to certain points maxims or rules c. but how if I should tell him that from his own principles it may fairly be deduced that the same maxims and rules are still remaining for if his notion be true that the Colledge hath made no improvement in Physick and are only to be esteem'd the Sectators of Aristotle and Galen no doubt but they retain the same maxims they there espoused although let me tell him for his better information that there are several discoveries in the Physiological part of Physick so clearly demonstrated in our dayes by those great and renowned Physicians he so much contemns that we must deny even credit to our senses if we will not give in our suffrage to the certainty of them which have been so far from rendring our Art more conjectural that they have obtain'd the universal consent of all the ingenious of our Faculty witness the Circulation of the blood its sanguification by the vital spirits and not by the Liver as the Ancients and all later Physicians believed till the incomparable Doctor Glisson discharg'd it of that office the motion of the Chyle through the lacteal vessels discover'd by Asellius it s discharging itself into the common receptacle and from that through the ductus Chyliferus valves of the subclavian veins into the mass of blood happily found out by the industrious Pecquet the Lymphaticks by Dr. Jolive the Ductus salivales and lachrymales by our learned countrey-man Doctor Wharton and that excellent Anatomist Steno and many others which I shall ere long have occasion to mention which doctrines had they been discover'd in the dayes of those Greeks and Arabians he talks of would have been so far from everting all maxims in Physick that I rather think they would have been engraven in letters of Gold and the Authors have had Statues erected to their memory And truly if we well look into the profession of physick we shall not find it so Conjectural an Art as Mr. H. pretends for Medicine strictly so called is very little conjectural as to the rules of it though as to the particular application of those rules to the hîc nunc of a single patient it may be but that is no more than is in Divinity and Law and indeed in all the professions of the world The errors of a mans life consisting in the ill usage of avowed and undoubted principles and misapplying them to particular instances But still as to the Theory of our Art as far as it is strictly Medical it will not be found as I just now mention'd so Conjectural as our Adversaries pretend for as to the subject Physick treats of 't is certain and well known to every one of the Faculty and the end and design of the same is no less agreed upon on all hands and for the general description and Diagnosticks of diseases who ever yet contested about them it being universally agreed that there are such distempers as Apoplexies Epilepsies Pleurisies Gout Stone Feavers Quartane Agues c. which are so specifically differenc'd by their descriptions and diagnosticks that not only Physicians but Nurses are able to know them And for the Pharmaceutick part of Physick so far as it relates to the use of such remedies which by experience have been found of great benefit in several diseases of humane bodies who hath not readily embraced it I might likewise inform Mr. H. that we are generally agreed as to the Causes of diseases so far as they relate to air diet and the rest of the non-naturalia so that 't is plain Physicians have had a standing rule to judge by these 2 or 3000 years nor will they want such a rule to the worlds end But the matters of debate are of a more remote consideration and not so truly Medical as Philosophical I mean the Physiological principles which are borrowed out of natural Philosophy to the building up of an Art which might in all parts be complete And though our Adversaries would pretend that these principles are wholly conjectural yet possibly if they be attentively considered it may be found that our contests as to these are rather verbal than real differences about the focus or minera morbi or it may be about what hypothesis such a humor may be best explicated by whether Galenical Spagirical or Sylvian I shall therefore endeavour to shew both in Acute and Chronical diseases how little our Art may be esteem'd conjectural from such debates as these For instance suppose that the Galenists shall teach us that intermittent Fevers or Agues proceed from excrementitious choler flegm or melancholy congested in some minera of the body and according as those humors do sooner or later tend towards a state of putrefaction and commotion whereby they are conveyed into the blood and ferment therewith do cause those febrile paroxysms to return sooner or later And the Willisians shall tell us that the Essence of the one consists in a more retorrid constitution of the mass of blood being too much impregnated with Saline and Sulphureous particles the other in a more acid and austere one which being deprived of its sweet and balsamick nature is apt by reason of its penury of spirits and too great exaltation of its terrestrial and tartareous parts consisting of salt and earth to degenerate into a fluor and induce a sowrness upon the whole mass the third in a more debile constitution of blood than the former insomuch that the greatest part of the nutritious juyce is perverted into a fermentative matter which occasions the Fits to return so much sooner than in a Tertian or Quartane And the Sylvians as strongly contend that these Intermittents have their focus in the Pancreas and derive their original or primary cause from the vitiosity of the pancreatick juice which at different periods according to its various constitution doth discharge its self through its common ductus into the intestines and there fermenting with an ill affected bile and phlegm doth produce not only the various symptoms that accompany these Agues but the different species of them And thus in continued Fevers the one shall tell you that the putrefaction of the humors in the Veins and Arteries is the immediate cause The other too great an exaltation of the Sulphureous parts of the blood which immediately breaking forth into an effervescence procures that distemper we call a Fever The third shall tell you that the saliva bile and lympha being ill affected and continually circulating through the heart do there excite the foremention'd effervescency which occasions this distemper And thus in most Chronical affections as Hypochondriack melancholy Scurvey Gout Rheumatisms Hysterick affections Madness c. The Sylvians shall tell you that these and many others of the like nature do own their original to a preternatural fermentation of an acid juice or lympha with different subjects or from diversity of acids fermenting with one and the same subject from whence they would explicate all the
phaenomena of those symptoms that are observable in the foremention'd distempers The Willisians will no less probably assert that they proceed from too great an exaltation of the Saline parts of the blood which are perverted in some of these distempers into an acid and austere nature in others into a sowre and corrosive so that the animal spirits and nervous liquor are therewith affected and in others into a state of fixed Alkalies whereby the lixivial parts of the blood being conveyed by the Arteries into several parts of the body and fermenting with the sowre recrements of the nervous juice do produce some of the foremention'd distempers And the Galenists shall teach you that the cause of some of these is an atra bilis which is sharp like Vinegar or Aqua fortis Now let any judicious person compare these several Hypotheses and then tell me whether there be such a difference betwixt them as our Adversaries would pretend to for seeing they all agree as I before mention'd as to the description Diagnosticks and procatarctick causes of these diseases to which give me leave to add Indications for the cure of most distempers which though explicated by different Hypotheses yet are so nearly related to one another that we may find them generally directing but one and the same method of cure and persisting in the use of Medicines of the like nature which surely cannot render our Art so Conjectural as Mr. H. would have it And as for those internal causes of diseases I mention'd which of the Galenists Willisians or Sylvians ever doubted the existence of those acid humors whereby they would explicate the symptoms of several Chronical affections which are so far from Conjectural that there have been several undeniable demonstrations to prove the truth of them One of which is mention'd by the learned Doctor Willis in his Treatise de morb Convuls p. 116. who had a patient whose sweat was so corrosive that like Aqua fortis it would cito exedere corrumpere lintea and in his excellent Treatise de morbis Capitis he tells us usitatum est nonnullos saepe laticem quasi vitriolicum oesophagi ac palati tunicas erodentem vomitu excernere And Skenkius in his observations as quoted by that great and noble Philosopher Mr. Boyl gives us an account of the corrosiveness of some juices which rejected by Urine or Vomit would boyl on brass fret linnen and stain silver And thus I might run through the whole Catalogue of diseases both Acute and Chronical and satisfie all ingenious Naturalists how little prejudice our Art suffers by allowing this freedom of Philosophising for by Physicians comparing these several Hypotheses they may make choice of explicating the nature of diseases by that Hypothesis which they find most universally satisfactory although 't is certain that our Moderns have ill managed their talents in Physick if they have not by enriching our age with so many fresh discoveries made us Masters of the reason of many of those rules which were gather'd from observation only and practice by the Ancients especially considering they have happily found out several humors in the body which our predecessors were unacquainted with as the Nervous and Lymphatick liquors Nutritious juices and other great Anatomick discoveries whereby they might more securely and unerringly found their Hypotheses and more happily solve the phaenomena of diseases And therefore I will not deny that this Age having made so many improvements of the rules that were given by the Ancients may in some part vary the doctrine concerning Indications and methods of Cure the greatest part of which improvements I shall anon shew to be the effect of Anatomical discoveries But this doth not at all invalidate my assertion nor change the main body of practical Medicine in which the chiefest trials are made by Collegiate examinations that still persisting as much the same as a house is the same that it was a 100 years ago though some ingenious Artist by beating out some large windows bringing pipes of water and digging cellars have rendred it more commodious And as for those Theories I mention'd they have not only advanced much the true skill of the present Practisers but have found that allowance among the learned men of the Colledge that they tye not any man so strictly in their examinations to the Hypothesis of the Ancients but are content with such rational accounts of Philosophical questions as his studies have furnished him withal provided be be vers'd in the practical Theory or general maxims thereof which I call the rule of physick nay though in some of them he differs from their opinion not explicating the constitution of humane bodies or conjunct causes of their preternatural affections by the doctrine of the four Elements but instead thereof solidly answers those Physiological questions by the Willisian or Sylvian principles they do not condemn him the only thing they sight against being ignorance and mens impudent reviling of what they so little understand SECT 3. The method of taking Degrees in the University of Leyden HAving now performed that part of my task which relates to those certain foundations upon which our Art is established I shall now make it my endeavour to vindicate the famous University of Leyden with some worthy and ingenious Physicians whom Mr. H. hath so rudely treated which you may find in the 19. 29. 30. pages of his pamphlet although I think neither of them have much reason to take it unkindly at his hands he having been so audacious as to affront High Courts of Parliament Kings Bench and Common Pleas not sparing the Lawyers but representing them as men who would unawares accept of a Bill for a Statute nor yet Mr. Pulton one of the most industrious men of our Age to whom all the subjects in England are highly endebted for his faithfulness and care in collecting the Statute Laws of the Kingdom But to our present purpose and to the giving a faithful relation of the manner of taking Degrees in Leyden which feather in the Cap Mr. H. so much contemns as you may see in the foremention'd pages I suppose because he was as unwilling to pass an Examination there as now he is in England knowing very well that his Certificates would not be accepted by the learned Professors of that University for the surest evidence of his learning and knowledge fit for his Faculty and though he is in some hopes that the Statute of 3 H. 8. may do him some service here yet it was to little purpose to plead it there The method of educating Physicians and taking Degrees in Leyden is after the following manner When persons have studied some years Philosophy and other Arts for their better accomplishment they have liberty allowed them of admitting themselves Pupils to any of the Professors in physick of that University whose office or employment is to read Lectures dayly to their Disciples and those who are admitted under the practick Professors do frequently
Author which they fancy may be made serviceable to their designs as they have been with their confutation of the learned Doctor Willis in the title pages of their books but I hope that none of our Faculty will ever give credit to any quotation of theirs without a due examination of the Authors design for 't is plain by this account that I have given of Mr. Boyles quotation that he hath been so far from discoursing against Anatomy that he hath spoken as much in the favour thereof as any of our Moderns would have done and therefore as if he had foreseen this vile sort of men that would abuse these excellent passages he wrote them with so much caution that one could have scarcely imagin'd that a man who pretends to cure the poor members of Jesus freely for his sake durst have been guilty of such apparent and malicious falsehoods and that to maintain so bad a cause I shall therefore for the prevention of these Empiricks for the future from quoting any passages out of Mr. Boyl against Anatomy acquaint the world out of this very book what a great honour and veneration he hath for this noble Art where you may find in the first part of it p. 5. that telling us that one would think that the conversing with dead and stinking carkases that are not only hideous objects in themselves but made more ghastly by putting us in mind that our selves must be such should be not only a very melancholy but a very hated employment And yet saith he there are Anatomists that dote upon it And I confess its instructiveness hath not only so reconciled me to it but so enamour'd me of it that I have often spent hours much less delightfully not only in Courts but even in Libraries than in tracing in those forsaken Mansions the inimitable workmanship of the Omniscient Architect And in p. 9. he tells us that were we not lull'd asleep by custom or sensuality it could not but trouble as well as it injures a reasonable soul to ignore the structure and contrivance of that admirably organiz'd body in which she lives and to whose intervention she owes the knowledge she hath of other Creatures And in the second part of the same book p. 9. he positively asserts that since diverse things in Anatomy as particularly the motion of the bloud and Chyle cannot be discovered in a dead dissected body where the cold hath shut up and obliterated many passages that may be seen in one opened alive it must be very advantageous to a Physicians Anatomical knowledge to see the dissections of Dogs Swine and other live creatures which puts me in mind of what a very learned Physician ingeniously observed that Dogs Pigs and Monkyes have contributed more to the advancement of Physick than this sort of men ever did or are like to do But to proceed in a further account of the great estimation that this noble Author had for Anatomy which you may find in p. 46. of the same book where he tells you that not only the dissections of sound beasts may assist the Physician to discover the like parts of a humane body but the dissection of morbid beasts may sometimes illustrate the doctrine of the causes and seats of diseases For that this part of Pathology has been very much improved by the diligence of modern Physicians by dissecting the bodies of men killed by diseases we might justly be accused of want of curiosity or gratitude if we did not thankfully acknowledge for indeed much of that improvement of Physick for which the Ancients were they now alive might envy our new Physicians may in my poor opinion be ascribed to our industrious scrutiny of the seat and effects of the peccant matter of diseases in the bodies of those that have been destroyed by them And in the same page he blames the acute Helmont for not having been a more diligent dissector of beasts And in the following page he tell us that here we may also consider that there are diverse explications of particular diseases or troublesome accidents proposed by Physicians especially since the discovery of the bloods circulation wherein the compression obstruction or irritation of some Nerve or distension of some Vein by too much blood or some hindrance of the free passage of the bloud through this or that particular Vessel is assigned for the cause of this or that disease or symptome Now in diverse of these cases the liberty lately mention'd that a skilful Dissector may take in beasts to open the body or limbs to make Ligatures strong or weak on their Vessels or other inward parts as occasion shall require to leave them there as long as he pleaseth to prick or apply sharp liquors to any Nervous or Membranous part and whenever he thinks convenient to dissect the Animal again to observe what change his experiment hath produced there Such a liberty I say which is not to be taken in humane bodies may in some case either confirm or confute the Theories proposed and so put an end to diverse Pathological controversies and perhaps too occasion the discovery of the true and genuine causes of the phaenomena disputed of or of others really as abstruse Now pray Mr. H. can any unprejudic'd or impartial person read this account Mr. Boyle hath given of his estimation for Anatomy and yet believe that little is to be expected from it and that he doth not see wherein by any of those new discoveries any thing hath been done to better the cure of diseases I am apt to think he cannot and if so what reason hath Mr. H. to peruse these passages with blushing Cheeks if he hath either ingenuity or modesty left him and come and supplicate pardon of that Noble person for that injury he hath done him in publick print The third Assertion was this That the greatest Anatomists and Practisers of our Age have been the greatest Chymists For the proof of this I need not take any great pains seeing two of our latest Anatomists and greatest Practisers may afford us so clear a testimony to the truth of this Assertion I mean the eminently learned Doctor Willis and Sylvius both which excellent Physicians have obtained an universal reputation throughout the world for their admirable accomplishments in the Anatomick and practick part of Physick and how highly they did esteem of Anatomy their great industry and pains therein with their learned writings drawn from that fountain will sufficiently testifie to all posterity witness that incomparable book of Doctor Willis de Cerebro with what he hath wrote de ventriculo intestinis pulmonibus and Sylvius his disputationes Medicae and though a friend of Mr. H. would perswade us that Sylvius his doctrines had not their rise from Academies but from his own and others Laboratories yet I believe he will scarcely be credited by any ingenious Physician that hath been conversant in his writings for 't is plain that Anatomy not Chymistry laid the
to chuse none into that order but such Qui gravitate literis moribus aetate caeteris praefulgeant Doctoratus que gradu insigniantur natione sunt Angli who for gravity learning good behaviour and age do excel the rest and have taken their Degrees of Doctor and are English men by birth And though formerly in publick Universities and when they were admitted into the Colledge they had given so full and ample testimonies of their great knowledge and experience in their Art yet notwithstanding are they obliged by Statutes of their own that whoever is chosen as an Elector shall be again examin'd by the rest and as if that examination were not a sufficient testimony of their fitness for so great an Office they do dare fidem that they will give their consent and suffrage to the choice of none as President or Elector nisi qui gravitatem eruditionem mores integros aetatem decentem sincerum animum en rem publicam alacritatem ad obeundâ— officia cognita perspecta habuerit but he of whose gravity learning competent age sincere affection to the publick good and readiness to undergo all Offices they are sufficiently satisfied As to the President He is yearly chosen out of one of the Elects and such a person quem caeteri Electores praesentes aut plurimi pro temporis rei personae ratione idoneum judicaverint whom either all or the major part of the Electors present shall think most fit for that office as to his person and the circumstances of the present time and occasions of the Colledge His power is great as being the principal Minister of managing the publick and private affairs of the Colledge yet not extravagant or unlimited he having no power of making or abrogating Laws without the consent and approbation of the rest and is farther under the obligation of a solemn promise ut honor Collegii asservetur statuta ejusdem sine fraude observentur omniáque acturum in salutem reipublicae That the honour of the Colledge shall be preserved the Statutes observed without collusion and that in all transactions he will have an eye to the good of the Common-wealth As to the Censors They are yearly chosen by the President and major part of the Colledge being four in number and those grave and learned men their Office is to take cognizance of all that practise Physick within London and seven miles of the same sive nostrates fuerint sive advenae eosque examinare corrigere gubernare lite si opus sit unà eum Praeside Thesaurario persequi eorum medendi rationes inquirere c. whether they be English or strangers and to examine correct govern and with the assistance of the President and Treasurer to prosecute them at Law if there be occasion and to enquire into the manner of their practice c. And that they may perform this their Office with the greater faithfulness they are under the obligation of a solemn Oath which seeing it may give great satisfaction to all rational and inquisitive persons how much it may tend to the encouragement of learning and industry and the advancement of publick good I have taken leave to acquaint them with Jurabunt coram Praeside se neminem in Collegium admittendum deâ—…eturos nisi quem omni seposito affectu judicaverint literis moribus idoneum nec pretio prece vel gratiâ quenquam hominem approbaturos c. They shall swear before the President that they will admit no man into the Colledge but whom laying aside all affection they shall judge worthy by reason of his learning and good manners neither shall they be drawn to the approbation of any man by reward entreaty or favour As to the Candidates of the Colledge out of which number the Fellows of that Honourable Society are chosen and their Examination in order to their admission None is to be admitted a Candidate qui non sit in medicinâ Doctor natione Britannus medicinam exercuerit per quadriennium Who is not Doctor in Physick and an English-man by birth and hath practised Physick four years And before this admission every one whether Candidate or Licentiate is to be thrice examin'd by the President and four Censors of their abilities for the practice of Physick they having well observed quòd nullo modo nisi examinatione prius habitâ nobis constare possit quà m sit quilibet idoneus ut secundum regni leges ad medicinae praxin admittatur that it cannot appear to them by any other means but by examination how fit any one is to be admitted according to the Laws of the Kingdom to the practice of Physick Their First Examination Is to enquire of their knowledge in the rudiments of Physick viz. in the Physiological and Anatomical part thereof which though contemn'd by the ignorant Empiricks of our dayes yet doubtless will never be so by the learned and inquisitive Age we live in and was so far from being despised in former that the great Oracle of the Law the Lord Chief Justice Cook in Dr. Bonhams Case hath this very expression oportet Medicum esse Philosophum ubi enim Philosophus desinit Medicus incipit It behoves a Physician to be a Philosopher for where the Philosopher ends the Physician begins Their Second Examination Is in the Pathological part of Physick where there is a diligent enquiry into the causes differences symptoms and signs of Diseases that so their Nature or Essence may more easily be discover'd likewise the great doctrine of Fevers which distemper puts a period to the lives of most men is enquir'd into and many other questions propos'd relating to Pulses Urines c. coincident with these Their Third Examination Comprehends the method of cure and diaetetick part of Physick especially what relates to the government of Sick and languishing Patients in acute distempers where are likewise propounded several material questions of a different nature from the former as what cautions are to be observed in purging and bleeding what time of the year and disease they may with the greatest advantage be made use of in what distempers in what persons c. which questions if seriously ponder'd by any judicious person he will readily grant us his suffrage to the usefulness of such an examination which tends so much to the making men fit to cure their Patients diseases citò tutò jucundè But here their enquiry doth not rest they knowing very well the great injury that may be done to the publick by Vomits or Opiates unduely administred of which I shall acquaint the world when I come to treat of Chymistry and therefore they are diligent to examine the kinds quantity use and danger of them likewise the manner of their operation upon humane bodies which being throughly and duly understood they may be tools of excellent use in a wise mans hands When these Examinations are thus passed they are obliged to a diligent observation
world that a Chymist hath made Oath that he extracted out of a very few of these Pills near half a small vial glass of Quick-silver which he hath sealed by him But Mr. H. that I might farther inform you of what may be done by ordinary medicines well managed by method I will acquaint you with the following observations The first is taken out of the Lord Bacon 's Natural History who tells you p. 16. that there be many medicines which by themselves would do no Cure but perhaps hurt but being applyed in a certain order one after another 〈◊〉 great Cures I have tryed my self saith he a remedy for the Gout which hath seldom failed but driven it away in twenty four hours space It is first to apply a pultess then a bath and then a plaister the first relaxeth the pores and maketh the humors apt to exhale the fomentation calleth forth the Humor by vapours and the plaister repelleth new humor from falling now saith he The pultess alone would make the part more soft and weak and apter to take the defluxion and impression of the humor the fomentation alone if it were too weak without way made by the pultess would draw forth little if too strong it would draw to the part as well as draw from it the plaister alone would pen the humor already contained in the part and so exasperate it as well as forbid new humor therefore they must all be taken in order as is said The second observation shall be of the Cholera morbus a disease which is oft-times no less violent than mortal upon which account it may truly be ranked amongst those distempers the Ancients called extremè peracuti its Symptoms being often times so violent that in six or eight hours space strong and lusty men have been reduced to spasms and Convulsions with other as well amazing as surprizing Symptoms and yet have I seen these per acute and cruel distempers relieved in a few hours space by a remedy of no higher extraction than Chicken broth and that although the Patients have been judged both by themselves and all their Relations to have been entring the very confines of death yet in a few dayes time they have been well and healthful again and that without the use of any Chymical Arcana And thus by a no less successful than rational method hath the industrious Doctor Sydenham acquainted us with the Cure of that cruel and tormenting disease the Iliack passion And I doubt not but that ere long he will give us an account of several other prosperous methods which he made use of in the Dysentery Colick Hysterick affections c. which have been attended with so speedy and happy success that all the effectual remedies which Mr. H. obtain'd by his laborious pains and travels deserve not to come in competition with those Galenical prescriptions methodically administred whereby he performed the forementioned Cures and whatever Mr. H. may think I am apt to believe that in process of time that Physician will be universally judged the greatest Artist in his Faculty who can cure diseases much more speedily easily and safely by the judicious administration and methodical prescription of proper medicines though Galenical than he that patcheth upon every post his Arcana or giveth us large commendations of his pilulae in omnes morbos in every printed pamphlet I could likewise tell Mr. H. that I could acquaint him with a â—…alenical medicine methodically used which hath been much more successful in the Cure of quartano Agues than his Coelestial liquor or appropriate remedies which sometimes have been so violent in ther operâ—tion that they have endangered the translation of his Patients into a Coelestial Countrey I might further assure him that I have seen a medicine so judiciously managed in some diseases accompanied with most violent racking and tormenting pains that the Patients in a few hours have not only been relieved from those dreadful tortures but by a methodical use of it secured from all danger of a relapse which medicine should it have been used without this due circumspection and method it would have inevitably ruined and destroyed the Patients to whom it had been exhibited I could thus proceed to acquaint all ingenious persons with what care and observation is made use of by all honest and conscientious Physicians in the exhibition of their remedies for the relief or cure of all other distempers which are incident to humane bodies as Hypochondriack Melancholy Dropsies Jaundies Apoplexies Sanguineous fluxes c. who being men of liberal education and well acquainted with the component parts of humane bodies and the causes that do ordinarily put them into disorders and produce that variety of Symptoms which do usually accompany distempers they do wisely consider as the learned Doctor Willis hath well observed quippe dum manifestò liquet cujusmodi particulae in patiente aut alterandae aut in motum concitandae quales in agente ad opus illud requiruntur non difficile erit hoc satis aptè designare ac ad alterum illud rite-accommodare And though Mr. H. I will not scruple to allow you that some Chymical remedies may be of great value and excellency for their admirable efficacy in the Cure of some distempers yet doubtless they are not to be used without methods nor yet where there are not fair indications for prescribing them unless we were willing to sacrifice our Patients lives to ignorance and confidence neither do I understand wherefore they should be applauded in those cases where other remedies have been experimented much more powerful and successful in their operation which occasioned that noble Chymical Philosopher Mr. Boyle to confess that he never knew any of the vulgar Chymists Essences or Elixirs half so powerful a remedy to stanch blood as a slight mixture of Hen-bane and white Poppy seeds beaten up into a stiff Electuary with Conserve of Roses nor ever did he see such wonderful effects against spitting and vomiting of blood of the most elaborate Chymical preparations as he had done of a slight Syrup made of the juice of Plantane Comfrey c. But to draw near a conclusion of this discourse I do very much hope that all ingenious persons who have taken the pains to peruse this Book and therein observed how much pains and industry how much learning and judgment is required to the due qualification of an able Physician will not only gratefully own how much this Nation is endebted to the labours of the famous Universities and learned Colledge of Physicians whose members have been so indefatigably industrious in every province of Physick as if they seemed thereby to tell the world that they could never rest satisfied till they had obtained as great a perfection in their Art as it was capable of but will likewise use their joynt endeavours to detect the folly and knavery of our London Empiricks whose Elixirs and Panaceas may be truly assigned as more probable causes of the
by the great Doctor Harvey yet the velocity of its motion and circulation was never so clearly and fully evinced as it hath been by Doctor Lower and how much this may tend to the clearing up of several of the dark and obscure phaenomena of nature as the speedy passage of liquors from the stomach to the reins c. I leave to the ingenious of our Faculty to determine And doubtless great service he hath done us in clearing out the nature origination conveyance and separation of milk in the breasts of women a doctrine so much controverted in former ages And no less service have the learned Doctor Walter Needham and Doctor Lower done us in their experimental demonstrations of the circulation of the Chyle with the mass of blood some hours before its assimilation which discovery with many if not all of the former are to be admired not only for the truth and excellency of their invention but for their great usefulness in physick as I have before mention'd Wherefore 't is apparent that these discoveries have not only tended to the better cure of diseases as I lately proved but have likewise been very advantageous in affording us more useful Hypotheses in physick for our principles having been more certain and demonstrative it were very unreasonable to conceive that our foundations should not be more firmly laid than the Ancients who were not acquainted with the distribution and natural motions of the nutritious humor blood nervous and Lymphatick liquors c. Since the investigation of which the world hath been made happy with the excellent writings both of foreigners and our own countrey-men One of which I mean the learned Doctor Willis hath satisfied the world so well with his excellent and surpassing abilities in that kind that his Name as well as his writings will be admired both in our own and succeedings ages And if as Noble Mr. Boyl hath acquainted us Pythagoras Democritus Plato and diverse others of those whose wisdom made after Ages reverence Antiquity did not only esteem the truths of Nature worth studying for but thought them too worth travelling for as far as those Eastern countreys whose wise men were then cryed up for the best Expositors of the obscure book of Nature How much reason then have we and the learned world to bewail our unhappiness in the loss of one of the greatest and clearest Commentators thereon Witness that ingenious explication of the phaenomena of those stupendous cases he acquaints us with in his book de morbis convulsivis c. and though he frankly confesseth that in his explication of the theory of diseases he doth not tread in the footsteps of the Ancients but his Hypotheses are altogether new yet saith that learned Author they are such quae super observatis Anatomicis fundatae ac firmiter stabilitae aegrotantium phaenomena quaeque melius solvunt symptomatum causas aptius declarant medendi rationes unicuique affectui magis accommodas suggerunt Which being more firmly founded and established upon Anatomical observations do better solve the phaenomena of the sick more aptly discover the causes of their symptoms and suggest more appropriate methods for the cure of every affection And though Sylvius his Hypothesis hath not been so universally embraced by our English Physicians yet in foreign parts it hath met with no less acceptance from the most learned and judicious of our Faculty than the foremention'd his Ternary of humors being question'd by none of the Anatomists of our dayes from the depravation and exorbitancy of which he would derive all the preternatural affections of humane bodies but however whether his Hypothesis be true or not 't is known very well to his friends and enemies too that his success in practice hath given him a reputation not only in the Low Countryes but amongst most of the learned men in Europe Which hath occasion'd your worthy friend M. N. to acknowledg that he hath done the world more service towards the promotion of the Art of Physick than ever any man did before him in the United Provinces and how kind and generous he hath formerly been to Doctor Willis in acquainting all the learned of our Faculty how much they were indebted to him for that excellent Treatise of his de febribus I shall have occasion ere long to acquaint them with But if all this will not satisfie Mr. H. of the improvements that our Moderns have made whereby they have done something more worth than a straw beyond what the Ancients have done I would advise him to read over what I have discours'd of in the precedent particular and what he may find in the latter part of that Section which treats of Chymistry and if he can spare so much time from his quacking avocations I would recommend to his serious perusal that excellent book of Doctor Lower's called Pyretologia Willisiana which was written against his countrey-man Meara upon this very matter of contest between my self and him which having been printed in the same year that his beloved friend's was printed in and received no answer to it from its most avowed Adversaries for eleven years methinks it should be own'd for a much more unanswerable book than M. N's which hath had four satisfactory answers already to it whereby I should be in some hopes that he might happily be reduc'd to his wits again which were unfortunately lost when he wrote this scandalous Pamphlet against the Colledge of Physicians though he spared not for pen ink nor paper And though Mr. H. and some others of his acquaintance would seem to commend the Ancients by this assertion that our late Anatomists have done nothing by Anatomy worth a straw beyond what was done by the Ancients I take it to be not out of judgment or skill in them of which they are generally ignorant much less out of love to them whom they contemn as oft as they are thwarted by them as witness the principal if not sole design of the foremention'd book Mr. H. so highly commends which tells us that we must proceed by other definitions of the nature of diseases and indagations of their causes and invent other remedies and reasons and rules of curation than what have been delivered by the Ancients and not confine our selves to their conceptions aphorisms and inventions c and chargeth the Aristotelians and Galenists for superstitious devotion to their old heathenish authors and their Sectators as drones of the old methodical Hive that practise in the ordinary dog-road of Physick and therefore calls them the herd of vulgar Methodists and the old way of practice lazy its principles dull and the bane of our profession c. which is a plain demonstration that Mr. H. in this assertion did only use the Ancients as an engine to pull down modern discoveries Whereas we profess our selves to have a great respect and veneration for them as having done great things in Physick in their times for which we and our posterity