execution of a Criminal who had his neck broken according to the laws of France whereof the took such an affrightment that made so deep a print upon her imagination that presently she fell in labour of her child and before they could carry her to her lodging but she was brought to bed before her time of a child who had his head severed from his body both the parts yet shedding fresh bloud besides that which was abundantly shed in the womb as if the headsman had done an execution also upon the tender young body within the matrix of the mother These three Examples and many others truely alleadged which I could produce although they mainifestly prove the strength of the imagination would engage me too far if I should undertake to clear the causes and unwrap the difficulties which would be found greater then in any of those instances wherewith I have entertained you because that those spirits had the power to cause such essential changes and fearful effects upon bodies that were already brought to their shapes of perfection and it may be well believed that in some of them there was a transmutation of one species to another the introduction of a new informing form in the subject-matter totally differing from that which had been introduced at first at least if that which most Naturalists tell us at the animation of the Embryo in the womb be true but this digression hath been already too long Est modus in Rebus sunt certi denique fines Quos ultra citraque nequit consistere Rectum To return then to the great channel and thread of our Discourse the examples and experiments which I have already insisted upon in confirmation of the reasons which I have alleadged do clearly demonstrate that the bodies which draw the atomes dispersed in the air attract unto themselves with a greater power and energy such as are of their own nature then other heterogeneous and strange atomes As wine doth the vinal spirits The oyl of tartar fermented by the levain of Roses draws the volatil spirits of the rose The flesh of deer or vemson buried in crust attracts the spirits of those beasts and so all the other whereof I have spoken The History of the Tarantula in the kingdom of Naples is very famous you know how the venome of this animall ascending by the hurt that the party hath received being pricked therewith towards the head and the heart doth excite in their Imagination an impetuous desire to hear some melodious aires and most commonly they are delighted with differing aires Therefore when they listen to an aire that pleaseth them they begin to dance incessantly and thereby they fall a sweating in abundance in such sort that this sweat makes a great part of the venom to evaporate besides the sound of the musick doth raise a movement and causeth an agitation among the aerean and vaporous spirits which are in the brain and about the heart and diffused up and down through the whole body proportionably according to the nature and cadence of such musick as when Timotheus transported Alexander the Great with such a vehemency to such and such passions as he pleased In the like manner also when it happens that one Lute doth sound it makes the strings of the other to shake by the motions and tremblings which it causeth in the air though it be not touched otherwise at all We find also oftentimes that the sounds which are no other thing than the motions of the air cause the like movement in the water as the sharp sound which is caused by rubbing hard with ones finger the brim of a glasse full of water doth excite a noise a turning and boundings in the water of certain drops as if the water did dance according to the cadence of the sound The harmonious sounds also of bells in those Countries where they use to be rung to particular tunes doth make the like impressions upon the superficies of the rivers that are nigh the steeple specially in the night time when there is no other movement which stops or choakes the other supervenient one For the air being contiguous or rather continuous with the water and the water being susceptible of movement there 's the like motion caused in the fluid parts of the water as began in the air and the same contact which is betwixt the agitated air and the water which is by this meanes also moved happens also to be betwixt the agitated air and the vaprous spirits which are in those bodies who have been bit by the Tarantula which spirits by consequence are moved by the agitated air that is to say by the sound and that the more efficaciously that this agitation or sound is proportioned to the nature and temperature of the party hurt And this intern agitation of the spirits and vapours helps them to discharge the vapourous venom of the Tarantula which is mixt among all their humours In the like manner that standing puddle waters and corrupted aires being putrified by long repose and the mixture of other noisome substances are refin'd and purifi'd by motion but winter approaching which devoures these bealts people are freed from this malady but at the returne of that season when they used to be pricked the mischief comes again and they must dance again as they did the year before The reason is that the heat of summer doth stir and raise up the venom of the beast whereby it becomes as malignant and furious as it was before And the poison being heated and evaporating it self and dispersing in the air the levain of the same poyson which remaines in the bodies of them who have been hurt drawes it unto it self whereby such a fermentation is wrought which infects the other humours whence a kind of smoake issuing and mounting to the braines of these poor sick bodies doth use to produce such strange effects It is also well known that where there are great dogs or mastiffs as in England if any be bitten perchance by any of these dogs they commonly use to kill them though they be not mad for fear that the levain of the canine choler which remaines within the body of the party bit draw unto it the malignant spirits of the same dog which might come to distemper the spirits of the party And this is not onely practised in England where there are such dangerous dogs but also in France according to the report of father Cheron provinciall of the Carmelites in this Countrey in his examen de la Theologie mystique newly imprinted and which I have lately read I will say nothing of artificiall noses that are made of the flesh of other men for to remedy the deformity of those who by an extream excesse of cold have lost their own which new noses do putrifie as soon as those persons out of whose substance they were taken come to die as if that small parcell of flesh engrafted upon the face did live by the spirits
it would call back that which was gone out before and was ready to fall and would make it thrust on and return to its former pace and enter again into the pot to mingle again with the water which lyes therein You see then this mystery which at first was surprizing displayed and made as familiar and natural as to see a stone fall down from the air T is true that to make a demonstration thereof by an exact and compleat rigor we must adde other circumstances which we have done in another Discourse wherein I expressely treated of this subject But that which I now say is sufficient to give a tincture how this so notable an attraction is made The other attraction which comes by fire which draws unto it the ambient air with the smal bodies therein is made thus The Fire acting according to its own nature which to push on a continual river or exhalation of its parts from the center to the circumference and out of its source carrieth away with it the air which adjoyned and sticking to it on all sides as the water of a river trains along with it the earth of thae channel or bed through which it glides For the air being humid and the fire drye they cannot do lesse than embrace and hug one another But there must a new air come from the places circumjacent to fill the room of that which is carried away by the fire otherwise there would a vacuity happen which nature abhors This new air remains not long in the place which it comes to fill but the fire who is in a continual carreer and emanation of his parts carries it presently with him and draws the new air and so there is a perpetual and constant current of the air as long as the action of fire continues We dayly see the experience hereof for if one makes a good fire in ones Chamber it draws the air from the door and windows which chough one would shut yet there be crevices and holes for the air to enter and coming near them one shall hear a kind of whisling noise which the air makes in pressing to enter and t is the same cause that produceth the sound of the Organ and flute and he who would stand between the crevices and the fire he should find such an impetuosity of that artificial wind that he would be ready to freeze while he is ready to burn the tother side next the fire And a candle of wax being held in this current of the wind would melt by her flame blown against the wax and waste away in a very short time whereas if that candle stood in a calm place that her flame might burn upward it would last much longer But if there be no passage whereby the air may enter into the Chamber the one part then of the vapor of the wood which should have converted to flame and so mounted up the funnel of the chimney descends downward against its nature for to supply the defect of air within the said Chamber and fills it with smoak but at last the fire choaks and extinguisheth for want of air Whence it come to passe that the Chymists have reason to say that the air is the life of the fire as well as other animals But if one puts a bason or vessel of water before the fire upon the hearth there will be no smoke in the Chamber although it be so close shut that the air cannot enter for the fire attracts parts of the water which is a liquid substance and easie to move out of its place which aquatic parts rarifie themselves into air and thereby perform the functions of the air This is more evidently seen if the Chamber be little for then the air which is there penned in is sooner raised up and carried away And by reason of this attraction they use to make great fires where there are hushould-stuff of men that died of the Pestilence to disinfect them For by this inondation of air which is drawn the fire doth as it were sweep the walls the planks with other places of the Chamber and takes away those little putrified sharp corrosive and venemous bodies which were the infections that adhered unto it drawing them into the fire where they are partly burnt and partly sent up into the chimney accompanied with the atoms of the fire and the smoke It is for this reason that the great Hippocrates which groped so far into the secrets of Nature disinfected and freed from the plague a whole Province or entire Region by causing them to make great fires every where Now this manner of attraction is made not onely by a simple fire but by that which partakes of it viz. by the heated substances and that which is the reason and cause of the one is also the cause of the other For the spirits or ignited parts evaporating from such a substance or hot body carry away with them the adjacent air which ought necessarily to be nourished by some other air or by some matter which keeps the place of the air as we have spoken of the bason and tub of water put before the fire to hinder smoke It is upon this foundation that Physitians do ordain the hot application of Pigeons or young dogs or some other hot animals to the soles of the feet or the handwrists or the stomacks or navills of their patients to extract out of their bodies the wind or ill vapors which infect them and in time of contagion or universal infection of the air pigeons cats dogs with other hot animals use to be killed which make continually a great transpiration of evaporation of spirits because the air by those attractions it makes taking the room of the spirits which issue forth of evaporation the pestiferous atoms which are scattered in the air and accompany it use to stick to their feathers skins or furres And for the same reason we see that bread coming hot from the Oven draws unto it the must of the cask which spoiles the wine if they put it hot upon the bung And that onions such hot bodies which perpetually exhale unto them the fiery parts which appears by the strength of their smell are quickly taken with infectious airs if they be exposed unto them which is one of the signes to know whether the whole masse of the air be universally infected And one might reduce to this head the great attraction of air which is made by calcind bodies and particularly by tartar all ignited by the violent action of the fire upon it which is heaped together and bodified among his salt for I have observed that it attracts unto it nine times more air than it weighs it self For if one should expose to the air a pound of salt of tartar well calcind and burnt it will afford you ten pound of good oyl of tartar drawing unto it and so bodifying the circumjacent air and that wherewith t is mingled as it befell that oyl of
by the tast by the smell by the colour and consistence thereof And sometimes they cause it to be boyled untill it come to an evaporation and see its residence with other accidents and circumstances which may be learnt and discerned by these meanes But those of whose milk this last experiment hath been made felt themselves tormented in their papps and duggs while their milk was a boyling therefore having once endured this pain they would never consent that their milk should be carried away out of their sight and presence although they willingly submitted to any other proof than that by fire Now to confirm this experiment of the attraction which the cowes udder makes of the fire and vapour of the burned milk I am going to racount unto you another of the same nature whereof I my self have seen the truth more than once and whereof any one may easily make try all Take the excrements of a dog and hurle it into the fire more than once at the beginning you shall find him heated and moved but in a short time you shall see him as if he were burned all over panting and stretching out his tongue as if he had run a long course Now this alteration befalls him because his entrailes drawing unto them the vapour of the burn'd excrement and with that vapour the atomes of fire which did accompany it they are so changed and inflam'd that the dog having alwaies a fever upon him and not being able to take any nourishment his flancks do lock up which causeth his death at last It were not proper to divulge this experience among such persons as are subject to make use of any thing for doing of mischief for the same effects which happen to beasts would fall upon mens bodies if one should try such a conclusion upon their excrements There happened a remarkable thing to this purpose to a neighbour of mine in England the last time I sojournied there He had a very pretty and delicate child and because he would have his eies alwaies upon him he entertained the nurse at his house I saw him often for he was a pragmaticall man and of good addresses and I had occasion to use such a man One day I found him very sad and his wife a weeping whereof demanding the reason they told me that their little child was very ill and that he had a burning feaver which inflamed all his body over which appeared by the rednesse of his face that he forced himself to go to stool but he could do little and that little which he did was covered with bloud and that he refused also to suck And that which troubled them most was that they could not conjecture any cause how this indisposition should befall him for his nurse was very well her milk was as good as could be wished and in all other things there was as much care had of him as could be I told them that the last time I was with them I observed one particularity whereof I thought fit to give them notice but something or other still diverted me It was that their child making a signe that he was desirous to be set on his feet he let fall his excrements on the ground and his nurse presently took the fire-shovell and covered it with embers and then threw all into the fire the mother began to make her excuses that they were not so carefull to correct this ill habit of the child saying that as he advanced in yeares he should be corrected for it I replied that t was not for this consideration that I held this discourse with her but I was curious to know the reason of her childs distemper and consequently to find some remedy And thereupon I related unto them the like accident which had happened two or three yeares before to a child of one of the most illustrious Magistrates of the Parliament of Paris who was bred up in the house of a Doctor of Physick of great reputation in the same town I told them also what I have now related unto you touching the excrements of dogs and I made reflections unto them upon that which they had often heard and what is often practised in our Countrey which is that within the villages which are alwaies dirty in the winter if it happens that there be a Farmer which is more proper than others and who keeps more neatly the approaches to his house than his neighbours do the boyes use to come thither in the night time or when it begins to be dark to discharge their bellies there because that in such villages there is not much commodity of easements besides that in such places so fitly accommodated these gallants the boyes are out of danger to sink into the dirt which otherwise might rise up higher than their shooes but the good houswifes in the morning when they open their doores use to find such an ill favoured smell that transports them with choller But they who are acquainted with this trick go presently and fire red hot a broach or fire-shovel and then they thrust it into the excrements all hot and when the fire lessens they heat it again oftentimes to the same purpose In the mean time the boy which made the ordure feels a kind of pain and collick in his bowells with an inflammation in his fundament and a continuall desire to go to stool and he is hardly quit of it till he suffer a kind of fever all that day which is the cause that he returnes thither no more And these women to be freed from such affronts do passe among the Ignorant for sorceresses and to have made a compact with the divell since they torment people in that fashion without seeing or touching them This Gentleman did not disallow those things which I have already told you but was confirmed farther when I told him that he should look farther into the fundament of his child for without doubt he should find it red and inflamed and that visiting him he should find that it was full of pimples and excoriated It was not long after that this poor child fell into a languishment and with much pain and pittifull cries he voyded some small matter which in lieu of casting it into the fire or to be covered with embers I caused to be put into a bason of cold water which was put in a fresh place which was continued to be done every time that the child gave occasion and he began to amend the very same hour and within four or five daies he became perfectly well recovered But fearing to trespasse too much upon your patience I will hold you no longer but with one experiment onely very familiar in our Countrey and afterwards I will make a summary of all that hath been said to make you see the force and value of this whole Discourse We have in England as I touched before excellent pasturage for the nourishment and fatting of cattle so abundantly that it falls out often
have a ring of gold on the other it will become white and covered with mercury though it doth not any way touch it Moreover if you put a leaf of gold or a crown of gold in your mouth and if you put but one of your toes in a thing where mercury is the gold which is in your mouth though you shut up your lips never so close shall turn white and laden with mercury then if you put this gold in the fire to make all the mercury evaporate and that you reiterate the same thing your gold will be calcind as if you had by amalgation joyned mercury therewith corporally And all this will yet be done more spee dily and effectually if in lieu of common mercury you make use of mercury of antimony which is much hotter and more penetrating and though you drive it away by force of fire it will carry away with it a good quantity of the substance of the gold in such sort that reiterating often this operations there will no more gold remain for you to continue your experiments If then that cold mercury doth so penetrate the whole body we ought not to think it strange that subtill atoms of fruit composed of many ignited parts will passe with more facility and quicknesse I will further make you see how such spirits and emanations do suddenly also penetrate steel though it be a substance so compacted cold and hard that the said atoms may keep their residence there many moneths and yeers Within a living body such as is mans the intern spirits do aid and contribute much facility to the spirits that are without such as those of fruits are to make their journy the more easte to the brain The great Architect of nature in the fabrick of human body the master-peece of corporal nature hath placed there some intern spirits to serve as centinells to bring their discoveries to their General viz. to the imagination who is as it were the Mistresse of the whole family whereby a man might know and understand what is done without the Kingdom within the great World and that it might shun what is noxious and seek after that which is profitable For these sentinels or intern spirits with all the inhabitants of the sensitive organs are not able to judge alone insomuch that if the imagination or thought be distracted strongly to some object these intern spirits do not know whether a man hath drunk the wine which he hath swallowed if perchance seeing a person who comes to salute him he fixeth his eye upon him all the while or if he listens attentively to the air of some melodious song or musicall instrument for the inward spirits bring all their acquisitions to the imagination and if she be not more strongly bent upon another object she falls a forming certain Idaeas and Images because that the atomes from without being conveyed by these intern spirits to our imagination erect there the like edifice or else a model in short resembling the great body whence they come forth And if our imagination hath no more use of those significative atoms for the present she rangeth them in some proper place within her Magazin which is the memory where she can repeal and rebuke them when she pleaseth And if there be any object which causeth some emotions in the imagination and toucheth her more near than common objects use to do she sends back her sentinels the internal spirits upon the confines to bring her more particular news And thence it proceeds that a man being surprized by some particular man or other object who hath already some eminent place in his imagination be it of desire or aversion then that man sudendly changeth colour and becomes red then pale then red again at diverse times according as the Ministers which are those intern spirits do go quick or slow towards their object then they return with their reports to their Mistress which is the imagination But besides these passages we speak of which go from the brain to the external parts of the body by the ministery of the nerves there is also a great road from the brain to the heart by which the vital spirits do ascend from the heart to the brain to be animated and hereby the imagination sends unto the heart those atoms which she hath received from some exterternal object and there they make an ebullition betwixt the vital spirits which according to the intervening atoms either cause a dilatation of the heart and so gladden it or they do contract it so sadden it and these two differing and contrary actions are the first general effects whence proceed afterwards the particular passions which require not that I pursue them too far in this place having done it more particularly else where and more expressely Besides these passages which are common to all men and women there is another that 's peculiar only to females which is from the brain to the matrix whereby it often falls out that such violent vapours mount up to the brain and those in so great a number that they often hinder the operation of the brain and of the imagination causing convulsions and follies with other strange accidents and by the same channel the spirits or atoms passe with a greater liberty and swiftnesse to the womb or matrix when the case requires Now le ts consider how the strong imagination of one man doth marvailously act upon another man who hath it more feeble and passive We see dayly that if a person gape those who see him gaping are excited to do the same If one come perchance to converse with persons that are subject to excesse of laughter one can hardly forbear laughing although one doth not know the cause why they laugh If one should enter into a house where all the World is sad he becomes melancholy for as one said Si vis me flere dolendum est primum ipsi tibi Women and Children being very moist and passive are most susceptible of this unpleasing contagion of the imagination I have known a very melancholy woman which was subject to the disease called the Mother and while she continued in that mood she thought her self possessed and did strange things which among those that knew not the cause passed for supernatural effects and of one possessed by the ill spirit she was a person of quality and all this happened because of the deep resentment she had for the death of her Husband She had attending her four or five young Gentlewomen whereof some were her Kinswomen and others served her as Chambermaids All these came to be possessed as she was and did prodigious actions These young Maids were separated from her sight and communication and as they had not yet contracted such profound roots of the evil they came to be all cured by their abscence and this Lady was also cured afterwards by a Physitian which purged the atrabilious humors and restored her matrix to its former