hath been the inventer of it or that he hath hit upon it by chance and it may be said that his boldness which would have been taken for a criminal rashness in any but an Emperick hath not a little contributed to the knowledg which we have at present of its use and manner of application The most wonderful effects of this Febrifuge appears in all intermittent Feavers which are its true object for it stops and in fine wholly Cures Quotidian Agues Tertian double Tertian Quartans double and tripple Quartans and sometimes also other kinds of Feavers for there are some continued Feavers which having kinds of Intermissions and Regular Paroxysms observable by some small cold in the extremities of the Body or some horror and shivering betwixt the Shoulders are cured by the specifick almost as speedily and securely as the true Intermittent Feavers and this happens often in respect of slow Hectick Feavers accompanied with a Consumption such as Children are commonly affected with because they have certain inequalities of remission and augmentation which give ground to the Remedy to exert its virtue to second the attempts of Nature and by consequence to reduce the blood unto its former disposition and to restore the Stomach to its Natural strength so that for the future providing only good and well digested Chyle it sends a Vivifying humidity to all the parts which corrects their dryness and restores the lost Plumpness and good habit of body It is nevertheless to be observed that since the matter of continued Feavers is diffused through the whole mass of blood that herein it causes a corruption hard to be rectified and that it wholly takes up Nature without giving her any respite she cannot be in a condition to concur the with Specifick but till by blood letting and Purging the impure and Heterogeneous matter be in some manner expulsed the irritation of the Spirins calmed and the humours be in good enough temper to return into favour with Nature without which the Specifick which does not always excite regular Evacuations is not powerful enough to put a stop to the sedition and compose the disorder which is then in the great Vessels and in all the other principle and more necessary parts of the body For the better understanding of the abovementioned directions and observations I would have it remarked That every thing that occasions an extraordinary agitation in the spirits humors and generally in the liquid and fluid parts of our body may be considered as the primitive cause of Feavers that is to say of those irregular motions which happen so often in the mass of blood but seems the same motions would be quickly rectified by Nature were they not kept in being by some permanent cause and that besides by discomposing all the oeconomy of Nature they corrupt the Ferments that serve for Digestion and by that means render the Chyle impure and of a bad quality the depraved Chylification may be looked upon as the immediate and antecedent cause of Feavers so that a Remedy cannot truly be a Febrifuge unless all at once it correct both the bad disposition of Stomach and of the Ferments of which I have been speaking and that is the proper effect of the English Febrifuge for like the most part of bitter Medicaments it is very Stomachical being proper to consume the superfluous humidities and to restore the bone of the relaxated Fibres of the Ventricle and by that means to encrease the diminished appetite and retrive it when it is wholely lost from whence depends the perfect digestion of the Victuals even of the most solid Food I cannot tell if one may not affirm it to be also more Cordial for besides that it re-establishes the scattered forces of the Body and the decayed natural heat it fixes the heterogeneous Particles that cause the Fermentation of the Blood and rallies and calls together those which have been divided and scattered during its ebullition This Augmentation of force and heat makes it sometimes appear as if this Febrifuge did re-kindle the Feaver after the taking of the first Dose but it only augments it that it may the better engage with it and that apparent disorder is the surest sign of its triumph for the more violent it renders one fit the more we may be assured that it will not be followed by another Many Physicians cannot conceive how this Remedy which seems onely to be fixative can radically cure Feavers and Agues but it is to be observed that though it causes not always a sensible evacuation yet it so powerful seconds the inclinations of nature that during its operation the heterogenious impure or superfluous matters are most commonly forced out to the superfice of the body to be evacuated by insensible transpiration and even very often by copious sweats as also it is sometime the occasion of a critical looseness of the belly and in many Patients the way of the urine serves for so salutary an evacuation that it cures both together the Quartan Ague and the Dropsie occasioned by it Furthermore though the most certain and regular operation of the English Remedy be to stop the fits of intermittent Feavers yet the use of it is not to be thought of dangerous consequence it causes no trouble in the oeconomy of Nature being like other bitter temperate medicaments incapable of making any bad impression on mans body for the reunion that it makes of the parts of the blood always facilitates the expulsion of morbifick Causes and though they should partly stay within after its operation yet by means of it they are corrected and reconciled to nature or at least by reiterated and continual digestions they are at length concocted ripened and dissipated Observations of the Kings chief Physician concerning the practice of Sir Robert Talbor in the prepation and distribution of his Remedy The greatest secret of most of Empiricks consists only in disguising the the Drugs that they make use of for since they are the very same whereof Physicians know the Nature and Properties they could not make them pass for secret Remedies unless they affectedly gave them an air of novelty thus did Sir Robert Talbor in the preparation of the Jesuits Powder either to make it be believed that the virtue of his Febrifuge did not depend on that Book or to make it be thought that he understood it much better than those that had made use of it before him for it was very ordinary with him to besprinkle fix Drachms of Red Roses with two Ounces of the juice of Lemons and afterward to infuse them for the space of four hours in six Pound of Fountain water to make use of that infusion for the making of his Remedy adding thereunto eight ounces of Quinquina powdered and besprinkled with four ounces of the Juyce of Fennel Root and put into infusion only for the space of twelve hours Sometimes instead of that Juyce he would employ the Juyce of Smallage Leaves and at other times
guilty of a no smaller fault in forcing if I may say so his Patients to drink Wine and to eat solid Food during the whole time of continued Feavers and in time of the Fit in Agues for though in the abatement of the one and the intermission of the others that kind of nourishment may back and fortifie the operation of the Remedy yet they considerably oppress the Patients when Nature is taken up in defending her self against the vigour of the Distemper that attacks her and then it appears that the prudence and skill of a Learned and Experienced Physician are at least of as great relief on such occasions as the most efficacious and salutory Medicines I have no more to say to shew how little confidence we ought to have in such kind of Empiricks but that it is strange that this man who hath prescribed to us so many juyces and such like trifles about the composition of his Febrifuge whereof the principle effect is only to be attributed to the Jesuits Powder should conceale the use that he made of Opium whereof he many times added some drops of Tincture to this Febrifuge which may be of great advantage when it is given seasonably in over watchings light headedness and loosness which are frequent symptoms in Feavers and always allayed by the virtue of that excellent Medicine I hope the Reader will take in good part that I describe in this place a Febrifuge Opiat prepared with Quinquina and afterward explain its effects with relation to the Nature of Feavers and Agues An Excellent Febrifuge Take of the Jesuits Powder the Flowers or Leaf of lesser Centaury subtilly Pulverised and of Treacle of each a like weight make them into an Opiat of which the Patient twice a day shall take the weight of a Drachm and a half during the space of six days drinking upon it a Glass of good Claret with Plantin or Bugloss water Reflections upon the use of this Febrifuge The excellency of a Remedy is very often the cause why it is despised Antimony hath been in our days a manifest instance of this but the Jesuits Powder and the English Febrifuge continue us more plainly of the truth of it so soon as chance or industry hath discovered a secret for any particular distemper the people lay hold on 't as of a Publick Good and apply it indifferently to all sorts of evils and if on some occasion it succeed not as it must unavoidably come to pass it is cried down with as much Zeal and Precipitance as it was brought in vogue This is the fortune of all the new Febrifuges having seen wonderful effects of them in some kinds of Feavers men took them for Vniversal Remedies but so soon as they found them produce bad consequences in others for which they were not proper it was then generally concluded that it was dangerous to make use of them For this reason that all scruples may be removed which people may frame to themselves in the use of this Febrifuge I have thought it pertinent carefully to engage into the Nature of Feavers and to mark their differences to observe those which are submitted to this Remedy and those to which it may prove prejudicial and lastly to prove with how much usefulness it may be employed when that is done with all care and necessary circumspection Two motions are to be conceived in the blood that of the whole which is the circulation and another of the parts proceeding from its liquidity A Feaver is a fermentation of the blood fermentation is an irregular motion of the insensible parts motus intestinus partium insensibilium We must look into the causes of the regular motion of this liquid body that by the rule of contraries we may discover those of the irregular motion There are two causes that maintain Vniformity in the motion of the blood 1. It s quantity and the constantly equal force of the spirits which are the immediate movers and impulsers of all the parts that compose this liquid mass 2. the just proportion of the same parts as well in their quantity and quality as in their scituation that is to say when the Sulphureous Acide Watry and Earthy corpuscles are not only in a laudable proportion as to quanty but likewise are so well adjusted and united together that they no ways annoy one another and are moved by the Spirits or Celestial matter that animates them in a regular and uniform motion As long as things are thus it may be said that the blood is in its Natural state of Health and to that end the Author of Nature hath not only made our body transpirable thereby to give vent to the too great quantity of Spirits but hath also put in different places Bowels and percolatories designed to filtrate the superfluous and exceeding parts which might trouble the purety of that Liquor From thence it may inferred that there are two immediate causes of the fermentation of the blood the first is the too great quantity or the tor great motion of the spirits which may be excited by the heat of the Sun violent exercise watching fasting hot and spirituous nurishment and the passions and perturbations of the mind and from thence it is that all Feavers Ephemerae or of one days continuance and simple Synoches which are the slightest of all and may be cured by transpiration alone do arise the second is the mixture of irregular and fermentative corpuscles rerum non miscibilium mixtio which confounding the order and alliance of the parts of the Blood raise a Sedition there and deprave its motion And of these Bodies some only raise a simple Fermentation which at length may be governed and subdued by Nature and the others being more Malignant and Venemous cause Coagulations Dissolutions and Colliguations in the mass of Blood and can in no manner be corrected From the former of these proceed all intermittent erratick and continued Feavers which are called subintrant and from the other spring Burning Pestilential Malignant and spotted Feavers It is now to be considered in what parts of our Body and how these humours are produced Though I have said that there are parts viscera appointed for the separation of the superfluities of the blood yet seeing they do not always discharge their functions aright either through a fault in themselves or through the too great abundance of the same superfluities the same are hurried away by the rapidity of the circulation as filth is carried away by the impetuous current of a River but in the same manner as there happens a turning in that River where the water is stiller and where all that filth turning slowly with the current stops so these heterogeneous bodies turn aside by the coeliack Artery into the branches of the Vena Porta where the Blood circulates more slowly and which for that reason may be compared to a Lake or standing Pool of Water in respect of the other vessels there it is where wanting
I would have it observed in the first place that the continual emission of Animal Spirits into all the Nerves and by consequence into those that constitute the organs of the senses producing that state of Body which we call being awake and wherein the Body is capable of all the Functions that depend on the Will the dissipation of the same Spirits and every thing that hinders their passage are the causes or sleep which may be defined a disposition wherein the external senses are so dulled that they are incapable of the perceptions which they give to the mind and wherein all the other parts of the Body are weakned relaxated and improper for those voluntary actions to which Nature hath destin'd them 〈◊〉 for such never sleep sound who have their eyes open speak walk or perform those functions asleep which seem to depend on the Will since they suppose the swelling strength and in a word the motion of the Nerves which can only be referred to the motion of the Spirits wherewith they are then possessed This being supposed it will not be hard to conceive why one falls naturally asleep after Labour and Travel and after long Watching for seeing those things dissipate many Spirits they are at length too few to fill all the Nerves to support the Body and to render it fit for sansation and motion insomuch that it necessarily remains as without motion and sense until the Blood being depurated and subtilized by its continual circulation discharges into the Brain a sufficient quantity of Spirits to make up the loss of the former dissipation With the same facility may be given the reason of dullness which is so common during the digestion of Victuals for seeing that cannot be performed without the elevation of Vapours into the Brain which entangle the Spirits and make a kind of obstruction in the Orifices of the Nerves it is no wonder if the extremities of the Body droop and be weak and dull since they cannot be strong and proper for action unless they have a continual and abundant supply of Spirits This last Observation will be very useful to confirm the explication that I have given of sleep which is procured by Opium seeing its Volatile and Vaporous parts are much more powerful than those that proceed from the digestion of Victuals whether for fixing of the humours and spirits or for obstructing the Nerves by which they are distributed through all the parts of the Body Since then Opium procures sleep by the power that it hath to stop the Spirits in the Brain it necessarily follows that it must asswage pain suspend preternatural evacuations and stop all kinds of Vapours seeing these indispositions depend naturally upon the Fermentation of the Juyce and that the Spirits flowing no more towards the part where it happens it must of necessity diminish as the Spirits that are contained in the fermented matter are dissipated and wholly cease when the same Spirits are entirely dispersed because there comes no new supplies and the substances that are destitute of the same ferment no more as experience confirms in the matters of cold abscesses and painless tumors Though this explanation of the effects of Opium be very plain yet it makes it evidently enough appear why it is so great a relief in watchings frensie inveterate and contumacious pains of the Head Gonvulsions Asthma's Coughs loss of Blood Dissenteries Colicks Fluxes and Loosness Gonorheas and generally in all Diseases which are caused and continued by sharp corrupt and fermentative Juyces Furthermore when Opium is prepared with Aromatick and Cordial Medicines it is called Laudanum this Preparation is made with design to correct its imaginary coldness and is therefore needless It may be given then in substance without any scruple or ceremony unless one had rather prepare it according to the advice of the Poor Mans Physician which consists in drying of it well that the impure Sulphers may exhale and then dissolving it in rose Vinegar to Cure it of its bad smell and lessen its Volatility but it s best Preparation is barely to dissolve it in the spirit of Wine that it may be given by way of a Tincture as the English Physitian used to do and is very convenient Opiats have drawn their general Name from Opium and I cannot tell why they have given the Name of Confection to Orvietan Treacle and Mithridate whereof it is an Ingredient and on the contrary have given that of Opium to many Compositions into which it enters not for it is certainly the most efficacious of all Antidotes and I have observed by experience that Venice Treacle is only more excellent than others because it contains Opium in a greater quantity It is said that if it were pure and without all falsification it would cause blindness but to prevent that there is no more required than only to give it in the necessary Dose for the effect which we expect from it besides the Dose wherein we give that which is brought to us being always proportionable to that I have been speaking of it would follow that that accident should happen to those to whom it is given if it were true that it is capable to cause it To conclude they who pretend that it ought to be ranked among Poysons should confess that it kills not but when a bad use is made of it and that so there is no more Poyson in it than in the best Medicines and I dare be bold to say that our very Food of which Bread is he most innocent being taken without measure may cause a Surfeit and Mortal Suffocation FINIS
matter or other morbifick causes dispersed in the humours or adhering to the solid parts it is so far from that that by reviting the homogenious parts of the blood it seperates them from the heterogenious or superabundant parts whereby it facilitates their expulsion for which Nature alone does often labour in vain in the same manner as by strengthning and fortifying the viscera it puts them in a condition of resisting all attacks and of discharging themselves of the Impurties that oppress them Experience well agrees with these remarks for the heat that dries up and consumes the Hecticks is often extinguished by the use of several Preparations of the Jesuites Powder It is no less powerful against all other internal Inflammations Feavers and generally against all extraordinary and preternatural Fermentations in a very short time it rectifies the depraved motion and the altered consistency of the mass of Blood and it many times occasions such salutary evacuations that having dreined the sourse of Dropsies by the depuration of the natural voices which through their depravation and transudation were become the antecedent cause of it that it becomes the principal cause of the expulsion of the extravasated Superfluities which were the conjunct cause of the same It is nevertheless strange that among so many Authors who with admiration have written of its effects not so much as one have taken the pains to explain them by their true causes nor indeed thought that it could be done for Willis who without doubt hath spoken most judiciously on that subject limits himself to this that having never seen any other such like effects and not being able to ground a general conclusion upon a particular experiment all that is to be done is to endeavour to understand and well observe the phoenomina that depends thereon without troubling ones self with the efficient principles thereof But to make appear how far one may err in the explication of things when they are not known by their proper causes it will not be amiss here to relate some opinions of that Author touching the effects of the Jesuits Powder upon the mass of Blood The first is that it always causes therein a certain Fermentation that only destrovs that of the Feaver because it proceeds from another cause Now the Jesuites Powder does indeed sift the fermentation of the Blood and the other Humonrs but not excite any it self The Second is that it maintains its effect no longer than it is in the Vessels and that so soon as all the parts thereof are spent and gone the disposition that it had suppressed infallibly wears in so much that the Relapse is as certain as the stopping of the Fit Nevertheless the contrary appears daily almost to any who knows how to use it aright to be short the Third is that it stops not the Fits of the Feaver neither by fixing nor yet by resolving the Blood as other febrifuges do nevertheless it is certainly true that the principal effect of bitter astringent and stiptick februifuges is the reuniting of the proper parts of the blood divided and scattered by the disordered Animal Spirits or by Heterogenious and superfluous matters The Author of the Additions to Scroderus has had no better luck in saying that Quinquina or the Jesuites Powder cures the Feaver by the virtue that it hath in Precipitating the Fabrick Ferment for besides that it is hard to be understood how a matter contained within Vessels and mingled with the Blood can be Precipitated by a Medicine whose principal action is directly opposite to that of evacuatives those kinds of Precipitations being only to be made by Urines by little and little and in a considerable space of time cannot rationally be attributed to the Jesuites Powder that acts so powerfully and so suddenly produces its effect that many times a single Dose of it stops and prevents the immediately approaching fit of an Ague The Author of the Cure of Feavers and Agues by Quinquina who makes the cause of the Feaver to consist in a certain Acide Ferment refers the effects of that Medicine to the faculty that it hath of subduing mortifying and resolving that Poison but that Author hath not minded that if in effect Quinquina were able to destroy or even to expel the Acides that are in the blood it would not be taken without entirely perverting that Liquor seeing it would deaden or drive out the very Acides that make naturally a part of the same and that it must necessarily lose its form and be changed into another kind of juyce if the greatest part of one or the other of its Elementary principles were taken from it Mr. Lameâ—y in his new course of Chymistry is not so wide of the Truth when he says that Quinquina does fix and coagulate the Feaverish Humor much in the same manner as an Alcali sifts the motion of an Acide Salt for in effect it is the property of that remedy to rally bring together and rounite the parts of the liquid body wherewith it is mingled as often as it is put in action by necessary dispositions but that Author hath omited to take notice that this reunion is only made of the proper parts of the blood and that the Febrifick matter remains confounded in the superfluous Serosity wherewith it is evacuated either by Transpiration or by the way of Urine The Principle that I have Established is of another Nature than the Opinions which I have now related it is plain clear just and every way conforms to all the Experiments that have hitherto been made upon the Jesuits Powder and I cannot tell but that I may say to all that shall be made hereafter for whether it be given for our sort of Feavers or for another for Vapours against which I take it to be very good for Dropsies or for other Distempers whether it be given in Substance Infusion Tincture Opiat Extract or Quintessence I am persuaded that its pincipal effect will always be to separate the proper and Homogenious parts of Liquors from those that are Heterogeneous and of a different Nature to them to reunite the one and by that reunion to facilitate the expulsion of the others yet with this difference that that effect will be more or less considerable according to the good or bad use and Administration that shall be made thereof Moreover That we may not too slightly pass over the different Preparations that may be made of Quinquina I am not to omit that Pol Fincius describes a kind of Essence of it which is nothing else but its Tincture Extracted with excellent Wine and afterward gentlely evaporated That Sturmius makes a description of another much like to it that the Author of the Cure of Feavers by Quinquina will have it to be given in Bolus Extract Fermented Liquors and in Infusions made in Wine Ale Distilled Waters Tisance and in common water that Mr. Lamery gives the Preparations of a Tincture of an Extract and of a
Powder for there are some Droguists that infuse it entire and having by that means extracted the first Tincture out of it for their own advantage sell it afterward at the same rate as if it had not lost his chief virtue Hitherto the price of Quinquina or Jesuits Powder hath been very various and uncertain When it was only in the hands of the Jesuits it was sold at Rome and Paris for Eight or Nine Shillings Sterling the Dose which consisted only of Two Drachms but so soon as Droguists began to Trade in it it began to fall in Price so that Three or Four Years ago the best might have been had for about Forty Shillings the Pound weight but no sooner began the English Remedy to be in vogue but men began every where to make Experiments with the Bark of Peru which much enhansed the value of it yet that was not all which raised it to the highest price for Sir Robert Talbot observing that Febrifuges were prepar'd which came very near his own and fearing least some body at length might discover it resolved to buy up all the Quinquina that he could find at Paris and the other chief Towns of France and of England also The execution of this Design making some noise several Physitians Chirurgeons and Apothecaries thought it concerned them to make all hast to provide themselves and some that they might not be wanting in Precaution caused a considerable quantity of the Bark to be brought from Roan and Bourdeaux so that Mr. Audry and Mr. Vilain the two most famous Droguists in Paris having Sold all they had at the Rate of about Fifteen Pound the pound-weight and not being able to procure any more from any place for above a Fortnight there was not a bit to be had at any Droguist's shop in Paris nevertheless some small quantity came at length but it was held up so dear that it was like to have gone off at the rate of an Hundred Crowns the pound-weight since that time the Merchants having imported much from Spain and Portugal and the English Remedy having lost the Advantages of the Mode the price of that Commodity hath fallen daily in so much that at present it does not yield above Four or Five Pound the pound-weight and I make no doubt but that in a short time a Fleet from the West-Indies will make it much cheaper Amongst the Authors whom I have named there are some who endeavouring to explain the properties of Quinquina or the Jesuits Powder according to the principles of the ancient Medicine think it enough to say that it is hot and dry in the beginning of the Second Degree and some others of the number of those who have introduced bad Principles into the New-Philosophy think to mend the matter by saying That Quinquina as an Alkali stops the motion of the acid which occasions the Feaver but that is to illustrate one obscurity by others that are far more obscure That we may give the World somewhat more satisfactory as to that point we must in the first place with Willis take our measures from Experience and allow with him That all things which are actually bitter have great virtue in sifting preternatural fermentations and upon that account it was that the Root of Gentian was heretofore in so great reputation for curing of Quartan Agues and that the Flowers of the lesser Cantaury the Root of Contrayerva and Serpentaria the leaves of Wormwood and Chervil Scammony and many other bitter Drogues are really Febrifuges though in virtue far inferior to the Jesuits Powder Having laid down this from undoubted Truth we must now enquire into the Natural Causes which produce Bitterness in mixt bodies now supposing as it is reasonable we should that the true Elements of Bodies are acid liquid fiery etherean and terrestrial corpuscles it will be a very easie matter to discover those Causes for seeing all bitter things penetrate the Tongue in such a manner that they leave therein a sense of their action for a long time after and that of all the elements none are so proper as acids to produce that effect we must conclude that they are predominant in mixts which have that tast but also since being mingled with many liquid corpuscles they produce only sharp and corroding liquors as the spirits of Salt Vitriol Alum c. that being joyned to fiery corpuscles they make only Causticks as corrosive sublimat the spirit of Nitre cauteres c. and that being in intimate conjunction with Sulphurous and Oily Particles they only produce sweet mixts as Honey Sugar c. It follows that none but terrestrial corpuscles mingled with them in a proportionable quantity can produce a bitter tast and in effect the more of Earth there is in Salt the bitterer it is and on the contrary the more it is refined and depurated the less bitter it is thus Sea Salt dissolved in a moist Air and afterward filtrated through brown paper has no other tast than of an acid spirit though before that dissolution and filtration it was considerably bitter Now since among the Elements that I have named the acid is heaviest and by consequence the coldest and that though the terrestrial be not so heavy as it nor yet as the liquid yet it is more ponderous than the fiery and ethereal we may say that it is temperat I mean of a quality equally distant from the two extreams and that so being with the acid predominant in a mixt body the mixt must certainly be cooling or at least proper to preserve the just temperament of our body But because there are no bitter things made up solely of acid and terrestrial corpuscles and that there are some wherein either the fiery the ethereal or liquid particles are likewise in a considerable quantity so there are some more or less bitter and even more or less cooling and temperate but if we mind the dryness of Quinquina and yet how unapt it is to take fire it will not be hard to conclude That the three Elements which I have named last enter but in a very small quantity into the composition thereof and that by consequence amongst all bittter mixts none can be of a more temperate quality than it From the Principle which I have now laid down concerning the nature of Quinquina all the other properties thereof may be deduced for seeing its predominant parts are the acids whose property is to coagulate the more substantial liquors such as Blood Milk c. and the terrestrial which by absorbing the humidity and unctuosity that relaxates the solid parts does bind and strengthen them of necessity it must be stiptick and astringent and it is in effect in these two qualities principally that the rarity and wonderfulness of its operation does consist as I have made appear in former observations But it is not to be thought as some have imagined that this property of binding renders it so fixative as to keep within the febrifick
again that of Parsley especially in Tertian and double Tertian Agues In continued Feavers he assured us that on the contrary he made use of the Juyces of the Plantin and Lettice and in Malignant Feavers of the Decoction of Scorsonera In Quotidian Agues he commonly besprinkled his Powder with Vinegar of Squills at the proportion of one ounce upon eight of the Jesuits Powder which he afterwards infused sometimes in Rhenish Wine and sometime in White Wine For Quartan Agues he preferred the Juyce of Pentaphyllum Cinquefoil and made his infusion sometimes in Spanish Wine In slow and Hectick Feavers he used the Juice of Colts Foot and Ground Ivie and made his infusion in one part of Wine two parts of Barley Water and one part of the Tincture of Roses He followed that Practice indifferently for both Sexes only with this difference that with Women he ceased the use of his Remedy during their Courses and Prepared it for those that were with Child or in Child-Bed in this manner After that he had wet his Quinquina with two ounces of the Juyce of Quinces he infused it in equal parts of Wine and the Tincture of Roses In respect of Complicated Agues he observed always to give his Febrifuge either in the Declension of the Fit or in the beginning of the sweating but that circumspection was commonly the more useless that without considering if these kinds of Feavers were the cause or the effects of other Distempers he always bent himself wholly to the Cure of them and it was by sticking to that pernicious Maxim that he erred so grosly in the Distemper of the Dauphin of France whose Feaver proceeding from Vomiting and the weakness of his Stomach was encreased considerably by the use of his Febrifuge and on the contrary ceased of it self when Remedies were only applied to correct the indisposition that was the cause of it not but that that Remedy hath some virtue against Vomiting and weakness of the Stomach which proceed from Crudities Indigestion and Relaxation of the Fibres of the Stomach but it is absolutely contrary to those that are raised by a hot intemperature of the Viscera and fomented by the irritation of overflowing choler as that of the Dauphins was Hence one may judg how dangerous it is to trust the life and health of men to the conduct of such kind of People whose knowledg is always too much limited to reach beyond the general Rules and Directions contained in their Receipts and to descend into the exceptions that are indicated by sound judgment experience and the Principles of a judicious Doctrine It is true Sir Robert Talbor did not always observe the directions prescribed in his Receipt touching the time of the infusion of Quinquina but in that he was the more to be blamed for besides that it is impossible that that Bark can in twelve nay even in twenty four hours impart all its bitterness and virtue to the Wine there is still much more time required to have the infusion so depurated as it is to be wished that it may not be nauseous nor apt to cause obstructions in the capillary Vessels which hath caused troublesome inconveniences to many who have been treated by that Emperick Upon the same account it was that in these late times thinking it best to give the Jesuits Powder in Bolus and by that means to revive in some measure the antient and primitive method which was to give it in substance he hath often been the cause of many Diseases far more pernicious than the Ague which he pretended to Cure the different Juyces wherewith he besprinkled his Powder being incapable to render it so distributive as not to stick in some part But what preference soever the infusions contained in the description of the English Remedy may deserve it is still true that seeing they cannot be safe but by the right use of them it is no wonder if their effect hath sometimes badly corresponded to the undertakings of Sir Robert Talbor since he gave them indifferently in all times of the Feaver which cannot be stopt in the beginning without unpleasing consequences that indisposition to speak properly being only a kind of Crisis excited by nature to force out of the Vessels Grude impure and superfluous matters which by consequent cannot be stop too early but that the ferments will lurk and remain in their Focus's quarters and subsist in full force which hath been the cause of those dangerous relapses that first brought the Jesuits Powder into contempt which notwithstanding is a most excellent Febrifuge I do nevertheless acknowledg that there are some occasions wherein in the very beginning of the Feaver an urgent danger seems to demund a speedy truce but when to have time to looae about us we have capitulated with the Disease we have procured an advantage that cannot withou great danger be abused and whereof we cannot secure our selves the possession but by observing the Maxims long since received concerning the use of the Jesuits Powder that is to say without ordering a Diet Blood Letting and especially Purging which by experience we know to be of indispensable necessity And now since I speak of Purging I ought not to omit to say that it may be practised with success before or in the time and after the use of the specifick observing the following Directions When there is nothing that hinders from preparing the Body to receive the Jesuits Powder the essential part of that Preparation consists in Purging Patients well after they have been once or twice Let Blood and that with relation to the quantity of the superfluities and the degrees of repletion When the action of the Ferments seems to resist the operation of the Febrifuge and that therefore one is obliged to administer Purgatives in the very time of using it its force is to be augmented or the Doses doubled to the end that by the motion of the matters which are to be evacuated the perturbation of the Blood be not encreased In fine when after we have done with the Remedy we would by Purgatives prevent relapses it is better to give moderate and reiterated Purges than to give stronger Doses and in less number Futhermore the ambition of Sir Robert Talbor having enclined him to extend the use of his Remedy beyonds its efficacy it is well known that he hath given it on divers occasions for continued Feavers wherein there was neither intention nor remission to be observed which was always attended with tragical symptoms and very often with death it self for that Remedy can never be successfully given in those kind of Feavers unless when some manifest Paroxysms are observed that they continued for several days that the Patients have been Purged by all ways and that they stand in need of a respite to recollect strength and so to relieve Nature and give her time to perfect the Cure of the Distemper which in vain she strove to surmount without that aid and assistance He was
their former agitation they have the means of fastening and uniting together to produce obstructions which are the primitive Causes of all Feavers of the second order and sometimes but seldome of those of the third as I shall now illustrate The Blood cannot be long stopt in a place without being exasperated and growing eager The spirits which are constantly in motion flie away and carry with them first the more volatile parts then the sulphureous which blunted and edge of the Salts and kept them as in fetters which is the cause that these bodies having now nothing to stop their activity break off and diffuse themselves through the mass of Blood to raise and ferment it untill that being dispersed and dissolved in the serosity they are expelled by the ordinary ways or otherways do so adjust and accommodate themselves with the other parts that they disturb their alliance and motion no more There is nothing in Feavers but may be explained by this systeme The obstruction and the ferment which remains in that part which is called the Focus make the Periodick Fits and Paroxysms which are sometimes quicker and sometimes slower according as the exasperated humour is more gross or more subtile the duplicity of Focus's or Magazines make the double intermittent Feavers In a word there happen sometimes so many of these nests that giving no respite they cause continued Feavers which may be called subintrants But it sometimes happens that these acid Salts whether through their their too long continuance in a place or by an excessive heat of the entralls acquire a pretty violent degree of corrosion and are exalted to that height as to become venemous enough for spoiling and wholly ruining all the oeconomy of the blood and causing those Feavers which by a general name are called Malignant but since the more common cause of these Feavers are Vrsenical Salts diffused through the Air which we breath or lurking in the Food we eat and that it is rare that our Natural heat which is mild should produce in our Bodies that which the most violent fire of Chymists can hardly perform in their Vessels I said it was the less ordinary causes of those kinds of Feavers Having laid down these Principles I say that this Remedy is useless for the first and dangerous for the third kind of Feavers useless for the first because they are commonly cured of themselves and dangerous for the third because a venemous Body and such as in no ways can be subdued nor corrected ought never to be fixed on the contrary it ought with all expedition to be driven out by sweats or by other ways of evacuation But I maintain that this Remedy answers all the indications that we can have for the Cure of those of the second order The Explication which I have given of these Feavers which by a general name may be called intermittent furnishes me with four indications for their Cure 1. To stop the Fermentation of the Blood 2. To fix and correct the Acid which is the cause of it 3. To dissolve attenuate and drive out by the ordinary ways of evacuation the gross humours that make obstructions 4. And lastly to repair the loss of the Sulphureous and Vnctuous Corpuscles which sweetened the Blood and which are evaporated by its offervescencie 1. The feaverish ebullition of the Blood is sufficiently stopt by the terrestrial and astringent parts of the Quinquina or Jesuits Powder and by the lesser Centaury and the Opium that enters the composition of the Treacle 2. After so many fair experiments we have no cause to doubt but that the fixed Salt of the Quinquina is the true corrective of the Fermentative Acid of the Feaver 3. Of all the ingredients that enter the composition of Treacle there is none but drives out by sweating and Vrine the impurities of the Blood Lastly we may be easily persuaded that the lesser Centaury is most proper for restoring the Sulphureous parts of the Blood which have been dissipated in the Fermentation if we consider its wonderful virtue in consolidating of wounds and if we observe that the reuniting of separated parts is only performed by a Balsamick and Vnctuous Sulpher wherewith that Plant abounds The wine that is given immediately after contributes much also to that effect especially when the activity of its spirits is checked by the mixture of the Plant in water which on this occasson I should prefer before that of Bugloss I pretend not for all this to exclude the general and common remedies of Physick Nay I maintain that in the beginning once or twice Blood-letting according to the strength and repletion of the Patient are necessary as well for facilitating the circulation of the blood as for remedying the pains of the head and oppressions that Blood swelling in the fermentation may cause in passing through the capillary vessels of the Brain and Lungs This Remedy is not to be given till first by a dissolution of Cassia or Catholicum the excrements of the lower region which may trouble its operation be evacuated And lastly seeing the blood like other Liquors in their ebullition drives always towards the Mesentery a great many impure and foeculent parts like a scum it is necessary in the declension of the evil to purge them out if one would prevent relapses and sometimes more troublesome consequences Seeing it appears by the remarks of the Kings chief Physician and by the foregoing reflexions that Opium may usefully be added to the English Remedy and other Febrifuges of the same Nature I make no doubt but that you will Read with pleasure the Natural History of that excellent Medicine The History of Opium OPium by most of the Eastern people is still named Offium in imitation of the Greeks who commonly change p. into an f. it is the thickned juyce of the Indian Poppy Garrias du Jardin saith that these Heads are big enough to contain four Ounces and a half Our Poppies yield also a juyce which being thickned may pass for a kind of Opium but it hath not the efficacy of that which is brought from hot Countries The Author of the Poor mans Physician proposes a very easie preparation of it he would have us pound the Heads of our Poppies about the end of May then put them in digestion in White Wine for the space of fifteen days and afterwards by evaporation reduce the digested liquor into a due consistency The true Indian Opium comes from the Eastern Countrys according to the testimony of Garrias du Jardin and Cristopher de la Coste The Poppies from which it is taken grow commonly enough in Egypt and therefore Merchands bring much of it from Grand Cairo this is in greatest esteem and is called Thebaick Opium Not to mention the Opium that may be made of the Poppies of Longuedoc and Provence nor of that which is made in Italy we may divide into three kinds that which is brought us from the Indies for there is one
sort of it White which the Indians keep for their own use and which is only drawn out by exstillation having made incision in the Heads of the Poppies and it is to this properly that the Antients gave the name of Opium for as to the second kind which is black and which is extracted only by expression they called it Maeconium the third sort is Yellowish and commonly sophisticated with the juyce of Glaucium which is an Herb whose Leaves resemble those of horned Poppy and are bitter and of an evil smell that Sophistication is discovered by dissolving that kind of Opium in some Liquor for because of that juice of Glaucium which is Yellow it looks like the Tincture of Saffron The good Maeconium that is say Opium of the second kind ought to be black bitter a little biting to the taste of an unpleasant smell pure solid ponderous inflammable and shining within when it is newly broken In Europe it is only used in Physick and most part of our Physicians are so scrupulous in using it that they seem to look upon it as a most dangerous Poyson though it be indeed one of the safest and most wonderful of all our Medicines but the Africans and Asians make extraordinory great use of it both in Health and Sickness for most of them take it dayly in so large a Dose that it amounts commonly to forty or fifty Grains and somtimes also to four or five Drachms at least if we believe Garrias du Jardin and which is more strange when they leave off taking of it they are in danger of death unless they drink Wine which their Religion forbids the reason of that custome is because thereby they find themselves more strong and vigorous and therefore it is that the Turks never fail to take of it in a great Dose when they are going to charge an Enemy or Attack a place Howsoevever it be seeing pain is the cruellest Enemy that men have so there is nothing they ought to esteem more than what eases them of it and therefore some have called Opium a Divine Medicine because it charms the most vehement pain by procuring a soft and sweet sleep and does so quiet and still the impetuous motion of the irritated spirits and exalted fiery Corpuscles that it stops the operation of all those sharp and biting juyces that depended thereupon The Ancients in regard of these admirable effects believed that the virtue of Opium consisted only in fixation which could not proceed but from a cold quality in the same manner as they believed that all dissolutions depended on heat The Moderns on the contrary have observed that because of the Countries from whence it comes its pierceing smell and how easily it is dissolved in the Spirit of Wine it must of necessity be Resinous Sulphureous and consequently of the Nature of those mixts to which a hot quality is assigned In a word some of the latest Authors who have written of it to reconcile those two Opinions say that there are two substances in it the one cold which renders it stupefactive and the other hot which gives it a requisite volatility to convey it to the Brain but seeing neither the one nor the other are in the right as not having grounded their Opinions upon the true Nature of Opium that is to say with relation to the number quality and quantity of the Elementary principles that enter into its composition we must of necessity take another course in explaining more exactly the properties of that rare Medicine For that end seeing Opium is of the kind of bitter Medecines it would seem that I should begin by an enquiry into the principles of bitterness but seeing I have been large enough on that subject when I treated of the Nature of Quinquina I think it more pertinent to refer the Reader to that place than here to make repetitions which doubtless would be as unpleasant as useless concerning the general Doctrine of bitter things Nevertheless that I may descend into the particular Nature of Opium that is to say into the enumeration of those things that distinguish it from other bitter mixts I confess that that distinction being founded upon this that it is both fixative and by consequence Febrifugrous Somniferous and by consequent Anodin we must enquire in what manner it acts upon the blood and spirits in producing such wonderful effects for a more clear notion of this it is to be observed that the particular motion of the parts of the blood wherein its liquidity consists becomes of necessity a hinderance to that of the whole mass when it is grown irregular by fermentative causes because the same parts being then violently agitated and every way dispersed they justle irregularly one upon another and so in some manner resist the action of the chief movers of the blood that causes the depravation of its circulary motion which according as it is more or less considerable causeth a Feaver over watching particular inflamations and the extravasation of sharp and biteing juyces that produce all kinds of pain Now seeing that some depravation may be rectified by bitter things as I have demonstrated when I spoke of Quinquina and that if amongst all mixts of that quality those that are too week acting but imperfectly and those that are too strong irritating many times the humours in stead of fixing them such as are of a moderate force are of greature virtue than others it is not strange if Opium which is but moderately bitter so efficaciously restore to the blood the uniformity of its motion and by consequent that pleasant tranquility that charms us a sleep and eases our pains But in as much as there are inflamations or if one may say so Feavers that are peculiar to every part of the body and that because of disquietness and application to Study and Business the Head is frequently subject to such which cause watchings and which seem rather to proceed from the irritation of the Spirits than the depravation of the motion of the blood it must indeed be concluded that Opium which so quickly rectifies that disorder hath some property which is not common to other bitter Medecines but this is not hard to be explained for supposing that all or almost all the drogues of that quality have the virtue to rally reunite and fix the parts of the Liquors of our body in which they are diffused it is sufficient that Opium above all other bitter Medicines have as many volatile parts as are needful to make those parts wherein its bitterness and virtue of fixing liquids does consist to be conveighed from the Stomach to the Brain that by means of that Sublimation they may have occasion of acting upon the extravasated Liquors and consequently upon those that are appointed for retaining and hindering the dissipation of the Animal Spirits whose impetuous motion causes watching as their calm and stillness produces sleep But to speak somewhat more intelligibly upon this Subject