Theses de corde et eius vitiis

XXVI.
Let this suffice regarding syncope. And since we have promised that we would also speak something about PALPITATION OF THE HEART, we have decided to omit a review of those things that pertain to the cure of syncope, for the sake of avoiding prolixity.

XXVII.
Καρδίας παλμόν Heartbeat/Palpitation. We call this palpitation, and along with Avicenna, a tremor of the heart, understanding it to be a general impairment of the pulse.

XXVIII.
The palpitation of the heart is, therefore, a symptom consisting of a vitiated pulsation. For since the heart naturally dilates itself to attract air, and subsequently contracts to expel soot referring to metabolic waste gases in Galenic physiology, and this with utility and without any discomfort, it now elevates and compresses itself more or less than can occur without discomfort or inconvenience to the body.

XXIX.
This condition either takes its origin from the heart itself, or it arises in the heart for the reason that more serious affections of other parts are communicated with the heart.

XXX.
Moreover, to come to the causes, the pulse is harmed either by intemperies imbalance of bodily humors, or by bad composition, or by a solution of continuity, so that one might say that any kind of disease is the efficient cause of palpitation.

XXXI.
For on account of a hotter intemperies of the heart, the pulse becomes more frequent and swifter than it ought to be; on account of a colder one, it becomes rarer and slower.