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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A34728	Praxis catholica, or, The countryman's universal remedy wherein is plainly and briefly laid down the nature, matter, manner, place and cure of most diseases, incident to the body of man, not hitherto discovered, whereby any one of an ordinary capacity may apprehend the true cause of his distempers, wherein his cure consists, and the means to effect it : together with rules how to order children in that most violent disease of vomiting and looseness, &c. : useful likewise for seamen and travellers : also an account of an imcomparable powder for wounds or hurts which cure any ordinary ones at once dressing / written by Robert Couch ... ; now published with divers useful additions (for publick benefit) by Chr. Pack ...	Couch, Robert.; Packe, Christopher, fl. 1670-1711.	1680 (1680)	Wing C6510; ESTC R9840	74,356	218

Consumptions 'T is not enough to remove the effect or matter produced nor the cause producing but the principal producer must be rectified before health be perfectly restored Thus I have directed you in the best course you can take and be sure you will do nothing that will hurt but rather to strengthen and refresh nature Obj. But you will ask me what shall we do to remove the cause Answ That is the principal Verb indeed I know a more proper and safe Medicine to effect it than I can direct you unto in all the Dispensitory 'T is true there are a great many good Medicines though good for little without it be the Laudanum of Paracelsus and some few Chymical Preparations the rest are hardly worth a man's knowledge That Physician that hath not found out better and more specifical means than what are there is like to make but a sad practice But I shall speak it to your comfort God hath given me the knowledge of such a Medicine as will effect it and not only this but it doth also eradicate and extirpate the cause of most Diseases incident unto our frail Bodies as you will hereafter perceive It is a Powder without either smell or taste and the highest dose or quantity is but five or six Grains to the most robustive or strong Body and so downward to half a Grain which a Child of two days old may safely take its operations are various according to the nature and place where the peccant matter resides How you shall take it and what is to be done and observed in the taking of it I shall give directions in the latter end of this Book And as it is an effectual so it is a safe Medicine for I have given it unto three or fourscore several Children in and about the Town of Boston and indeed I know not of any one that died that ever took it except one the spirits of which were quite spent before I gave it that it was not able to retain it in its stomach but immediately brought it up again There is an eminent person in this Country whose knowledge is great in the most curious and best Arcanums or secret Medicines that are used he could tell you it is as safe as good who was an eye-witness unto a wonderful operation it had in a most contagious and malign Disease which was the Small Pox which struck in among the Passengers in Captain Lord's Ship coming from England two years since that not one died that took it two only died and neither of them took it as the Chyrurgion Mr. Whiting can testifie I gave him some of this Powder and bade him give to every one that was infected with that Disease which he did accordingly though he gave it to some that was blind to others after they appeared twenty four hours and very ready to be suffocated and very soon made them all perfectly well which was well known unto all the Passengers in the Ship as well as unto themselves that took it which are dissipated through this Country and I question not but this Paper will find out some of them who can well witness this truth By this you may judge of its efficacy in any other Disease of a malignant nature I shall tell you what I have observed from it in some other Maladies I have cured all sorts of Fevers with this Arcanum universale in all Ages and Sexes for continual burning Fevers whether putrid or not are frequently taken off by it with one Dose in the beginning or at the most by two so that the Patient may be well before the time of the expected Crisis The same Benefit I have often observed when given in the state of the Disease that it hath been presently taken off although then nature is obliged to take a longer time to renew the strength than she would have needed if she had been assisted with this Medicine in the beginning How common a thing it is to make a Month or six weeks work in curing a Fever although peradventure nature it self hath overcome the Disease in twelve or fourteen days but the diseasie matter formed and some symptoms of effects must entertain the Physician a great while longer For if the Fever were putrid then the Stomach and Lungs remain loaden with much pituitous matter to carry off which the common practice is to follow the Patient close with Expectoraters such are their Pectoral Electuaries Decoctions Syrups Lohochs c. the which are so far from answering that end as really to add to the matter they are designed to expel for they not being Agents impowered to alter or rectifie any Ferment as soon as they come into the Stomach either nauseate it with their Load and so are cast up or if they stay submit to the depraved digestion of the Stomach and there make an increase of the diseasie matter whence an extraordinary spitting continues till nature it self by degrees retrieves the natural Ferment and frees her self from the disease matter and the pretended remedy together But if this seem too long a doing that no piece of Art may be wanting there is another way at hand and that is to exhibit purging Medicines to carry it downwards the which is more pernicious than the former for the Purge drawing a great quantity of sordid matter from the Thorax to the Guts and nature not having yet recovered her right Regiment may admit some of this matter by the Meseraick or Milky Veins again into the Blood whence may succeed again a Fever de novo called a Relapse or if the lately tired spirit take not the present Assault then the occasional cause of a Dropsie Hectick Consumption or some other Cronick Diseases All which is easily prevented by taking a Dose or two of this Arcanum which evacuates the present matter by vomit and rectifies the vitiated Ferment of the Stomach and other parts whence the power of making such matter is quite taken away This I have had very large experience of But a few days before the writing of this I was sent for to a lusty young man who had laboured under a Synochus about a week having for during that time been treated by an Apothecary first with cooling Juleps which were continued all the while then strongly sweat by a Sudorifick and the next day blooded but the Disease notwithstanding increasing as being newly changed from a non putrida to a putrid when I came made the Apothecary it seems weary or doubtful of his work for he desired the Man's Wife to send for a Physician or a Second who was a Friend of his 't is like for the Bills sake but the Woman having formerly had some experience of my Medicines sent to me about five or six that Afternoon I presently ordered him four Grains of this Powder which wrought once only by Vomit and discharged the stomach of that Diseasie matter which before felt to him like a great weight the pain in his Head

for my timerosity because I then thought I might have saved life by the Balsamick Pill and on the other hand was confident that she would be certainly lost by that usage she had which accordingly came to pass the next day at the fifth or sixth bloody Bout dying under the Lancet But I never failed to cure any Pleurisie with the Pill by repeating it if need be in ten or twelve hours I have sometimes wholly removed the pain in two hours time although they have been twice let blood before without ease although I do not deny but blood-letting may sometimes cure it without injury in such as are lusty and strong or those that have a Plethora of Blood But for a common easie Remedy there is none exceeds the infusion of Horse-dung in Ale for it is rich in Volatile Salt whereby it hath power to slay any acidity in the blood as also to transpire any other peccant matter Ictoritia or Yellow Jaundice THe Schools have told us That this Disease proceedeth from an obstruction of the Gaul-Bladder whereby Choler is diffused through the whole Body Helmont judgeth it to be a poysonous Ferment besides nature which so badly affecteth the Pylorus or lower Mouth of the Stomach that the digestive and distributive faculty is alienated and the Seat of this poison to be either in the Duodenum or Ileon And he proves it to be poisonous from the instance of one that was bit by a Serpent who presently turned yellow But my judgment doth not sute with either Helmont is very near it only I think it not to be of so poysonous a nature as he takes it to be This Distemper is often the sequel of some antecedent sickness and therefore is not any primary Disease but rather the effect or relique of some foregoing one If you look back into that Disease of Children there I tell you how the peccant matter comes to be tinctured with Choler some of this matter which was morbifical in some precedent Disease did adhere unto the Duodenum or Pylorus which tinctures the Chyle and so the body becomes yellow and a bitterness perceived in the mouth I say it is from the morbifick matter of some precedent Disease that this Balsome of the Gaul hath coloured and seasoned with its bitterness to prevent its putrefaction and adhering to the Pylorus or Duodenum stains and imbitters the Chyle which is transferred through the whole Body whereby the superficial parts are discoloured As to the biting of the Serpent this yellowness is not essential from the poyson of the Serpent but from this Balsom that is sent thither to antidote it and so the Body becomes yellow as I have instanced in a little Wormwood and Saffron CVRE I have often cured it with a little Turmerick roasted in an Apple with a little Saffron Likewise the middle Rind of a Barbary Tree steeped in a little White-Wine and a little Saffron Flowers of Marygold Rhubarb c. The yellowness of those means shew their ordination to be for the scouring of this Relique Vide Helmont for Signatures bewray the internal Crasis or temperature of a thing but the Crasis it self doth not discover the thing Things of this nature have happily cured several but if those should chance to fail my Powder doth it presently Calculus Vesicae or the Stone in the Bladder THe Stone in the Bladder that Monster in nature which well may be reckoned with those Diseases that are the shame of Physicians The cause and manner of its generation hath not rightly been understood by the Ancients and our Modern Physicians having made no latter search into it there is yet no Remedy found out for the Cure but the poor miserable creature is left to the tyranny of this Monster or delivered up unto the tortorous way of cutting which is such a Remedy as was never instituted by God or nature All men are liable to this Disease though some more than others but especially Children You may observe that in most Mens water there is this stonyfying matter though it may not be discerned when it is hot and new but after it hath stood some while exposed to the cold it is separated from the Urine and remains in the bottom of the Pot or cleaves unto its sides CAVSE Men of ripe years are not so inclinable unto it as Children because they have a better digestion and have not so much of that crude matter out of which it is made Old men are not incident unto it though their Digestion be weak because they want quantity of the matter but when the Ferment of the Bladder is weak in them they are liable to the Strangury which I shall speak a word unto presently But Children are most inclinable unto it because they have weak Digestions which breedeth abundance of Crudities the Mother of this Disease It is more from the weakness of the Ferment of the Bladder where it is produced than from the matter producing neither is this matter coagulated and hardened as Clay is by the heat of the Sun but condensed as Ice is by the frigidity of the Air And what inordinate heat is perceived it is only accidental as by that example before of a Thorn in the hand I could produce several instances to illustrate this truth but I shall omit them at present The intention curative will shew it according to that Maxim the truest Indication is from the benefit or hurt of things formerly used and that hot and warm things do mitigate and correct the pain and cold things do exasperate it PROGNOST If it hath been of a long growth and confirmed I am sorry to tell you I know not what will dissolve it Such a Remedy hath been if we will credit Paracelsus which I believe to be true and I hope God will discover it to some of us for the comfort of those miserable creatures which are affected with it and keep them from that torturing course of cutting which very often proves a Remedy worse than the Disease But when it is in doing and of no long continuance it may easily be prevented and reduced CVRE Now the Cure consists principally in those three things viz. Evacuation Alteration and Corroboration 1. In evacuating the matter contained 2. In altering the Ferment of the Bladder if it be vicious or 3. In corroborating of it if it be weak which is commonly the cause And you can hardly evacuate the matter before you corroborate the parts which is done by this course Victûs Ratio Let most of his Liquor that he drinks be Sack let most of his Meat be roasted well whereof let him eat but little at a time though he eat the oftener let his Bread be Bisket or the Crust of Bread well baked let him eat Salt with his Meat Salt Beef boiled is good for him if he loves it and doth well digest with him Let him avoid Milk Cheese let little Butter serve him and fruits an Apple he may eat if

of all curable Ruptures and maketh all sorts of Trusses fit for the accommodation of any His Wife treateth with Women they give Advice for nothing A TABLE of the several Diseases and Distempers treated of amongst other things in the ensuing TRACT FEvers in general Malignant Fevers in Children Directions Heat in Fevers Cold in Fevers Thirst in Fevers Agues Dropsies Falling-Sickness Griping of the Guts Surfeits Fluxes Stone or Gravel in the Reins or Kidneys Windy-Melancholy Wind in the Small Guts Collick Wind-Dropsie Gouts Pleurisie Yellow Jaundice Stone in the Bladder Consumption without a Cough A Consumption with a Cough The Rickets Apoplexy Vertigo Palsie Convulsion Cramp Worms The breaking of a Vein Coughs Catarrhs Rheums shortness of Breath Strangury Fits of the Mother Praxis Catholica OR THE COUNTRY-MAN'S Universal REMEDY IT was the custom amongst the ancient Greeks that if a sure Cure was found for any Disease the party was bound to write it on a Table and hang it up in the Temple of Diana at Ephesus that every one labouring with that Disease might afterwards repair thither and receive their Remedy Soon after did they digest the Art of Healing into a fatal Method as a Directory to the true knowledge of Curing whereby a further enquiry into Medicines came to be neglected and so this false Doctrine of the Greeks spread it self amongst the Arabians Romans and then amongst the Christians and is still in use amongst us to this day to blind us from the knowledge of true and perfect Remedies for curing our Diseases whereby we see many yearly swept away from us through some accustomed Diseases as well as new ones and especially that amongst Children of a Griping Vomiting and Scouring which gives me great cause to mistrust that either the true cause of this is not understood as well as the rest or a fit Remedy not yet found out Nor is it Children alone that this Fever the Prince of Diseases doth appear unto in those bloody manners but to some of full Growth and Strength It doth assault us in various Shapes and Habits This Disease is a grand Enemy to man for there is hardly a Distemper but is accompanied with a Fever either going before or following after it Wherefore I shall a little anatomize it unto you and shew you its Rise the place where it commonly abides and what it feeds on and so describe it as you may know it at a distance and not only this but most of our Serpentine Enemies I shall observe that method in treating of them as I do in curing of them which is to have respect unto that first which doth most press amonst which I think that peracute Disease of Children is most urgent so my method leads me to begin with a child whom I shall trace unto his old age where I shall leave him to that great Physician whose Servant I am not worthy to be First it will be necessary that I give a preparative to your understanding in unfolding the right use of two or three principal parts whose proper uses have not yet been discovered before you enter upon the main Body viz. The Spleen Liver and Gaul From these three comes Life and Death Health and Diseases as they are disposed either well or ill These are the Pillars that do support the Fabrick of the Microcosm The two first do principally respect the preservation of Health the last is of a more Balsamical Nature which doth as well prevent Diseases as restore health when it is wanting Understand by a Ferment A Specifical Virtue or Power which every part is endued withal that whatsoever is transferred through them is transmuted into their fermental quality Omnis facultas quando praevalet ea est natura ut mutet sibique simile faciat id quod ad ipsam est victum as the Aliment in digesting in the Stomach is sow'r then when the Chyle passeth through the Guts Duodenum and Ileon it is saltish and being more elaborated in the Meseraick and Milky Veins becometh more salt which is a preparation for Sanguification which is perfected in the Liver and so assimilated by every part The whole Body is seasoned and tinctured with the Ferments of those three principal parts viz. sharp from the Spleen Whitmore de Febre anomala Salt from the Liver and bitter from the Gaul To begin with the first The Spleen This part hath been hardly censured by many to be the receptacle of the Faeces of the Blood the mother of black Choler or Melancholy the Sink and Fountain of many stubborn and rebellious Diseases and to be a Bowel of no great use only to elaborate this more feculent Blood and give a small nourishment to some of the natural parts likewise the efficient cause of Madness and Dotage c. Some have not stuck to say that if ever nature made any thing to hurt her self it was this and if she had found out some other way for discharging of this Excrement as she hath done the rest she had eased her self of abundance of trouble c. but I rather think the contrary there is not any part within us nature hath been so liberal unto as to this nor hath bestowed such special favour on Vide Dr. Highmore de affectione Hypochon fol. 132. it is enriched with ten times at least as many Arteries as any other part There is life peculiarly due unto it more than sensitive for it is extant long before quickening Helmont de Author duum virut It hath a double Ferment there is a Vital from the Arteries and the digestive faculty of the Stomach which is made by an acid juice sent from it and for that great concernment which is committed unto its charge it is termed the President of the Stomach I cannot think that any excrementitious matter can reside where it hath so worthy a place for its Emunctory as the Stomach the Arteries fetch from the Stomach of their purest Chyle and sanguifie it for their pleasure and it may be by their too liberal attraction may debilitate their Ferment that so they may require an assistance from the main Body whereby the Stomach may be neglected with a due quantity of this juice whence lack of appetite and crudities do arise and so this Ferment may be exorbitant in the Spleen from whence comes bloody and black spitting into the stomach which some have judged black Choler which is nothing but an expurging and renewing of nourishable blood from the Spleen it self the Humour Melancholy and black Choler was never yet found in nature nor indeed is there any such thing extant wherefore whatsoever distemper may arise from the Spleen it is from a vitiated or debilitated Ferment not from a peccant matter which doth offend only in quality not in quantity Again if the distemper of the Spleen be the cause of Madness then in its right order there is a sound and judicious understanding due to the same place according to

presently abated and that night he rested pretty well for he had no sleep worth mention since he was ill the next morning I sent him four Grains more of the Powder which gave him three Vomits and two Stools about six in the Afternoon I went to visit him and found him about his Chamber saying he thought he was as well as ever his Stomach being returned and he very hungry Thus you see a Fever cured in eighteen hours or less which in all probability would have been at the least three or four weeks if recovered at all before nature by such enfeebled helpers or rather hinderers as are the common Medicines could have freed her self from the Disease I could instance many the like cases were it needful This Medicine hath besides its other gifts such a general tendency for the curing of all Fevers that upon the first knowledge of it in practice I called it my Species Febrifuga by which name I published it in my Catalogue of Medicines Printed in the year 1676 although I had then seen this little Book of the Authors I shall here subjoyn a short Discourse of intermitting Fevers or Agues in which Mr. Couch is silent except in the name yet I cannot doubt but he must be well acquainted with the power of this Medicine in curing them Of Agues GReat Diversity hath been and yet is among Authors concerning this Disease some holding one thing and some another concerning its Seat and Causes but I without reciting their differences or contending with any man's opinion either of which is no way profitable shall briefly endeavour to give you my own sentiment It needs no Definition being sufficiently known here neither Division seeing all the sorts thereof proceed from one cause and may be cured by the same Medicines Seat The Place or Seat of Agues is the Pancreas or Sweet-bread for all the parts of Man's Body being considered which only by intervals may transmit the cause of intermitting Fevers to the Heart none is found to which not only the Focus or source of those Fevers but also the causes of all their Symptoms may be ascribed besides the Pancreas or Sweet-bread Cause The Cause is an Obstruction of one or more of the Lateral Ducts or Branches of the Pancreas by reason of Phlegmatick Matter carried thither in too large a quantity and there detained the which being separated from the Blood together with the Pancreatick Juice by the Glandules of the Pancreas and sent to the main Duct or Pipe thereof causeth an Obstruction there and detaineth the juice of the Pancreas contrary to nature which ought continually to flow into the thin Gut called the Duodenum This Juice being thus stagnated quickly grows acrimonious or sharp and acquires a putrefactive Ferment whence at length it makes way through the obstructing Phlegm and is effused into the Duodenum where meeting with the Bile or Gall it stirs up a vicious and preternatural Ferment from whence comes the Ague Fit with all its Symptoms as in the beginning horrour chilness cold shaking c. then presently reachings yawnings and vomiting of bitter or four relish and afterwards burning heat the causes of Heat Cold Thirst c. you have in the foregoing Chapter of Fevers but if any desire further satisfaction concerning the reasons of the differences of Agues and the constant or various access of their Fits with the particular causes of Symptoms they may read it at large in Regnerus de Graaf in his Book intituled de succo Pancreatico published by me in the year 1676 to which I refer the Reader not having room here to be any larger Cure The Cure consists in opening the Obstructions changing the diseasie Ferment and expelling such matter as the Disease hath rendred incapable of being redintegrated and taken into the communion of life All which intentions are truly and radically performed by this Powder for an Ague being removed by the due use of this Medicine returns not again neither leaves any danger of its degeneration into another Disease both of which too frequently happen after the use of some Medicines which take off the Fit only by a kind of soporiferous quieting the present fury of the Archaeus If it be taken before the Ague hath exceeded three Fits one only Dose is usually sufficient to carry it away if fix or seven Fits two Doses or three at the most yea I have cured divers at twice or thrice giving it that have had it six or eight weeks but if it be a year old or more the continuance of its use but a reasonable time with the help of the Balsamick Pill will not fail to cure it I have also known it to cure Agues when it hath had no other sensible operation than Breaking of Wind. A person living in Greenwich who had a Tertian Ague and sometimes a Quotidian all the last Winter was cured this Spring by three Doses of the Powder which never had any sensible operation and two Doses of the Balsamick Pill so that in eight or ten days he was abroad about his Affairs and never had any Fit since although he was before so low brought that he could not sit up any longer than while his Bed was made notwithstanding the constant advice of an eminent Physician of that Town which he had used It is to be taken in a Spoonful of Drink or Posset drink about an hour before the Fit comes for two or three Fits together according as the Ague is in continuance If the Patient be weak or of a tender habit of Body let him take a Dose of the Balsamick Pill the same night after the Powder hath been given when he goes to Bed with a draught of warm Ale or a Glass of good generous Wine which Pill will mightily corroborate and refresh his Spirits and also tends much to the Cure if the Ague have been of a long continuance or be a Quartan or fourth Ague then after the Patient hath taken the Powder three times if the Fit still remain then let him take a full dose of the Balsamick Pill two or three hours before the coming of the next Fit and goe to Bed and dispose himself to sweat before the Fit comes the which if he do it s ten to one but the Fit comes no more but if there should be a failure of sweating timely enough then let him take the powder before one Fit and the Pill before the next till it be gone but not one Ague in twenty will need to be thus treated A general Direction in Fevers TO drink liberally of such Liquor as is most convenient is good I like not Beer of any Liquor in a Fever before the peccant matter wherein the Disease doth subsist be evacuated because it hath a nutriment from the Grain it is made withal which doth add unto the matter of the Disease whereby Thirst is exasperated as is commonly seen I rather advise to drink Wine and Water two parts Water and one Wine sharpened a

little with the Spirit of Vitriol or Sulphur if it be per campanam which is drawn from a Bell Still it is the better which is a singular Medicine to allay and correct the inordinate Thirst and Heat in Fevers Medera Fial French or Sherry Wines you may use Malaga or any Sweet Wine is not so good neither Syrups or any Sugared or Honeyed Meat or Drink And when they begin to recover 〈◊〉 plainest Broths and Gruels are the best till then a little is too much and if you did use Salt and Vinegar instead of Spices and Sugar the sick would like it the better and it would be better for them a few Prunes and Currants if the sick like them may be used But some may say How shall we do that live far up the Country where we have no Wines nor can get neither of those Spirits the best that I can advise you to is Milk boiled and turned with some Vinegar or Verjuice the Curd being taken away whereof he may drink freely but he is to take it alway hot and the hotter the better This course is to be taken after the cause is removed by my powder or something else but I know not what otherwise this or any other is like to do but little good Bleeding Purging Clysters Cordials Juleps c. are but Trifles in curing a Fever they do at best but correct the Symptoms or Effects I will do more good with one dose of my Powder and one of my Pills than they with all those in a Month. If the Fever be continual and come by a Surfeit or otherwise so that the Patient feel a Load or Weight at his Stomach or hath a propensity to vomit the first thing to be done is to give a Vomit whereby the Stomach and first passages may be freed of the grossest of the Diseasie Matter wherein the Fever sits or hath taken up its Inn to which purpose you may give half an ounce of the Infusion of Crocus Metallorum or six Drams or a whole Ounce according to the age and strength of the Patient in a small Draught of warm Posset-drink but if you know any better Antimonial Preparation then give it That being done ℞ Tartar Vitriolat six Grains Volatile Salt of Amber and Harts-horn each seven or eight Grains mix them and give the mixture twice a day in a little thin Broth or Water Gruel This is abstersive and Diuretick and will cleanse the Stomach and Intestines of the remaining Sordes and expel them by Urine For the Feverish Thirst give the dulcified Spirit of Nitre or of Salt in Posset drink and all the Liquids they take from five or six to ten or twelve drops at a time Keep the Patient in a small breathing Sweat either with the Posset-drink before-mentioned by Mr. Couch or with Treacle-water and Powder or rather the Tincture of Virginia Snake-root or which is most excellent if you can get it the Aqua Prophylactica of Sylvius de le Boe of which Take three Ounces Water of Carduus and Borrage each one Ounce Syrrup of Citron Peels an ounce and an half mix them and take it often by a spoonful or two at a time But instead of this if the Fever be malignant give Bezoardicum minerale to eight or ten Grains every third or fourth hour in a spoonful or two of good Canary But because the Aqua Prophylactica mentioned is rarely to be had at any shop I will here describe the making thereof for the sakes of those who are willing to make it ℞ Roots of Angelica Zedoary of each an ounce Butterbur two ounces the leaves of Rue four ounces of Balm Scabious and Marygold Flowers each two ounces unripe Walnuts cut two pounds fresh Citrons cut one pound Let them be all beaten together and pour upon them six quarts of the best distilled Wine-Vinegar let them stand in digestion all night and then distil them by a very easie fire without burning till they be dry and keep the distilled liquor for use It is very profitable in all Fevers especially in those which are malignant and the Plague In the declining of the Fever if sleep be wanting this following mixture will much avail both to cause rest and refresh the Spirits ℞ of Treacle water an ounce the thin Syrup of Corn Poppies an ounce or an ounce and a half Laudanum Londinens or rather that of Paracelsus two grains mix them and let the Patient drink it at the hour of Sleep But give nothing wherein there is Opium or Poppies in the beginning of a Fever because they tie up the Archaeus of the Stomach and first passages thereby hindering him from separating and expelling the occasional cause of the Disease For Agues or intermitting Fevers whether they be Quotidians Tertians or Quartans proceed as followeth ℞ Of Salt of Amber twenty grains Tartarum Vitriolatum six grains Diagridium seven eight nine or ten grains according to the strength of the Patient mix them into a Powder and give it in a little Posset-drink or thin Broth four or five hours before the time of the Fit Repeat it two or three times if need be but if the Ague be not then gone give the following mixture about an hour or an hour and an half before the Fit comes the Patient being in Bed and disposing himself to sweat ℞ of Carduus Water two ounces Treacle Water two drams Salt of Wormwood half a dram Spirit of Salt Armoniac ten grains Syrup of Corn Poppies half on ounce mix This if the Patient sweat well with it frequently removes the Ague This following also hath cured many without any other Medicine ℞ of the Salt of Wormwood and Carduus each fifteen grains Tartar Vitriolat six grains Sugar of Pearls half a dram powder and mix them and give it half an hour or an hour before the Fits access The Juice of Featherfew being drank about half an ounce in a glass of Wormwood Wine is profitable against the Quartan or fourth Ague These Remedies I have used with good success but never found any thing so certain and effectual in Fevers as my Species Febrifuga and Pillula Balsamica A Dropsie There are three sorts of Dropsies viz. Anasarca Ascites and Timpanites the two first are most from Water The last Timpany is more from Wind. Anasarca is when the extreme parts swell but when the Belly then it is Ascites The Cause I do not believe as hath generally been received that it proceeds from a Distemper of the Liver and that to be the principal part affected but I have more reason to think it to proceed from an obstruction or impediment in one of the Kidneys for commonly they that are troubled with Gravel and Stone in the Kidneys are Hydropical and seldom any that have been affected with either Anasarca or Ascites but they have observed a Dolor in their Reins to precede it and so that Water which should be transferred through the Kidneys to be evacuated by the Bladder is forced out

soon suppurates which makes an Imposthume or Empyema and although an eruption by those means may be prevented yet there may be some of that aqueous matter transpired through the Pleura which may be tinctured with a sanguine complexion and cause that colour which is seen in expectoration so that I conceive the essence of this Malady is not blood with submission to sounder Judgments Now you may ask me which of those two ways I think the surest for Hippocrates saith a Plurisie not perfectly cured before the fourth day the party becometh consumptive Answ I judge the morbisick matter to be evacuated by transpiration through the Cutis or Skin to be the directest Course REASONS 1. For so there is nothing exhausted but the matter offending 2. Those that are cured by Phlebotomy or Blood-letting are more liable to that Distemper again 3. The Blood is not so depurated from this offensive matter as by a powerful Sweat 4. The party affected may be in that condition that letting Blood may prove prejudicial as women with child young women obstructed c. I am not averse to Blood-letting but I had rather make use of my Balsamical Pill which effects it singularly and not hurtful in any condition Now I am speaking of letting out blood I shall give my judgment in that great question which hath been and is to this day controverted amongst our great Doctors whether it be proper in Fevers Hollerius Forrestus Sennertus Galen Avicen with the rest of the Schoolmen press it of a necessity to be done in the beginning Paracelsus Helmont with the rest of the Quicksilver Wits condemn it as not convenient at any time Betwixt Scylla and Charybdis there is a safe Channel but he must be an experienced Mariner that can sail through As Practice is the best part of Physick so observation is the surest Errors being sometimes admitted do instruct judicious erring persons as good Remedies do confirm good Operators From my observation I shall speak something to those two extremes If I could think the School definition of a Fever true that it is heat besides nature being kindled in the heart first and throughout the whole Body I should think nothing could more clearly indicate Phlebotomy but I hold the contrary and no necessity for it in the beginning but rather prejudicial I have been an observer in this Intention about twenty two years and have had many hundreds under my consideration at once and almost some of all Diseases and those in Fevers some have been let Blood and others not and for the most part those that were not let blood were well before those that were In any contagious pestilential malignant Fever to let blood is very destructive Detracto sanguine licet impuro impurior multo succedit Fernel as experience well teacheth In a continual Fever as Synochus or burning c. it prolongs their sickness and commonly strikes them into an intermitting Ague or some other Disease In a Fever intermitting or determinated into Paroxysms or Fits it strongly confirms them In a word to let blood in any Fever in the beginning I have found to do much hurt several times good hardly at any time so that I am inforced to shew my dislike of letting blood in the beginning of this Disease Neither do I consent with great Helmont the Calciner of Physick and laudable Paracelsus that Blood-letting doth exhaust the spirit of life because the life is seated in the blood nor that it may be convenient at any time but I have reason to believe the contrary 'T is true Letting-blood doth never cure a Disease properly but it doth mightily refresh and cherish a weak nature that hath almost spent her self through freeing her from her mortal Enemy As we see often after a tedious sickness nature her self stirs it up as a Crisis Quo natura verget ad locum conferentem to ducere oportet and then to take a little blood from her doth much revive and strengthen her I have cured a man that had a Quartan Ague above a year and four months only by once letting blood who never had a Fit after The drawing blood was but the occasion nature was the efficient cause for she was much more elevated and strengthened by it whereby she expunged the morbifick Reliques with a greater facility I have cured a man that had laboured with an Atrophia or Consumption for a long time wholly become a meer Skelleton only by letting blood three times about six ounces at a time in the space of ten days without the use of any other means he became perfectly well to the admiration of all his Neighbours I have several times since experienced it in an Hectick Fever and although this nor any thing else that I know of will cure it yet they have been more refreshed by it than by all the things took and whosoever practiseth it will find it so I could instance in several more but let this suffice to evidence the truth though a Paradox that Phlebotomy is very disgustful to nature in the beginning of a Disease but very grateful in the latter end The Pleurisie is cured by Diaphoreticks and Diureticks being mixed with such things as have power to concentrate acidity as this following mixture â„ž of the Syrup of Marsh-mallows an ounce Syrup of Corn-Poppies an ounce and an half Crabs-eyes prepared and Mineral Bezoar of each a dram mix them and make a Linctus of which let the Patient lick very often till he come to sweat Or if he had rather have it in a liquid form add to this Mixture Triacle and Carduus-Water of each two ounces shake them well in a Glass and take it by spoonfuls till sweat proceed For an outward application this following is excellent â„ž of the compound ointment of Marsh-mallows an ounce oil of sweet Almonds and Roses of each a quarter of an ounce oil of white Lillies Poppies and Henbane strained each a dram and a half Chymical Oil of Cammomile Cummin-Seeds and Bricks of each a scruple Camphire half a dram mix them and make a Liniment With which anoint the pained side as hot as it may be suffered It would grieve any pitiful heart to see how many persons lives in this Disease as well as some others expire with their Blood some being blooded five or six times over and yet receiving no ease while they live as I have divers times known About three or four years since I was sent for to a Gentlewoman lying under this Disease she had been let blood three times but yet had no ease and was plyed with Lohochs and Linctus's and such like broken Reeds and while I was in her Chamber the Apothecary came in with a Commission to draw more blood if he found her not eased She was Patient to one of the oldest Doctors in London upon which and the consideration of her weakness I wholly declined to meddle with her not without much reluctancy and regret of mind since