . I do not mean that it is completed to a minute or an hour, as has
been surmised, because the birth of the child may be delayed by a multiplicity
of accidents. But parturition will be accomplished, or the parturient
disposition will take place, before or at the expiration of forty weeks
from the time of conception. Nor does it seem reasonable that A LAW OF
NATURE, which is not altered by the differences of age, by the diet, by
the extremes of climates, by the seventies of slavery, or the indulgences
of luxury, should be changed by circumstances of less importance."
Thus throughout all ages, and in all countries, the initial stage of human
existence, the intra- uterine life of every one born into the wide world,
is measured by weeks,. and not till forty weeks have run their course,
does the human being attain independent existence. These are phenomena
of universal occurrence, and of fundamental importance in the natural
history of mankind; they are leading and unquestionable physiological
facts. The periodicity of life, and the periodicity of birth, need no
demonstration, for the experience of every individual bears witness to
it, as well as to the fact that it is regulated by a law of weeks. And
if this be the case in health, and with normal functions, so is it also
with disease, and in abnormal derangements. From time immemorial, it has
been observed that fevers, and intermittent attacks of ague, gout, and
similar complaints, have a septiform periodicity; that the seventh, fourteenth,
and twenty-first, are critical days.
In his investigation into the phenomena of fevers, Dr. Lay-cock states
that, Whatever type the fever may exhibit, there will be a paroxysm on
the seventh day, and consequently this day should be distinguished by
an unusual fatality or number of crises. For analogous reasons the fourteenth
will be remarkable as a day of amendment, the last paroxysm of a quotidian
taking place on that day, and the last of a tertlan on the day previous;
for observation has established that if a tertian is to cease about the
fourth paroxysm (the seventh critical day), the second paroxysm will be
more severe than the first or third; but if the fourth be severe, and
the fifth less so, the disease will end at the seventh paroxysm, and,
of course, the change for the better, if this rule be applied to remittent
or continued fevers, will be seen on the fourteenth day. Should, however,
the exacerbation occurring on the thirteenth day end fatally, whether
it be the seventh of a tertian or the fifth of a quartan, death will probably
take place early on the fourteenth day, namely, about three or four o’clock,
a.m., when the system is most languid."
That these theoretical inferences are borne out by facts, all medical
writers agree, and indeed it may be proved numerically by tables of cases,
compiled without the least reference to critical days.
Nor is it in fevers alone that this law of septiform periodicity is traceable.
Paroxysms of gout afford another illustration of its operation.
"A fit of the gout going regularly through its stages in a robust
subject, observes the following order:- "The patient retires to rest
well, or perhaps in better spirits than usual, and is awoke at two o’clock
in the morning by rigors, thirst, asiA other febrile symptoms, and with
pain in the great toe, or heel, or other part. This pain and the febrile
action go on increasing for exactly twenty-four hours, that is to say,
until two o’clock, a.m., comes again, when a remission takes place,
sometimes an intermission; the interval it occupies being another nyctemeron,
or period of twenty-four hours, at the end of which another febrile paroxysm
comes on. And so paroxysm and remission or intermission alternate, until
the fit terminates. A fit of the gout, under the circumstances stated,
is a tertian intermittent (in the measure of its intervals), and, like
a tertian, it terminates in fourteen days, or after seven Paroxysms.
"If the patient go on luxuriating in his diet, the next fit, if left
to flannel and patience, will be of a double length, or occupy twenty-eight
days, and have fourteen febrile paroxysms, or exacerbations; or it will
be tripled, and be of six weeks’ duration, and so go on increasing
in length by a definite ratio of weeks, as the predisposing and exciting
causes become more efficient, until the Viscera and the general system
become so deranged that no regular fit takes place."
It is important also to notice, that not only is the week an evident measure
in such fevers, and intermittents, but the half week also. His investigations
of the subject of vital periodicity forced ’this fact on the notice
of Dr. Laycock, and its agreement with the periods of prophecy, leads
us to call attention to his statement.
"The complete day of twenty-four hours is the pathological period
most generally noticed by physicians; but, as I have shown, there are
also periods of three days and a half, or seven half- days. This is, in
fact, the ancient division of the whole day into two parts. We must start
with this half day, or day of twelve hours, as the unit which will comprise
the phenomena of the best- marked class of periodic disease, the intermittents.
Dr. Graves is, I believe, the only physician who has made this observation,
and applied it to pathology. He observed that, if this period were adopted,
’we should not count three days and a half but seven half-days: we
would not say seven days, but fourteen half-days.’ Reckoning thus,
many of the anomalous critical effects, and critical terminations in continued
fevers, would, I have no doubt, be found strictly conformable to some
regular law of periodicity."
The operation of the law we are considering may be traced also in the
growth of children and young people from infancy to maturity, in the duration
of the human powers, in their fullest perfection, and in their gradual
decay.
Dr. Laycock divides life into three great periods, the first and last,
each stretching over 21 years, and the central period or prime of life
lasting 28 years.
The first, which extends from conception to full maturity at 21 years
of age, he subdivides into seven distinct stages, marked by well defined
physical characteristics, as follows
"1. Intra-uterine life
"2. The period between birth and the first dentition;
"3. The time occupied by the first dentition;
"4. The period between the first and second dentition;
"5. The time of the secoisd dentition;
"6. The period between the latter and commencing puberty;
"7. The time occupied in the evolution of the reproductive system.
"The second great period will comprise three minor periods
"1. The perfecting of adolescence, from 21 to 28;
"2. The climax of development, or status of life, from 28 to 42;
and
"3. The septenary of decline in the reproductive powers, extending
from 42 to 49 (after which latter age conception rarely takes place).
"The third great period comprises also three minor subdivisions
"1. The grand climacteric, from 49 to 63;
"2. Old age, from 63 to 70;
"3. The years of aetas ingravescence, or decrepitude, from 70 to
death.
"In fixing these epochs," says Dr. Laycock, "I have followed
the generally received septennial division, being reluctant to make any
innovation thereon. It would I think, however, be more in accordance with
modern science, to date, not from birth, but from the conception of the
individual. If this be done, each great period, should be calculated as
commencing forty weeks earlier."
The process of dentition affords also illustrations of the operation of
the law of septiform periodicity in vital phenomena ; and viability, or
the probability of life, is highest at 14 years of age. Dr. Laycock puts
the results of his careful researches, into the five following propositions
"1. That there is a general law of periodicity which regulates all
the vital movements in all animals.
"2. That the periods within which these movements take place admit
of calculations approximately exact.
"3. That the fundamental unit,-the unit upon which these calculations
should be based,-must for the present be considered as one day of twelve
hours.
"4. That the lesser periods are simple and compound multiples of
this unit, in a numerical ratio analogous to that observed in chemical
compounds.
"5. That the fundamental unit of the greater periods is one week
of seven days, each day being twelve hours; and that single and compound
multiples of this unit, determine the length of these periods by the same
ratio, as multiples of the unit of twelve hours determine the lesser periods.
This law binds all periodic vital phenomena together, and links the periods
observed in the lowest annulose animals, with those of man himself, the
highest of the Vertebrata. .
He concludes his investigation with the following words:—-
"The sure and steady course of proleptical science will be from particulars
to generals, and if its foundation be firmly established on severe induction,
we may hope at some future day to extend its principles to the cycles
of the seasons, and to comprise within its sphere, not only individual
men and women, but societies generally, and even the whole human race.
The axiom that the whole is equal to the sum of all its parts, is universally
true, whatever the whole may be; and there is really no reason for despairing
that we shall attain to a knowledge of the whole alluded to, (a knowledge
which must necessarily be derived from a knowledge of its parts,) because
those parts are microscopically small to the intellect. The boundaries
of astronomical science have been pushed from small and obscure beginnings,
into the infinite in space, time, and number; and who can tell but that
Providence may so assist the humble inquirer into nature, that science
shall be extended to the infinite in littleness, and so man be able to
look down, by the light of philosophy, upon the varied phenomena of terrestrial
life,-their multifarious combinations and complexities, their cycles and
epicycles,-as he looks into the planetary world; and see nothing but order
and simplicity where now there appears inextricable confusion."
"There is a harmony of numbers in all nature; in the force of gravity,
in the planetary movements, in the laws of heat, light, electricity, and
chemical affinity, in the forms of animals and plants, in the perceptions
of the mind. The direction indeed of modern natural and physical science,
is towards a generalisation which shall express the fundamental laws of
all, by one simple numerical ratio. We would refer to Professor Whewell’s
’Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences,’ and to Mr. Hay’s
researches into the laws of harmonious colouring and form. From these
it appears that the number seven is distinguished in the laws regulating
the harmonious perception of forms, colours, and sounds, and probably
of taste also, if we could analyse our sensations of this kind with mathematical
accuracy.
"1- There are probably few branches of natural science from which
additional facts in confirmation might not be culled. But the above may
suffice, for our object is less to trace the extent of the dominion of
this law, than to prove its existence in nature. The realm of entomology
recognises this law, ichthyology and ornithology do the same, and the
mammalia equally bear witness to its prevalence. As to man, his birth,
-growth, dentition, development, maturity, vital functions, reproductive
system, health, disease, life and death, all his times and all his seasons,
are more or less distinctly controlled by the law of completion in weeks.
His very pulse keeps time to the seven day period. Dr. Stratton states
(as the result of several series of observations) that in health, the
human pulse is more frequent in the morning than in the evening, for six
days out of seven; and that on the seventh day it is slower.
And man’s life as a whole is a week, a week of decades. "The
days of our years are threescore years and ten" and that by Divine
appointment. Combining the testimony of all these facts, we are bound
to admit that there prevails in organic nature a law of septiform periodicity,
a law of completion in weeks. We turn now to consider, the prevalence
of the same law in Scripture.
Index I. 1 2 3 II. 1 2 3 III. 1 2 IV. a. 1 2 b. 1 2 3 c. 1 2 3 4 5 6
