tartarous Diseases of which they speak often and many flie to that in time of ignorance they say then the disease is from Tartar but few explain what Tartar is Lib. de morb tar tar c. 1. Paracelsus rails against the Galenists because they call tartarous diseases sand or the stone because it is a Metaphorical appellation but in Physick we must speak properly and things must de denominated from their Nature which he doth not observe He saith the cause of this appellation is because an oyl and a water and a tincture are made of it which burns the sick as the Tartar of Hell therefore if the name be from the likeness of Hell fire it is taken from a similitude and is not proper Others extend the word Tartar larger then that it should be given only to the stone for they call a slimy humor by the same name which causeth the Colick corrosions and divers pains in the stomach Thus they cal divers things by the name of Tartar to which it doth not equally in reason belong and so is not proper But to the purpose agreeing about names let us see whether the Chymists and Dogmatists may be reconciled in this The Chymists have no clear definition of Tartar Lib. 2. de tar tract 1. c. 1. Paracelsus defines it thus It is stony disease or a bole or between a bole and a stone which hinders the effect and vertue of Nature Other Chymists say Tartar is that impurity in the nourishment under a resolved form that cannot be discerned but yet tends to coagulation and a stony Nature Some from Paracelsus say It is an excrement coagulated by its spirit Some Chymists seem to agree with the Galenists who say Tartar is a stone-making juyce or a matter by Nature apt to coagulate And this juyce is drawn from Plants with the nourishment and sent from Plants into Animals and then it hurts much when Nature is weak to concoct and void it They make four kinds of this Tartarous juyce Viscous bolare or like bole sandy and stony and hence come divers diseases in divers parts of the body First they bring most diseases of the stomach from Tartarous impurities when such a matter covers the sides of the stomach the vital spirits are obstructed which are the Author of all natural actions hence comes slow concoction compression loathing and the like and as the tinctures of the Tartarous spirits are stronger to wholly overcome the inbred spirits there follows want of concoction and nourishment But if these impurities have strange spirits with them they turn the nourishment into a strange nature and there is belching and stink and if they have vomiting properties as of Hellebore or Antimony they cause loathing and vomiting If they have the tinctures of Salts there is burning of the stomach gnawing and the like If of vitriolated Salt there is a Dog-like appetite Let us grant all this that we be not so unjust against the Chymists as Erastus Part 4. disp conâ—a para Yet this tartarous matter is not the onely cause of the hurt actions of the stomach for a hot or a cold distemper often hurts it Moreover from the opinion of Severine diseases breed from those tartarous impurities mixed or alone from the mixed come sulphurous stinking diseases thirst heat bitterness of mouth headach with cold and shaking called ordinary feavers But he thinks they come rather from their roots which are Niter with Sulphur Because he saith feavers have seeds and roots in which slimy and salt spirits with Niter are mixed with impure stinking dissolved Sulphur Therefore at set times when the mineral or matter of the disease begins to spring being nitrous Sulphur there is horror chilness panting and the like as the nitrous Sulphur differs As we are not in this enemies to them so let them be milder against the opinions of Galenists for first we must distinguish the seaver from the cause The cause is that matter which they call Nitrous Sulphur from the accession of which there is a hot distemper in the whole body by which all the parts are unfit for their offices and this preternatural disposition is called a feaver Nor must the name of humors be rejected for Niter or Sulphur are never vomited up or purged forth or sweat out but only humors Though we grant that the humors are set on fire by Sulphur we will not therefore reject the name of humors Scheunemamnus his opinion of the original of feavers is ridiculous he saith that a globe or bal of many Sphaeres like a Bezoar-stone is bred in the stomach or liver and thence come seavers and fits and when this ball is struck from Heaven it flames and smoaks and infects the air hence comes a little cold and trembling and then heat But this globe and its circles of which it is made ought to be very great because he writes that the patient shall have so many fits as are circles in it Against Severine I say the Colick cannot breed from a slimy Tartar mixed with stiptick or binding four spirits because he made one cause only of the pain of the Colick I agree with him about the name for the case is plain that the colick is from glass like flegm as Galen taught But if he make that the only cause he errs exceedingly because there are great pains from wind that extends the guts nor doth sharpness or wind cause pains but by stretching which being made to pass by a Clyster or two the pain ceaseth better then by the laborious Chymical medicines Ideo Philos 13. It is false that he saith the sharpest pains are only from the sharpest spirits of Salts he calls the pains from cuts burnings and stroaks Relolls But all men living do witness by sense that there is no greater pain then that from cutting and burning c. Severine proceeds and saies and describes the generations and differences of inflammations saying That the seeds of these diseases come to the matrixes not only in a liquid form dissolved but in a spiritual vapor and continual nutrication and digested fermentation and except the time of neaturity and separation which coming the spirits break forth and boyl And then the signatures that lay hid before in the spirits are explained colours tasts scents heat and other qualities And by nourishment daily attracted they make bodies agreable to the principles mattery slimy bloody coagulated dissolved stinking red black He brings the kinds of inflammations from the proprieties of the sulphurous spirits And Arsenick spirits make plague sores Orpiment spirits make Pleurisies not only in the breast but in the brain lungs heart liver spleen and stomach He accuseth Galen and other Doctors for saying That inflammations come from much blood violent exercise falls contusions And denies that these effects can come from these causes except some Arsenical seed cause the Plague or other the Pleurisie lying in the blood till it get an occasion to boyl For the breeding of ulcers
Sulphur drawn by the same fire out of any body for much Salt is drawn from Wormwood Fennel Vine-branches but very little from the Gourd or Cowcumber But they object that the resolution is artificial not natural and the axiome that all things are made of such things as they are resolved into is ment of natural not artificial resolution But we deny that Chymical resolutions are not natural if we consider the immediate agent though the Artificer be joyned for they are from heat and fire which are natural causes as for example When a plant is burnt to make Salt the action is plainly natural not in respect of the plant which is destroyed but in respect of the agent When the spirit of Wine is raised by heat the action is as natural as when the same spirit is sent to the brain by the heat of the stomach and liver or when a thing is evaporated by the heat of the Sun Therefore we say the thing made by the Chymists is natural in its being the action of heat by which it is made is natural and the motion of the thing is natural But it is artificial in respect of the Chymists putting it into a vessel and applying fire to it nor is it any otherwise artificial then health which is recovered by the help of a Physitian The use of Chymical principles is that the proprieties which are in mixed bodies and cannot be immediately shewed from the Elements may be shewed from them as the next and proper principles as it is plain in the searching out of the faculties of Medicines For though Erastus thinks that all these may be fetcht from the Elements he proves it not let them tell me why when Opiats are distilled the vapors cause sleep so that the servants are many times sound asleep other vapors do not the same Why doth the fume of Lead and Quicksilver corrode gold not the fume of Vitriol and other things Why doth only a flegm distil from spirit of Vitriol and sealed Earth These questions cannot be answered without the Principles of the Chymists onely from the Doctrine of the Elements and Meteors Nor do I think all the proprieties of bodies are to be reduced to the Chymical principles for some come from nobler forms as I shewed Nor am I of opinion in all things and I dispute not here whether the force of purging be from Salt only in general I say some properties are from Salt others from Sulphur and in what mixture soever such a property is found there you must seek for the principle hence arise the profitable separations of Chymists But note these common Principles as such are not proper and next principles of particular affects nor is force of purging from Salt nor is a narcotick force from Sulphur as Sulphur for then all Salts would purge and all Sulphur would be narcotick But these principles as they are common are only the principles of common affects but the special affects come from determinate principles So we have shewed in general that besides the Elements there are other principles of mixed things nor is the generation made immediately from the Elements but there are other bodies which as the first subjects some qualities do flow which cannot come from the Elements which Hippocrates acknowledged and the Chymists have given them names and I care not what the names are so the thing be true But as for the species number and nature of particulars it is not clear I will pin my self upon no mans sleeve but give my judgment not to dissent but consent with the Aristotelians and Galenists if it may be The three Principles are Salt Sulphur and Mercury I 'le give my judgment of every one First for Salt Lib. 31. hist nat c. 7. it is so plainly in every natural body that Pliny saith Salt is a necessary Element only consider the growth of Plants what makes them fruitful and flourish the chief cause is piss which hath much Salt and consider that there is no art used As for the properties of Salt It is first a thing to be tasted and all things to be tasted are so from Salt nor is Kitchin-salt the only Salt but that in Mustard Rhadish Garlick Vinegar Choler Allum Vitriol and the like And because tast and feeling are senses united and have objects alike acrimony is ascribed also to Salt and that which twitcheth the feeling is Salt Hence there is in smoak Radishes Watercresses Onions and the like force to twitch the eyes from the volatile Salt in them Secondly Salt will melt in moisture and be hard in a dry place which earth will not and though earth dissolve in water yet it melts not in it as Salt much less will earth melt in a moist air as Salt wil. Thirdly from Salt is the coagulation of all things the Crystal and Diamond are hard from Salt the Metals are strong also Bones Herbs and Trees consist by it Also the stone in the bladder and kidnies grow together from Salt The Chymists prove this by many things in the Sea that grow as Coral and Waters that make stones the growing of Vitriol and Allum and other Salts in the water Moreover they who have the stone piss like snot or the white of an egg which taken into a clout turns to a stone and it hath much Salt because it is sharp and corroding and causeth pain in pissing the cause of these cannot be heat cold or driness For stones bred in the bladder in cold and membranous parts and in infants in whom there is no excess of heat but manifest signs of crudity And how can a stone-making juyce be caused of heat in a cold Well that turns sticks into stones Nor can cold be the cause because stones are found in the arteries of the heart and in the heart and lungs Nor are these causes by accident or by drying up the moisture for in some waters things turn to stone of which Anshelme Boetius speaks Lib. 2. de gemmis c. 300. Also stones breed in the kidnies and bladder where moisture is never wanting and there can be no such drying Hence they think it in vain to seek for the cause of concretion in external causes but to consider the internal matter and disposition by which stones are made hard nor are they against Philosophy I shall deliver my opinion in short First there are many equivocations by which they are bafled in the causes of coagulation and concretion for concretion and coagulation are not the same for juyces and gums and water and many other things may be concreted as ice by cold and clay by the Sun There is Crystal and glass and solid Metal but they are not concreted from the same cause nor is water or Crystal hard or concreted from the same cause To speak distinctly the question is not here of things which are coagulated and made hard only by driness after the moisture is consumed by which they were soft before or
by nature were concreted and made fluid by heat and then concreted again by cold But in regard many things congeal in moisture and grow together hard whose cause is neither heat nor cold nor driness we must think of another internal cause Two kinds of concretion are to be here considered which are when no part of the matter is taken away or any other added but the whole taking its consistence and concrescence from moisture which we want fit words to distinguish The Chymists call one of these by the High-dutch word Schiessen this coagulation is properly of Salts as Vitriol Allum Niter Salts of Herbs come from a moisture to a consistence This is of Salt properly and they by nature tend to this by their form But being there is one form by nature of Niter another of Vitriol another of Allum another of common Salt Every Salt according to its form and proper spirit coagulateth and grows together in this or that figure so do Gemms concrete in certain figures Lib. 2. demasc prima v. 9. for every form makes bounds to the bigness and quantity and sigure as Zabarel shews Another sort of concretion is called Lapidescentia or turning to stone the next and adequate cause of this is not the Elements nor the principles of Chymistry only but a stone making juyce or spirit which is not without Salt and contains more then Salt as the order of nature is to go from simples to things more compound This is in all Jewels and Stones but according to their special forms We said it was a spirit and a juyce but the chief force is in the spirit and the juyce hath it from the spirit because that stone-makeing force is found in the spirit without the juice As for the differences of Salts they are altered in divers Plants and Animals as in corruption of humors there are divers differences There is Salt in Vitriol Allum Sal Armoniack Iron There is a volatile Salt in a Nettle Arsmart Cokow-pints smal Celandine Mustard There is a salt in humors that causeth the Itch Scab Cancer and other corroding Ulcers There are made Salts as Borax Sal Armoniack and the like Sulphur is another Principle of the Chymists which is properly to burn and nothing burns without it The Elements of themselves are not inflamed and if they seem to burn it is from the sulphurous vapors in them Therefore Sulphur is the first scented thing and other things are smelt by their Sulphur many things that are very sweet being whole scent not but when they are burnt or bruised Hence it is that Sulphur and Fat 's scent not much but when they are burnt or smoak Some joyn scents and savors in a subject and say the scent is of the savory part but experience shews otherwise for there are many most savory and sharp things which have little or no scent as Arsenick Sublimate Mercury and other corroding Minerals that have little or no scent Some impute colours to Sulphur and more probably then to Salt but in colours the matter is more difficult Aristotles Interpreters that bring colours from the mixture of the Elements proye nothing Therefore let the principle of colours be Sulphur or as Anshelme Boetius saith God himself who gives colours as well as shape to Jewels and the like for they come from the proper seminary of every thing Common Sulphur Petroleum or Naphtha Amber and Sea-coal have much Sulphur Gums and Rosins of fat Trees as Pine Fir tree Pitch Oyl and the like Fat 's of Beasts of which see Libavius Parte 3. singular He useth the word Bitumen generally as the Chymists use Sulphur The third Principle is Mercury somtimes taken for Quicksilver Ide Philos c. 8. somtimes for a Principle Salt and Sulphur Severinus saith it is added to the other Principles that by daily moistning of them to nourish them from decay by often action In defens contra an̄o c. 14. In Tyrocin Chymico Quercetan saith it is a liquor sharp and penetrable pure and aetherial and so saith Beguin But they agree not therefore Libavius writes that the modern Chymists describe Salt Sulphur and Mercury by Notes but when we ask what it is they consound all and say that Salt is in Sulphur and Mercury In exami Philoso vit and Sulphur and Mercury in Salt and Mercury and Salt in Sulphur and then he gives this definition Mercury is an essential Liquor drawn by the Chymists from a mixed body after the elementary impurities are separated opposite to the Sulphur and Salt of the same mixed body To speak my mind if there be any such Mercury it is a spiriful Liquor or Spirit which can scarce be separated from subtile Sulphur and volatile Salt to be seen by it self and though it be not seen it is no matter for pure fire is not seen nor air nor the spirit in Animals which are true parts of the Nature of things and the best Such things saith Scaliger deceive the vulgar eyes but wise men see them But I appeal to the Learned whether I be absurd in making these principles mixed with the Elements the common matter for the habitation of forms of the Natural bodies To conclude Metals Minerals Stones and Gemms and Plants are not simply mixed and have not only their forms from the forms of the Elements much less from a double exhalation which maketh the next matter of Meteors because they have better actions then are from Elementary qualities and a double exhalation But the Elements give them matter with the chymical Principles and may hence be better by the causes of many things then from the doctrine of Meteors We can clearly shew Salt and Sulphur from a Chymical separation though they are not manifest before We desire to know more of Mercury not of the Metal but of the Principle Aristotle attributes all to a Spirit which the Chymists do to Mercury for Quercetan and Beguin call it a substance or body to be passed through penetrated aethereal pure subtile quickning and the next instrument of the form and call it the Spirit of ancient Hermes The Chymists call that vital Sulphur which Aristotle calls the Natural heat and describe their Mercury as that it is in the Natural heat And this Sulphur and Mercury are so united in Nature that they cannot wel be separated but when the Sulphur is on fire Mercury flies away Also the actions from the whole substance and the hidden qualities are attributed to this Spirit as to the proper subject this in poysons is a venemous spirit in purges a purging spirit As for the original of these Principles some think them to be the first mixtures others to be peculiar natures in the first Creation concreted with other species of natural things to be of the Nature of the Elements He that will embrace the first opinion must hold that these bodies have nobler forms by which they are more noble then the Elements and from which other qualities
and strong imagination yet it is never lawful to ask any things of the Devil or expect his help Nor is there any Example in Scripture that ever the Devil did any man good Certainly Crollius is very wicked in saying That true prayers in spirit and truth are the foundation of Cabalistical Magick For prayers are the worship of God according to the 5. of John and they must be according to his promises and will and this worship ought not to be prophaned with such wicked Speeches Now that natural saith he speaks of which is a power to do miracles and given equally to all men in the Creation is a meer lye For true miracles onely belong to the Church and those done by Infidels and Conjurers are from the Devil and are not true but lying wonders What Crollius writes of Imagination In Praefat. admonit are dreams of Enthusiasts none deny but there is great force in imagination but that it can do what Crollius mentions it is a meer fable and if Crollius could have cured diseases by imaginaon why did he spend so much time in preparation of Chymical medicines In a word concerning Crollius his Magick avoid it there is knavery in the Baker and under the honey of Chymical medicines there is a venemous gall Therefore beware least under the pretence of Natural Magick and Divine Philosophy and light of Nature you do not use Diabolical Magick which may be though you make no contract with the Devil for it may be made not only explicitely but implicitely An explicite contract is when one makes a Covenant with the Devil An implicite is when any useth such means with another who hath contracted with the Devil explicitely and plainly hath before used For though there are examples in Scripture that the Apostles ruled over the Devil and cast him out yet there is no example that any Saint used the help of the Devil for a good end to profit man And though it may be objected for Paracelsus that it is no inconvenience for any to get better medicines then are known from the Devil to cure incurable diseases yet I suppose it is neither safe nor religious and St. Chrysostome saies well That a man had better die then recover by such remedies God that wounded can heal therefore seek help from him alone There is a famous Example that it is not lawful to seek help from the Devil 2 Kings c. 1. in Ahazia 2 Kings c. 1. by which we are taught to seek for cure from God alone not from the Devil and we can expect no good from that great Deceiver Moreover the means in Magick are not ordinary nor natural as you may see in Paracelsus but are words characters waxed images and superstitious inventions of the Devil And that we may not use such superstitions that are suspected to have an occult contract from the Devil observe what follows For where there is neither miracle nor force of Nature nor Arts ingenuity there is a contract with the Devil whosoever he was that made it And when characters and unknown words are used that are obscure and do not cohere or agree or are holy but applied to another meaning or when Ceremonies of no force are used or the like there is a strong suspicion Lib. de occul Philos As when Paracelsus saies a man may be freed from diseases from inchantment if he put on an old shirt with the wrong side outwards He makes Astrologie the third piller of Physick Lib. 1 de Philos sagaci Lib. de aere lo. aq but he extends it too large comprehending all Magick under Astronomy and dividing it strangely As for Astrology if it be right and upon Natural principles we hold it necessary for a Physitian as Hippocrates shews And there are many reasons why a Physitian should not be ignorant of it Therefore I consent to the modern Physitians that say the Stars work upon inferior bodies not only by heat and light but by occult influences But here we are to seek and the strength of the purest Stars is not known And Paracelsus and Crollius should engage us if they would explain the consent between the upper and lower World more plainly But here they are at a loss with the Aristotelians and Galenists many whereof were good Astrologers and studied the force of Stars very much but ingeniously confessed their imperfections of whom Cardan saies well Astrolog aphor sect 1. aph 34. That Astrologie as it is most excellent so it is most difficult And the motions of the Stars can never be known perfectly nor the judgments from them c. Chap. 14. Of the strength of Imagination BEcause the effects of Natural Magick seem to the Paracelsians to depend upon Imagination not onely to cause diseases but to cure them and they shew wonders done by imagination from Philosophers and Physitians we shal here shew what the strength of it is But note first that those effects which are attributed to imagination do not immediately depend upon it nor doth the soul produce such effects by imagination For imagination is only a knowing power that hath an immanent action which goeth not forth to other things and imagination doth nothing effectually but know but the other powers vegetative and moving do act upon others And though the phansie concurs to local motiō as knowing it yet is it not the immediate cause of motion therefore it doth not act upon any body of its own or anothers nor doth it by any sort of motion alter move or change it But appetite or desire follows knowledge and then there is a prosecution or flight which is by a local motion Whose cause is a place moving power distinct from the imagination Therefore the humors are not moved of themselves or immediately by the imagination but only by accident stirring up the natural powers whose office is to move the humors and spirits to nourish the body The imagination directeth the humors and spirits to move towards this or that part and it determines the moving faculty that it may move the spirits and humors to this or that part as when one is lasciviously minded the spirits and humors go to the privities by which motion the body is altered not by the phansie of it self nor can the species of the phansie produce a real quality nor formality make an alteration because the formal and essential reason of it is only in representation and it cannot act beyond its force and perfection Therefore when some are loose bodied from the conceit of a purging medicine not taken it is not because the species of the purging medicine hath a purging force but because the moving natural faculty is drawn to consent with the imagination and stirs the humors which being stirred do provoke the expulsie faculty to stool especially if humors abound First it moves the desiring faculty or appetite and by the passions of the mind affects the body for the passions follow knowledg which causeth
gladness at what is pleasant and sorrow at what is unpleasant these passions have great power to alter the body But phansie doth not immediately alter the body by the appetite but as the appetite moves the natural moving faculties in the members and chiefly in the heart these being moved do move the humors and spirits and the spirits comming and going to the part do change them Therefore the remote cause of alteration is the phansie and so it affects its own body and causeth divers diseases in it but of it self it causeth none And if it should the disease would be but imaginary not real So some melancholick people have thought they had great noses or bodies and yet were not so And though some fall into diseases by imagination yet the phansie doth not of it self but by accident by reason of fear which moves the malignant humors lurking in the body and these being moved cause the plague One Vincent thought his body so big that he could not pass through the door and when the Physitian commanded him to be carried through he complained that he was very much bruised and soon after died But this is not because the patient imagineth but because he is diseased And if imagination doth any thing it is by accident from sorrow or fear and the like passions Many diseases come by accident by means of the spirits and humors as they are different in nature and motion And imagination being the cause of divers passions as anger sorrow much joy they have such force to corrupt and change humors that we need not prove it Moreover strong imagination draws the spirits and humors strongly to the head and the heat is taken from the parts ordained for nourishment Thus imagination may cure diseases namely by accident not of it self for confidence makes the patient obey orders because imagination brings passions by which the humors and spirits are moved by which motion they oppose the disease Therefore confidence begets chearfulness and this stirs up the natural heat and spirits and so there is better concoction and the bad humors are overcome and the disease opposed Hence it is that they who are alwaies sad have many crudities and soul humors from the constant loss of heat and spirits From the same cause if patients have some meats they longed for they recover though they be not wholsom And Hippocrates saith that the best meats 2. Aphoris 38. if not affected cause loathing and the stomach doth not rightly embrace and concoct them hence come wind and crudities and the disease increaseth or the patient is longer sick 〈◊〉 â—â—at taken in with pleasure somtimes curethe because either by the joy the spirits which were dull by the disease are raised and refreshed which are the fittest instrument to conquer soul humors and the disease or because when then the patient hath his desire ceaseth from that imagination and the disease which was falsly supposed There are many Histories of this in Thomas á Vega and Alexander Trallian Com. in art med Galeni c. 48. Tralia lib. 2. c. 17. who speaks of a Woman that thought she had swallowed a Serpent Therefore if imagination of it self cannot afflict its own body it cannot change or hurt any other body For the soul cannot act upon externals but by means of the body because the phansie is an immanent action not transient But by accident it may do somwhat for what is said of Witchcraft is not to be wholly despised They say the Baselisk kils a man by the poysonous beams from his eyes These come from spirits and vapors by which the occult Sympathies and contracts of things are And the imagination may somwhat direct these spirits as we said by moving the natural faculties or stirring up the passions so in envy hatred anger venemous humors which are moved in the body are carried to the eyes and flow from thence But a certain distance is required and it is absurd to think that any can be afflicted at many miles distance and it is worse to ascribe to imagination things beyond its force and to which it no waies concurs as when they say a man may fall from a horse by imagination or corn be carried from one field into another Lastly let us consider what imagination can do in child-bearing Hipp 1. de supert Gal dether ad pis Avic fen 2. lib 1. doctr 2. c. 14. gen c. 30. of which there are many Observations so that it is simple to doubt them Hippocrates Galen and Avicen and many other Authors prove it and that of the Patriach Jacob is well known But it is hard to know how imagination could change a child It is certain that the phansie being known and an immanent power doth not of it self change the child and the forming faculty is the immediate cause of quantity figure number position and heat and not the imagination Nor is the child changed by a species of the phansie because of it self it cannot produce any real quality nor hath it any force but to move imagination and to represent to its object and if this species had any force there would be more changes in children It is therefore more probable to reason that the child is changed by the phansie either through the passions and motions of the spirits and humors or by directing the forming faculty The changes and hurts in children are of two sorts common and determinate The common are abortion death inward sickness and weakness smalness or greatness of some part defect or abundance in number The determinate are changes and signatures which have a determinate similitude to some outward thing as for Example when they long for Cherries the impression of a Cherry will be upon the child The first changes may be from phansie by means of the passions and motion of the humors and spirits but the determinate signatures which answer to external things that are offered to the imagination cannot be by motion of the humors and spirits by the imagination For the passions stirs the spirits and humors which stirred are carried with force or in plenty to the child which troubles it and cause abortion by stirring up of the expulsive faculty of the womb Somtimes the forming faculty is disturbed from the same cause in its operation or is overwhelmed or the spirits and humors being sent another way the parts are not rightly formed or they are greater or less But these are not determinate faults nor have they any resemblance with external things because they are made by an accidental motion of the humors onely stirred by the passions and they are not determinated by a peculiar manner according to the species received in the imagination Therefore these errors are to be attributed rather to the passions of the mind â—hen to imagination nor doth the phansie truly and effectually conduce to them nor otherwise then as it stirs up the appetite But when these signatures are determinated and peculiar according to
Chyle then Blood Choler or Flegm c. Severinus is out when he saith there is blood in Balsom with spirit flesh bones ligaments and nerves and that these are seperated from it by help of the mechanick spirits There is in all sood somthing familiar to us that turns nourishment and may have divers forms as the parts are to which it comes call it Balsom or Mummy I am indifferent but I allow not that the things mentioned should be contained in them and be only made known and separated by the mechanick spirits Thus we should say with Anaxagoras that all things are in al things and there is no true generation But when chyle is made of bread blood of chyle bones membranes flesh of blood in every change there is a new form And every part hath force to turn its nourishment into its own nature which is the peculiar faculty of the vegetative soul what we have spoken of blood and humors is meant of alimentary humors that make blood We shall speak of excrementitious humors in the next Chapter in the Causes of Diseases Lastly They make two Anatomies the one local which they esteem little as the dissecting of bodies to see the shape figure and position and number of parts this they called a dead Anatomy for Butchers by which the Carcass is only seen but not the secrets of the nature of man The other they cal essential vital formal by by which every body is dissolved into its principles Paracel de orig morb ae tribus primis substantiis c. 6. alibi Severin c. 3. alibi passim he that wil try this must first know the nature of seeds and properties the offices of the elements and of the principles the roots of generation and transplantation the laws of Astronomy and the disposition not of the dead but of the whole living body Therefore they say the heart is wheresoever there is vital heat The Stomach is every cavity or place of concoction The womb is every place where there is seed of any fruit and they think the consideration of the great world is chiefly to be had in this Anatomy They say whatsoever is in the great world is also in man not according to a superficial likeness but indeed and according to the species and that man contains all things in himself though invisibly As to the local Anatomy they speak of they dishonor it for Anatomy is much beyond a Butchers work for by it all parts are artificially found out and their constitution and use Thus did Galen in his Book of the use of parts and others which if Paracelsus had read he had not written so absurdly They arrogate to themselves only the vital Anatomy but the Galenists had it as you may see in Galens Books of the faculties of nature of the Seed of the sorming of the Infant of Breathing temperaments Elements c. in which he speaks of the faculties of the soul which govern the body and of the instruments thereof in action Yet if the Chymists by their Principles can give it more light we wil accept of it thankfully But they here rather quible with words and with new terms they sell the opinions of the Ancients as their own and do little discover them or clear them up as when they say the heart is wheresoever there is vital heat It is the part of a wise Philosopher to call things by their own names and not so to quible with names as to confound things that are distinct Chap. 16. of Pathologie or Diseases THe Chymists seem also to enlarge the Pathological part of Physick Ideae Philos c. 13. when they suppose that the antecedent cause the Disease and the Symptom differ not in kind essence or specifical propreties but only in power and act Thus Severinus and that they differ no otherwise then a sleeping Physitian doth from the same being awake brimstone not burning from that which burneth salt not dissolved from that which is dissolved therefore he supposeth names are to be given from the roots as from the hidden roots of diseases in intermitting feavers when no heat is fired in the heart while the feaver lies close in the body and not from the antecedent cause But Galen doth better divide all things that are besides nature in mans body into three Cap. 12. that is the disease the cause and the symptom and there is no Discipline that makes no difference between the causes and the effects therfore it must be in Physick for the humors are the causes the diseases the effects and again the symptoms are effects of them both and all these differ in their whole essence and nature Therefore Severinus writes foolishly saying That which is most remote from producing of an effect is a genus that which is nearest to the individual is the species and the effect is the individual He makes the most general genus or kind to be the stony tartarous Mucilages in fruits and those in the stomach and guts to be the sudordinate genus But when they cause diseases and symptoms they are species and the last actions being hurt or hindered are the individuals But every true Philosopher may perceive this absurdity He writes like a fool when he saith he saw a feaver vomited forth for he saw the cause but not the feaver And more simply when he saies that matter so vomited up shaked for a time like an ague But either he read not or observed not what Galen and Galenists have written concerning the shaking of feavers But these Severinians are offended that the names of diseases are not given from the causes But they are unreasonable to think names must be given as they please and that fit names may be rejected Therefore it is not bad to define a feaver from its essence then let them enquire into the nature of the cause and whether the cause of a feaver may be called Choler or Sulphur Nor do the Galenists allows eye the disease alone but look often more at the cause much less do they only observe the symptoms for many of them come often from the same cause and one somtimes from divers causes and if these be not diligently disting dished he plaies the Emperick and will be deceived and if the Chymists will help us in curing we shall thank them As for the nature of a disease Paracelsus errs exceedingly when he saith a disease is a substance and that the disease is a whole man and hath an invisible body and this he shews by the Jaundies But every disease is nothing else but a quality in the body besides Nature Lib. 2. de morb podag by which the body is so disposed that it is unfit for its proper actions Now all error is from this that as plants come from their seeds so they think diseases do also and the true cure of a disease is nothing else but the taking away of those seeds and if they be not taken away by changing
of cold and heat and ther qualities and evacuation of humors no disease can be truly cured He illustrates this by an Example as saith he he that labours to keep fruit from growing in his garden doth not enough to pull off the fruit every year or lop off a branch or two from a Tree much less if he die the leaves or the fruit of another colour but he must take up the Tree by the roots So to take away heat or cold and the like qualities by their contraries is to take away the fruits onely and leave the root Concerning the original of the seeds of diseases they say That though in the first Creation when by divine power the seeds took their force to generate and multiply all things else were without corruption yet after the Fall there came new tinctures by the curse upon those pure seeds as Severinus saith by the mixture of which the beauty of the Creation was transplanted into a calamitous condition and these pure seeds were covered with unfortunate new garments and he adds that man who useth all sublunary things and lives upon Plants and Animals is defiled with universal impurity and hath many sorts of diseases and deaths Severine brings the rise of hereditary diseases from hence so that they may be to the fourth Generation And hence he saith is the reason why people not having the Gout or Falling-sickness beget children that have For the inbred impurities of the Parent not being ripe in thē may be increased in the children and bring unexpected symptoms He saith on the contrary that they which have the Gout may beget children that have not Either because the seeds of those diseases are not fixed in the root and Balsom of man but cleave only superficially or because they are overcome in the womb by the power of its natural Balsom or because the seeds grew old and barren For say they those seeds which are not united in species but individuals have their ages and when their root is exhausted they are barren and unfruitful They allow not the first qualities to be causes of Diseases and when they are convinced they say they are so inconsiderable that they require not the help of a Physitiā They regard not compound Diseases and say they are but a certain hinderance to actions For they affirm that the desect of Instruments and Figures and Cavities and Solution of Continuity come not as Diseases from Seeds but they say the Diseases of the Similary parts have their seeds They say humors are but Phansies In labyrinth med err c. 8. and though Paracelsus allow them yet he denies that they are causes of diseases and saith the humors come from diseases not diseases from humors But many of these opinions are not to be believed for in the generation of diseases it is otherwise for the good humors are altered corrupted and infected from the bad as from Leaven and do hurt the parts and bring preternatural qualities But we cannot find any forming force in the causes of diseases as in the seeds of Plants which may produce such a body And they are like the doting Manichaes when they say Those seeds and evil matters of diseases were made by God First they make God the Author and Creator of evil and diseases as if he had made any substantial which is wicked For God saw what he had made and they were very good for all substance as a substance is good and evil is not consubstantially but accidentally joyned unto it Then they make a double creation the first which was by the blessing of God in six daies the other was by the curse of God upon the pure seeds and roots of things by which the evil roots of Diseases and Death were added But God rested from all his labour the seventh day and the Curse of God only declared punishment Severine doth ill in bringing hereditary diseases from seeds It is true that the diseases of Parents come to the children by the seed and mothers blood but an hereditary evil is a vitious disposition in some part by which in time humors of the same kind are gathered and so produce the like diseases It is against experience to leave the first qualities out of diseases and their causes for all ages have allowed them for as soon as any preternatural distemper is in any part all acknowledge that its actions are hurt nor can it do its duty till the natural temper be restored Hippo. 3. Aphor. 16. in Epid. Severin this is dayly observed in the Stomach and there are thousands of Examples of this in Hippocrates and Galen Nor can we admit of the new interpretation of Hippocrates made by Severine saying that the South Wind makes not dull hearing nor other symptoms mentioned by Hippocrates First he should prove that absurd opinion that wind rain and snow are the fruits of the Stars nor need they fly to occult qualities powers and tinctures when a manifest cause may be shewed as appears in Hippocrates They are out also in Diseases of conformatiō saying they are only impediments of actions as if all diseases were not such they reject the humors erroneously because it is manifest to sense that divers humors are evacuated in divers diseases by vomit and stool by Nature or Art when they cannot deny this Severine thinks that excrementitious humors are to be called by other names and leaving the phantastick names of Vitelline eruginous salt and crude flegm he flies to the kinds of Salts nitrous aluminous vitrlolate and to the properties of salts in Plants as in Cookowpints Nettles Celandine c. That the names of Choler Melancholy and Flegm are to be rejected but there is no reason or cause why these ancient names should be rejected no more then the names of a Feaver Apoplexy Dropsie If they can find out more proper names we shal admit them provided they expound the intrinsical nature of the things For to speak plainly the difference and nature of humors cannot only be explained by the first qualities but they may be more specially determined by their more proper qualities which Hippocrates teacheth saying Lib. de vet medict It is heat moisture cold or driness that hath much force but sourness sharpness and bitterness c. The Cancer is an example in which he that acknowledgeth not a corrosive sait is blind And the same may be seen in the itch scab and ulcers that corrode and creep Therefore I deny not but such humors the causes of such diseases may be so called from the Salt or other Chymical principle although I denied when I spake of blood and natural humors that such humors in which such excess appear not ought to receive denomination from the Chymical principles Nor do I think that the excrementitious humors in which a manifest excess doth not appear should be denominated from the Chymical principles but keep their ancient names Yet it is not unfit that the differences of
strong corroding humors which are divers should be distinguished with names taken from Sulphur or Salt when there appears any remarkable excess of any one humor For Hippocrates calls a defluxion from the head 4. De rat vic in acu sent 31. Lib. de vee Medici hot and nitrous and writes That men are not only fevorish from heat alone nor can that alone cause a disease but bitterness and heat and sharpness or saltness with heat and the like Nor is it strange that such things should be in the body when a man is fed with Plants and Animals which are nourished with plants and these have from the earth their nourishment which contains in it salt bitter and the like juyces and Mineral spirits which are derived into man whose altering force changeth them as much as it can but they can never be overcome by our nature Nature indeed labors to void them being unfit for nourishment and if they be retained and separated from the good blood and abide alone they hurt the body divers waies Galen and other Physitians own this who mention salt and nitrous humors and the effects of Salt are manifest in Catarrhs or Defluxions Some humors are called Aeruginous not that they are like Verdigreece as Erastus thinks but because there is the tast and force of corroding as in Verdigreece and other qualities Nor is it unprofitable to observe these differences of humors for they are of concernment for cures therefore there being great difference of humors as to their colours tast consistence and essence and they cannot be called at by the same name If the Chymists can here help us there is no cause why we should not observe them yet we must not cast off the old names of the humors for Rhubarb doth alwaies purge choler not Salt or Sulphur The Chymists speak diversly of the differences of diseases In labyrinth medic arr Paracelsus saich that there are two kinds of seeds the Iliastrum Cagastrum The Iliastrum is when the feed of the disease is from the beginning as of Apples Pears Nuts Cagastrum is that which is from corruption The diseases from the Iliastrum are the Dropsie Jaundies Gout c. Of the Cagastrum Plague Feavers Pleurisies But as I said diseases do not spring up from seeds but from preternatural causes in the body either bred therein or gathered Paracelsus hath another difference by which he constituteth five Beings of diseases First the Ens or Being of God In paramiro for he saith some diseases come from God The second being is an Astral Ens under which he comprehends not only diseases from the Stars of Heaven but such as come from the stars in Man that depend upon the stars of Heaven The third is a Natural Being when a disease by a fault in Nature and they consider Nature by their three Principles The fourth is a Mental Ens under which are comprehended all diseases from imagination in our selves or others and under this they comprehend Incantations The fifth kind is a Being of Poyson natural or artificial Here Paracelsus shews his ignorance in Logick and Philosophy and he never learned from the Metaphysicks what Ens or a Being is It is ungodly to say that any disease is from a Being of God And he speaks improperly in all the rest of his differences But we may bear with improper speeches so good things be under them Ideae Philos c. 14. Nor can we suffer what Severine saith in referring all diseases and cures to four Monarches The Epilepsie Dropsie Gout and Leprosie to every one of these he reduced certain diseases under the Epilepsie he placeth Catarrhs Palsies Cramps Megrims Melancholies Apoplexies and Suffocations of the Womb. Under the Dropsie Aposthems Jaundies Cachexy Under the Leprosie all Ulcers Under the Gout the Cholick Stone Toothach and Headach But it is evil to refer diseases that differ so in essence and causes to the same head Nor is this division to be admitted into coagulation and resolved diseases They say that some impurities come from the seeds whose fruit doth coagulate Others come from seeds whose fruit ends in flowing resolution those they cal coagulated these resolved diseases What Severine saith of the disease and fruits of the superior Globe hath many absurdities except they are explained otherwise then the words sound We grant that the causes of Epidemick diseases depend in a great part upon the Stars and their influence and arise from the air and spirits that we attract and breath in But that there should be any Opiate Arsenick Orpiment or the like or fruits of celestial bodies or resolutions of celestial seeds I cannot admit because matter of such corruptions which is in the air and drawn in by the breath to infect the body comes not from Heaven but is contained in the inferior World and the coelestial bodies may diversly stir dispose and mingle and alter them The modern Chymists dare not defend this Doctrine of Severine Quercetan searce mentioneth any seeds but saith In defensione contra Anoni That Mercury Salt and Sulphur have all sorts of vertues faculties and properties from whence come infinite varieties colours tasts and scents and the like which produce divers diseases from their distemper and the company of other things If Sulphur abound it brings divers inflammations and feavers besides other narcotick effects which the sleepy Sulphur produceth by its narcotick spirits which do the same thing that wine or the like doth which cause sleep not by cold but a narcotick Sulphur From mercurial sour and sharp vapors come Epilepsies Apoplexies Palsies and all kinds of Catarrhs From Salts he saith come corrosions inwardly Imposthumes Ulcers Dysenteries Bleeding and from the dissolving of them come heat of Urin and Strangury And from the variety of Salts come divers Ulcers Imposthumes Corrosions by their sharp and sour spirits also divers kinds of Colicks From Salts coagulated he brings Nodes Scirrhus Tumors and swollen Joynts and infinite sorts of Obstructions The best distinction of the Chymists is that from the three principles and causes of diseases if they would be constant therein or explain themselves for the matter is very intricate concerning Mercury For if they say every humor is not Mercury but the first and substantial humor which gives sense and motion to all parts it cannot be the cause of diseases But if Mercury be taken for the cause of a disease who will say that it is an excrement of natural Mercury and flegm And I see not how they can distinguish it from Tartar from which Severine saith Catarrhs do arise The differences of Salt and Sulphûr are manifest because sour bitter and falt matter is gathered in the body and vomited up Somtimes the humor is so sour in the stomach that before it is vomited up the teeth are set on edg by it The differences of Salts are plain in divers Ulcers as in the Scab Cancer heat of Urin and the like To this division belong
he saith thus If from the inbred Balsom weakned from error by immoderate diet in the mummy of the blood the Synoviae of flesh defect of separation come from impure matter the impurity being left which is full of corrosive salts if this happen often and then tincture be strong of the corrosive seeds and the mummy of the blood be transplanted they will bring in the roots of the flesh or Synovia and by constant nourishment from things of like impurity at a digested time they will produce fruit agreable to the roots He saith that salts of iron breed the roots and fruits of a Cancer in the flesh veins and members resembling the Anatomy of Mars and they dwell in the face lips papps breast and somtimes the womb The Herpes and Wolf have aeruginous roots near of kin to the Cancer and place themselves in the musculous flesh in the joynts and breast c. I shall not repeat more for brevity sake But many of these are false and absurd First he denies the causes alledged by the Galenists but every one may see them daily especially if they be in an impure body Moreover inflammations rise not as plants out of seeds but when bad humors are heaped up in the body if nature cannot expel them by usual waies she sends them to ignoble places where with blood gathered out of the vessels they are hot and putrefie hence comes pain and inflammation the skin discolored according to the variety of the humor And that which Nature doth every where she doth here also that is she makes divers quittors according to the humor the same is to be thought of the breeding of ulcers Nor are the Chymists to be totally rejected for their explaining of the differences of inflammations and ulcers though it may be objected against them there are divers effects of Arsenick Orpiment Vitriol if they be applied outwardly by things that appear in inflammations for animal Salt and Sulphur differ from vegetable Salt and Sulphur and things taken from the earth have a kind of alteration and the greater in Animals though they do never wholly change their Nature as you may see in Bubo'es Carbuncles Cancers and the like 2. De loc att c. 9. Concerning the cause of pain they say that the spirits of Salt dissolved causeth pain this we allow but it is also from burning cutting stretching as I said But I take it ill that he should reprove Galen because he denied that the names of tasts should be applied to pains Galen saies right That every sense hath its proper sensible therefore as colours cannot be perceived by the ears so tasts cannot be apprehended by the touch as they are such yet Galen denies not that things that are tastable as they are salt and sharp do diversly afflict the touching but this is not from a savor as it is tastable but as it is sharp which may be tasted also which Severine confessed therefore he unjustly accuseth Galen Also it is evident that differences of pain come from the nerves in the part being more or fewer Severine saies Those parts are most pained in which are the sharpest spirits of Salt which go outwardly at the mouth of the stomach the guts But he is out for parts covered with nerves and membranes have the sharpest pains Scheuneman in his Book called Reformed Physick or his Hermetical Penny laies down ten chief Causes of diseases as spiritual Mercury burnt Mercury sublimate Mercury praecipitate Mercury Sulphur coagulated Salt calcined Salt dissolved and Salt reverberated But he shews no cause of these Principles they are new beings which he no waies proves and therefore he useth new words nor plain Greek nor Latin as Pneumosus or spiritual Mercury Cremosus which is we suppose from Cremare to burn At last he propounds an aetherial Spirit-like fire the governor of all actions the radical moisture that bedews the whole body the spirit of the radical humor the quickning substance and immediate instrument of actions the aetherial spirit author of concoction and digestion But these being not sufficient he adds a fourth the most pure white sweet pleasant panting the cherisher of the heat of the whole body c. which he calls congealed Sulphur the first moisture or Virgins milk that bedews the body and refresheth it the first subject of generation also a moist and soft substance a fifth spirit which he calls Sulphur dissolved But here we admire He propounds so many Spirits and Principles and proves not in the least whether they are in being or be so many He brings inflammations from Sulphur congealed and burned but in the fifth Chapter he brings the Quinzy and Pleurisie from Mercury sublimated Then he brings Feavers from Sulphur fired So Hippocrates and Galen call them by the name of Fire but he mixeth false things with them What he saies of dissolved Sulphur is not wholly to be rejected for the Galenists say that pleasant vapors sent to the brain cause sleep nor when he saies That Narcoticks cause sleep not from cold but from Sulphur But he errs in saying all sleep is from a moist Nature and soft substance that bedews all the parts for who will say that the venemous quality in the Plague which produceth deep sleep is such In that he brings Fluxes and Dysenteries from congealed Sulphur and dissolved he differs from other Paracelsians that say they come from Salt which is more probable But he accuseth the Galenists false for saying excrements are diseases For the Paracelsians do so and Severine that saith he saw a Feaver cast out by vomit Then he makes diseases of Salt threefold calcined dissolved and reverberated Salt He saith the calcined Salt is the Balsom of life and if it melt in the body it causeth Dropsies Oedema and Cachexy He saith dissolved Salt is a liquid body of a fat tast that coagulateth and astringeth that nourisheth all with its good relish and preserves all and is therefore called the meat and drink of the Gods c. and whatsoever wants this Salt is quite unsavory He saith the reverberated Salt is the Lixivium or Clenser of all Nature that takes away filth To this Salt he brings the Itch Scurse Morphew Pox Scurvey Though we disown not the Salts of the Chymists which the resolution of bodies shews Scheuneman did well in a few things but adding some falsities he made the rest suspected He gives no reason why so many Salts nor is it needful that what compounds the body should cause diseases Moreover he is not constant in describing the kinds of Salts as appears when he derives all tasts from calcined Salt and that it is now bitter then salt now four and then sweet yet in another place he brings the tast from dissolved Salt saies nothing is savory that wants dissolved Salt Other Chymists are more right as we have shewed in the Chapter of Salts Moreover he errs much in shewing the causes of Sweat Cachexy Dropsie and the like That Sweat hath
here he did ill for all Physitians have acknowledged diet to be necessary to the cure of all diseases and he that neglects it finds it by experience In feavers it is plain for if the patient eat too freely or that which is improper he relapseth And in many diseases good diet is half the cure As for Physick let us consider the universal Medicine which the Chymists so commend by which a man may be preserved from diseases to the determinated time of his life as Robert Valensis writes Lib. de verit Chymiae This as Arnold de Vill a nova faith Hath vertue and force above all Medicines to cure all diseases both hot and cold because it is of an occult and subtile Nature it keeps Nature in health strengthens its vertues and makes the old young and expels all infirmities c. But many Chymists think there is no such universal Medicine that can cure all diseases in similary and organical parts in excess and defect and in conformation They confess that wounds fractures and luxations Ruptures and the like which require Chyrurgery are not ment here They except also the stone hereditary diseases hecticks and diseases in number deficient fixed Cancers and Gangrenes because God alone not man can cure all diseases only they are only curable with this universal Medicine that come from the inward fault of the humors or as they say Which spring from an internal Root And they call it a Medicine of much use as the Ancients called it a Panacea But the Chymists brag of this but few or none have explained it They say it is enough to know the patient to be sick and that next to the Word of God by which eternal life is promised there is nothing more precious but this Medicine is rather to be wished then hoped for nor was that yet found that hath done that which the Philosophers stone doth in transmutation of Metals it is plain and many of our age have had it but it is not evident what it hath done in curing diseases nor yet any thing proved by good witness If this Philosophers-stone can trāsmute ignoble Metals yet it follows not that it is an universal medicine for they should first prove it upon thēselves as Paracelsus and others that bragged of the Philosophers-stone and yet died all young But they which have this universal Medicine and do hide it have no mercy like Christians when they see so many men tormented and will not help them Nor are good things to be concealed because they are abused I doubt whether a Christian Physitian can with a safe conscience conceal a Medicine that can cure great diseases and if he do he doth not like a Christian that must love his neighbor as himself They agree not among themselves in determinating this Medicine for many take it for the Philosophers-stone yet Scheunaman makes the leaves of black Hellebore almost equal to the Philosophers-stone and saith that they being brought into a Balsom make a man live a second age and do purge beyond all There are three opinions of the universal Medicine The first is of them that think that it cures all diseases not primarily but secondarily by strengthening Nature wonderfully for according to Hippocrates Nature is the Physitian she concocts separates voideth and takes away all faintness And here the Chymists extol their Quintessence and Balsom and their incomparable vital Sulphur they call the secret flower the Sun and the Heaven They say their Quintessence and aetherial Spirit diffused through all natural things is the fountain of all vigor and actions In Animals it gives soul in Vegetables it gives growth and vegetation in Minerals and Metals it doth according to them In men it makes concoction and Crisis and then triumphs over his conquered enemy They say this Spirit and Quincessence and Balsomick Medicine comes from the great World to the less that the spirit in the body of man being helped by external aid that is by this strengthener may oppose diseases more valiantly and either change what is foul in the body to a natural state and expel it Some say this is to be done by Chymistry so that it may easily agree and be united to our natural heat and radical moisture and spirit and increase it and raise it to the height of purity And though this quintessence be in all things yet it is more in some then in others And the universal Medicine is to be made of that in which this Quintessence doth most abound but what and what kind of matter it is they do not explain Of this first opinion I think thus First I admit of what they say touching the strength of inbred spirit The Galenists teach this only let us have the soul to be the principle agent this inbred spirit Inst l 5. p. 1. s 1. c. 3. to be only an instrument of it Nor do I wholly reject their Quintessence but admit it so as I shewed in my Institutions namely to be somthing like to the Element of the Heavens a spirit such as is in wine by which it so strengthens the body and refresheth the spirits and by Chymical resolution you may shew it in all plants And many Galenists confess that there is in Medicines not onely that which works by the first qualities Part. 2. disp contra Paracels but by a nobler force Therefore Erastus speaks too rash to call the Quintessence a Dream of idle persons that desire to cheat But let us grant them this and that there is Nature that which abounds with this Quintessence and Spirit which being artificially prepared hath great power to strengthen and therefore may be called an universal Medicine Yet they prove not that it can cure all diseases without purgers alterers and openers and the like And it cannot be that Nature should purge water in a Dropsie with Medicines that move the belly or discuss the nodes in the Gout or the Stone without help of Medicines And though all diseases should come from the hurt of the vital spirit yet the cause of that hurt may be manifold therefore to restore the spirits divers Medicines must be given according to the variety of causes that hinder it Therefore it is not sufficient that the spirit which governs the whole body be strengthened but the strength of every privat part must be preserved The second opinion is of those that allow not only force to the universal Medicine to strengthen the inbred Balsom and Spirit but to dissolve consume and dissipate the seminary tinctures and impurities or diseases and causes thereof But let us consider if this may be to defend their opinion they say that fire burns all things Antimony consumes all Metals mixed with gold and hurts not that therefore the same may be by the universal Medicine which like a purging fire consumes all the impurities of our bodies Secondly they say as there are poysons as Arsenick and that of a mad Dog which hurts
Oyl or Volatile Salt by a Retort From Stones bred in mans body there is made a Salt and Oyl and a Magistery from Pearl Crabs eyes Perch stones but I doubt that the spirit of Pearl is mixed with a Menstrual Salt therefore I suppose that Pearl vulgarly prepared is wholsomer in many diseases As for Minerals and Metals they are objects of Chymistry Of Amber there is an oyl Of Sea salt or other a Spirit or Oyl Of Niter is made Sal Prunellae From Sulphur there is flour by sublimation of this flour there is a Tincture and Balsom of Sulphur with spirit of Turpentine and Wine and of the same flour is Lac Sulphuris made The Chymists talk much of the oyl of Talk but of it self it is not made into a liquor but being calcined with a strong fire or with Niter and Vinegar sprinkled upon it the volatile Salt in the Vinegar unites it self with the caclined Talcum and then melts he that can shew better let him From Gemms are made Magisteries then Tinctures but if any coloured Liquor be from Gems it is rather the dissolving of the Gemms then an extracted Tincture Things made of Minerals and other metals are not so easie we shall speak a little of some of them From Vitriol by distillation is first drawn a Flegm and Spirit Spirit of Vitriol is thus made Take Vitriol as much as you please calcine it yellow pour enough of the spirit of Wine upon it to make it like a Paste distil it rectifie the spirit when it is extracted thence make a salt of Vitriol by pouring hot water upon the Caput mortuum or Lees. I see no cause why this may not be counted a Salt Some labour to make a green spirit of Vitriol Antimony first may be calcined and then it is called Crocus metallorum from its Saffron-colour You may make flour of the same by calcination There is also a Stone or Glass made of Antimony Some make a Tincture a Regulus and a Butter Antimony is made Diaphoretick and loseth its purging quality by the mixture of fixed Salts this is done when Antimony is often melted with Niter for Niter gives another kind of substance to Antimony and makes it of volatile fixed this is so hard as Crollius writes wittily the art of Fire cannot take away the force of causing Vomit from Antimony though many have attempted it because they abhor that quality of vomiting nor hath any Chymist this preparation though many brag of it for if the vomiting quality be gone the purging quality must go with it Nor is it an argument because some vomit not after Antimony is taken by them for that is from the strength of the stomach or the disposition of the humors to be evacuated Let us speak a little of the Physical use of Quick-silver this only shews that one thing keeping the same internal form and nature may have divers external forms it may be dissolved sublimed precipitated poudered made to flour-like silver into glass to be like a metal coagulated and changed and many waies transformed in divers liquors yet so that it easily comes to its old nature flies away and is fixed nor is there any heterogeneal part that may be separated of it are made first many precipitates of which there are many descriptions some call it Turbith others distinguish it Also there is Mercurius vitae Crollius cal'd it the flour of the butter of Antimony but wrong Of the same is made a Bezoard Mineral then there is an ordinary Sublimate and a Mercurius dulcis the secret of Coral is a kind of Sublimate Also there is a Silver flour made of Mercury In Apocalyph hermetica and waters oyls and spirits Libavius hath described the Mercury waters As for other metals some are fixed others not the fixed are Gold which alone loseth nothing though long in the fire and Silver which because it is more fixed then others is counted fixed as Gold we shewed in our Institutes the calcination of metals by fire and a Menstruum Lib. 5. p. 3. s 3. c. 5. 6. From Lead is made Saccharum Saturni if this be put into a Retort and distilled there is made a liquor called oyl of Lead Of Tinn is made a Crystal and oyl or liquor Of Steel is made Crocus martis of which there are divers descriptions and tinctures If Vitriol be dissolved in water and spirit of Vitriol it is after coagulated into Vitriol Vitriol is made of Copper called Vitriolum veneris Of Silver is made a Tincture There are many disputes of drinkable Gold but I suppose that what is sould for potable Gold is only the Magisteries mentioned and Gold dissolved into the smallest parts and mixed with a menstruum divers menstruums are carried about the force of dissolving in all which lies in the Salt And Gold is to be brought to that pass that it may be dissolved in spirit of Wine or other liquor which may be done by divers Menstruums And in all the end is that the body of Gold being thick and compact may be resolved into very fine atomes that being taken in it may with more ease exercise its force upon the body Therefore first they use stronger then weaker menstruums and if any menstruum be an enemy to nature it is separated by the fire or by washing But then the Gold doth not of it self dissolve into a liquor but by reason of Salt that is mixed with it from the menstruum FINIS