Page 124 - My FlipBook

122

be remembered that which I have established at the begin-
ning of this treatise touching the different parts of which the
teeth are composed ; that supposes, I believe that their sen-
sibility is of two kinds in general, and may he thus distin-
guished : one was comprised under the name of fixed and
permanent pain ; that which is generally understood when
one says he has the tooth-ache : and the other, that of their be-
ing set on edge or passing pain. I believe that this disa-
greeable sensation resembles, and may be compared to,
what is experienced when the hand is passed upon certain
things, as on a hat, or when certain instruments are attempted
to be ground in a certain way, one against the other, &c.
Conjectures* so very similar have given me room to con-
clude that the teeth are sensible, not only on account of
the membrane in which their roots are enclosed, but more on
account of the nervous and membranous threads which are ex-
panded over all the body of the tooth. The only thing that
ought to be remarked, is, that the sensibility is much less at the
enamel than the rest of the tooth ; because its tissue being very
compact, and its pores very close, nothing can easily pene-
trate it. From whence it is impossible, that the same causes
can occasion on the enamelled part, a sensation as sharp and
as painful as that which can be felt on the rest of the tooth.
The particular manner in which the nervous threads are
found- in the enamel of the tooth, might in the meanwhile
make us conjecture, that it is the only seat of their being set
on edge.
This will be the place here to explain more or less this kind
of disagreeable sensation which I have arranged with setting

* Fauchard, On the Sensibility and getting on edge of the Teeth, page
142.