I have been pleas'd with the evidence of Art when I could not readily cure a Disease viz. an Epilepsie that came on at 27 in the true Prediction of its declining and departure at 30 and of the Diseases that assaulted at 14 superceded at 18. The Apoplexy which is cured by the more acid Chalybeats and reliev'd by the light ones transcends the common Notions of the other glandular Diseases as it is an Affection of the very Root of Life it self and requires a particular Consideration in order to inform us how and where this Remedy is proper for although it is evident that it is an Affection of the medullary part of the Brain whence Sense and Life is distributed yet with submission to better Judgment I conceive the Accounts of this Disease are at a loss about the Production of it when they come to the immediate Cause and the long Excursion this Enquiry demands as it is unavoidable so is so seasonable also by reason of the Increase and Frequency of this Disease here especially in the Country where this Year it has insulted more than ever that I question not but the Acceptableness of the Disquisition will excuse it I shall distinctly view the Nature of an Apoplexy and Disposition it consists in The Causes of it The Differences and lastly The suitable Intentions and Indications The general Phaenomenon upon Dissection of those that dye of this Distemper being an Effusion of Blood upon the Brain Authors do generally agree in placing the Production of this Disease in an Obstruction made at the Brain and must be allow'd to be produced in the Cortical part and conceive this to be made by some Congestion in the Blood-Vessels and which the Learned Dr. Cole supposes may be of viscous or serous Matter as it is either in quantity or freshly excited or else Polypous Concretions or any other obstructing Matter to admit which the Brain is pre-dispos'd by its Laxity or Openness in which likewise the bare Distention of the Arteries may suffice to produce it I shall with all Deference to those great Authors and particularly the last humbly offer my Conception though more grosly yet as it appears to me and best explains the Benefit of the Mineral Waters in this Case thus That an Apoplexy is a Disease of the Cortex cerebri not founded in any Obstruction though often attended by them but consisting in the Ruin of its mechanical Crasis and Temper which is such as Steel restores and Niters destroy the Causes and Nature of which is common to other Glands and produceth a Paroxysm by a Hamorrhage or Admission of Flatulent Parts consequential to this which Distemper the Suicus nutritius may arrive at either by Age or Qualities contracted upon Congestion and grossness of the Chyle or receive by Particles communicated from the Air or all joyntly besides violent Causes and so may truly be said to be seated not in the Sanguinary Vessels but Glandular Ducts But as they wrongfully charge the Blood-Vessels with the cause in that an Apoplexy may be produced without any of this as is clear from Dr. Willis's Instance so they seem incumbred in the explaining the Reason of the Abolition of Sense and Motion and in the place and nature of this Congestion the Mistakes in the Nature of this Distemper seem to me to be owing to the ill Notion of Animal Mechanism and use of the Brain wherein they suppose a Circulation or passage of Animal Spirits so necessary to Life as that the Interruption of them sufficeth to abolish it The Difficulties of which way of Solution are taken notice of by all the Writers on this Subject rather than explain'd My Sense in this Matter I shall give by considering first the Inconveniencies the Brain can suffer without this Deprivation 2ly The Vital Mechanism of the Brain And 3ly The necessary Cause or Reason of its Production as appears in the Brain And to be brief first it appears from the Dissections in Wepfer Willis and others that all the passes of the Animal Spirits at once cannot be obstructed nor a Compression of the Brain and Cerebel nor an Inflammation of the Brain or its Meninges produce it there are as just Exceptions lye against plenty of Blood nor is it from Stones generated Abounding Serum may be without it and Water beap'd within the Cranium and Ventricles And Plater's Instance proves that a Carnous Schirrhous and Fungous Tumour on the Corpus Callosum produced Stupidity and Death without an Apoplexy 2ly I shall consider the grand Design of the Brain and its vital Mechanism of which though it be inextricable in its private and more recluse Motions yet thus much appear Although Animal Mechanism is compound and Respiration is necessary to the Motion of the Blood to which the Lungs are accordingly framed and upon which Motion Life depends yet as the Pulse of the Heart is perform'd by the Nerves so the Air Atmospherical upon whose obstructing or fixing so as to hinder its Elasticity Life so suddenly ceaseth in some Animals seems to act only on the Nerves as in those that have membranous Lungs where no more Blood circulates in their Lungs than is necessary for the supply of the part whereby the Air seems to serve the Circulation in other Animals for greater force and greater Heat for those Animals first nam'd are colder and live long without Food and so both Air and the Niter of it is useful with equal Pace and in equal Degree to the Motion necessary at the Lungs to the fury of the Circulation of the Blood and to the Nourishment to be consum'd and it is observable that the Par vagum and intercostal Nerves which are the Instruments of involuntary Motion serve both Lungs and Ventricle The use then of this Heat in the Blood seems to prepare a due Elasticity in the Chyle that is to serve the Brain or parts of it be it the Spirituous part in what sense soever being accommodated to some Disposition of the Brain for in the external Air there is besides all this but answerable to this a due degree of Elasticity or quantity of elastick parts or compressure of them necessary to Life which is proportion'd to the coldness of the Animal perhaps but certainly adapted to the Spring of Life in the Brain as is seen in Fish which live by the Air yet dye in the open Air and is confirm'd in Whitings which swim deep in the Water aâ—d so with us are not liable to be taken by Nets and dye instantly upon being taken out of it The Brains of Animals are accordingly adapted to this use those who use the greatest force of the Air as Birds have the Cortical part vastly larger in proportion than men no doubt to separate the Air and perhaps corroborate the Brain and their Lungs fix'd accordingly and Fish have least Brain and Cortex too The Nature of Life and use of the Brain being thus stated to consist in the justice of a Spring
good Service to this Inquiry as to observe it and makes it a Phaenomenon the Solution of which is no small Direction But as I think the Constipation or Obstruction made by admission of the Nitrous Particles not satisfactory without accounting for the new Capacity they have obtain'd beyond what they have in other Frosts and the Difficulties of admitting them so it seems evident to me that the rise of this Disease or first increase is of a longer date And to offer my sense of this matter the Apoplexy seems to me to be one of the fix'd temporary Diseases which as they result not from the immediate Changes of Season and Weather so are rooted in some more subtile parts of the Air which Weather and Season may assist by giving them a liberty of exerting themselves and likewise a supply And because I never yet observ'd any sudden leaps ordinarily though I nicely observ'd the Air as I could made in the Production of new Diseases I was ready to judge from the rise of this at the declension of the Rickets that the actors of both were parts of equal subtilty and not much differing in Nature And I confess the Experiment of the Marbles seem to favour a Notion that there is differing degrees of Subtilty in our Atmosphere it self and so in the parts lodg'd in it I shall not attempt determining though there is great reason to believe the matter to be Nitrous by its Effect and its Cure The Reason of this Disease and Nature of the Condition of the Air producing it is probably more clearly to be seen in the Observation of the particular times of the grand Efforts of the Air in producing it in which we ought to observe the general Effects of the Air on all Bodies and carry on the Inquiry by the Effects and Power it exerts on Animal ones And because this evidence or detection of the parts affecting is liable to exception that differing Diseases are produced often at once by differing parts or distinct qualities in the operating Body and especially in so mix'd a one And again as the more subtile cause is unknown so if we discover the Particles of the Air or disposition of it that conveighs the paâ—â—ss we have small advantage I must observe that I am of Opinion that the Nature of the Air and the Disposition of it to which Diseases owe their rise are more discoverable than they at first thought give hopes of and that in so great a measure as to make the Knowledge serviceable in the known Diseases And any Man I think will be reconcil'd to my Opinion that will take the trouble of tracing Diseases in conjunction with the Air and Seasons for the Difficulties are in great measure solv'd by barely distinguishing between the Diseases produced by single Seasons and observing the constant tenour of the Humour or diseasy matter and how it receives alterations from variety of Seasons and that as the place of the Disease is partly or chiefly owing to the first so the Nature to the last of these That the present case depends on these evident Causes may reasonably be concluded not only from the increase of it joyntly with these but also that it traced in its containing and procatarctick Causes which require no more to explain than what the common effects of the Air in other Diseases exhibit and the nature of the Air thus consider'd accounts for The first time to be consider'd and which assists us in the discovery of the Cause of this Distemper from the occasion of its Increase extraordinary is the great Frost To avoid prolixness I shall only observe that as that can never determine the matter to the Brain nor account for the increase of this Disease at so great a distance and is contradicted by experience so the incidence of such a Season may give a lift to this Disease on other Considerations than the conveighing of the Frosty and grosser nitrous parts and that may be of more subtile or distinct Parts that may be contain'd or mix'd with them that may better account for this Phaenomenon which must be suppos'd to be vastly supply'd by so great a Frost which may be allow'd either to feed the more subtile or increase them by the Precipitation and Congestion of the Parts they bring and separate and leave Indeed the grand Continuation of the Increase makes this Deduction necessary both of its Subtilty and Nature The last of these must most disclose it self at the time of its abounding in the highest degree and this must be fix'd at this present Year 1698 the reason of which I shall now examine that I rightly fix the Inundation and Exorbitancy of the invading Matter on this or this and the last Year I need not indeavour to evince being so extraordinary as that the like number of Apoplecticks were never yet observ'd in this or past Ages and indeed by the generality of the Vertigo's that have invaded which must be referr'd to the same assault may be said truly to be Epidemical That the matter concern'd in this is nothing obscure or besides what is evident and obvious appears in that first the other Distempers raging at the same time were uniform and differ'd only in place the matter of which is plainly enough Nitrous but particularly because the Nature of that differs its Qualities consist in Acidity such as will not preserve from but promote Putridness Subtilty to penetrate and Liquibility to flow with the Juyces which Qualities appear easily in the Effects in both the Chronical and Acute Diseases of those Years last past It much illustrates this account to observe the steps made in the producing this general Disposition in the Air which I must here but touch at without explaining It is very notable that a Glandular Acidity attended the Diseases in 94 Epilepsies in Children and Nervous Rhumatisms in the Grown advanced with the great Mealdews in 95 both seated in the Membranes and at the Head In 96 remarkable for sudden Changes of Heat and Cold rag'd Epilepsies Vertigo's and lax Tumours and Vlcers of the Throat that came as Colds Through the Subtilty and Increase of this matter which seem'd fitted to weaken the containing parts the unseasonableness of the preceding Year reasonably assisting it obtain'd admittance at the latter end of the Year which was wet and windy to the Interior Glands as I call those that serve Life it self And now appears an odd Distemper that seiz'd with Faintness and Inquietude and Deliquiums and a yellowness of the Skin and dry Cough Vpon Dissection of one of these Bodies I discover'd a recluse Abscess in the Lungs invested with a tough Coat and containing thick Pus without any opening external or into the Bronchiae but was fed by a small Duct from the largest Gland of the Lungs which Gland was grumous and look'd and felt like powder'd Chalk The Pancreas was in the same state which occasion'd the yellâ—â—â—ess as I conceive and the Thymus emaciated
their Virtue two hours which yet will scarce be lost in ten days if headed with Oyl They all give a purplish Red with Galls which upon standing a while turns to a purplish Black Tunbridge Water in Kent THIS Water gives a deep Green with Syrup of Violets as Vitriols do and in the quantity of about seven Ounces and a quarter weigh'd ten Grains lighter than a River-water near me which was lighter than Spring-water and as much lighter than Rain-water and about four Grains lighter than the German Spaw to which it is preferable on that account The Ground above and about this Spring is a cemented Rock and the Spring is large of long use and much celebrated and frequented Wellenborow VVater in Northampton-shire THIS Water weigh'd at the Spring eighteen Grains lighter than common Water in a quantity of about twelve Ounces with a few drops of Tincture of Logwood gave a Black with Syrup of Violets a deep Green with Syrup of Cloves blackish with Galls a Violet Islington VVater THIS Water as the rest makes no Alteration in a Solution of Sublimate and with Sal Saturni dissolv'd in fair Water became milky a little and a little curdled and not clear as with a Saltpetre with Lignum Nephriticum it remain'd pale but clouded a little with a thickish dusky White near a Rain-water and weigh'd two Grains lighter than Tunbridge Water in the same quantity which I thought might be owing to the difference of the Season Felstead VVater in Essex THIS Water lies in a Moor the bottom whereof is a cemented Rock the Earth where the Spring rises is Fat and Bituminous or Unctuous and very Ferrugineous no Incrustation in the boggy Hole where the Water stands but the Water that passes through the Meadow begins to incrust as it touches this Ground It is of the same weight exactly with Tunbridge it becomes milky with a Solution of Sal Saturni and with Lignum Nephriticum suffer'd no stain but only a milky cloud swimming in it This is but a small Spring scarce more than a Land-drain Of the Virtues of the Chalybeat VVaters THE Virtues of Steel are so very great and large and in many cases so contrary as not to be explain'd by what are grosly call'd the first second or third Qualities but to help us to a Notion of them we must consider the Essence of this Mineral in its Affections that are apparent And thus we may conceive of it as a hard body of the Mineral Kingdom and so qualifi'd with Firmness which is apt to enrich the Blood being easily convertible into Fat or Sulphur the nature of whose Sulphur is to preserve Fluid Bodies and the Temper of whose Acid Spirit is such as raises and yet restrains or rather adjusts the Fermentation of our Stomach Soluble Friendly to our Nature and some-how Correspondent to the Mechanism of the Air we live in by its Magnetism and then we may intelligibly add the more Simple and other evident Qualities as cooling potential Heat Drying Balsamick or Healing Quality c. which I shall take notice of under these Heads in these Waters 1. They Invigorate the Blood and Juyces as a Chalybeat 2. They Astringe 3. They Incide and Attenuate by their Acidity 4. The Acidity is Connatural and agreeable to the Ferment of the Stomach and other Offices which these Waters promote 5. On the same account and partly in that it is Sulphurous it is a Fraenum or Curb to Fermentations and Flatulencies and performs more effectually what Oxycrate does in the Vapours in Women and Spirit of Sulphur or Vitriol in Men whence the Acid seems adjusted to the Temper of our Bodies which can preserve the just Fermentations as it destroys or reduces Exorbitant ones 6. They depurate the Juyces of forreign or grosser parts lodg'd with the Nourishment in the Body as is evident in the Stone which is but the same thing which they effect in gravelly Waters at their Springs 7. The Acid being Spirituous passes where other Medicines cannot and so are Diuretick and Exterminate and discharge the offensive Matter by Urine and the rest it Volatilizes 8. The Vehicle of this Mineral and Spirit is not apt to Elasticity or Fermentation And on the account of these Qualifications the Chalybeat Waters warm strengthen heal open Obstructions absterge invigorate and thus are capacitated to stop Fluxes of all sorts and remove many Diseases among which the Stone and Affectio Hypochondriaca stand at the Head But although all the sorts of Chalybeat Waters have some Qualifications in common as to invigorate the Blood and cleanse the Viscera yet as they differ in their Salt so likewise in their Virtues which I shall particularly treat of The Virtues of the Acidulae Which Name I would make proper to those Waters that are lightly Chalybeat THese have a fine Acidity not collectible into a Salt the residue upon Distilling being an Insipid Ferrugineous Earth and as I said before give only a Claret red with Gall. That which is proper to this sort of the Chalybeat Waters is That they are free of any gross Salt and have plenty of a Vitrioline Acid with little of the body of the Steel and that Acid more fix'd than in the light Chalybeats In order to understand the Benefit of this I shall observe that there are Cases that require a Water so qualifi'd either on the Score of the Distemper or Constitution of the Patient such as we commonly call Complexion in which a quantity of Steel may do more harm than the Vitrioline Spirit can do good And this must be allow'd me to be in all Cases and Persons where the Blood offends in quantity Floridness and Fluxilness by every one that observes the power Steel has to heat and invigorate the Blood in the Chlorosis And when I consider the opposite Nature of Chalybeat Acids and Nitrous Salts as I observed before I fansie I have a clear Reason for all this One Case that the Body of Steel agrees not in is that Indisposition of fresh-colour'd florid-complexion'd Persons about the last grand Climacterick as I call that of 49 who are liable to Fluxes of Blood or great Tumultuations of it It is very easie to discover the Alkalisat state of the Blood in aged Persons by only tasting the Urine which in those grows almost Caustick The Diseases that this sort of Water is a peculiar in are Apoplexies Phrensies and Fluxes of Blood and because the first of these is a Distemper that has strangely rag'd of late and extraordinarily this last Winter beyond what has been observ'd perhaps ever before to explain the reason of it so much as to give light to the Effect of these Waters may be no unacceptable a Digression Of the Apoplexy THE Reason of an Apoplexy and the Cause of so sudden a Deprivation of Life that great Judge the Prince of Physicians Hippocrates resolves into a Stagnation or Station of the Blood whereby all Motion and Action of the Spirits is taken away
and on which it operates partly by the Insinuation of its Elastical and other Irregular Particles partly by the Interposition as well as Lancination of the Nitrous Raâ—ous Parts which promotes the Comminution of it whereby the Crasis of it may be alter'd if such Air be admitted as shall over-check this Agitation 2. The Nervous Juyce which he supposes lyable to Impressions in some degree analogous to what are made on the Blood from Substances mix'd with it He supposeth some of the admitted Substances of the Air may be deposited into the Nerves at their Original or that it must communicate with the Blood in receiving some of the Viscous parts produced in it by the Air and that some more subtile Particles must be admitted through the Pores To which the same worthy Author adds That he conceives them in some due Proportion necessary to the due Spiritualization of this Juyce Again The solid parts are lyable to the same Inconvenience and to retain them longer Lastly The Brain may be affected not only by the Mediation of the Blood but also by the Airs affecting the Mammillary Processes or the Ears or the Extremities of the Nerves in all parts of the Skin And this pressure of the Air may be unequal some part of it being mov'd with greater Violence where is greater Dilatation or a part kept warmer And this Injury of Air Tenderness and ill Digestion through want of Exercise makes the Body obnoxious too And thus the Brain may suffer in that Continuity due Confirmation and Repletion of its parts wherein this Author supposes the tone of the parts to consist So that in the Author 's own words as well as Sense The part affected may either be the whole Brain or any considerable part of it and either the Cortical or Medullar but especially or at least first the Cortical from whence the disaffected Matter is transmitted to the parts of it which lye deeper where the Animal Spirits principally exert themselves the Nature of the Distemper to consist in the sudden Abolition of the due Excrasie and Distribution of thâ—â— thence the immediate Cause most usually when unavoidably fatal an Effusion of Blood out of its Vessels upon the Substance of the Brain Though I conceive says he a bare 〈◊〉 of the Arteries there may occasion it as also may perhaps a Congestion of Viscous or Serous Matter when it comes to a considerable degree and becomes freshly excited or else Polypous Concretions or if we can suppose it any other obstructing Matter deposited in it may at last produce it and the Pre disposition of the Brain to it to consist usually in the more than ordinary Laxity or Openness of it And whatsoever either first causes a Congestion of Blood or 2ly otherwise so Indisposes it that it cannot readily and duly circulate through its usual Vessels in the Brain or 3ly disaffects the Brain whether by weakning its Tone or altering the Figures of its passages or straitning them too much may occasion Apoplexies And the greater Urgency or Violence of such antecedent Causes may introduce a greater Frequency of them than ordinary Thus I have given the Notions of this Distemper distinctly for these Reasons 1. It sets the Distemper as we do a Picture in all Lights to try which way we may see it best And 2. As it prepares to the understanding of Apoplexies so in my further Inquiry in many particulars Repetition will be sav'd and less intelligible Parentheses avoided 3. We may by this means observe the Specifick Symptoms of this Distemper and what hints they gave these Authors Information being not to be gain'd by Controversie I shall not inspect the Particulars of these Accounts in which they are not Satisfactory as why after that Frost and not preceding ones why the Aera should be then fix'd and yet the Increase began long before Why the Head should be affected and not other parts rather it being necessary to account for the Reason why Air afflicts one part particularly as we see the Fauces and Throat at the Alps the Lungs at Rome So likewise of the Changes of the Distempers which are temporary and many other things but shall offer some Observations which I submit to the Judgment of the last cited Author and others which if approv'd give a more natural account and may carry on the Inquiries and they are such as answer two Questions or Inquiries 1. Of the Reason of the sudden and accidental Death 2. That may inform us of the Indoles of the Morbifick Matter and how much is observable in the Air that can answer for this My Notion as to the first of these is deduced from these Considerations 1. That the Motion of the Blood is necessary to Life 2. That this is owing to Respiration 3. That Respiration is necessary to Life 4. Both Motion of the Blood and Necessity of Respiration consist in the Elasticity of the Air. 5. I observe that besides the Atmospherical Air that is exhausted by a Pneumatick Engine there is a finer Elastick Air or Matter contain'd in this Atmospheric Air which in an exhausted Receiver hindred the parting of the Marbles which is Elastick too the pressure being ad modum or in Proportion to the force that is capable to separate the cohering Bodies and may be surmounted by a force superiâ—â—â— to it 6. There seems to be a Nitre in the Air necessary to maintain and share in produciâ— the Elasticity of the grosser Atmosphere which being consum'd an Animal dies 7. There are certain Termini fines of the Tenuity and Grossness of the Air on this side of which or beyond the Air becomes 〈◊〉 for the Respitation of Animals Thus Fish that die in an open Air yet are choak'd for want of it if a Pond Freeze and accordingly are provided with Pipes that strain the 〈◊〉 Matter and are stronger and not lyable to the Inconvenience from the force and weight of the Water And lastly as the Matter drawn is finer so there is no need of the Contraction and Opening or Conquassation of the Air to get the Matter out they want which is strain'd by the Water 8. I observe that Animals which have a Crasis of Blood to which less Nitre is requisite as they can be long without Food so can live a considerable time without Air as Tortoises Adders c. and therefore have membranous Lungs in which no more Blood circulates than is required for their Nourishment and so not the whole Blood as in those that have fleshy Lungs 9. This Elasticity is requisite to Life as it keeps in a Springy Motion and so Life ceases either upon a Stoppage of the Air Externally as in a Glass or Internally as we see is the Effect of Damps which by some and those great Men have by mistake been conceiv'd to contain Poysonous Matter and to perform it on that account but the contrary is evident since in Pump-wells the Water is wholsome and a new built House from the