Putrid and Imputrid Intermitting Fevers are all adjudged Putrid Some have made this general Division of Fevers into Simple Putrid and Pestilential There are also Distinctions of Fevers termed accidental differences and these Fevers are called by their Names which serves only to confound young Practisers and amuse the people thereby making Fevers more perplext and difficult to be understood by additional cognominations from complication of Symptoms As Epiala Lipiria Causus Syncopalis Soporiferae Assodes Elodes Tiphodes Phlegmonòdes c. Fever by Denomination and different Fevers by Cognomination is strange Doctrine Thus compounding of Symptoms is the confounding of Reason in Practice Since all Fevers or febrile intemperature is only the aestuation and disturbance of the vital governing Spirit by provocation from some Disease or Morbific Cause producing various Symptoms in several Parts of the Body Tacking such Symptoms together by Cognomination that have no dependance upon each other in causation or existence is no good fashion nor good reason At this rate of diversifying and denominating of Fevers by coupling them with Symptoms and Diseases you may make five hundred sorts more of Fevers and draw all the practice of Physick upon Fevers Plurisie fevers Stone fevers Colic fevers c. All the Acute and most of the Chronic Diseases have Fevers adjoined The Practice of Fevers after this manner may be as large as the Practice of Physick And by this variation of Fevers in Masquerade from Complication with other Symptoms and Diseases the Doctrine of Fevers will stretch in infinitum not to be comprehended by human understanding They might have put in Camp Fevers and Fleet Fevers for variety among the rest But if you understand Fevers no better than what your Books and Tradition does inform Princes are like to have but a melancholy return of their brave Souldiers and Seamen as too oft it falls out so And here I might give you a sad Account of Men and Money lost after this manner by the formality of Physick and deficiency of the Professors But I troubled my self once before in this matter and I shall trouble my self no more But this obiter If all other Symptoms and Diseases were to have various names affixed to them from the diversity of Symptoms happening contemporary from Complication with other Diseases They might also be varied abundantly to no purpose by differing adjunct Titles as properly as Fevers are thus multifariously distinguished and denominated wherein there is no reason nor advantage for Curing Symptoms supervening and complicating with Fevers are such as these Horror Rigor Pandiculation Oscitation Vomiting Fluxes Watchings Deliriums Hamorrhages c. Hereby shewing the various deportments Passions Agonies and strivings of the vital governing Spirit Spiritus impetum faciens preternaturally affected and provoked according to the diversity of Morbous irritating causes And also shewing the different Parts infested therewith labouring under the impulsions and expulsions of incensed vital power endeavouring by such extraordinary motions to expel and cast out what is offensive and hostile to sedate vital government But Writers have given themselves much trouble to find out and set forth the Causes of such Symptoms assigning them as particular Characters to distinguish Fevers by Herein shewing their Ingenuity Nicity and Exactness in giving a full Account of all things appertaining to Fevers as they would have the World believe But the Insufficiency of the Reasons and unprofitableness of those Endeavours are such that I shall not trouble the Reader with the Inquiry and Examination of the Validity thereof SECT IV. Of Putrid Fevers BEfore I set down the difference and distinctions of putrid Fevers delivered to us by Authors Antient and Modern I think it necessary first to inquire into the word Putrid that we may know what is meant by Putrefaction and putrifying in their sense that first taught and those who now support the Doctrine of putrid Fevers whether they be all of a mind and what confidence we may have in this learning upon their dissent or to whom we may adhere In determining of putrefaction I find there are variety of opinions and from thence several Definitions Galen's definition seems to agree with Aristotle's And for brevity sake I shall only give you the explanation and sense of both these great Men well done by another Author in these words Putrefactio nihil aliud est quam corruptio caloris nativi in humido radicali existentis alicuius mixti corporis facta ab externo peregrino calore Kercherus Herein external peregrine Heat is made the agressor and invader of the Life of every mixt Body That natural Heat is set upon and destroyed and consequently radical moisture is consumed This is the sense and meaning of the celebrated Definitions of Aristotle and Galen wherein there are these great mistakes 1. Calor innatus and Humidum radicale are supposed and made substantial Principles in nature when reverà they are but Qualities assurging from their Principles 2. They are made the support of every Animal and to these they have attributed too great a share in mixt Bodies as if the Being thereof depended essentially thereupon 3. That innate Heat is seated in radical moisture where putrefaction and corruption begins and that the Life of an Animal consists in these two That they are Animae domicilium the which failing Life departs 4. Hence it is that Putrefaction is defined by the alteration and perdition of these two Principles in Nature which Galen often calls totam rei substantiam The Doctrine of Physick fails much from these grand errours which biasseth Practisers in the Cure of many Diseases For Putrefaction is caused not only by external ambient Heat but also by external Cold And particularly in the case of putrid Fevers cohibited transpiration by cold occluding the Pores is one chief cause assigned by most if not all Writers And likewise we find that other Animals and also Plants are mortified by extreme cold which their natures could not bear and from thence you need not doubt but Putrefaction follows Putredo Putrefaction is not rightly defined by alteration of Qualities Heat and Moisture that may or may not be and are accidents not essential to Putrefaction For Dry and Cold Bodies are subject to putrifie as Bones Straw Wood c. wherein is no sensible Heat or Moisture and do putrifie into dry powder Heat and Cold and I may add the other two first Qualities also Wet and Dry though they may be causes of putrefaction sometimes and sometimes the effects thereof yet they are not sufficient to set forth and illustrate Putrefaction as the ratio formalis thereof and a result differing from all other preternatural alterations and transmutations Nor does this Definition make distinction between putrefaction and combustion à calore externo nor sufficiently extinguisheth putrefaction from fermentation And thus much concerning putrefaction in general from the two celebrated Definitions of Aristotle and Galen if you be satisfied therein I am not They sound great in
doctrine for they that gave this definition do also determine Qualities preternatural to be Symptoms and Heat being one of the tactil Qualities of the first rank by the same Authors can be but a symptom Now preternatural febrile Heat being only a Symptom and none of the urgent Symptoms there is at least there ought no cure belonging to it but to that Disease on which the febrile Heat is dependant and those Diseases are many and various For methods and medicines are indicated from the Disease not from the Symptom and their adaptation proper and peculiar only to the Disease not to the Symptom to causes not to consequents and dependants Since it is so why do you create such fears in the Sick and make so much bustle at the Shops about this febrile Heat designing multiplicity of Medicines against it and those very injurious since this feverish Heat being only Symptomatical gives warning and is a signal only of some latent Disease the which being found out curing lies there and there only the depending Fever is included therein and falls of course with it In Corde accensus In the Heart you say a Fever is kindled as the place of its rise But I rather think cujus contrarium that a Fever is communicated or transmitted to the Heart from all Parts of the Body at several times by several Diseases For if preternatural Heat Febris be the general and most common Symptom of Diseases caused thereby and depending thereon rising and falling with those various Diseases seated in divers Parts of the Body then all their Symptomatical Fevers must have their rise and seat in the several diseased Parts and the Heart only by consent and transmission per vasa through the vessels of communication The vital Principle or Spirit of Life that presides over and is planted in every Part of the Body to govern each member raiseth a Fever upon any morbific matter there offending and the Heart being a principle Part in office is soon made sensible and raiseth the Pulse as a signal of condolence if any disturbance be in the Body And sometimes the Head also is affected thereby and drawn into consent If the Foot be greatly pained by Gout or otherwise the Heart is grieved and frebile Heat is kindled but this Fever first riseth in and is communicated from the diseased Parts the Foot primarily affected and the Heart disturbed and heated only secundariò by consent And the Fever thus raised requires curing not in the Heart so affected but in the Foot diseased having its rise there and dependance there not in the Heart Therefore Cardiac medicines are not curative in the case nor conducing but such means as are proper for the diseased Part first complaining and the cure of this Gout-fever lies there only which being rightly applied to the Symptomatic febrile Heat abates and vanisheth as the Disease is tamed and subdued The like may be said and holds true in all other Fevers arising from several Parts of the Body diseased But a late famed Author Dr. Willis in his Book of Fevers though he agrees with these Writers that the Heart is the Fire-place where Fevers are kindled yet he differs from them in the manner how and the combustible matter what Sin verò sanguis ob sulphuris evecti copiam aut effluvia cohibita aut victum calfacientem nimis luxurians turgescere aptus evadat ejus in corde sive accensio sive fermentatio plurimum intenditur ita ut exinde calor febrilis effervescentiae solito majores in toto concitentur p. 114. He makes preternatural fermentation to be the ratio formalis of Fevers and prosecutes upon that notion through the several sorts of Fevers and gives this description Febris est motus inordinatus sanguinis ejusque nimia effervescentia cum calore p. 117. using effervescence and fermentation as synonumous and univocal all along True it is febrile Heat sometimes does follow preternatural fermentation from thence occasionally procured yet not always arising out of fermentation as the proper and only effect thereof but issuing from the governing vital Principle or Spirit of Life fons caloris disturbed and aestuating In like manner preternatural fermentation motus inordinatus sanguinis is caused by febrile aestuation They follow one another and often meet together in sickness yet are distinct and different from each other Fever and Fermentation differ in Predicament fermentatio est motus calor febrilis est qualitas Vomiting and Fever meet sometimes and are complicated Also Fluxes of the Belly with Fevers And preternatural fermentation with Fevers But they are all different symptoms and may exist separately So that preternatural fermentation is not inseparable from Fevers and cannot be so essential thereto that posito uno ponitur alterum but an adjunct that may or may not be and a Fever in Being rightly denominated so For Fever ex vi vocis from the etymon of the word importing heat denotes the nature thereof febris à ferveo vel ferbeo to be hot and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 graecè à 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ignis shewing Heat to be the great distinguishing character of a Fever A Sulphure accenso deflagrato Febrile Heat says that great Author is kindled from Sulphurous inflaming matter Sin ultra crasin naturalem sanguinis pars sulphurea seu oleosa incalescat statim effera cum caeteris improportionata evadit ita ut fere tota à cordis fermento velut in flammam acta sanguinis massam immodice effervescere ebullire cogat Dr. Willis Lib. de Febribus p. 158. Several other places I might recite in that Book setting forth the combustible matter of Fevers and how kindled which for Brevity sake I omit and having enough to discourse on But my Reason informs me otherwise and determines First that natural Heat and preternatural is the same in specie in kind arising from one and the same Principle or Fountain and differ gradu tantum only in moderation and gradual state Quicquid in sanis edit actiones sanas id ipsum in morbis edit actiones vitiatas Axiom Therefore that vital Spirit which heats Man naturally in a State of Health The same does preternaturally aestuate and burn in Fevers being disturbed at hostile morbous matter Secondly Febrile Heat does not arise à materia sulphurea oleaginosa combustibili from any sulphurous oleaginous combustible matter kindled as that Author asserts but from any offending matter that 's the fomes Morbi the fuel of Fevers that provokes and stirs up the vital governing Spirit to kindle aestuate and become fiery labouring and endeavouring nisu quodam irato thereby to exterminate and expel it Fevers are not kindled nor continued à materia flammante but à materia peccunte quacunque A stone in the Kidney without the help of Oleagenous Sulphureous combustible matter will readily procure a Fever Thirdly Febrile matter remains after the Patient is dead but febrile Heat is then gone and why
then Because the vital spirit is extinct which plainly does shew that preternatural febrile Heat efficienter is seated in the Life And that peccant febrile matter non fervet ex se contains no such heat in it self but produceth excitativè by irritating the vital Heat spiritus impetum faciens beyond moderation and its natural temper Fourthly A wound received and pain arising thence begets a Fever though a great effusion of blood doth happen therewith Now letting out the sulphur if such there were with the blood was more likely to prevent a Fever than to cause it if that Doctrine were true but I find the contrary that pain continuing the Fever continues also Fifthly Persons that are heated by great labour violent exercise or heat of weather if they drink a glass of Sack or other spirituous hot liquor it reduceth them safely to good temper and prevents a Fever But if they drink much small Beer after such heats thinking to cool themselves sooner that cold liquor commonly makes them sick and raiseth a Fever thereby Now observe that Sack and not spirits are more likely to kindle Sulphurous inflamable matter and a Fever from thence as small Beer and cool liquors most likely to prevent Fevers by that Doctrine But the contrary hereof does prove that inflamed sulphur is not the material cause of Fevers but any other offending matter Sixthly Wet and cold taking are oftentimes the causes of sickness and a Fever But such causes are so far from kindling Sulphur that they are more likely to damp and extinguish Sulphur kindled if any such inflaming matter were in Human Bodies All which does plainly shew that Fevers have not their Rise or any dependance from sulphur kindled in the Heart and that Doctrine erroneous founded upon false Principles I must now make this observation not to follow an Author by the cry of the People nor the Vogue of the learned Party who commonly are catcht with a fine dress of good latine not suspecting or not discerning the substance and matter thereof Since my writing I lately met with another Piece de Febribus much differing from the former Author who derived all the causes of Fevers from Sulphur of the Blood this only and wholly from a venemous Ferment infesting the Animal Spirits Dr. Morton Puretologia This novel Doctrine coming in my way I cannot pass it by without regard but must inquire into the verity thereof The common received learning that asserts Humours and Qualities this Author rejects as fictitious and useless to set forth and explain the causes of Diseases and their Symptoms Hoping to give a better account thereof by this new Hypothesis For setting forth and explaining of which he premiseth postulata quaedam Pag. 6. some precarious concessions promising to prove them afterwards which are these following 1. Dari reverà Spiritus animales This Assertion of Animal Spirits was the common received Opinion in former Ages and does yet keep up as a Truth not to be questioned in the Judgment of most for that they perform such necescessary offices in the Body as without their help many Functions they think must cease And in giving an Account of many Diseases especially such as are attributed to the Brain and Nerves they can give no probable Reasons without alledging and accusing the Animal Spirits setting forth their exorbitant Motions or preternatural cessations their interruptions or impetuous Influx their sluggish dull and torpid Fixations And scarce any Passion is named but the Spirits are Actors and by them All that is done or should have been is imputed to the Spirits And Dr. Morton gives a greater Prerogative and ascribes more Power to Animal Spirits in the Government of the Body than others have primum Principium activum totius Machinae p. 6. and bottoms his new Hypothesis upon Animal Spirits quasi fermentum universale totius corporis p. 12. making them universal in the causes of Diseases and as generally necessary in a State of Health to perform all vital Actions If this be so 't is very fit we should all know and assent to it Notwithstanding it is so undoubtedly asserted I question whether there be any such distinct Beings in Human Nature as Animal Spirits or only the Fancies of Mens Invention And my Reason perswades me to deny their Existence First Because their Matter and Manner of Generation their Ways and Motions are so uncertainly and contradictorily set forth by disagreeing Judgments Secondly For that all human Actions internal and external may be performed without their help and a rational and full Account of all Diseases may be given without them Entia non sunt multiplicanda sine Necessitate I shall therefore divide Human Nature into these two grand Principles An Invisible Spirit And a visible organized Body with canals containing liquid alimentary Juices to feed and supply this wonderful Machine The first a Vital Active Regent Principle The latter altogether Passive and Instrumental under the Power and Domination of the former which is the Life More than these two comprehensive Principles I know none nor can admit of as necessary or useful in the composition or oeconomy of Human Nature No Subordinate nor Co-ordinate Agents such as Archeus Helmontii or Anima Sensitiva of the Antients Nor as Dr. Willis understands and holds the Animal Spirits to be the Sensitive Soul That Plastic or formative vital Principle termed Anima that delineated and fabricated the Body in the Womb does also govern and is the sole Efficient cause of vital Actions in the state of Health and also in Sickness Vnicus tantum est vitae Moderator nec plures From hence Vegetation Sensation and Loco-Motion without a Duplicity or Triplicity of Souls which elsewhere is set forth and proved Monarchia Microcosmi that I shall not repeat here True it is that the contained current liquors in the Body are various in colour consistence use and gradual Perfection Some elaborated as finer and more spirituous in the common Sence and Acceptation of artificial rectified Spirits Yet when all this is done by Defaecation and refining they are but liquors still of one continued cohaerent visible expanded Body and not separate Atomical Beings to act conjunctim aut divisim as divers Agents in combination or separation upon Occasions so requiring as the Notion of Animal Spirits does insinuate and are so alledged and taken in that Sence Now if what we have said be true and the Reasons cogent then Animal Spirits have no Residence nor Office in Human Nature and the Basis of that Author 's new Hypothesis is annihilated and all the derived Doctrine and depending Practice thereupon comes to nothing or to naught But in casting off so antique and beloved Opinion so frequently made use on to set forth the causes of many Diseases and that Book de Morbis universal acutis brings in Animal Spirits invenom'd almost into all Diseases as principal Causes That I may not be thought singular and absurd in denying the Existence of these
ignotum per atque ignotum We must proceed on for better Information atque vitae Principio seu Spiritibus animalibus inimicum Here the Life and animal Spirits are made one and the same or equal at least in vitality for so I must conclude First From the Particle seu connecting those words as Synonimous And likewise He useth seu equivalently and for that purpose in the front of the Definition Venenum seu Toxicum signifying the same Poyson by two words Secondly From the words immediately following Vnde facultas eorum expansiva penitus obruitur flamma vitalis necessario extinguitur The which do declare Febrile Venom to have Antipathy against animal Spirits as to the Principle of Life That the Stress of Poyson aims at and lies upon animal Spirits as upon the Life That the fatal stroak is given there and the ratio formalis of Dying represented by Contracting and Stifling the Expansion of animal Spirits which puts a Period to Vitality And that animal Spirits are the Biolicknium the Lamp of Life What more or greater can be said of Anima the plastic and the Regent Principle than now is attributed to animal Spirits This is Strange Philosophy to me such as I never knew before deeper than my Reason can fathom and above my Faith to believe That animal Spirits so much questioned and doubted whether they have any Being in Humane Nature though so unnecessary and improbable should now be exalted as Supream or made coequal at least in dispensing and managing vital Operations Credat qui volet Let animal Spirits be first proved 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 convincingly that there are such from the necessity of their use we may then more likely be induced to believe the new Hypothesis founded thereon SECT III. The Difference of Fevers And their Division into Classes AVthors concurring in common Doctrine have made this Difference and Division of Fevers à subjecto in quo calor febrilis insidet from their place of Residence in the Spirits Humors and solid Parts which makes this tripple Division of Fevers Ephemeral Humoral and Hectic Famosa Vulgatissima est Febris essentialis differentia qua Febris in Ephimeram Humoralem Hecticam dividitur quae tota à subjecto Febrium petitur Troph Serrier Pyretolog p. 13. Ephemeral Fever is an effervescence of the Spirits only and continues but a day or two Humoral is the esservescence of putrid humors and continues a longer time Hectic is a preternatural Heat in the Solid parts and is most durable and fixed All these Fevers must take their rise in the Heart by the common definition that 's the Center and Seat thereof You have brought all Fevers into a little compass the Heart where we may soon find them if they were there to be found And if all this were true what advantage and what use can we make of it What cunning ways will you invent to make your Practice answer this Doctrine and how will you make this Doctrine serviceable in Practice This Celebrious Division is essential general and comprehensive But quid inde boni what shall we learn thereby If you come to a Patient whose Fever is beginning and the Fever is one of these three Sorts comprised in the general Division you have no help by this Doctrine if it were true no information to determine what or prosecute with what You cannot ask the Patient how are the Spirits of your Heart How the Humors And how the Flesh but you must look off the Heart and cast about somewhere else inquiring here and there How is your Stomach have you good Appetite and digest well are you Costive how is your Head do you urine freely have you pain any where and so forth After all these and such like necessary Questions 't is very probable you may find out the place where the Fever is bred and what is the Cause thereof If so as true it is what then have we to do with the Heart but only to examine by the Pulse how affected or afflicted in the case what consent from thence or condolence what vital Signals by that Pulsation not what Sort of Fever Now after all the subtle and nice distinction of Ephemeral Humoral and Hectic we must examine most Parts of the Body the principle at least to find out the Rise and Seat of the Fever and then it will appear to be not in Corde primò accensa as you say but in Corde per consensum and that some other Part is the original cause of the Fever where the Cure is to be directed If there must be a place or places in the Body assigned for Fevers as the Rise and Seat thereof And since they are all Symptomatical and dependant upon various Diseases in divers Parts of the Body as their causes occasional Sedes Morbi est Sedes Febris then where the Disease is there is the Seat of Fevers So that the difference of Fevers from thence will not be triplex according to this antique approved Division but multiplex I wish you good Success with your Doctrine of Fevers but I should be loth to be a Patient under it least the first tryal of your Skill upon me should be the last Scene of my Life There is another received distinction of Fevers into Essential and Symptomatical And this I must take notice of because it byasseth Practisers from the right Notion of Fevers and causeth errour in the designs of Curing For this Distinction may well be set aside when as there is no Fever essential therefore no Disease but all are Symptomatical arising from and dependant upon some Disease morbific Miasm or Seminary and a Symptom thereof And this appears from the Definition of Fevers Febris est calor preter naturam preternatural Heat being the genus comprising all Fevers under it And this Heat by your Doctrine a Symptomatical Quality only The distinction then of Essential and Symptomatical Fevers is void unless you will hold a contradiction in your own learning But why some Essential others Symptomatical Riverius gives this account essentiales dicuntur quando putredo in venis communibus extra partes privatas accenditur Symptomaticae verò quando in parte peculiari inflammata putredo aut suppuratio fit a qua ob vasorum communionem vapor putridus cordi continuo communicari potest lib. de febr p. 373. They that will take this for good Reason may be so satisfied and probably they may not see the Definition of Fever therein contradicted Calor in Corde accensus ex eo and the Doctrine discordant in it self Another Distinction of Fevers there is which divides them into Continual and Intermitting This difference is apparent to vulgar understandings but the manner how the matter what the place where generated causes occasioning and promoting These are not so well known which hath produced diversity of opinions among the learned and these I shall take notice of in their due places Continual Fevers are distinguished into
then shall a proper Method with effectual true Medicines be adapted for their Cures I must confess had I no Knowledge nor Guide to direct me herein but Books I should be at a stand and much puzled what Course to steer and with what Means to do the Business required or aimed at when such Fevers present But how pernicious are the Methods and Medicines for the Cure hereof as appointed by Authors we shall see anon when I come to set forth the Practice SECT V. Of Fevers Continual and Intermittent ACcording to Method and Custom I have not omitted this Difference and Distinction of Fevers but shall say no more in this Place than what distinguisheth one from the other Continual Fevers are such as have no perfect Intermission but only sometimes they have Intensions and Remissions And from the difference of their exacerbations in Distance whether every Day or every third or fourth Day they are called Continual Quotidian Tertian or Quartan But the consideration hereof is not of such Moment in Practice as to require various Methods of Curing and therefore I shall not trouble you with the Niceties and Distinctions of Authors reasoning thereupon Intermitting Fevers are such as in the English are called Agues And these are Quotidian Tertian and Quartan from their Cessations and Intermissions coming and going on such Days In assigning Causes for the periodic Returns of these Fevers on Certain and Several Days and for their Duplication and Triplication Authors do so much differ in their Opinions that an Account of their Conjectures Reasonings and Probabilities would give us more Trouble than Profit I shall therefore wave those Disputes that we may sooner come to the Curative Part which is more Satisfactory and Useful that proves more certainly what is true or false SECT VI. Of Fevers Malignant so called Measels Small-Pox and Pestilential HERE we make Malignant as the Genus comprising several Species under that general Denomination I shall first examine the Import of the word what is meant thereby and then inquire into the particular differences of Malignant Diseases For if we have not a true knowledge of the Sense and Import of the generical word we cannot have a distinct intelligible Account of the Species or kinds thereof I hear great talk of Malignant Fevers sometimes and I Consult Authors upon that Subject But I am not satisfied what they mean and so far as I can gather by the Discourses they do not well know what they mean themselves at least not how to set it forth For they have laboured to explicate the Intention and Scope of the word Malignant and rank it with intellible Doctrine But in fine the Result terminates in occult Qualities And this is acknowledged by a late famous Author treating of malignant and pestilential Fevers Ignotam ducunt originem ut earum Causae essentia sine recursu ad occultas qualitates raro explicentur Dr. Willis de Febr. How comes this word Malignant to be tackt as an Adjunct belonging to Fevers Malignant Fevers so much and often treated I know none such For all febrile Heat in gradu Summo remisso is but the same Heat in specie issuing from the same vital Principle and only differing gradually Furthermore those Fevers which are called Malignant are observed by the best Judgments to have their Heat more mild and moderate than other Fevers that are accounted and termed benign Therefore malignant affixed to Fevers as a distinguishing Character is an improper Compounding and Confounding of words together making the Sense and Meaning thereof intricate and perplext which breeds confusion and mistakes in Practice Clarioris Doctrinae gratiâ nec non verioris we must first understand what that thing is which truly may be called Malignant Then Secondly to what this Malignant Thing bears Enmity or evil against which it would hurt These two Points being rightly stated illustrates and clears the Doctrine from Obscurity Ambiguity and Intanglement Malignant by the Import of the word signifies Evil Malicious and Hurtful And it is used by Physicians to set forth that which is very Evil Pernicious and Dangerous more than ordinary And therefore Diseases arising from such malignant Causes are accounted worse than others That which denominates and makes Diseases Malignant is either some inbred Matter in Human Bodies highly and variously degenerated into a malignant venemous state as producing Cancers Gangrens Leprosie Small-Pox c. And this variously depraved malignant Matter is capable of no other Description and Distinction than what the Symptomatical Products and Effects thereof does manifest the Heterogenity of such causes in Human Bodies Pertinent to our Purpose Van Helmont Speaks tho' about to prove something else Excrementâ—m venenosum in Febribus praecordis includi producens sopores deliria c. ergo virus anodinum est amens In caducis paritur esse venenum insensitivum amens pro spatio affligens in praecordiis stabulatum In Amentiis hypochondriacis venenum furâ—osum vel cum joco delirans In vertigine virus rotans In apoplexia tollens sensum motum p. 268. Hence you may understand that great variety of venemous malignant matter is sometimes generated in Human Body producing many different and dangerous Effects afflicting variously Or else Secondly Malignant Diseases are caused and received from without As when the Air that surrounds and enters the Body is infected with noxious exhalations and vaporous malignant effluviums arising out of the Earth from carrion or dead Bodies expirations of venemous Creatures or by Influx of the Stars producing epidemical Malignant Diseases As the Pestilence or Pestilential and malignant in a lower Degree Or by the Bite of some venemous Creature or by depraved Corrupt Food or virulent Physick And this malignant matter whether inbred or imperceptible Miasms from without they do shew their Pravity Taint and Infection by the direful destructive Symptoms that attend their Operations and Alterations made in Human Body variously Quicquid recipitur recipitur per modum recipientis Some malignant Matter being more acute deleterious does destroy sooner Others not so fierce and active do take more Time in killing yet are more difficult and obstinate in yielding to means than other Diseases that are not malignant All which does prove that Diseases are rightly called malignant from the material Cause only of which they are bred Secondly We must discern to what more immediately and directly this malignant matter is opposite to and where it makes the first Attack and Impression where the Stress of Malignity aims first and lyes most upon Not to and upon animal Spirits because the Enmity and Contrariety is not founded between them as Antagonists For granting there were no animal Spirits in Human Nature the Repugnancy Discordance and Hostility by malignant venom would be the same and the symptomatical Effects in like manner the same And it is but rational so to determine Because Sympathy and Antipathy Amity and Opposition in the nature of Creatures issue
immediately from the Life of one and points directly at the Life of the other Inclinations and Aversations arise from thence and the first Impressions are made there for mutual Complacency or Resistance That which is venemous and destructive to one creature is not hurtful to another and serves for Food to some The Dog and other Animals eats Carrion and it 's good Food for them The which would be destructive to Man as Poyson What can make this difference of good and evil among the Creatures but the Specific Formative Principle that fabricated those Bodies and from whence all the distinguishing Properties do flow And not only Creatures of a different Species but also Individuals of the same Species do differ much in their Appetitions and Aversations according to the Proverb one Man's Meat is another Man's Poyson And this Peculiarity and Individual Propriety does arise from the Life and not otherwise from animal Spirits The Discordancy and Reluctance is not founded there The vital Principle the Life or Form is that which distinguisheth all the Creatures essentially in their Being And also gives them their different Inclinations and Dispositions Properties and Qualities From hence we may understand that the first Assault and Injuries offered either from without or within the Body is made upon the Life That what agrees or disagrees is by Approbation or Rejection and Displicency of the Life The animal Spirits if such there be do not receive the first Assault of Malignant and Venemous matter they are not primely concern'd therein But ex falsis suppositis they can only feel the mischief secundario consequenter from the conflict and struglings the irregular and disturb'd Impulses of the Life They being supported and ill governed thereby in the execution of their Functions I must not believe the first Commotion and Disturbance to make a Disease is begun among the animal Spirits or any thing else so inferiour in Human Nature that 's Subservient and instrumental Nor can I think the continuation of Diseases to depend upon them The Life or vital Principle being ubiquitary in its Dominions always guarding and upon the Defence is first sensible of injury offered forthwith endeavours Repulsion and Expulsion and that 's the Disease begun If Helmont says true as I am apt to believe morbem omnem in vita Consistere P. 444. Then doubtless Diseases must there first begin nor does it end until the Life be clear and quit thereof by the Assistance of good Means when greatly assaulted and seized And he confirms this in another place ut Sanitas consistit in vita integra ita morbus in ipsamet vitaoblasa p. 442. All which does suggest and prove that animal Spirits if such there were are not primely concern'd and affected with any discordant malignant Matter that is fomes Morborum but collaterally or consequentionally from the Irritations and Discomposure of the Life by whom they are supported managed and act instrumentally If so as most probably appearing then the new Hypothesis setting forth the Rise and Continuation of Diseases by animal Spirits principally affected is not rightly bottom'd and stated but founded upon unsound Principles and the Practice formed hereby erroneous and unsafe Now I have shewed what malignant Matter is that causeth such a Disease And to what this Matter aims or where it primely affects and seizeth to produce a Disease called Malignant We are next to inquire how properly or improperly and injuriously Fevers are denominated Malignant Fevers upon due examination unfitly are called malignant First Because malignant denotes only and specifies Matter properly distinguishes it from other Matter and Morbifick Causes And Fever imports only febrile prenatural Heat arising from the Life or vital Principle incensed from any disturbing cause whatsoever Malignant can give no distinguishing Character to Fever for febrile Heat in all cases is idem specie the same in kind and only differing in Degree as being more or less Febrile Heat therefore cannot be Malignant because the Spring or Principle of that Heat is the Life Secondly They dissent by Indications in Curing Malignant requiring Alexipharmacal and Bezoardic Medicines And Fever or febrile Heat indicates refrigerating or Cooling means according to the common Practice and Galenic Canon Contraria contrariis Curantur But I say Febrile preternatural Heat being only Symptomatical and dependant upon the Life requires no Curing means directly and peculiarly thereto but is allayed and reduced of course by various Means such as is proper only for that Disease which causeth the Life to aestuate and be discomposed Thirdly They differ widely and are incongruously yoaked because as coupled they do not thereby illustrate and direct but darken and amuse a Practicer in determining the quid agendum and quibus auxiliis You must therefore divide and separate Fever from malignant considering them apart in their single distinct Natures as proceeding from much different Principles that you may rightly level at and oppose the evil and not stifle the innocent Fourthly Malignant is improperly affixed to Fever for that which makes the Fever efficienter and from whence febrile Heat does issue is fons caloris the very Life it self Therefore Fever is not malignant but the Disease may fitly be called malignant from the morbifick malignant matter which is the constituent cause thereof From whence we may understand that many and various Diseases going under the Name of Fevers are very indirectly dealt with by a wrong Information as being falsly denominated and mistaken Fifthly Malignant is injuriously added to Fever as an appellative and distinguishing character because Fever is no Disease but a Symptom or signum commune a signal only that the Life is male affected But how or with what febrile Heat makes no Discovery nor requires any curative Consideration But malignant denominates a Disease properly distinguisheth the Morbific cause from other Matter and thereby indicates the Curing means Therefore Malignant having no Relation to Fever but remotely and occasionally is no distinguishing Title for Fever and joining them together does not inform but amuse by contraindication Sixthly Symptoms arising from morbific Matter as Vomiting Fluxes immoderate Sweating and such like may receive a distinguishing Denomination peculiar and apposite as shewing the Nature thereof and if urgent may require Means for Palliation and Mitigation But febrile Heat a common Symptom of the Life male affected is not capable of Distinction by any Addition because it proceeds always from one and the same Principle tho' the procuring or occasional Causes be ever so different and various And requires no Means peculiar thereto but such as is proper and Curative for the Disease only that occasioned the aestuation By the common Doctrine we are hitherto at a loss in the Notion of Fevers being no Disease and requiring no Curing means adapt thereto giving little Information and is no true Guide in the cure of any Disease that is Couched under that Denomination But they being entituled Fevers hath caused great mistakes and
by the way The same Author appoints the Peruvian Bark to be reduced in alcool into the most minute or finest Pouder quo facilius per habitum corporis trajiciatur p. 179. that it may the more readily pass through the habit of the Body But if I were to use this Pouder I should chuse rather to have it grosly beaten that the vertue may be extracted only and conveyed where and how nature pleaseth But the Substance more fitly to be carried downwards to be voided with Excrement For I cannot think it safe that so much Pouder of a ligneous indissoluble Substance should commix with the Blood and be imported into the smaller vessels but by incrassating that stream it must cause obstructions of very ill consequence tho' the Pouder be genuine und true But since it is so much adulterated and abused as this Author tells us and the Dose therefore to be augmented double or treble I cannot think otherwise but it must then make ill work in the Body and that there will be need of another Antidote or a Course of Physick against the mischief of this famous Febrifuge And this medicine making no manifest Operation we may fear that both the Dregs of the Disease and the Dregs of the Medicine do remain in the Body Therefore I am apt to believe it was not for nothing or no cause that Vopiscus Plempius a learned Physician of Note did charge this American Bark and condemn'd it as guilty of many misdemeanors and Homicide His words are these Plures tertio vel quarto reciderunt plurique cachectici facti nonnulli mortui Item Magnates hujus Aulae nominare possem qui ab usu Pulveris extenuati sunt ad Phthisin pracipites facti in usu longo lactis Asinini restituti fuissent I do not think it necessary that this Pouder or any Medicine of that substance should be conveyed Materialiter into every Part of the Body to discharge its virtue Nature does not operate after that manner with Medicinal Help is not bound to transport by Canals for her Relief but transmits virtualiter and influentially penetrating tatam Partium Compaginem Diaphoretics operate after the same manner Nor do I think it necessary or convenient the best and richest Cordial Pouder should be introduced into the Habit of the Body But let that pass The Jesuits Pouder was cried up and promoted in Italy by Sebastian Badus a Physician of Genoa And there were others that as much decried it as not being steddy and constant in good effects or doing no Hurt but oftentimes as being the cause of much ill and thereby went under an ill Name Which Party we are to credit in this matter I leave every one to Judge This we well know that the Duke of Savoy by several Accounts received about two years since was in a valetudinary State for a long Time caused by an Ague which for many Months continued in going and coming again Very probably this Febrifuge was the chiefest Remedy which put by the Fits for a Time But the minera Morbi the morbific cause not being discharged and sent forth the Fits returned again several Times But Supposing his Physicians did not advise the use of this Medicine or did not continue the use of it we may conclude it was under some disgrace or not in such Repute there as formerly But let us go on The Pouder is appointed to be taken in the Intermissions of Ague Fits every fourth Hour And when there is such a Cessation of the intermitting Fever or Ague as seemingly Cured yet that is no security but you must Continue the use of the Pouder thrice a Day for three Weeks or a Month intervallo octo vel decem Dierum as our Author appoints P. 132. I find hereby that this famous Bark makes but an uncertain and a tedious Cure for when it will be perfected who can tell Our Author gives us the Reason thereof in another Place P. 76 and 77. to this purpose That the febrile venom hath a fixed and determined Time of Duration either for weeks months and sometimes years That although it be subdued and seemingly cured for a Time yet it will revive again until the venemous fomes metam suam ultimam attigerit hath run its Course and spent it self P. 76 and 77. If it be so how does the virtue and great Power of the Antidote appear This is small Hopes for the Patient and little Incouragement to use Means since there is such a determinate Time of Cure and before which it cannot be But to make us Amends for this great Impediment And to keep up the Reputation of the Febrifuge He saith We may be glad that we have such a Remedy as can relieve Nature oppressed and worn down when we please by this Febrifuge and prevent the fatal event P. 77 78. So that we are hereby secured from Death but when we may be rid from the Fever or Ague that 's uncertain tho' we use this great Antidote famed so potent against the febrile venom If this be all that can be expected from this Pouder then I shall not trust to the occult Quality of this Medicine and which makes only an occult Operation in the Patient least the good effects prove occult also But I am for a Medicine that works manifestly and therein more probably to effect a cure more certainly by Operations that we know how and which way a Disease goes off And such is the Catholic Extract that makes a manifest Operation but very gentle which is much more pleasant and easie to take than the Peruvian Bark And we have more Reason to hope and expect the desired effects from this Catholic Purifier because it carries off and frees the Body from offensive depraved impure Matter the minera morborum termed venom by this Author thereby it does perform a radical Cure of Agues not a fallacious Cessation and we shall not fear a Relaps or Return And so much I dare promise upon a Forfeit By such certainty properly and only we may call Curing This Catholic Extract being of my own Elaboration perfected by divers Alterations and gradual Improvements I can presume upon from many Proofs to do more and better service in Fevers therefore in various Diseases whereon they depend than any single Medicine that I can know of Extant in the World And I have examined the best Authors and Pharmacopoeia's for that Purpose As for Prescripts the sudden Inventions pro re nata and suddenly to be made at the Shops I do not inquire for any extraordinary piece of Art in that way nor in Reason can we expect it there I shall not here Discourse the Latitude and Comprehension of this Medicine The excelling Properties in Operation and Performance its Commodiousness for use Durability and Portage for emergent occasions abroad For my own Part and particular private use I had rather be destitute of all other Medicines than to want this For I am more beholden to this
desired effects This Medicine will do true service and deserves to be made known and is much esteemed by those that have us'd it in these and many other cases of which more at large else where SECT IX The Practice upon Fevers Perniciously mistaken PRactice grounded upon false Doctrine cannot be hopeful or Safe But there are some and not a few who mistaking Fevers in the true Notion thereof have a common Method of Cure by Bleeding Blistering Juleping and other ways of Cooling to damp and suppress preternatural Heat not knowing what this Heat is from whence it proceeds and the Principle thereof There is nothing duly administred in Practice without Indication to direct what is properly required to be done Fever quatenus Fever barely and solely considered as preternatural Heat and only a Symptom of the Life so affected requires no Remedy adapt thereto but only to that Disease or morbific Matter which is the occasional Cause provoking the Life or vital Principle to aestuate If so as true it is by the Discourse and Reasons preceding then the Practice is governed by every such Disease particularly and Fever not to be regarded in Curing otherwise than as signal shewing the Life to be disturb'd and in a preternatural state But how and with what is not thereby appearing but to be sought for and inquired elsewhere among the Causes and you have no more to do with Fever The Curative means are to be appointed as every Disease doth require Then the Practice upon Fevers is out of Doors and nothing to be done there the Fears and the bustle about Fevers is vain or rather pernicious How absurd it is for any Man to say He is Curing of a Fever when he is Curing something else he is busie to no Purpose or rather he is doing of mischief For he is doing in the dark and what can you expect from thence To institute a Practice for allaying of Fevers to adapt rightly safely and hopefully therein is to appoint and go through almost the whole Practice of Physick For most Diseases have Fevers attending and following after them yet as dependants-remotely related thereto and arising immediately from the Principle of Life But if you will fix your Eye upon Fevers chiefly and Characterize them with the Denomination in all those cases as deeming Fever of greatest Importance and the Disease principally to be Cured Then the Practice upon Fevers is very erroneous and dangerous But the Practice which ought to be in Fevers is as various as the Infirmities of Human Nature are different from each other and by their Cures Fevers are cured consequenter of course Contrary to all this I find a late Writer who tells us of the Protean Nature of Fevers disguised Sub larvâ Algoris funesti vomitionis indefinentis Diarrheae torminosae Colicae Ventriculi Hemicraniae periodicae Apoplexiae Syncopes Rheumatismi Spasmi universalis Pluritidis Peripneumoniae vel alterius morbi securè delitescens Dr. Morton Puretolog p. 189. He would have Fever to act all these tragick Parts and many more as being variously disguised and hid under such several Appearances and their Cures to be included in Curing the Fever Cujus contrarium He draws all the Practice upon Fevers and I take all the Practice off from Fevers and apply it elsewhere Here I demand the Reason why Fever or febrile Heat which is but a Symptom should be exalted above the rest of its fellow Symptoms as most dangerous and be Dux gregis the Master symptom or rather as this Author would have it to be Genitor Symptomatum the Father of a numerous off-spring and the first and chiefest to be aimed at in Curing The contrary whereof does appear for as much as febrile Heat is the consequent occasioned by such various Disorders and preternatural Affects not the Producer or Leader of them And therefore they are of greater Importance and threaten with more Danger than Fever doth Because they are descended from and do participate of Morbific causes Matter or Miasm in their Nature But febrile Heat is vital Heat nearly allied to Human Nature a Symptom of the Life only exceeding natural Temper provok'd thereto by such morbific Causes Now tell me where and to what Curing is to level at when those various Phenomena present The same Author hath given an Answer and directs our Aim at febrile Venom or fermentum febrile But why fermentum febrile and not fermentum emeticum apoplecticum Catharticum Spasmodicum dolorificum c When the fermenting Matter or Miasm produceth such Operations and Effects apparently why should they not bear that Denomination which is most significant and shewing the nature of the ferment the Tendency or motion thereof If the fermenting Matter must have a Name give it a proper Name a distinguishing Name that does indicate But febrile gives no information of the Matter of what condition it is therefore an improper and useless Title as making no distinction At this rate a Stone in the Kidney may be called fermentum febrile because it occasions a Fever but how fitly let every one Judge And all the Morbifick causes in Aetiologia may as unfitly be termed febrile Ferments If causes that have been set forth so various can be reduced under this one Head Fermentum febrile few excepted then the Practice of Physick will be very concise and easie now the Jesuits Pouder is so effectual against febrile venom as some will have it to be But I do not find the virtue of this Febrifuge so great but will require much Assistance from other Means in the performing of Cures And we will go no farther for Proof hereof than the Examplars set forth in Pyretologia of the same Author last named After a long Harangue upon Fevers shewing the Diversity Difficulty and Dangers thereof when we come to the Curing Part there is nothing to be Cured that properly and truly is called Fever but something else They lay all the load upon Fever charging the mischief and Ruine of Sickness and Diseases upon Fever and that is the least Part of the Sickness Then put the Saddle upon the right Horse The variety of Fevers is the Diversity of Diseases under false Denominations and the Umbrage of Fever But by false Accusations Fever is a horrid and terrible Disease being made the Epitome of Diseases Fever bears the Blame for all but is wrongfully charg'd Insons febris Innocent Fever a general signal of complaint to let you know that the Life or vital Principle is uneasie injured or in Danger and calls for Help being impeded in Government and attack'd by Morbific Causes Requiring such Assistance as requisite for the case which may be as Various as Diseases are numerous and different Then let every such Cause and Case bear its proper Name and not be Shrowded and mask'd with a false Denomination of Fever under a Pretence of the Protean Nature thereof which if allowed the Practice upon Fevers will deceitfully be extended and engross the greatest
Part of the Practice of Physick The consequents whereof must prove fatal Observe what great Helmont saith Infebribus universis est unica Archei accensio sive indignatio unde in essentia nomine febrili conveniunt Solum autem per causam occasionalem distinctae De febr cap. 13. When the Life aestuates and complains it is not without a cause and you must find that cause out and apply proper means there Then you are in the right way of Curing and there is no other safe and hopeful way to allay febrile Heat Farther you need not trouble your self about Fever What Indication have you from Fever or febrile Heat by the Galenic Rule of contraries you will say Cooling is indicated but that is the ready way for killing in some Fevers and in all other frustraneously and injuriously used Because Indication for Cure in all febrile cases is taken for Diseases and their Causes not from febrile Heat a symptom of the Life Fever therefore does but amuse the World and leads the unwary and herein unknowing out of the way for Curing When a Person is wounded fractur'd or dislocated a Fever commonly ariseth as the consequent of Pain But this Fever makes no Curative Indication gives no Direction for Curing the Wound Fracture or Dislocation and forbids nothing that such cases does require The Chirurgical Means are indicated by those several cases and the Surgeon is not to regard the Fever but proceed by the true Indications according to Art So likewise in all other Diseases and Causes Because febrile preternatural Heat is but a Symptom of the Life hurt not a Symptom of the Disease or morbific Cause immediate Whereas I have in this Discourse asserted Fever to be a Symptom dependant upon Diseases my meaning is a dependant remotely concern'd and occasionally procured But properly approximatly and intimately preternatural Heat ariseth from and is dependant upon the Life as its Principle and an Emanation thereof Omnis Morbus indicat Remedium Febris non indicat Ergo non est Morbus The Major Proposition is the Doctrine of the Methodus Medendi generally received nemine contradicente The Minor appears true and fully proved from the preceeding Reasons and needs not Repetition Since Fever being no Disease nor morbific Cause does not indicate a Remedy and is not to be regarded as requiring Curative Means directly pointing and aiming thereto Then why so much noise and so much to do about Fevers 'T is all a great mistake and blustering in the dark giving false Names to Sickness and adapting Curatives where none are indicated or required Thus much in general of male Practice upon Fevers In the next Place we will examine more particularly the Methods and Means Chirurgical and Pharmaceutic commonly appointed and used as Bleeding Blistering Juleping c. how they do properly answer their Intentions as truly indicated by Fevers Or rather how erroneous and wide from what they ought to aim at SECT X. Blood Letting in Fevers Examined UPON the Doctrine delivered we are now to Inquire how fitly Phlebotomy does answer as a proper and sutable Remedy in the Cures of Fevers being so generally used and most commonly appointed in the first place as of right to begin the Method of Curing The Blood may well be accounted the Treasury of Nature for as this Store-House is full or empty with good or bad the Person is chiefly adjudged to be in a good or bad State ut Signum Causa The dependants from hence are so many and so great that much Caution and Circumspection is to be used in the Diminution of it not prodigally to be wasted upon slight and seeming occasions but upon very urgent and necessitous Cases Some there are that appoint Bleeding not considering so much an Indication for it as the Custom and present Fashion of Physicians so to do Thinking their Method of Cure not compleat unless this come in course Causes in Sickness are always to be principally regarded and sought for where the Seat of the Disease is and from whence it ariseth If the cause of febrile Heat does not lye in the Blood as many Times and more often it does not Then Bleeding is vain and gives no Relief in such cases but rather Hurt by debilitating Nature Diseases take their Rise more frequently from the Stomach than any other Part of the Body This being the first and chiefest office of Elaboration for supplying the whole Body And being the Seat of the Life more eminently where the Power of Government is distributed and does virtually or influentially preside over the rest There you may expect to find the Origine of Diseases mostly or more often The Defects and Insufficient Performance of that Office lays the Foundation of most complaints either by Transmission of ill matter by Consent or Debility of Influx to enable the several Parts governed for acting their Duties Curing must begin where Diseases have their Beginning What advantage then will Bleeding afford when the Stomach requires rectifying and corroborating no Benefit but much harm thereby All Remedies are or ought to be adapted to Diseases and their Causes Fever is no Disease as before proved but a dependant upon Diseases therefore bleeding in Fevers for Fevers sake only is erroneously instituted Inquire into some of the Diseases that commonly have Fevers attending them As when a Fever presents from a Surfeit and over-charge of the Stomach from too much received or something disagreeing and not digesting but oppressing Such cases are very frequent for most Sick People complain at the Stomach of Nauseousness Fulness or Heaviness and Oppression Now what can Bleeding do in such like Complaints How shall the Stomach receive any Benefit thereby Bleeding empties the Veins but it does not discharge the Stomach of peccant Matter does not cleanse and roborate that principal Part Therefore is no Curing Means in such Cases A Fit of the Stone produceth a Fever And likewise the Gout with continued Pain hath a Fever attending The Colic also will procure febrile Heat Obstructions of the Spleen causing Pain in that Part raiseth a Fever And all other Pains of the Bowels continuing begets a Fever Now inquire rightly into the true Causes of all these Pains you will not find the Blood so much concern'd as the Cause thereof for to let it out You are to distinguish a Fever arising from the vitiosity of the Blood as the continent Cause of Stagnation in the smaller venal Pipes which is rare And a febrile Distemper Communicated to the Blood which is frequent occasioned from some remote Cause disturbing the vital Stream by Superfermentation When the cause of Fever is in the Blood Vessels you have then some pretence to appoint Phlebotomy But when the cause of Fever is extraneous and not in those Tubes of conveyance the Blood affected by Consent only from the disturbance elsewhere in all such cases and which do commonly present there is no occasion to use the Lancet In all
But bleeding debilitates and exhausts the strength which should contend with the Disease how can you then expect a good Crisis when Nature is enfeebled and checkt in her encounters for by the Strength of Nature the Crisis is procured sooner or latter as she is strong or weak Natura Corroborata est Morborum Medicatrix If this Truth were rightly considered in the Practice of Physick there would not be such frequent recourse to enervating Phlebotomy To incourage and countenance Bleeding as a laudable Remedy and to captivate the Understandings of People They endeavour to prove the good effects thereof by ocular Demonstration exhibiting to the view of the Sick and by Standers the Pravity of the Blood taken away as appearing variously discoloured and different in consistence if compared with others The Blood after it hath stood some time thus presenting to the Eye so depraved they straitway undoubtingly conclude it was discreetly and happily taken away for the Patient 's good Thinking hereby so much matter of the Disease is abated and let out And since they find the Blood thus faulty they charge all the mischief or mostly to lye in the vitiousity of the Blood Quid planius This incourageth to proceed on in the same way and to repeat this Operation to draw out some more of the morbific Matter as the most ready way to free the Patient from the Complaints But all this while they are not aware of the Errours they are under in this Prosecution For they do not consider the different State of the Blood under the Power and Protection of the Life in its proper native Place the Veins and Arteries and how apt it is to change and variously to degenerate when extravasated and exposed to the Air The Blood is not the same now 't is exhibited to the View as it was in the Vessels of conservation The Life was in the Blood before but now in the Porringer it is dead Blood Between the Dead and the Living there must needs be great disparity so that the Judgment passed upon the dead Blood does not affect or represent the live Blood for it is not what it was Tho' it is now ill coloured coagulate or in a state of separation and abounding with Serosity Before it was more ruby florid Balsamic and more intire when running in the Veins and Arteries which have a conservative Power I do not deny the Blood of several Persons to differ in Purity and Goodness and the difference thereof in the same Persons as they are in a good or bad state of Health But I do not approve of the severe rash Judgment pronounced upon the Blood extramitted from the dead Aspect thereof concluding from thence it was fit for no other use but to be thrown away and better to be out than in the Body True it is there are some Diseases that the Blood is much in fault as the Cause of such Maladies yet notwithstanding that is not a sufficient Cause to let it out since there are efficacious purifying Remedies to reduce the Blood into a better Condition and not prodigally to waste that vital Stream so necessarily useful and serviceable to the whole Body For the Mass of Blood is not depraved and amended by Phlebotomy let out as much as you will equal Parts of good and bad will remain behind from this promiscuous evacuation Besides A degenerate bad Blood does arise mostly from the insufficiency and depravedness of the previous alimental Juice of which Blood is made And then the fault to be remedied is not in the Blood or office of sanguification but in the preparatory offices and those Parts defective upon which Bleeding hath no Influence nor possibility to rectify And as for Fevers which arise more oft from other Causes than from the Blood there is no Pretence for Bleeding in such Cases if you will be governed by Indications and not go on blindfold Nidus Febrium in primis est officinis extenditur scilicet à Pyloro per Duodenum vasa ibidem multiplicia Intestina item Venas Mesenterii Lienem usque ad Hepar Helm de Febr. According to this great Author the Seat of Fevers both Continual and Intermitting is not in the Veins or Arteries but in the first Region of the Body from whence they take their Rise Then what signifies Bleeding in such cases but to add more mischief Their Cures are performed by Abstersives and Depuratives to cleanse where such morbific matter is bred And those are the true Antifebrific Remedies And not only such but they are also universal Medicines required as necessary in all other Cures I do allow of Bleeding upon some suddain great Inflammation that threatens the Life and when efficacious discussing Means are wanted to prevent Apostomation But otherwise if it come o◠gradually and slowly giving warning and good Medicine ready for use at Hand then bleeding is not required and better to forbear the Lancet Some are so bold at Bleeding that they forbear not in the highest Malignant Fevers Small Pox c. But if the Sick recover 't is wonderful Providence that saves them but more oft Death is procured thereby In the expectance of the Small Pox they will Bleed under Pretence of abating the corrupt Matter that breaks forth thinking thereby the Patient may not be so much disfigured with Pustles and may be a Help to preserve the Face from Deformity which before was beautiful The end proposed was good but the Medium they go by is very dangerous and unlikely to succeed well For saving a Face to hazard the Life is no good designing They begin at the wrong end of such malignant Distempers for by Bleeding they aim at and apply only to the Effects the producted Matter and neglect the producing Cause the Venemous Miasm or fermenting Leven that corrupts the whole Mass of Blood To prevent Impurity and Corruption of the Blood is much better than to lessen and abate the Quantity of the Blood after it is corrupted The main design in such cases is first how to expel the putrefying venom before it spreads and taints the whole at least so to fortify Nature that she may be able to Master it and defend her self The Indications for Cure are these to assist and strengthen the Life that she may be able to resist the Venom And to Mortifie the malign Ferment by proper Alexipharmacals thereby to preserve the vital streams from mortal Putrefaction or Coagulation But bleeding is quite contrary to this Method and Intentions for Cure and is the ready way for killing That which makes a promiscuous evacuation of good and bad together is no true Remedy for Curing Phlebotomy does not distinguish the better Part of the Blood from the worse but le ts both out together the remainder in the Vessels is not amended thereby but equal Proportions continue behind of good and bad Therefore abating the Quantity of naughty Blood in any case by bleeding is an indirect way to amend it and
consequently an unprofitable attempt for Curing But in Fevers Malignant a most dangerous Practice to weaken Nature by letting out the Balsam of Life and thereby retracting inwards what should be protruded outwards to the universal covering Membrane and from thence to be sent away by Transpiration The chiefest Pretence for bleeding is Plenitude if you can be assured that the Blood-vessels are full to distention and over-loading Nature as when some Customary Evacuation is stopt that ought to be free and the Body does superabound with Blood Being convinced thereof by evident Signs it may lawfully then be diminished by the Lancet if no Contra-indication at that time forbids determined at the Discretion of a Judicious Physician in such dubious Cases SECT XI Epispastics for blistering in Fevers Condemned as Injurious IN the Cure of Fevers 't is now become a great Mode amongst Physicians even those reputed of the first Rank to appoint Vesicatory Plasters as a necessary Help to allay Fevers This Invention is most frequently used as urgently required in their Methods of Curing What Benefit may arise hereby or rather what Hurt from thence procured we shall now strictly inquire into that Practice For the better managing whereof more clearly satisfactorily and to avoid Repetitions I shall examine this Matter upon different Heads distinctly inquiring particularly as followeth First Into the Nature of the Ingredients of which Vesicatories or blistering Plasters are composed Secondly After what Manner they perform their Operations Thirdly For what Intentions they are used Fourthly Whether they do attract Morbific Matter or make ill Matter where none was Fifthly Whether their Operations be auxiliary and pleasing to Nature or otherwise disturbing and crossing her endeavours to help her self For Satisfaction to the first Head or Division you must know that in the Distribution of Simples which have some Affinity and ranked under proper Classes there are a sort termed Pyrotics so denominated from their Nature being hot and fiery as the word imports Of these Pyrotics there is a gradual difference and therefore they have several Names Vesicatories Catharetics Septics and Caustics All of them more or less blistering burning potentially putrefying corroding exulcerating and consuming some whereof are very malign and enemies to the Life In appointing and making of Vesicatories Practisers do differ by electing and compounding variously this and that together But every such Composition that performs the Intention of Blistering must have some of the forenamed Pyrotics 2. Then it appears from hence how they produce such Effects viz. by Quality extreme in the third and fourth Degree and by malign venemous Properties tota substantia hurtful and destructive to Human Bodies As also inimical and hostile to Human Nature the Life they acting as venoms This Account is given by good Authors of the simple Ingredients of such external Medicines and they operate per se as such 3. The Purposes for which Vesicatories Blistering Plasters are used so frequently in Practice and the Benefits expected or prefended from them are these To qualifie and allay the Heat of Fevers to make Revulsion or Derivation of Humours inconveniently lodged infesting and paining some noble or tender Part By casting off and giving a remove of ill matter and to discharge it outwardly by the Skin These Intentions are advantageous and very good but the Mediums they go by to arrive thither the Means used to effect such designs I doubt are not suteable and probable to answer as will appear following 4. We are now to inquire whether Vesicatories do draw the Morbific Matter from Parts remote ill-affected therewith or do make ill Matter in sound Places whereto such Plasters are applied And here also we shall examine the Probability or Possibility of that Invention to abate and draw out the Heat of Fevers Pain being a Common Cause of Fevers always raising or continuing a Fever if the Pain be great Then Blistering Plasters that add more Pain to the Patient Sufferer are very unlikely means to allay a Fever but on the contrary more like to aggravate and augment the febrile Heat For the Ingredients of such Vesicatories are very hot in their Nature and Operations and so hot as to blister the Skin as if burn'd or scalded Thus here is adding Heat to Heat And consider that febrile Heat is vital Heat you are to esteem it so and treat it as such fairly to reduce it into Moderation and Natural Temper by subducting the irritating Causes that provokes the Life to aestuate and be disquiet But by applying venomous scorching blistering plasters they rather give a disturbance than Pacify and the Life is more uneasie and incensed thereby From hence it does appear that Vesicatories applied to asswage Fevers is a vain attempt and rather Fomenters than Mitigators of febrile Heat which is vital Heat preternaturally graduated Furthermore you will find as much Improbability of operating upon the occasional causing Matter as upon the producted Heat For those vesicatory Plasters if I grant they have an attraction of humoral Matter it is promiscuous only not elective and peculiar of this or that Morbific Humor at your pleasure and appointment What probable good Reason can you give for dragging of Morbous Matter or Miasm from central remote Parts to the cutany Circumference by unknown difficult ways if it could so be when more likely ready and convenient Passages there are to convey and discharge by known Ductures fabricated by Nature for that Purpose True it is that a good Diuphoretic Medicine does send forth expulsive from the Center to the Circumference directly and linealy with much Benefit in cases so requiring such as Fevers especially the Malign that mostly stand in need of that Operation and Help And this is frequently and freely performed because Nature is prompt and complying therewith this being an Operation of her own Institution opening upon such Occasions all her Secret invisible porous Passages for a free transmission and curess on all sides Totum Gorpus est perspirabile This work Nature does willingly perform with the Assistance and Provocation by good internal Medicine But to virulent blistering painful Plasters Nature is not so obedient and complying therewith does not dilate and open her imperceptible vents of Communication Transmission and Perspiration to such irksom injurious and improper Applications From what hath been said I rationally conclude That such Humor discharged by the Blisters is no far-fetcht Matter not from the Diseased Part primarily affected the Seat of the Disease far off causing a Fever But it is only a putrid Water from a colliquation of the Flesh and a depraved Alteration of the nutricious Juices of the Part applied to so converted by the virulent corrosive Nature of the Vesicatory Plaster And yet notwithstanding those Physicians have believed at least they would have Patients to believe that it is morbisic febrile Matter attracted thither to the Skin è longinquo by virtue of the Topical Medicine credat qui volet which is against all Reason For
this blistering Plaster shall make the same ichorous Water issue from the sound and healthful as from the sick feverish Person So that I am well satisfied this Water thus extracted was not morbific pre-existing but factitious Matter transmuted by the external Medicine and so vented by blistering Medicines are to aim and level at Diseases where they are seated and to discharge their Power there as well and truly designed If so then these Vesicatories must draw away the febrile Matter from the Heart sedes Morbi according to their Definition of Fever But if those corrosive Plasters shall send their virulent virtue to the Heart the Patient then must be very Heart-sick with that Operation And grant it should extend thither quod non est supponendum How shall the peccant Matter find the way out from the Center to the Circumference this being an obscure impassable way at least not to be found unless by the extraordinary secret conduct of Nature who as I said before is not pleased nor complying with this irksom blistering Invention Invitâ Naturâ irrita sunt omnia Ax. Wherefore no good can be expected from them in Curing Fevers In Sickness when Nature does protrude and send forth any ill Matter to the extern Parts appearing upon the Skin it is a good sign she will be victorious having dislodged Morbific Matter from within and safely brought it to the confines of the Body as in the eruption of the Small-Pox And also when Nature does shew any tendency that way by breathing Sweat it behoves the Physician to promote and help forward with wholesom internal Medicine for that Purpose But if you think by blistering to prompt or put Nature upon expulsion that way you rather distract and disturb her good Inclination than put forward that beneficial Operation for the Reasons aforesaid 'T is a great Errour so formally and constantly to appoint Vesicatories as necessary to compleat the Methods for Curing Fevers As if Nature had not sufficiently provided other ways to discharge Morbific Matter and this were the principal way invented and not to be neglected When a Person is Sick oppressed at the Stomach a Fever commonly ariseth from such complaints And this sort of Sickness from Fulness or Foulness is most frequent What have you to do with blistering in such Cases Can you draw this oppressing undigested or depraved Matter out of the Stomach by Vesicatories Or if they had such a power of Attraction as to bring it forth to the Skin is it not very unfit and unreasonable to draw such foul Matter and often very gross Matter directly through the Habit of the Body and leaving Dregs in the Passage when other patent ways are ready to transmit it upwards or downwards by Natures Design and Appointment To avoid this Censure in part perhaps they will say we intend to carry off the vitious Matter by Purging or Vomiting the Vesicatories are to draw out the Fever and keep that under I don 't like your Policy for this erroneous Practice of blistering is but blustering in the dark and proceeds from gross Ignorance having a false Notion of Fever what febrile Heat is and from whence it does arise Take away the Morbific Matter by unloading the Stomach set that right by cleansing and roborating with good internal Medicine and then the whole work is done that you need not trouble your self or the Patient about the Fever that abates and goes away of course as you discharge the Stomach from the offending Cause So likewise a Fit of the Colic or Stone raiseth a Fever and this Fever not to be regarded But proper Medicines to be used only respecting the Stone or Colic An hundred other Diseases and Cases we might name wherewith Fevers are attended but not to be considered otherwise than as signal shewing that the Life is disturb'd and incensed by some Morbific Matter or Cause in this or that part of the Body Find that Cause out what and where the offending Matter is and prosecute there only with good Means The Fever needs no other Cure than the Cure of that Disease which caused the Life to be unquiet to aestuate and grow hot Upon the Appearance of a Fever Physicians are much and over much concern'd straightway fall on upon the Fever with bleeding blistering and Juleps to suppress and keep that under to secure that Bugbear in the first place as chiefly threatning the Life of the Patient The Sick and their Relations being very apprehensive of the Danger how many have died by Fevers as commonly but falsly said resign up freely to the Doctor 's great Skill and Care herein submitting to the Risk of all the male Practice in bleeding blistering c. the ready way to Destruction After this manner slight and trivial Sickness becomes long and sometimes hazardous Sickness many times mortal And I do account it a special Providence that delivers out of such perilous Practice In Sickness we are always to observe the Inclination and Tendency of Nature which way she thinks best and most expeditely to discharge Morbific Matter according to the Precept of Hippocrates Quò Natura vergit conducere oportet And that is sometimes by the Intestines by Vrine by Expectoration by eruption of Blood at the Nose per Vterum and by the Skin Not to thwart and cross her endeavours except she be forced into a wrong course by stimulating Matter and thereby becomes apparently extravagant therein As when a Symptomatical Flux per Alvum is extream then to mitigate and allay it by good internal Means but not by Vesicatories to attract injuriously a contrary way If the cause of Fever be in primis viis in the first Region of the Body as most frequently it is then 't is great Imprudence to attempt drawing outwards by Vesicatories when other Ways and convenient Ductures are open to transmit it When Nature inclines and shews a disposition to free her self by the Guts 't is very injurious to divert her Intentions by attracting outwards and endeavouring to vent by the Skin drawing a contrary way Si Materia turgeat says Hippocrates If the Morbific Matter ferments and swells for vent let it go that way most expedite and inclinable thereto by Stool by Vrine bleeding at the Nose c. Sometimes Nature hath a Tendency and is prompt for evacuation by the Skin which is advantageous and to be promoted by good Means But I do not account blistering in the Number of good Means to promote that Operation except some Matter be collectied in a particular Place under the Skin and wants some Help to bring it forth Then a Vesicatory applied or Cupping is rational and good But when Nature makes a critical effort by the Skin generally per Diaphoresin breathes out effâ—uviums on every side Then Vesicatories are useless and not only so but hurtful by troubling that Operation To apply Vesicatories in the beginning of Fevers is to compel Nature to discharge that way which perhaps she hath no Intention
to do and no occasion for it but rather another way But if there be an Inclination and good occasion to operate that way it is more safe and better to assist and promote with internal Means that certainly roborates and expels à Centro undique every way outwards to the extream Parts Much rather than trust to dubious attracting external Means in puncto circumferentiae upon a narrow Spot that gives no Ability to send forth but painfully and doggedly coerceth nolens volens and that 's the best of it if attractive power be granted 'T is agreed by all that Medicines are to level at Diseases where they are seated And if so then these Vesicatoriâ— must draw away the febrilâ— Matter from the Heart according to the in deâ—iâ—iction of Feven But if the corrosive Plasters shall send their 〈◊〉 attractives Vertue to the Hearâ— the Patient then must be very Heart sick 〈…〉 Operation And if granted this topical Medicine does extend its power thither how shall the peccant Matter find the way out from the Center to the Circumference Being an obscure impassable way not to be found without the extraordinary secret conduct of Nature who as I said before is not pleased nor complying with this blistering Invention Invita Naturâ irrita sunt omnia Some Years since being called to two Children sick as commonly said of a Fever with whom the Apothecaries were concern'd as Practisers or Vndertakers And being informed of their Intentions to apply Vesicatory Plasters I cautioned the Relations not to suffer it But when I was gone they were over-perswaded by the Apothecaries and blistering Plasters were applied with great Diligence until both the Patients were dead Some time after meeting with the Relations who related to me what was done I blamed them for not following my Advice who answered that the Apothecary said it was the Practice of the great Doctors of the Town therefore it might safely be done From thence I might remark at large upon Apothecaries Practice in Imitation of their Doctors and the shameful Prestitution of this Art But upon this Subject something hath been said elsewhere therefore I pass it over And although Blistering and Juleping be the modish Practice of the Town yet being instituted upon false Notions of Fever and apparently injurious I shall not follow that Fashion SECT XII Of Juleps and Coolers in Fevers FAlse Notion of a Disease begets an erroneous Practice both in Method and Medicines Fever not being rightly understood judging it to be what it is not the Prosecution against it is ineffectual and not only so but also injurious and hazardous to the Patient Fever supposed to be the Disease not known but by its Name and is only a general Symptom of all fierce Distempers and dolorous Diseases being apparent to the standers by and confirm'd by Sentence of the Physician takes up most of their Thoughts in designing how to Master and Secure this common Enemy that stands foremost in view And as their Eyes are most and chiefly upon the Fever so their Fears are from thence and their Endeavours are bent to abate and suppress the febrile Heat at the first Appearance thereof But when this preternatural Aestuation is raised to a Degree all Helps are then thought of to damp and extingush this kindling Flame as great and threatning Danger from thence which byasseth the Physician from his right Aim at the morbific Cause of all this Disturbance From hence ariseth all the Inventions of Cooling so frequently used in Fevers Juleps Emulsions Ptisans cooling Apozems Embrocations c. which make a great clutter of Gallipots and Glasses about the Sick and nothing more advantagious to Physician and Apothecany than trifling away the Time with such insignificant and ineffectual Medicines But loss of Time and unnecessary Charge is not all the Prejudice For if we consider the Rise and State of those Diseases which raiseth Fevers and whereon Fevers do depend we cannot but be sensible of the Injury and oftentimes great Hazards by Juleping and other cooling Practice There are two Causes generally and principally assigned for the Production and Continuance of Diseases viz. depraved noxious Humors and Obstructions And to these Causes Physicians do always aim at in Curing tho' the Diseases be distinguished by various Names Then the stress of Curing lyes here only for opening Obstructions and cleansing away all foul degenerate Matter The design for Cure therefore in all Cases when a Fever appears is to find out where and what the Matter is that disquiets and provokes the Life to be hot and exceed its natural Temper And to such Causes the Physician should bend his Endeavours and the Medicines to level against the Disturbers of the Life Not regarding febrile Heat otherwise than as signal and which requires no means directed thither but to the Disease only that causeth the Life to aestuate What Advantage can you expect from Juleps or other Coolers in any Case of a Fever Since they Cure no Disease nor do they seem as likely means Will a Julep Cure the Gout Stone Pleurisy Colic Spleen c. any other Disease upon which Fevers do depend And if not then vain are the use of these Cooling Inventions and frustraneous But the doing of no good that 's not all the loss by Juleps for they do much mischief As when the vital Spirit the Life heats and strives to expel morbific Causes thereby shewing the endeavours and vigour of vital strength Juleps may then damp this vital Heat and disable Nature but they remove no peccant Matter They check and oppress the Stomach that is too flat and dull in Fevers and requires then something to whet and sharpen the Ferment thereof But instead of such an assisting Remedy they ply the Sick with injurious Coolers that act against the Fortitude and Endeavours of Nature and giving no Satisfaction to the languishing Patient desirous of other Drink How many thirsty Sick Persons have long'd and earnestly beg'd for a Draught of Beer But was denied to them because the Doctors forbad it and appointed Julep Barley water and such Stuff After this manner Thousands or I may say Millions have been kill'd by the Ignorance of their Undertakers for Curing The faint sick Man cannot eat and his Physician will not let him Drink what he likes and is most likely to do him good We may rationally judge that Sick People cannot live long under such Circumstances But this is not all the mischief yet For the Hazards of this Juleping and Cooling Practice will further appear if we consider the Frequency Latency and Danger of this Series and Transition of Pains to Inflammations Tumors Apostems Vlcers Gangrens and Mortifications internal The common Stages and Progress of mortal Sickness but disguised and couched under some other Disease more apparent or more known by some Vulgar Name This latent dangerous Train more frequently lurking than discovered not suspecting or sought for hath brought more to the Grave than any commutation or
that Rule Fevers are hot therefore you say they are to be Cured by Coolers which are contraries as the Canon appoints herein I differ from other Practisers they endeavor to Cool with Contraries I Cool and Cure with Similars They go about to Cool Fevers with Juleps Ptisans Emulsions c. and they go a great way about I Cool and Cure with hot Liquors and Spirits which is the ready way But here is the Mistake which causeth the Difference They suppose Heat to be the Disease in Fevers and I look upon Heat as a Symptom and Signal only They apply to Symptoms depending I level at Diseases producing and continuing them valuing not the Heat of Fevers but am very solicitous to find out and have a careful Eye upon the Disease that causeth the Fever Curing lyes there and there only the depending Fever is included therein and falls of course Since febrile Heat does not arise from any Sulphurous Matter as before-proved but from various other Material Causes not inflammable but provoking the vital Spirit the Life to aestuate and become hot preternaturally which Heat riseth and falls as morbous Causes are intended and remitted What are now the Curative Intentions to be aimed at in all Fevers but only to remove those several Diseases which incense the governing vital Principle to exceed its bounds of natural Temper and Moderation Level at and overcome the Disease the Fever then is gone also Sublata causā tollitur effectus But what Probability or Reason is there for such Coolers to Cure any Disease that produce Fevers for whether it be Obstruction in any Part or oppression at the Stomach by undigested degenerate or discordant matter or by Wind and Flatulency by any exotic generation as Worms Stones c. any Tumor or Apostem breeding Inflammation or Vlcer planted c. These cooling and cold Inventions touch not the Disease except to exasperate and do mischief and remove no morbific Cause For the nature of these Causes and Diseases requires Cathartics Aperitives Abstersives Discussives Dissolvents Sarcotics c. some such Medicaments of these Operations But those Coolers stand in Opposition and act repugnant to such Medicinal Properties and consequently to the Cures of those Infirmities By obstructing of Ductures and the Pores incrassating what should be attenuated coagulating what should be kept fluid condensing what ought to be rarified and discussed fixing and retaining what should be moved and sent away impeding Transpiration and promoting Putrefaction generally they check and damp the Power of Nature endeavouring to extricate and quit her self from those Incumbrances and growing Evils that assault and oppress her In what Case soever a Fever or vehement Heat shall arise with ebullition and preternatural Fermentation of the Blood Cooling Medicines are very prejudicial in many Cases mortal for whether it be a malign miasm seminary or taint or other Impurity and Feculency of the Blood that Nature intends by this febrile disturbance and general Aestuation to separate and throw off which Nature sometimes without any Medicinal Help does perform and makes a good Crisis But these Coolers act counter to such Intentions and prevents Natures intended good work checking the Fermentation and thereby hindering the separation of any depraved or noxious Admixture And the Reason of these ill Consequents from Cooling Medicines does chiefly lye here Since the Stomach doth preside over and hath great Influence upon the subsequent Digestions and all other Faculties whose vigorous and true performance depend much thereon so that whatever subverts the Tone of the Stomach and flats the acuteness of this principal Part and prime office of Digestion as Juleps c. do injures allays and abates the energy of the rest impedes the Fermentation of the Bloud for Depuration in such Cases as also for conservation and supply in the constant daily work It may be objected and said that Lemons and Oranges are used in Fevers with good effects from their cooling I answer that Lemons Oranges Barberries and such like are allowable in Fevers as proper and fit to be used but what Benefit ariseth from them is not to be ascribed to their cooling virtue if any such per se but only to their Acidity which acuates and sharpens the Ferment of the Stomach by whose reinforcement and strength regained by this means the whole Body is refreshed fares the better and some allay at least more Ability to bear the febrile Heat and to contend with the Disease that occasions the Fever Wherefore such fruits and such liquors are to be granted the Patient for Refreshment and Support as are most agreeable to the Stomach and desired by the Sick And the Dictates or Appetitions of Nature in these Cases are to be regarded who oftentimes prompts for her own Help and Satisfaction And generally 't is observed the Drinks so desired by them are fermented Liquors no Juleps c. Beer Ale Cider or Wine And commonly such are most agreeable to the Stomach in Sickness as was most acceptable in Health which being discreetly used are no Promoters nor Continuers of the Fever tho' they be spirituous and brisk upon the Palate yet beneficial and great Relief to the Sick But always to impose medical Drinks upon weak sick People as if they were to be nourished and live by Physick only is very irrational and absurd And I must tell you wherein I differ from other Physicians when I allow Patients cooling Drinks as Whey Buttermilk Cider Meath when desired in Fevers or hot Bodies They lay a stress upon Coolers as Curative and principal Means against Fevers and hot Bodies thereby to reduce the Distemper I allow them not as Physick against the Disease but as Refreshment to Nature being coveted and pleased therewith So that I do not impose as of Necessity because they Cure not the Disease whereon the Fever depends but observing the Propriety of some Bodies being delighted and comforted with such liquors I readily grant them unless there be a contraindication that forbids A labouring Man that toils and heats himself must have drink to quench his thirst and refresh him and requires more Drink than another Person even so it is with a Man in a Fever he labours under a Disease to remove it and he is then more thirsty requiring more Drink than at another Time And it must be such as delights him that Nature does desire not Barley Water Juleps of Still'd Waters and Syrups such slops that the Patient is averse to and gives no satisfaction Keep a labouring Man with Julep and Barley Water and see how long he will keep his Stomach and keep his Strength to be able for work He will not hold it out long in good condition and ability for Service Observe then if these Drinks shall make a well Man and a strong Man decline if they pluck him down you cannot in Reason expect they can be helpful to raise up a weak sick Man to Health and Strength All this considered it plainly
appears that from what Cause soever a Fever doth arise this Juleping and Cooling Mode of Practice is dangerous more or less as the Disease is in its self whereon the Fever does depend But in no Case advantageous making acute Diseases to Commute and terminate in chronic and lingering chronic Diseases to hold on their Course and become more Contumacious Febrile Heat is much safer and sooner allayed with hot things than with cold for Coolers only are but like the sprinkling of Water upon Fire which burns the fiercer for it afterwards Coolers cast a damp for the present makes a short suppression of Heat and it soon bursts out again But hot Medicines that have Spirit and Life in them do assist Nature in ejecting of the peccant Matter which being cast out Nature then returns to her sedate moderate temper Therefore one good Sudorific Medicine checks a Fever better than ten Juleps Here I shall make some Observations useful in Practice First from the Denominations of Fever and Inflammation what affinity there is and near relation they have to each other for from the Etymon of the words they seem to import a Parity as denoting only an extraordinary Heat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 febris from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ignis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 inflammatio from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 uro But the difference lyes here Fevers are known and defined by preternatural Heat and effervescency through the whole Body Inflammation is a preternatural Heat of a particular Part. Hence we remark that Fevers are general and dilated Inflammations Inflammations particular Fevers of a Member Thus they differ in Latitude and Extent But withal observe the order of Causation Inflammation commonly precedes and lays the Foundation in this or that Part there is the fomes minera Morbi A Fever follows upon the whole Body caused by consent from thence and condolency Here you may take notice that Fevers are erroneously defined by Authors à calore praeter Naturam in Corde accenso assigning the Heart to be the focus where febrile Heat is first kindled and from whence it is maintained when almost in any other Part of the Body if an Inflammation happen there a Fever will follow taking its Rise from thence not from the Heart So that the Heart then suffers Sympathically by consent not idiopathically and primarily as Sedes Morbi Since most Inflammations cause Fevers and Inflammations so frequent as being the certain Consequents of great Pain then two things are to be noted First that upon the appearance of a high Fever you may suspect an Inflammation couched under it from whence as the Spring this Fever doth arise Secondly that the Cure of many Fevers ought so to be designed and managed as respecting and aiming chiefly at a particular Inflammation of some Part upon which the Fever doth depend And when a Fever ariseth upon this bottom as often it doth then little regard is to be had to the general Fever but the stress of Cure lyes upon removing the occasional and material Causes of Pain and Inflammation in the particular Part the Foundation of all the rest which being removed the depending Fever falls of Course Thus all our endeavours tend to make a true Discovery of Causes that when preternatural Heat does arise in the Body and begets a Fever you may know not only what to call it but also what to do by levelling at the right Mark And I must tell you also how a Fever sometimes does arise and not from Inflammation of a pained Part That is when some depraved discordant Matter or some malign venenate Miasm is mingled or got into the Blood Nature which is the Life raiseth a preternatural Fermentation and febrile effervescency in the Mass of Blood for a Purification and Separation of this exotic Mixture and admits of no sedation or rest until that work be finished From hence you may be warned of the dangerous common Practice in Fevers by Juleps Barley-Water and other such like Coolers to allay the Heat from a great Mistake of Fevers and from whence that Heat doth assurge For whether the Fever does depend upon a particular inflamed Part or a general Fermentation of the Blood for Purification in both Cases of Fevers such Cooling Medicines are pernicious and have killed thousands For by insisting so much upon them and aiming to suppress the Fever by Coolers not possible to be done that way thus mischievously spending Time the opportunity of Curing is lost and the Disease prevails The Error of those Cooling Medicines is apparent from the insuccess thereof for never was the Thirst of a sick Person satisfied by Juleps but a Draught of good Drink such as the Patient's Stomach affects that is refreshing and relieving Julops are but Cold Comfort or rather no Comfort to a Fevorish sick Man for those Cold Medicines imposed upon the sick are no Coolers in effect and are so far from assisting Nature to do the work she is strugling about that they nauseate and flat the Stomach which should vigorate and inforce the other Faculties they damp and check the Power of Nature contending with the Disease and leave her languishing for Refreshment coveted in her natural common Drink Thus cheating the Patient of that desired assistance by Drink which would be Comfortable And thus much may suffice to shew the Vanity and Insufficiency of Juleps and other Cooling Inventions to allay the Heat of Fevers Having now gone through the Common Practice upon Fevers shewing the Errors and Dangers thereof in their Designs for Curing All which ariseth from their Mistakes in the true Notion of Fevers not knowing what they are and from what Principle they proceed It remains now that I set forth the direct Ways and due Means for effecting their Cures which will appear more plainly and probably Succesful being compared with the common irrational Practice grounded upon false Notions of Fevers wholly mistaken SECT XIII The Author 's Compendious Method and Medicines for Curing Fevers compared with the Common Practice IN the first place I shall set before you the Common Prctaice upon Fevers and take the Account thereof from Riverius a French Author of great Repute much consulted with and followed by most Practisers He having Collected from the best Writers what is most remarkable and thought most useful for Curing so that in his Praxis you have the Methods and chief Matter of all the rest And his Book being furnished with variety of Medicines many that are inquisitive after Physick do peruse and esteem that Book I shall here only take notice and cursorily view the great Magazine of Medicines disposed under the several Divisions of Fevers as properly and necessarily assigned to answer all the Indications of those different Fevers variously denominated and distinguished as Diseases requiring different Methods and various Remedies But how unnecessary improper and injurious most of that trouble and charge of Medicines will appear upon inquiry into the Nature and Vanity of them As