VICTOR (1772-1838). A French physician. Ile was born at Saint Malo, France. and was edu cated in the Dinan Public School. lie volun teered at the outbreak of the Revolution, but ill health caused his discharge from the army. lie then studied medicine under his father, who was a physician. and returned to the service with a surgeon's tom mission. being attached first to the army and later to the navy. In 1799 he began a course of medical study in Paris. From I804 to 1808 he was again a sur geon in the army, and from 1805 to 1814 he was chief physician of a division of the French Army in Spain. In 1820 he was appointed professor at the military hospital of Val-de-Grnee. in Paris, after serving a few years as assistant professor. In 1830 he became professor of general pathol ogy and therapeutics in the Faculty of tledieine in Paris. and afterwards was made a member of the Institute. In 1841 a statue was erected to his memory in the court of Val-de-GrAce. Brous sais's peculiar views are ably explained in his chief works—the Ilistoire des phlegmasies on inflammations chroniqucs (1SOS) and Examen dr In doctrine mf'dicalc gi'neralement adopt& (1816)--which assert the following principles: No life is possible without excitation or irrita tion. As long as the excitation is evenly dis tributed throughout the organism and remains within certain limits of intensity. the processes of life go on in a normal physiological manner; but if the limits are exceeded, i.e. if excitation
becomes either too strong or too weak, the re sult is a condition of disease. Disease, originally local and generally caused by local over-excita tion, gradually spreads in the body by physiolo gical sympathy, and thus becomes general. The urgans most subjeet to local over-excitement are the stomach and the intestines, and hence a great many general diseases are directly traceable to local disease of these organs. Broussais's ideas. which bear an unmistakable resemblanee to those of the Brunonian system of medicine, gained many adherents. especially in France, who took the name of 'the Physiological School.' The historical importance of the theory lies in the fact that it has led to a careful study of physi ological sympathies and of pathological anatomy. and thus to the building up of important chapters of modern medical science. Besides the works already mentioned. Broussais wrote: Truitt' de hi physiologic appliques a hi path ologic (1824): des propositions de pathologic consignees duns l'exam•n (1829); and Le ehob'ra morbus (1832). Consult MonG)gre, Notice hislorique stir la He, lcs travaux et lcs opinions de Broussais (Paris, 1839) : and Reiz., Etude sur Broussais rt sur son tram. (Paris. 1869 ) . See BROWN, Jonx.