time the virtue of purging Medicaments is better and more valid seeing some are better new than old others on the contrary and others in their middle age Quando recentia meliora Now that this dignotion may be certain and that the election may be good it ought to be taken from certain differences of sapours and from the variety of the substance whereby we judge some new to be better than old Medicaments as styptick and bitter which being ill from their imbred siccity become worse by age because siccity increases in these by time but being new they have humidity which tempers the excess of heat and siccity Those also that have but weak virtue as the flowers of Violets Borrage purple colour'd Lilly Bugloss Rosemary or those whose virtue is posited in the superficies and therefore easily resoluble because of the rarity of the substance are better new than old as almost all Flowers especially those whose odour quickly fails On the contrary Quando vetusta meliora some old ones are better than new especially sharp Medicaments which are of thin parts because the fiery heat posited in the superficies which causes their biting and burning by age expires And what Acrimony remains within in time waxes mild and is broken as Galen speaks of Eupherbium cap. 2. lib. 3. de comp med gen In Onions and Garlick the case is otherwise for their Acrimony proceeds from heat conjoyned with humidity which taken away they are more sharp and therefore better new Secondly those whose virtue is valid from the temperament and hardly resoluble for the density of their substance not posited in the superficies but shut within are better old than new for all excrementitious and superfluous humidity is absumed in these by time and their natural humidity remains because of their density Many are best in their middle age Qua media atate meliora first sweet secondly unsavoury thirdly salt Medicaments Sweet because these newly gathered are flatulent by reason of their superfluous humidity undigested and being old they are bitter Unsavoury Medicaments also being new abound with superfluous humours whereby they are flatulent and loathed being old they are dead and useless Salt Medicaments lastly ought neither to be too old nor too new for being too old by reason of their ficcity increased and their humidity absumed they are bitter and sharp and being new by reason of superfluous humidity they trouble and subvert the ventricle Now they are antient or new naturally Vetustum recens non omnibus â—quum from a like number of dayes months or years Whence an equal age or newness cannot be given to all because all do not endure altogether the same number of dayes but some grow old sooner and some later CHAP. XXI What election of purging Medicaments may be made from the place A Good purging Medicament may be discerned from an ill one by the place and that either from the native place where Plants grow or from another place near to or remote from the Plant or from a place near to or remote from the Sun or from a place exposed to its heat or obtenebrated and hindred of its heat Neither is it of small moment to know the place from whence the Plant sprung up because from thence together with its Aliment it partook of such virtue as Nature had imparted to that place Gal. cap. 1. lib. 3. de sympt caus For a Tree transferred from Persia into Numidia and Egypt doth not onely depose its malign quality but conveyed to us is wholsome and may bring forth gratefull and wholsome Fruits Now the place in which Plants and Medicaments taken from Plants grow is either hollow and polluted with dung clay and other naughty vapours or free from all strong smelling inquinations or hot or cold moyst or dry In the free place which admits of no heap or filth of dunghils Cloacarum soetor ac putredo plantas insalubres reddit Medicamental Plants as also Nutritive acquire the property due and convenient to their nature while by an attractive faculty they draw the humour familiar to them out of the earth and convert it to their nutriment as those that are nourished with sweet attract sweet humours bitter bitter humours and such as are nourished by salt and nitrous humours attract salt and nitrous humours But in a place not free but inquinated as the suburban Gardens Hortorum suburbanorum insalubria olerâ— which smell more of smoke and dung than earth otherwise unapt to nourish Melons and Cucumbers do not acquire the property due to their kinde and nature but to the mixture of dung and other things and therefore Melons Lettices and other herbs growing in such putrid places are more unwholsome and all Medicaments that grow in a free place better and therefore the rather to be chosen Now those that are hot immoderately sprung in too hot a place Calida loco calido naâ—a qualia are worse as also cold in too cold a place for the similitude of the place to the Plants intendeth and increaseth their quality and malignity diffimilitude tempers and represses them Whence those that abound with excrementitious humidity grow and are nourished in most humid places as Turbith Hermodactyls Polypody because through the humidity of the ground siccity and acrimony are retunded as it is known from Bartram or Pelitory Water-pepper and others The vicinity also and society of one Plant to another makes the quality sometimes better and sometimes worse and is not to be rejected in the election of Medicaments Lupines makes the Vine better which if they be sown besides it causeth it to bring forth sweet clusters The Radish root also makes Hermodactyls better The Epithymus that grows about Thyme is good that which is gathered about Basil is naught Polypody of the Oak is very good that which is gathered off old walls is naught The tree Cassia alone in the field is not worth a Pease cod We have before to wit in the 8. Chapter shewed the contrary of Colocynthis for some become better by vicinity and number others worse Now from a subsolar place or from a place nearer to or more remote from the Sun or Stars some are better or worse so the Oriental Senny Illyrium and Florentine Flower-de-luce the Spanish Angelica the Cretian Thyme the Judaical Bitumen the Ethiopian Cummin the Macedonian Parsley the Mompelian Maidenhair the Arabian Cotten weed or Staechades the Thebane Poppy the Scythian Amomum the Chian Mastick the Damascen Prune the Calabrian Manna the Rhabarb that is the root of Barbary those Oranges that are brought out of France are judged best because of the property of the earth and the virtue of the celestial cause But there can be little judgement given from the aspect and vicinity of the Sun and Stars and the selection of the malignant from the benign thereby is not safe because we can hardly know from what place every Medicament comes or whether they
other parts but that by a speciall faculty they respect this more than that and that more than another part So that many are called Cephalicks Cephalica or head Medicaments that have their whole substance congruent and familiar to the head So fitted and prepared by the long experience and use of learned men that with a certain kinde of sympathy they may be with safety appropriated thereunto As amongst aromaticks these following Muske Amber Civet Cloves Mace Cinamon Calamus aromaticus Squirant Camphure and amongst other more common simples Betony Rosemary Sage Marjorum Balm Staechados the Mirtle-tree the flowers of Betony Clove-gilliflowers and Orange Ophthalmick or Eye-medicaments are these and such like Ophthalmica Eyebright Salendine Fennil Rue and Clary the grains whereof put under the eye-lids for they are so small that they cause no sense or trouble purge eyes exceedingly from corrupt matter Those are called Odonticks which roborate the teeth Odontica and cleanse them as the Mastick-tree and Mirtle Sage and Bay All dulcid things are agreeable and pleasant to the Lungs yet a certain herb called Lung-wort by a peculiar faculty is more especially attributed to the pains thereof If Foxes Lungs help or any way profit Mens lungs Pulmonica as many of the Antients believed then it must happen through the familiarity of the substances no other reason can be rendred Reysons Figs Jujubees Pistac-nuts Dates and Honey do somewhat refresh and benefit the Lungs and that onely by their sweetness Orrice Maiden hair Hyslop and Horehound onely by attenuation Cardiacks or Cordials are these and such like Gold Silver Cardiaca pretious Stones Cinnamon and other suavolent Aromaticks and also Borage Bugloss Carduus Scabious Goats-beard Meadow-sweet Violets Roses and Saffron Stomachick or Medicaments belonging to the Stomack Stomachica are Nutmegs Mastick Wormwood Mint and Dill for these by a particular property help it and also innumerable more benefit it but that by heat rather than any special virtue as Pepper Ginger Mustard and Wine Hepaticks or Medicaments proper to the Liver are these Tansy Hepatica Egrimony Succory Fumatory Rhabarb Splenick or Medicaments proper to the spleen are Cetrack Splenica Capars Tamarisk Epithymus with many more which for brevities sake I omit Sage Rosemary and Primrose Nervalia by a certain property corroborate the Nerves Ground-Pine the Arteries I shall not hereunto reduce such as respect several parts for even a Critick Reader may be content with these for a grain of Salt is sufficient for him that would know its virtue and learn its taste CHAP. XII Of Amulets which carried or hanged up do cure many Diseases by an occult virtue THose Remedies that are called Periammata Periapta and Amuleta that is tryed and suspended Medicaments appertain to such as cure Diseases by an occult faculty Amulets are of two sorts and they are of two kinds one sort consists solely of characters and words another of simple Medicaments hanged about the neck or any other member of the body Physicians laugh at the former and reject it as a thing fabulous delusive uncertain and incredulous for we finde that neither Physician nor Metaphysician ever spake thereof unless some Cacodemoniack that refers them to his Philosophy But a Physician and Philosopher being a Moralist and an Advancer of Nature who in honesty of life and conversation setting the fear of the Almighty before his eyes assayes nothing but by the just good and lawfull rule prescribed by Nature and doth not go about to deceive the ignorant and illiterate people with vain toyes and unlawfull Arts but studies the knowledge of things by their natural causes for Knowledge is the understanding of a thing by its cause and happy sure is he that knows the causes of things Whence Galen concludes that Medicine is not made for the Disease but for the morbificous cause which being removed Periammata the effect is hindred But Amulets neither take away the cause the disease nor symptomes as those falsly perswade themselves to whom they have been suspended being deceived by their perswasion who worship and invoke Devils who also imagine that all things may be done in their name and by their virtue without any other cause Of which and such like impious fellows the Poet thus writes Gens invisa diis maculandi calida coeli Quae nunc stare polos fulmina mittere novit Aethera sub terras adigit montésque revellit Which they perform two manner of wayes for some by the virtue of most Divine names invoke and compell evil spirits and that because every Creature fears and reverenceth his name that created yet others more impious than these wicked men submit themselves offer sacrifice and worship Devils The reason why Witches use onely evil spirits is manifest for good Angels are very seldome Cur cacodaemones ab improbis viris invocentur and not without great difficulty obtained because they wait on Gods command and accompany none but such as are of a clear heart and pious conversation But evil spirits do yield themselves prompt and ready to be invoked falsly favouring and feigning Divinity they are alwayes present that they may deceive and that they may be worshipped and adored Out of this Shop of Devil-adoring Witches issued all those Books of Darkness which Ulpianus by no means will allow to be read Libri improbatae lectiones qui. but ordains that forthwith they be burned The first Founder whereof was as it is recorded one Zabulus that was addicted to the illicite Arts. Afterwards succeeded one Barnabas a Cyprian and in our times Cornelius Agrippa and many other impious men amongst which Crew Paracelsus deserves not to have the lowest seat Paracelsi impietas whose impiety was accompanied with the baseness of all vices Now since that these Characters and Amulets have issued out of these impious mens Shops being grounded on no reason Characteres inde prodterint and pestiferous to Mankinde not onely Physicians but also all Worshippers of God ought to reject and abhor them Yet Fernelius that excellent Physician and Philosopher yea the most famous of our times attributes great virtue to Words and Amulets And certainly if we assent to the Hebrews Vis verborum secundum Hebraeos the best Authors of Virtue and Discipline they tell us we shall finde greater power in words than natural things For say they whatsoever is in the minde voice word or speech all that is in Scripture the letters whereof are full of beavenly mysteries are according to the position of the Stars whence the great Creator of all things will have himself named by two letters Α Ω. Furthermore the more critical Matchiavels of the Hebrews Literarum figura do profess and promise to explain all things by the figure of Letters and by the simplicity composition crookedness defect abundance colligation revolution coronation apertion order and transmutation of letters points and
certain Cloth somewhat bare with wearing is often dipped and inculcated in a fit Emplaister already made up but now melted till it be all infected inquinated and on every side incrusted which is then extracted and exposed to the air that by refrigeration it may become obdurate and so be preserved till future exigency Now hereof are many kinds the differences whereof arise not from the Cloth but the Emplaisters wherein it is dipped for some are catagmatical which are used in solidating and roborating broken bones which are made of astringing and roborating Emplasticks as â„ž Oil of Quinces and Roses and Rams suet ana â„¥ iiij of Frankincense Mastick Pitch Bole armeniack Wheat-flowr ana â„¥ ij of white Wax q. s that an Emplaister may be made wherein when melted the Cloth may be dipped Others have an exsiccating and epuloptical faculty which are applyed to induce skars as this here described â„ž Oil of Roses lb. j. of yellow Wax lb. ss of Venetian Ceruse and Thutian ana â„¥ ij of Lithargy of Gold â„¥ iij. let hereof an Emplaister be made and with a Cloth somewhat worn with age a Sparadrap Joannes Vigonius describes many other forms in his Work of Chirurgy which I neither will nor ought here to transcribe seeing any one for any purpose may take any Emplaister with a small labour and inculcate a Linnen Cloth therein for whosoever knows how to prescribe and make Emplaisters he may easily make Sparadraps thereof by inquinating a Cloth therein liquefied OF PHARMACEUTICAL INSTITUTIONS The fourth Book Of Laws to be observed in compounding Medicaments CHAP. I. Who first compounded Medicaments and the reason of composition SEeing every Disease is the way to Death all presidy must be used for its cure or expulsion ere it be too far increased and such sedulity must be used in finding and selecting Medicaments that we may have alwayes in readiness such as preternaturally conduce to the expugning of several affections and as it were a Wood of the more excellent Medicaments Yet may not these Medicaments whether simple or compound be exhibited till they be changed by Art and after much preparation as we have before demonstrated wherein several Simples should not onely be washed dryed beaten or infused macerated expressed and made fit for commixtion but they must be united with such care and proportion that some new mixture may arise from their complexion in this concourse their several virtues if not integrally at least preserved so as they may perspicuously be seen while the commixtion is new and not perfectly fermented cap. 2. lib. 1. comp med gener But because Medicaments exhibited alone sometimes hurt and mixed with others admirably advantage when the qualities of any Medicament is proved but the one may hereby be improved for certain it is that even simple Medicaments have several and different qualities and the other which is noxious either obtunded or ejected and so the best will be more effectual And though some Simples hurt not yet because they do not sufficiently help they are not used without commixtion with others as an Emplastical Medicament of which according to Galen cap. 13. lib. de Ther. ad Pis none is simple and therefore the first and best Authors of Emplaisters have excogitated how to melt and make some of Oil. Now composition of Medicaments is necessary Quis primus medicamentorum compositionem tradidit for many reasons shewed in our former Book which was first of all approved and defended by Mautias Herophilaeus afterwards by Cappadox Heras Musa Asclepiades and Andromachus cap. 2. lib. 2. comp med gen but chiefly by Galen cap. 2. lib. 1. comp med gen Epilogismo who having shewed the reason of compounding Medicaments teaches the legitimate proportion of the Compounds and the manner of their exhibition Not like those Empiricks who refer all Medicaments to imaginations chance or fortune except some few which as it is apparent by the common suffrage of all are bettered by composition all consisting of one and the same faculty of which also some are fitted by nature to cure which tenent Galen cap. 3. lib. 6. comp med loc denies Sarcoticum optimum ex facultatibus oppositis and proves by the example of the best Sarcotick confected of Ceratum and a twelfth part of Verdigrease that Medicaments of two or more opposite qualities or faculties may be best of all compounded for Ceratum produces corruption Aerugo erodes ulcerous flesh yet the Medicament compounded of these is excellent both for generating flesh and filling the hollow ulcer Thus we mix hot with cold weakning with roborating and cordial Medicaments with Poysons compounding our best Medicaments of Simples endued with contrary or different qualities Galen cap. 29. lib 9. de facult med Historia Galeno nota tells us of one of that number who hold that Medicaments should be compounded according to experience onely no reference had to reason to whom a gouty fellow by chance came while he was boasting of his podagrical Medicament who being so moderately pained before this Empirick applyed his salve to his foot that he could go but was with pain after one sleepless night so handled that he was so far now from going as before that he could not endure to be carried The event therefore of fortuitous Compositions is alwayes fortuitous and oft unfortunate as Galen shews at large besides the above-mentioned story wherewith he derides the vanity and slothfulness of the Pseudomedick who also judges it requisite that a Physician should not onely know the causes of Compounds but the way and manner of their composition and also that he should compound the best Medicaments for every Disease while it is time lest that punishment be inflicted upon him which was upon two Physicians well known to Galen cap. 1. lib. 2. comp medic gen the one whereof was starved with famine the other not suffered to perform his function and all for the loss of some forms of Compounds CHAP. II. Of the basis of Medicaments and their collocation in Forms or Receipts IN prescribing a Medicament we should first appoint a basis that is some simple Medicament as the chief in that composition and most fit for depelling the disease upon which the rest may depend As when we undertake to oppugn any disease if it be simple accompanied with no ill symptome we choose onely a simple Medicament of an equal virtue and just auxiliary but if no Simple be apt for it then we must compound one Medicament of many the basis whereof must be averse to the disease and adde others which may corroborate the member affected or carry the quality of the Medicament to the parts more distant Others also we must adjoin to make it acceptable and gratefull to the palate or to felicitate and facilitate the work Now the basis is for the most part more prepollent in quality that in quantity as in aromatical and purgative Confections and by how much the disease to be depelled is more
catharticke will sufficiently exagitate the ventricle Wherefore the Physician does wisely who being called by some patient never before seen of him askes him whether his body needs a weake and gentle or valid and strong purge and whether he be most commonly laxative or restringed that he may the better accomodate his purgative Medicament neither too much nor too little to exagitate his ventricle nor yet to exclude more in quantity or quality than he should Yet if the body wholly abound with ill humours he may not at once but by little and little not on one day but many remove them for nature cannot beare great evacuations of any humours whatsoever but delights in graduall actions wherein is no violence CHAP. VII A just quantity of Medicaments can scarce be defined yet a little in excesse or defect is not perillous THE Medicinary Art is indeed conjecturall yet much helped by experience augmented by reason and confirmed by reason and confirmed by the authority of Doctors who trying effects by the indagation of causes and being more skilfull and prudent by long observance have left Theorems to posterity grounded upon many strong and necessary reasons whereby diseases may be known remedies invented and a quantity of Medicaments described if not just and definite yet so accomodate to nature and the disease that one may triumph and the other be captivated For what perill can be doubted or expected If where an ounce of Cassia is convenient seven or nine drams be exhibited if where oue dram of Rhabarb is requisite two or four scruples be assumed a small errour should not cause great feare and as all excrementitious humours cannot alwayes be educed by a Medicament without indangering sanity so we shall not need to suspect any harme by the eduction of some of them onely that are not of an offensive quality since meat and drink are not alwayes ingested after the same measere and at the same time Nor yet ill humours always bridg diseases with them Many have often eaten Hemlock instead of Persly in Pottage which the maid hath mistaken because of their convenience in externall form those also who love Froggs eat Toad stools often without harm Yet we must with all judgement and artificiall conjecture endeavour to make the quantity of the Medicament respond to the strength of the nature and the burthen to be educed which if it be copious and a proportionate Medicament cannot with safety be exhibited at once it is better to wash it away in severall dayes than at once both deject strength and humours It s sad to reiterate purgative Medicaments Suppurgatiâ—â—imenda where one will accomplish the design or to minister a violent one where a gentle one would sufficiently exonerate For suppurgation is dangerous which by too much opening the veins sometimes excites the dysentary evacuates blood and prostrates the integrity of natures strength to danger It s better therefore to relinquish some of the superfluous humours than by immoderate vacuation to protrude both necessary and excrementitious ones And as the same quantity of the same Medicament given to the same man at severall times may produce different effects so as its quantity varyes it acts variously one while is more proper for this another while for that disease for if Aphor. 1. lib. 4. Hippocr a woman with child be advised to purge which she may without fear or danger do betwixt the fourth and sixth moneth of her pregnâ—ncy she may confidently assume a roborating Medicament in a small quantity that the cause of that molestation whereof pregnant women complain may be gently removed and the foetus receive no detriment thereby But when the quantity of Opium Diagredium or such Medicaments which have great power in a little bigness is to be excoginted let it be with great care and prudence prescribed and pondered that if a just quantity can scarce be defined the exoberance or defect may â—e very small for whereas the least thing is not reached by the Law nor judged by the Praetor yet we may cafily offend in the least excesse CHAP. VIII Of such Medicaments as may without harme be taken in great quantity for whom they are convenient and when Every Medicament doth more or lesse offend nature as its faoulty is stronger or weaker by how much a catharticke is more grievous in odour or sapour by so much it causes more molestation for all purges saith Galen cap. ult lib. quos quando quibus offend the ventricle especially in its mouth which consisting of of many nerves is of more accurate sensation and therefore we either mixe benevolent lenocinyes with purgatives or select such as are not so ingratefull nor so much disturb the ventricle Which if they can be procured must not yet be presently exhibited save by those for whom they are convenient and in such quantity as may respond to the strength of nature and be easily born Which quantity is various according to the various faculties of the Medicaments which if they be weaker may be exhibited by so much in a greater quantity if stronger in a lesse Now I call them purgatiâ—es weak which by gentle and benign motion of the ventricle cleanse the first region of the body and are measured rather by câ—â—â—â—es than drams as Mannae the pulpe of Tamarinds the pith of Caffia 〈◊〉 â—â—e like Those valid or strong which being small in quantity produce groat and violent effects and which are rather weighed by grains and soruples than by drams of which hereafter all them are accounted weak which are measured by ounces and they vidleâ—â— which are 〈◊〉 by grains they indifferent which are measured by drams as Rhabarb Senny Aloes and the like all which as also all lubricating and roborating purgatives may be taken in greater quantity This also holds good in alterating Medicaments Alterantium dosis which by how much they recede lesse from the symmetry of our body as being onely hot or cold in the first degree may be prescribed in greater quantity by how much they recede more as hot or cold in the fourth degree may be exhibited in lesser quantity it is not then without perill copiously to assume Pepper Bartram Euphorbium or Cicuta Hedum or Water-Lillies because by the former the intralls would be inflamed by the later benummed and chilled But since roborative Medicaments differ much in their active powers they must be used in different quantities as cordiall waters by ounces conserves roborating the principall parts by drams more potent Antidotes by scruples Bezoar-stone and Unicorns horn by grains Now such liquids as are assumed either to roborate alter or purge may be given in a greater quantity Furthermore not only the efficacy of the Medicament but also the state of the body and humours require an augmentation Qui Medicamentis vaitdis qui benignis egent or diminution in quantity a gentle and weak Medicament will not move a strong and firme body which hath been either accustomed
to labour and frequent purgation or pestered with many obstructions whereas the soft and slender bodyes of women and children which are either dry or macilent as also of pregnant women and persons newly recovered from diseases will not endure strong ones The species also and plenty of the humour Frigidus crassus humor tardius purgatur varyes the quantity of the Medicament for a viscid grosse frigid Melanchollicke pituitous and tenaciously adhering humour will hardly be deduced but requires a more valid and potent catharticke for its exclusion a thin calid and chollerick humour will sometimes be ejected by spontaneous vomit very easily by a purgative Medicament Furthermore the state of the heavens the nature of the region and the condition of the season of the year require a different quantity of Medicament for seeing the belly is obdurate in a cold season Aphor. 5. lib. 3 and a rigid Winter coartactes and condenses the body especially in the frigid region or climate the humour then tenaciously adhering is not propelled save either by a strong Medicament once or a gentle one often and in abundance exhibited and as the year for the most part causes diseases according to its own constitution Aphor. 5. lib. 3. so according to the species of the humour causing the disease and its greater or lesser progresse it is requisite that not only the kind but quantity of the Medicament be changed which must be more copious if by reason of the body humour state of the heavens region or custome purgation be difficult as on the contrary if purgation be easy in lesser quantity as shall appear hereafter CHAP. IX Of such as must be prescribed in small quantity EVery purgative Medicament hath either a strong or a weak facultie which by a particular propriety respect the gentle or potent eduction of this rather than another humour Now that Medicament I call gentle or weak â—landum medicamentum quale which assumed in an indifferent quantitie moves the ventricle benignely and educes moderately but superfluously assumed educes superabundantly For if an immoderate quantitie of Rhabarb or Cassia which are of the most familiar Medicaments to nature be assumed as an ounce and a half of the former or half a pound of the later it will move either stoole or vomit or both with a great and immoderate turbation of the ventricle and agitation of the humours That I call a potent purgative Potenter purgans which in small quantity as that that 's weighed by grains causes a copious and great dejection which must be given in small quantity as also all such as are ingratefull rare dear indued with potent efficacious vertue or partaker of any malignant quality Those are ingratefull Ingrâ—ta qualia which by their odour grievously affect our nose or brain as Castor Sagapenum and Assa-foetida which being a stinking gum the Germans call the Devills dung or by their sapour such as are bitter Medicaments as Colocynthis the lesser Centory sharp as Euphorbium Bartram most acid as the Oil of Sulphur Vitriol a few drops whereof in a due proportion mixed with the syrup violets make it of a red shining colour and somewhat acid of taste and thereby very pleasant to the eyes and palate A certain Court Doctor at his first coming gave this syrup thus altered by Art equally for all diseases with his own hands who deceiving the vulgar with his ostentations called it the secret of secrets Those that are rare and dear as Gems Precious-stones Pearle Balsam Precious Aromatas Amber Musck Civet and such as work an alteration in the body by their calidity or frigidity in the fourth degree must be prescribed in small quantity Those which by a certain antipathy Qua magna cautela sumenda and speciall potency impaire the principles of life spirit and heat consume the flesh and destroy the integrity of sanity must not be exhibited without extraordinary care and prudence as Vipers flesh against the pestilence or leprosy the reins or rather the flesh of the loines of Stincus to provoke to Venery Cantharides against the retention and obstruction of urine for these Cantharides rightly prepared and mixed with fit Medicaments and administred in a small quantity do move urine without harm but in a great quantity they stay it and impensly calefy the bladder Rondeletius Minerals also and all such as have more efficacious faculties must be taken sparingly such as are more remiss liberally Furthermore those that conduce to the dulcoration correction or deduction of other Medicaments must be mixed alwayes in a small quantity as Cynamon Sanders or Squinant to conciliate suavity of odour or sapour in the Medicament Ginger to the castigation of Agarick Saffron of Opium opening and mciding Medicaments to the dilation of the quality of other Medicaments to the parts to be cured But nothing doth so much dehort from a great quantity of any Medicament as its effrenate prepotent and malign quality which as soon as it is educed into act doth grievously disturb Nature and excites a Troop of symptomes Those which are rare and by their price fit Princes and rich men if necessity require may be prescribed in small quantity CHAP. X. In what quantity Simples must be mixed for composition FEW Compounds are found to confist of many Simples equal in proportion but two or more exceed the quantity of the rest They exceed which are the matters Vicegerents and induce an apt form to the Medicaments as Oil Wax Lithargy in Salves and Unguents or which are most potent in action and constitute the basis in composition as Aloes in many Pills as also such as have but weak faculties in great quantity or are adhibited for the preservation of others as Honey and Sugar in Electuaries and Syrups This rule is chiefly to be observed in the proportion of Medicaments to be compounded that that which brings more utility to the Medicament should be adhibited in greater quantity in composition They which are symbolical whose matter is equally apt to induce the form of the Medicament and which are in their faculties equally averse to the cause and symptome of the part affected should be mixed in equal weight which seems to be observed in the Tetrapharmacal Unguent which consists of equal portions of Wax Rosine Pitch and Bulls fat And also in Justinus his Electuary which by Nic. Mirepsius his description cap. 403. receives an equal portion of thirty Simples all which are thought by a certain propriety to break stones and clear the urinal passage To these is added Honey and Sugar in a different proportion that the Electuary may acquire a convenient form and apt consistency and be fitter for long preservation Some portion of simple Medicaments is measured by number some by weight others by both some in measures some in handfulls others in pugils The quantity of roots are variously measured for their dosis according to their various virtue and efficacy in operation If their faculty
second degree bilious and melancholical moving urine its root cocted and drunk in wine takes away the graveolence of the whole body depelling it through the bladder with urine CHAP. LXVII Of Phu or Valerian PHu which some call wild Spikenard and Pliny Cretian Spikenard is Valerian by some called Marinella whereof there are five sorts the first is the male the second the female the third the small the fourth the red and the fifth the Graecian Valerian The first whereof Dioscorides alone makes mention by knowledg hath a cubital caul geniculated concave and articulated with tare intervals its leafs are long late smooth green sinuated very like wild Parsnip leafs two whereof emerge out of each genicle of its surcles its flowers are fair small umbellically collected on the tops of its branches purpureous and odorate its root is of a digital spissitude transversly sected with many fibres and adherent to the surface of the Earth It is calefactive and alexiterial Vires whence some call it Theriacaria herba Benedicta it is mixed with Antidotes and moves urine and flours The rest of the Valerians which are seldom or never used are at large described in Herballs CHAP. LXVIII Of Fumitory FUmitory is so called because its succe immitted into the eyes cause tears like fume It is an herb well known growing either in Gardens or Fields it is very like Coriander it emits many red and sometimes white flowers acuminated on one side like the crist of a little bird they call the combed Lark there are two sorts thereof the first is vulgar fruticating among segetives and in a prique places the other which growes most in Gardens is bulbous subcineritious variegated sometimes with white sometimes with luteous or otherwise coloured flowers All Fumitory is acrimonious and amare Vires it moves bilious urine and cures the obstructions and imbecillity of the Liver It s juice stilled into ones eyes wonderfully helps against caliginosity and acuates the sight The vulgar Fumitory is in frequent use from which two Syrups are denominated the one is the greater Syrup of Fumitory the other the lesser CHAP. LXIX Of Eyebright THis plant which is by some called Ophthalmica and Ocular herb is low scarce exceeding a foot in heighth it emits gracile and black Caulicles from its slender and fibrous root its leafs are small and serrated like dwarfe elder flowers white maculated with minute points it growes in macilent dry and incultivated places near high-wayes and margins of fields that are not umbrous it flourishes about the beginning of Autumn and should then be gathered and kept or else its water distilled while it is fresh for their eyes to which it very much conduces and is thence by the Germans called Solamen oculorum some call it Euphrosyne because it exhilarates the mind for which effect Bugglosse is sometimes so denominated It calefies gently Vires siccates potently and helps the eyes admirably for when it is adhibited it takes away caliginosity and oures all pituitous diseases therein the wine wherein much Eyebright is macerated at Vintage time doth with much efficacy adjuvate the Eyes and expugne their affections CHAP. LXX Of the lesser Centory THere are two differences of Centories the one greater the other lesse which are very dissident each from other in form and faculties for the greater hath bicubital Cauls long leafs cohaering together and crenated in the margin with heads turbinated on the tops of its branches obduced with herbaceous scales like Lacea out of which stamineous caeruleous and elegant flowers erupt which greater is not of any great moment in medicine though the ancients for its dignity have called it Ceutaurium or Panax But the lesser Centory is frequently used which from its potency in captivating and expugning Fevers is often called Febrifugium and sometimes from its amaritude Fel terrae and sometimes Limnision It is a small plant assurging with a pedal angulous Caul vested with small leafs like Hypericum two at each interval coronated with small purpureous flowers which in the day-time are explicated in the night recluded short Cods succeed these wherein small grains are coarctated it growes spontaneously in incultivated herbous macilent and aprique places it is found in some places with a luteous in others with a white flower I have seen one with purpureous leafs in the middle in other parts with white ones The lesser Centory calefies potently Vires expurges and cures inveterate Ulcers its decoction takes away the obstructions of the Liver and helps against the induration of the milt its succe in sod wine educes flours and accelerates delivery and emplasticated with honey it takes away dimnesse and caliginosity from the Eyes CHAP. LXXI Of Rhaponticum RHaponticum is not Rubarb nor the greater Centory as many deceived with their affinity have credited for †But now we have it plentifully growing in England Rhaponticum is a peregrine root coming from the Regions beyond Bosphorus in Thracia and Pontus in Euxinum of the crassitude of the greater Radish somewhat black and ruddy like the greater Centory fragile of a dark red colour within and of a ferrugineous subamare astrictive and inodorate sapour void of all acrimony There growes in many Gardens in France especially in such as appertain to them that delight in rare simples Rhaponticum that so well agrees with the antique that it seems to be the very same That root is best which admits no Worms and which in manducation becomes pliant and clammy without much astriction and colours the spittle palely red and Croceous It cures the imbecillity of the stomack Vires is good against the lienous hepatical coxendical and convulsive dolours cures burstnesse circuits of Feavers and bitings of venenate animals it is an useful ingredient in Antidotes CHAP. LXXII Of Meum or Spignell MEu or Meum Species is twofold the one most laudable which is found in Macedonia and copiously in Athamanthe whence they call it Athamanticum the other more vulgar which grows in many places in France and Italy which Herbalists call sometimes the wild Dill sometimes tortuous Fennel both of them have small angust and capillaceous leafs gracile and cubital surcles out of whose summities umbells with candid flowers emerge to which angulous long odorate and acrimoniously amare seeds succeed greater then Cumin seed its roots are very slender and odorate It calefies in the third Vires and siccates in the second degree it incides attenuates expurges removes obstructions moves urine and flours discusses the flatuosity of the stomack takes away the stopings of the Liver and emends the vices of the reins CHAP. LXXIII Of Anethum or Dill. BOth Medicks and women make use of Anethum the women in June at which time it is coronated with flowers and most fragrant excerpe or cut it dry it keep it and recond it with their Linnen to conciliate a pleasant odour to them but the Medicks use its seed also to many things as
the best those that come out of Syria Alexandria and other Regions are black and not so good the latter Writers also assert That the best Opium flows from white Poppy That which comes from Cambaia flows from the great Poppy there called Carcax each of whose heads equalizes in magnitude an Estriches Egge so that it is no wonder that such plenty of succe should erupt from them when vulnerated All agree not about the qualities of Opium for Dioscorides and many more say it is cold in the fourth degree Its qualities Matthiolus opposes them from its odour and acrimony I think it is of a mist quality participating of a light and fugacious calidity but a more valid and contumacious frigidity Besides its elementary qualities it hath others also which much commend it if exhibited opportunely and in a just dosis and much discommend it if unduly used for it doth not onely induce tremour and palsey but leads to a perpetual sleep Rightly prepared and rightly administred it helps much for it cures perpetual watchings by conciliating sleep it allayes and deceives the fierceness of any dolour by making the sense more stupid It is much used in Mauritania and Asia where they call it Amfium and Osium as though Opium were the most admirable exhilarator of the minde and erecter of the body whereunto they have so accustomed themselves that if they should totally abstain from it they would periclitate their lives The Turkish Souldiers used to eat it that they might be more chearful for battel and like drunken or mad-men precipitate themselves carelesly into danger Some think it stimulates to venery but reason and experience refragate its use rather arceating its heat by making the motion of the flesh more ignave CHAP. 2. Of Elaterium ELaterium is numerated among mochlical Medicaments which agitate the body by a turbulent motion which though it be violent yet Hippocrates used it Sect. 2. Lib. de loc in hom Now it is seldome usurped except in a few Regions in Italy where some take it for the curation of such diseases as milder remedies will not profit Elaterium according to Theophrastus is the inspissated succe of a wilde Cucumer which by a special propriety will keep two hundred years it is saith he the most diuturnal of all Medicaments and that is best which is oldest which to experience a certain Medick having received some for a gift very old kept it till its two hundred years were expired The cause why it endures so long I think is its copious humour whereby it extinguishes a Candle if it be set near it till fifty years be perfected The manner of its extraction and inspissation is notorious which he that knows not may learn of Dioscorides Wilde Cucumer which we call anguine or asses Cucumer is very like the sative onely its leaves are not so angulous and more hoary its fruits are lesser palely green and full of seeds and succe which leap out at the first touch like siliquous Arsmart which they thence call Nolime tangere The wilde Cucumer Vires and succe of its fruit which they call Elaterium saith Galen are accommodated to Medicine The succe is very amare hot in the second degree it moves flowers kills young and by moving the belly educes waters CHAP. 3. Of Ladanum LAdanum is a kinde of liquor exuding out of the leaves of Cistus growing in Cyprus where it is called Ledon which if Dioscorides say true is collected by the she-goats for the Kids and Goats feeding upon the leaves of Cistus whose innate pinguetude in the spring-time they deterge and receive with their beards and carry it on their hairy legs whereunto it adheres which afterwards the Incolists kemb off and percolate making it into lumps and so keep it calling it Ladanum Some reject this manner of accepting Ladanum as fabulous and yet substitute not an easier way It is indeed so tenacious and viscid that it will easily follow contact and may be excerped otherwise The Cyprian odorate greenish soft Ladanum that hath not gathered sand and filth is the best The Arabian is more vile and worse It is calefactive and mollifies opens the orifices of the veins Vires mixed with black Wine Myrrhe and Oyl of Myrtle it keeps on deciduous hair It flows not from Cissus that is Ivy as Pliny thought but Cistus a small surculous lignous shrub emitting long and blackish leaves glutinous to the tact which in the Spring exude a certain fat odorate and rosinous matter which collected by any Art is called Ladanum It bears small whitish flowers like little Roses CHAP. 4. Of Hypocistis BEsides Ledon or the Ladanigerous Cistus there are two other varieties the one Masculine Cistus masc out of whose roots springs Hypocistis whose spurious branch is like to a Quince-tree some call it Ludonorum others Robethron Fuschius fungus its succe is extracted as that of Acacia concreted and kept The other Cistus is Foeminine which bears long Cistus foem and not angust leaves white and small flowers and small seed in a triangular hull it is very like the Ladanigerous Cistus The Masculine Cistus is a small shrub greater then Thyme with leaves like Basil but rounder rosaceous flowers like them of the Foeminine but lesser with a lignous and hard root out of whose middle Hypocistis pullulates as viscum out of an Oak and other trees Hypocistis is very rare in whose stead we use Acacia Vires whose saculties are analogous though more imbecil it is chiefly astrictive it helps the Dysenterian collical and all fluxes of blood It siccates also and roborates and is a very efficacious remedy in all fluxions CHAP. 5. Of Tartar AS the substance of Milk part whereof is butyrous and ligher part caseous and crasser and part serous and moderate is not homogeneous so neither is the substance of Wine part whereof is tenuious and is called the flower of Wine part somewhat heavier occupying the middle of the Hogshead and part more crass which settles to the bottom which some call Lees and the more recent Tartar perhaps because this is the Empyricks Idol as Tartac was the Hevaeans But I rather think it so nominated because it possesses the lowest place And though Tartarum be but Lees of Wine yet is it indued with many faculties for as some excrements in an humane body are benigne and useful as Sperm Milk and other humours included in other parts for certain uses so are these dregs useful for as the Proverb goes No Wine without Lees for this excrement conserves it longer from corruption as ashes do fire from extinction Tartarum included in a Cloth-bag and suspended in a Wine-cellar or other moist place will exude an oleous humour which they call Oyl of Tartar which delabes from the Canvas bag into the vessel subjected as we have shewed in our Officinary It may be educed also by ascent but the work will be more and to less purpose The ashes of
binding our Apothecaries have seldom the right Acatia but instead thereof use the juyce of Sloes Accended burned Access a fit of an Ague Gout c. Accelerator in plain English an hastener Physically it is used for the Muscle that opens the passage of the Seed and Urine Acerb sowr or sharp Acetum Vinegar of Beer Acetaries Sallets or Herbs mixed with Vinegar to stir up appetite Acetum Vini Vinegar of Wine Acetum destillatum Distilled Vinegar Acetabula see Cotylidones Achor vel tinea or scald-head is a Disease possessing the musculous skin of the head or hairy scalp and eating thereinto like a Moth. Accidents something necessarily accompanying a Disease Acquires obtains Acrimony sharpness or freting of any sharp or corrosive water or humour of the body Aconite a venemous herb having a root like to a Scorpion shining within like Alabaster Acuminated sharp pointed Acute Diseases such as are sharp and violent but of short continuance Adamant A pretious stone commonly called a Diamond brought from Arabia and Cyprus It s the hardest of all stones insomuch that it cutteth Glass and yieldeth neither to the hammer nor fire yet it may be dissolved with warme Goats-blood Adeps farness Adjacent neer adjoyning Adjection casting or adding to Adimpleates fills up Adjuvant causes such as are subservient to the principal causes Adjument help and relief Adjuncts qualities dispositions and symptomes annexed to a Disease Adjutorious helpful Admixtion mingling together Adscitious false counterfeit Adulation flattery Adust the blood is then said to be adust when by reason of extraordinary heat the thinner parts are evaporated and the thicker remain black and dreggy Adustion burning of the blood Adulterate corrupt or counterfeit Adventitious not natural but proceeding from some Cause existing without the proper body Adstriction binding or shutting up the pores of the skin Aegilops fistala lacrymalis a tumor in the great corner of the Eye by the root of the Nose Aeftuary an hot-house or Stove Affectus unimi affectionis motions or passions of the mind Affected troubled or distempered Afflux flowing to any particular part Agaric a kind of Mushrom or Toad-stool of great use in Physick it grows upon the Larch tree in Italy and is white light brittle and spungeous it purgeth phlegm and opens obstructions in the Liver Agitation shaking any liquor together in a glass Ahenum a brass skillet with a cover Ablution is exaltation clensing impure things by often infusion reducing them to purity Albation is the abstraction of Dust moths gret cleaving to a thing with a Hares foot feather spather or such like Albugo is the white spot in the Eye called pin and web Alacrity chearfulness Alchimy is an art dissolving natural congealed substances and likewise congealed substances dissolved for the more grateful wholsom safe preparing of Medicines for mans body an art which produces magisterial and essential medicines from mixed bodies Alkakengie winter Cherries the red round berries whereof are good against obstructions of the Liver the stone and divers diseases of the Kidnies and Bladder Alcolismus is an operation by calcination ribellation and other means which reduceth a matter into Allcool the finest pouder that is Alexipharmaca Medicines to resist the plague and poyson Aliment food nourishment Aliotica altering Medicines Alopecia a falling off of the hair Alumen raw Allum Alamen combustum burnt Allum Aloes Zoccatrina it s brought from India the best is clear and red like the liver it s an excellent medicine to purge choler and proper to be taken by them that are troubled with the Emrods Allantois the skin that holds the Urine of the Child during the time it abides in the womb Allauded praised commended Alteratives medicines changing the humor and temper of the body Amalgamation is the putting together solution or calcination of familiar vessels by argentum vivum Amaritude bitterness Amaurosis Gutta serena A disease in the eyes viz. when the sight is gone and no fault to be seen Ammoniac a gum like frankincense so called because it grows in Lybia where the Temple of Ammon stood Hence is also a Salt so called found in Affrick under the sand Amnios the inner skin that compasseth the Child round in the womb Amputation dismembring or cutting off the arm leg c. Amulet any thing hang'd about the neck to preserve one from inchantment Analeptica restorative Medicines Analogical answerable in every particular Anastomasis an opening of the mouths of the veins Anastomaticum Medicine opening obstructions Anatomy is an artificial cutting of the outward inward parts Aneurism a swelling caused by the breaking the internal coat of an Artery the external being whole Anfractures turning and winding Angina a swelling in the throat which hinders breathing and swallowing and yet no defect in the lungs or breasts Animosity courage stoutness Anodines Medicines to aswage pain Anorexia a loathing of meat caus'd from abundance of crude and raw humors Anthera a Compound medicine used for sore mouths Anthrax a Carbuncle coming from blood which is black thick and filthy burning exceeding hot Anthonies fire the shingles Antidote a Medicine against poyson or any medicine which serves to amend any distemper of the body Antimony a Mineral like to Lead Antimonii vitrum Glass of Antimony or Stibium Antimonii Regulus Antimony preciptiate Antinomasia a naming before or that of any sort which is most excellent as Barbary gold Orient pearl c. Anus the fundament Apertion opening Apophlegmatisms Medicines which draw Flegm from the head Apoplexy a deep steep wherein there is a total privation of sense and motion except breathing Apostema Hepatis the Aposthume of the Liver which comes from a fall bruise or being too strait laced Appellations Names Apothects an Apothecaries-shop Apozem a Drink made with Water and divers herbs and spices used in stead of a syrup A prique place where the Sun shines Appropinquating adjoyning bordering near Neighbourhood Aptha certain Ulcers bred in the uppermost part of the mouth Aqua fortis strong Water made of Copperas Allum and salt-peter Aqua Regis a Water which divides Gold made after the manner of Aqua fortis only adding sal Armoniack Aquatical Which grows in the Water Aranea tunica the cobweb coat or tunicle Arbuscle a little shrub Arceates drives away Ardent burning or heating Arid dry Aromata Spices and sweet-smelling drugs or perfumes Aromatical smelling sweet like spice Aromatized spiced or perfumed Aromatization is an artificial manner of preparation whereby Medicaments are made more sweet to the smell and acceptable to the taste and more comfortable to the heart it is done by spices commonly Arsenicum Arsenick many wayes a good healer Arteries proceed from the heart are in a continual motion quicken the body they carry the vital blood to every part of the body their motion is that which is called the Pulse you may feel it at your Temples Wrist Groin c. Arthetical Medicines proper for the joynts especially for the heart Arthritis is a pain in the joynts
that maketh black Denominated so called Dentifrice such things wherewith the teeth are rubb'd to make them white Depose put off Depraved wicked vile base Depurges draws forth Descention is when the essential juyce dissolved from the matter to be distill'd is brought back and doth descend Despumation a scumming or taking off the froth Despumed purged clarified Detersory clensing Detriment hurt or damage Deturpates fouleth defileth makes filthy Diabetes a continual and unnatural making of water after which there comes a violent thirst and consuming of the whole body Diacatholicon an Electuary much used in Physick so called because it serves as a gentle purge for all humors Diagnosticks signs whereby is known the disease which the patient hath Diagalanga a confection of hot spices good against the wind chollick and cold distempers of the inward parts Diagridiates medicines that have scamonny or diagridium in their composition Diagridium Scammony is the juyce of a forreign plant dried it s a most strong and violent purge being boyled in a Quince it is in part corrected which when it s thus prepared Apothecaries call diagridium Diamond a well known jewel or pretious stone Diapasm medicinal pouders unguents or liniments used for delicacy and perfume Diapedisis the sweating of blood through the pores of the veins Diaphoenicon an electuary used by physitians to purge phlegm and choler Diaphoreticks medicines provoking sweat Diapnaetica medicines that bring a tumor to suppuration that it breaks a sore Diaphragma the midriff a skin that separateth the stomach and breast from the belly Diaprunum an electuary made of Damask prunes and divers other simples good to cool the body in hot burning Feavers Diarrhaea a looseness of the belly by which the excrementitious humors are sent forth without blood or food and without the Ulceration of the Intestines Diasena a purging electuary good against quartan Agues and all other Diseases proceeding from melancholly Diatraganth a Confection of Gum Traganth and other simples good against hot diseases of the breast Diet signifieth most commonly a diet drink Difflation is when through heat spirits arising and with a kind of bellows blown in the adverse Camaera and there are found congulated Diffoded digged as a hole or ditch is digged in the earth Diffused dispersed scattered or spread Digestive medicines are such as prepare evil humors to be purged out of the body Digestion is simple maturation whereby things unconcocted in artificial digestory heat as food by natural heat in the stomach is digested Dignotion the searching out of any kind of knowledge Dilacerate to tear to rend in pieces Dilated enlarged made wider or opened Dilucidely clearly plainly Dilutely shining bright Discuss is to dissolve a swelling insensibly by degrees without breaking the skin or causing a sore as many knavish Surgeons do for their private gain Discussive that disperseth dissolves unlooseth Dislocation putting out of joynt Dispel to thrust drive or put away Disquisition a search or enquiry Dissentany things disagreeable Dissipated diffused or spread abroad Dissect to cut in pieces to open to cleave in sunder Dissite remote Dissoluble in a possibility of being dissolved Dissolution is a preparation of Medicine simple and compounded by some convenient moisture to a certain consistence Dissolved it s used to be spoken of dissolving hard knots kernels or swelling by application of outward medicines and internally by dispersing any coagulation or gathering together of humors by diet drinks Distemper any excess of heat or cold in the body of man Dissention stretching Distillation is a flowing down of thin humors from the brain into several parts also a separation of things pure from things impure Distillatio per descensum is when the liquor drawn from the distilled materials falls down into a vessel placed below that which contains the matter the particular way and manner hereof is to be sought in the books of Chymists Distortion writhen or turned from the natural place and situation in the body Distraction is a disuniting of divers things before uniting and agreeing Diuturnity long continuance of time Diuretical Medicines to provoke urine Divaporation is exhalation by fire of vapour Diverting medicines which turn aside the course of the humor so that it doth not run to any particular part which the residence of that humor hath made the seat of a disease Dolor aurium pain in the ears from cold winds it happens to many through a hot distemper or inflamation and sometimes sharp and biting humors cause pain in the ears Dolor nephriticus stone in the Kidneys and pain in the Reins the vulgar call it stone-chollick because of the great affinity it hath with the chollick Dose the quantity of any medicine usually prescribed to be taken at one time so much as may safely be given at once Dolor ventriculi is a sad and troublesome sense in that part from some things that gnaw and stretch it till it break or be wounded Dropax is a topical medicament sometimes hard like a salve sometimes soft as a pultise as the case requires its proper use is in long tedious diseases Dulciaries sweetners such things as sweeten Dulcification is the correcting of mineral medicines by Ablutions c. Dulcity sweetness Dulco-acid sweet and yet sharp as syrup of Lemons Dulco-amare bitterish sweet Dulcorate sweeten Duration when things mollified at the fire are set in a cold place and harden Durity hardness Disepulotica an hard dry scar after the healing of an Ulcer Dyspepnia ill concoction Dyspnaea difficulty of breathing Dysentery an often and bloody loosness of the belly with pain and torment depending upon the ulceration of the intestines in plain English The bloody Flux Dysury a scalding or stopping of the urine a painful pissing E Ebullition boyling or working of the blood and humors in the body like new Wine in a hogshead Eclegma a Medicine or Confection not to be eaten or chewed but licked or sucked and suffered softly to melt down into the Lights or Stomach it is a liquid Confection thicker than a syrup and thinner than an electuary Educed brought forth pressed forth Eduction a bringing forth Edible that which may be eaten Efferous fierce cruel violent Efficacious powerful Efficient cause the working or making cause as the Apothecary is the efficient cause of a compound medicine the material cause is the Druggs whereof it is made the formal cause is that proper form given it whereby it s distinguished to be a Pill a Potion an Electuary and the final Cause is to procure health Effigiated formed or shap'd Effluxion a flix of the seed Effoded digged up Effrenate unbridled head-strong Effuded powred off Effringed broken ground to powder Egritudes griefs sicknesses diseases calamities Elaboration a manual operation an extracting of ignoble matter from that which is more excellent Elaterium the juyce of wild Cucumbers dryed being taken inwardly purgeth waterish humors and is good against the dropsie but it must be well corrected or it will be extream painful in operation Election is a
grow near others or no or what good or malignant Star respects every one we must credit those that effode the roots and gather the other parts of the Plants And as the number in some doth change intend or remit their virtue and quality as one onely Apple of Colocynthis manifests so also doth magnitude or parvity for the virtue of the Earth and Plant is diffused and in many is more remiss but coacted into one Plant or one Fruit more valid Yet many Fruits are commended for their parvitude as Capers and many Seeds for their magnitude as Garthamus CHAP. XXII Of the choyce of purging Medicaments taken from their faculties WE have briefly but clearly shewed how purging Medicaments ought to be selected by a judgement taken from their substance proper temperament second qualities proceeding from their temperament from their disposition extrinsecally acquired from the circumstances of place time number magnitude and parvity it rests that we dispatch briefly what may be spoken as to that choyce which is taken from their purging faculty which though it be helped by the first and second qualities yet saith Mesue its original is celestial and it hath that specifical property whereby the Medicament received into the ventricle and solicited by our heat attracts to it self the humour familiar to its nature as we have noted elsewhere from the veins and passages of our body not perceived by the senses into the belly and then Nature laden with the burthen of the Medicament and the humours attracted prepares a way to excretion either by vomit at the mouth or by dejection at the inferiour parts Whence there are two kinds of purging Medicaments the one a vomiting or ejective Medicament the other dejective which distinction is taken from the manner of excretion or vacuation Now the dejective is more desirable than the ejective because Nature hath alotted the inferiour course to expell Excrements the superiour to receive Aliments Whence it frequently happens that Nature acting spontaneously and provoked by no morbifical cause doth abundantly carry and deject excrementious humours at the inferiour parts and sometimes irritated by the virtue of the Medicament of it self ejective and by the force of the swelling humour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quomodo purgâ—ndi it ejects both Medicament and humours by the mouth Whence it comes to pass that ejective are sometimes better than dejective Medicaments especially to those whose first region of the body or upper ventricle is stuffed with much choler which by reason of its levity and the facility of the traction may more easily and sooner be extruded by vomit Hippocrates also commends vomit to them that are slender especially in Summer Because for the most part they are cholerick slender folks saith he Aphor. 6. lib. 4. are prone to vomit and are to be purged upward but take heed in Winter And Aphor. 40. lib. 4 in Summer it is better to purge upwards in Winter downwards for the gross and cold humour collected in Winter is more easily educed by the inferiour parts and therefore the skilfull Physician uses sometimes ejective and sometimes dejective Medicaments as the condition of the swelling humour requires or the nature of the diseased will bear For Galen saith lib. 1. de loc affect That no man should be compelled to vomit unless he be prone to vomit and that consuming men are never to be purged by vomit nor they who have a strait Thorax or narrow passage But if a Vomit be prescribed to whom it is convenient Quae vomitoria seligenda then let it be provoked by those Medicaments which subvert the ventricle without great molestation and not with white Hellebor according to Galens advice lib. quos quando quibus medicam lest any vessel of the breast should break And much less by Antimony whereby crafty beguilers kill many and sometimes themselves as it is to be seen in that admirable Historie in Cornelius Gemma c. 4. lib. 2. pag. 239. linea 14. The same choyce is to be observed in other Purges that we use the more benign analogical to the morbifical humours For we ought to give a choler purging Medicament to the cholerick saith Galen a flegm purging Medicament to the flegmatick and a melancholy purging Medicament to the melancholick otherwise we offend Nature Now there is no blood purging Medicament prescribed either to purge blood by the mouth or fundament because as Galen saith cap. 6. lib. de purg medicam facult that were to jugulate not to purge men Historia notanda Which the Historie of one Thracius a Bithynian Rustick who found a herb which if any one assumed he should first lose his blood then his life Now many dying by this means the Magistrate judging the offence worthy diligent inquisition apprehended the Malefactor who being demanded of whom he had learned this deletory Poyson answered that he learned it of none but as he once carried a Hogs liver to a neighbouring place his belly compelling him he laid the herb down in a place where a certain herb grew while he had eased himself Note which after some respite and interval he took up again and found that all the blood drew towards the herb whence he conjectured that the herb would attract blood from the body and finding it true by experience made upon one he met as he had before imagined he afterwards transferred the herb to evil uses yet he professed he never did shew that herb to any of which there was much in that Countrey Now the Malefactor amongst other his torments that he was to endure was first to have his eyes put out that when he was led along to the place of Execution he should not shew the herb to any Medicaments therefore that draw blood being omitted as poysonous others not analogical to other parts are to be selected but such as respect certain parts by affinity So Physicians prudently prescribe Agarick Staechados Betony to many distempers of the head Manna Cassia to distempers of the stomack and reins Aloes Myrobolanes and Wormwood to purge and corroborate the ventricle Senna Cetrarch to the spleen Hermodactyls and Ground pine to the Arteries Sage and Rosemary to the nerves Yet these simple Medicaments are not so much astringed to those parts but they may be applyed conveniently to others And as many Medicaments as well simple as compound do peculiarly corroborate some certain part by some familiarity and so some on the contrary do manifestly destroy and hurt some parts of the body as the Sea hare the Lungs Cantharides the Liver Hemlock the Brain as it is well observed by Galen cap. 1. lib. 1. compos medic per genera The end of the first Book OF MEDICINALL INSTITUTIONS The second Book In which we shall treat of the preparations of Medicament CHAP. I. Where we shall demonstrate whether some preparation be not required to all Medicines that tend to aliment A Compound Medicament that is united and made up of many