scandalously and continually much hurt it is too ordinary vse and manner generally with all orders of men for since most men are not capable worthy nor vnderstandingly able to discerne a true good it is no wonder that the fewest speake truly good of good Some of these sorts do not simply or absolutely disswade physicke but as an inducement vnto their owne practise and admittance such physicke onely as cometh vnknowne vnto them out of Apothecaries shops or from Physitions hands and directions thereby preferring their owne priuate ointments plaisters ceareclothes drinkes potions glysters and diets because by time and custome they are become familiarly knowne vnto them and now are of their owne domesticall preparation therefore are by their knowledge acquaintance and auouching of them growne into some credite and reputation with them With this insinuation officious promise of their knowne gentle and pleasant medicines and of vndoubted good from this their owne protested proofe and experience many allure the sicke miserably to beguile themselues to exchange reasonable likelihood for personall confidence the knowledge of the right and safe vse of medicines for the knowledge of the composition of their medicines the preciousnesse of time and oportunity of health For the partiall expectation of vncertaine triall these knowne defects as the perpetuall consequences of this ignorance and want of knowledge as they are ordinarily admitted so are they continually manifestly obserued and noted by others harmes and ofttimes too late repentance for since want of knowledge doth euer lamely giue supply to any want what safe expectation or probable hope can the diseased haue of ignorant persons in their distressed wants Old Eue will neuer be worne out of Adams children Alas an apple can do no great hurt It is faire and beautifull vnto the eye pleasant to taste and but a trifle a small matter a little quantity and of excellent quality Adam must needs taste It is good for his eyes it will cleare his sight an excellent medicine to make him see What is more faire more easie more gentle more harmelesse more cordiall more daintie then an apple Eue in good will offered it and so Adam tooke it It made him also see but Adam had bene better still blind A dangerous and incurable leprosie and infection thence seised vpon him which after none but the great Physition of heauen and earth could cure Many medicines are small harmelesse gentle pleasant and in themselues do not hurt But by accident by consequent by circumstance death oft followeth them at the heeles Milke broth butter and many other wholesome meates iuices and fruits in themselues are of common harmelesse vse milde nourishing and comfortable some of them sometimes soueraigne antidotes against many poysons mitigators of diuers paines yet because sometimes against some circumstances against art or reason vsed they proue a destruction vnto the vser and as sometime a smaller dammage sometime a greater so therefore sometime more and sometime lesse obserued Who almost suspecteth a messe of milke or a cup of beere things so familiar and customary in daily vse and diet yet permitted in some conditions in some manner with some error the messengers of death attend them oft faintings swoundings sodaine extinction of the naturall heate anxietie and vexation with other accidents of easie corruption and putrifaction in the one as of stupefaction and mortification in the other This did witnesse a late Sommers sodaine heates wherein the vnaduised hasty satisfying of thirst with cold drinke by heapes in diuers places in Northamptonshire sent labourers haruest people into their graues With these for farther illustration I might number without number many more but vnto the wise and worthy a word is sufficient intimation And thought many ignorants may speake faire and pleasing and commend things that looke smooth and smiling vpon the liking of the sicke yet prouident necessitie will hence be warned to be wise for it selfe not rashly admiting so dangerous flattery nor too swiftly trusting Syrens for their songs nor Crocodiles for their teares but in matters so nearly concerning life and death duly and carefully inquiring and according to the verdict of vnderstanding and reason trying and examining and not forgeting beside the hazard in vnsafe error by vnsufficient Counsellors the losse of time and oportunitie for better helpe which ofttimes is neuer regained And for entertayning so meane counsell in the vse of such meanes as carry a manifest danger and malignity in their nature and vse I could thinke no man so voide of counsell as to neede therein counsell yet because experience of some errors herein past is argument of other remaining possible to come I will onely by one example aduertise and from that example it will be easie for euery one to raise a rule and caution to himselfe It is ordinary with many vnskilfull busie-bodies vnder colour and pretext of gentle and safe dealing to make familiar and ordinary the vse of perillous medicines which haply also they do not so distinguish or repute and therefore cannot be said to lye because they speake their thought yet tell not truth because they thinke not right I was sometime solicited by a carefull mother for her child whom I found by a sharpe and acute conuulsion violently distorted and before time allowed leasure for preparation of remedies swiftly strangled In any propension thereto in the constitution or other disposition of the child was nothing which might apparently be accused and therefore making diligent inquirie after some outward cause I found that the suspition of wormes had occasioned the commendations and vse of of the hearbe Bearefoote which though ordinary and much accustomed for that end among women and oft by good hap without hurt yet we could not but with good reason hereof conuince conferring the present harme which no presumption could vnto other thing impute with the danger and maligne nature of that herbe in production of such like effects although many for the like vse haue in like manner giuen it vnto their children without blame Thus sometimes some men haue deuoured mortall poysons not onely without harme but with good and commodious effect By these conueyances through the like presumption many vnwotting bodies oft bury in themselues vnbewailed because vnknowne Ellebor Quicksiluer Precipitate and the like coloured with better names and at the present vnperceiued Desperate trials sometime bring forth strange deliuerances yet neither is the boldnesse warrant nor the escape encouragement There happen oft in these daies many sodaine maruailed and strange accidents posing the best Physitions themselues without doubt oft raised from causes by these errors vnknowne secret concealed or haply by time before the effect appeare forgotten for secret mischiefs long time insensibly vndermine before the sensible euent appeare For proofe of dangerous customes in ignorant hands I will make one example a light vnto many A woman sometime came to
parts and the like hence take vnto themselues an emerited priuiledge in physicke practise Some also venture farther and for some rare exeperiences arrogate vnto themselues ability a power and authoritie to educate institute Physitions as an vnder-growth vnto themselues by lying promises perswading many honest simple parents to commit their children otherwise perhaps more fortunate and ingenuous to be their apprentices Hence it cometh to passe that many in these daies thus traded vp by their example vnto a nimblenesse of deceit and of aduenturing in all occurrents so ordinarily promise like gods dare aboue men and act like diuels crucifying the liues of poore men while by the grace of one good deede of good hap the oportunity of committing many tragedies vnspoken is gained And thus is the world furnished with factors for the graue and the perdition of mankind An example of double impudence let here witnesse A gentleman of Northamptonshire vexed with an vlcer of the bladder required my aduice Vnderstanding by the daily abundance of purulent matter in his vrine for the space almost of halfe an yeare before continually obserued together with some store of bloud ofttimes withall neither of which the bladder it selfe and the exility of the veines thereof could so plentifully with so easie accidents afford as also by the more perfect permistion thereof with the substance of the vrine that it was not onely an affection of the bladder but a greater and more dangerous in the reines about the region whereof was euer much paine and weaknesse and coniecturing them past possibility of cure their substance already so far spent I refused to promise or meddle farther then by palliatiue cure wherein accordingly I insisted a long time with good ease and satisfaction vnto the patient At length by some friends there was commended highly for a farther and better performance a Barber Surgeon who thereupon being required and conducted thither came vnto the gentleman and according to the commendatiōs premised promised to cure him in sixe weekes space Shortly after the patient complaining of want of sleepe he gaue vnto him a Ladanum pill of Paracelsus and after Mercuriall pilles for another supposed end by the vse whereof in his body then by the length of his disease exceedingly before weakened and extenuate he presently fell into an amazed staring sleepinesse or an astonishment betweene waking and sleeping wherein after he had continued a naturall day in the morning following he was sodainely surptised with acute and epilepticall fits and a generall conuulsion with foming gnashing his teeth loud stertors and the like whereof after in one day he had passed 8 or 9 fits in my sight being then vpon that new occasion newly required the Surgeon fled he was after my coming and meanes vsed partly by Theriacall glysters suppositars and antidotes fitting the present cause and accidents through the grace of God vnexpectedly deliuered after he had by stoole thus procured auoyded one whole pill vndissolued seene by diuers well vnderstanding witnesses present as also diuers small fractions of Quicksiluer fluctuating and floating like white pinnes heads as the women that saw reported vnto vs. To make the cause of these accidents yet more manifest it happened that two maid-seruants there attending vpon the gentleman by their continuall conuersing neare him and the infected sweate of his body fell strangely and sodainely into the same fits one after another by course and each hauing suffred sixe or seuen apart were carried forth and after that time neuer since as I yet heare nor euer before had the like as they both then said One of these now liueth maried in Towcester in Northamptonshire the other was lately seruant vnto an honorable Lady This history is knowne vnto many of note and worth beside To conclude the gentleman thus escaped and grew by little and little vnto his former senses and strength as his first disease would permit Within a quarter of an yeare after or thereabout another Surgeon againe put the gentlemā into a new hope of recouery although the report of my iudgement did somewhat as I heard shake his confidence yet not conceiuing my reason nor seeing the cause and supposing no other but the vlcer in the bladder he tooke him in hand and in his hand within few dayes he left his life according to my prediction vnto diuers his friends concerning this second attempt likewise solicited By these examples it is manifest both how bold and confident ignorance will be as also how powerfully and bewitchingly it deceiueth the distressed minde easily prone to beleeue that which it desirously would From hence also may be coniectured how commonly such errors by these ignorant persons in likelihood befall yet for the most part either for want of knowledge vnespied or by the priuacy smothered For if they kill a dead man telleth no tales or if by chance they saue one life that shall be a perpetuall flag to call more fooles to the same aduenture This is commonly seene in the vulgar custome of curing the French disease by Barbers and Surgeons who precipitate commonly euery one alike and confusedly without respect or order thrust all through the purgatorie of their sweatings bleeding vomiting vnctions plaisters and the like Hereby many needlesly intangle themselues vpon meere supposall and feare and many take more then necessity vigeth and others for satisfying that necessity neglect a more materiall and flying too timorously and rashly a knowne inconuenience run headlong vnknowing into an after too well knowne vnrecouerable mischiefe For if they that fal into such rough handling be strong in themselues and no way liable to the harmes of such desperate remedies and be free from the implication of all other diseases besides which entring by their breaches may interrupt their smooth passage and make pernicious their French medication they may haply escaping the danger for the hazard attaine their desired deliuerie as is in some seene But if nature haply be weake or the disposition of the sicke subiect to the perils of that cure which these men seldome do or can consider or any other disease lie in waight too prompt to trust with any aduantage which these men want knowledge to foresee the acquaintance with such remedies may easily proue a greater plague vnto the greatest poxe How can he that considereth the disease and not the person as is vsuall with these men because the contrary is not possible with ignorance how can they I say in curing the one but indanger the other We see ordinarily the same medicine in the same force vnto one man is scarce sensible vnto another is a sting vnto one fauourable vnto another cruell in one wanting edge in another exceeding It therefore requireth learned ability to discerne the hidden ods and differences thereby iustly to distribute vnto euery seuerall his proper and fit proportion of the same thing Neither is it safe to accommodate so
after described as some say It is not vnusuall with the sicke oft to imagine indifferently as well things inconsiderate and incomposed as truths and therefore are their imaginations of no validitie without better proofe or reason which I thinke before sufficiently satisfied And in this gentlewoman hauing her head where her disease had so manifestly deeply seated it selfe therefore so mightily oppressed it was more easie for any faculitie therein to mistake and erre then to conceiue aright And therefore though it might haply manifestly appeare which may be and is ordinarily rather the abusiue impression of some indiscreete whispering about the sicke that she of her selfe primarily and without suggestion conceiued the forme or shape of a witch yet is that no sound proofe or clearing of the question of witchcraft in generall nor any reasonable euidence against one particular since the trials of truth are not sterred by imaginations It is lastly obiected that certaine witches lately dying for sorcerie haue confessed themselues to haue bewitched this gentlewoman I grant the voluntary and vncompelled or duly and truly euicted confession of a witch to be sufficient condemnation of her selfe and therefore iustly hath the law laid their bloud vpon their owne heads but their confession I cannot conceiue sufficient euiction of the witchcraft it selfe It is knowne euidently vnto men learned that the subtill serpent and deceiuer the diuell doth vsually beguile delude and deceiue those that trust in him by his iugling collusions perswading oft times those actions and euents to be his gratification of their malicious affections which are indeed the very workes of nature and oft times the rare effects onely of hidden causes in nature A witches confession therefore being onely grounded vpon his credite information and suggestion whose nature custome and propertie is and euer hath bene to lie and deceiue is a meane poore and vncertaine proofe of witchcraft though a iust condemnation vnto the witch her selfe being proued an associate with the diuell in any sort Her death therefore doth satisfie the law for her offence but is no sound information of the iudgement of the witchcraft Thus according to that whereof my selfe could take notice in this gentlewoman if more full information of others obseruations in those things that by my selfe were not seene or noted faile me not I haue truly and fully described euery materiall accident and circumstance and to all the knowne or conceiued likely doubts and difficulties therein haue carefully and directly answered and therein also haue I suppose satisfied the ingenuous and reasonable with breuitie at full Now to conclude the former explication of the question of witchcraft in generall I intreate the Reader to call vnto mind the formerly mentioned feares and doubts of witchcraft which vnknowne accidents and diseases easily impose vpon mindes herein vnacquainted and not discerning their cause and reason and in them farther for future good to consider the possible contingence of many more of like nature and sort in other the like cases elsewhere hapning and here vnmentioned In both and with both let also be recalculate and cast the strange and slie suggestions of the fancie and imagination sometimes countenanced by admired casuall euents and chances sometimes applauded by ignorant credulitie and sometimes aduanced by superstition in all and euery of these still with the vulgar sort aduantaging the same error and opinion of witchcraft I haue so much the rather thus farre laboured for that ordinarily herein I see truth and iudgement too much peruerted the diseased their health and life thereby neglected and many times simple ideots and fooles oppressed whose weaknes doth oft seeme guiltie because euer vnable to defend it selfe Euery one in these cases is not fit or competent arbiter it requireth the learned and not learned in word and superficiall seeming but indeed truly iudicious and wise whom euer to preconsult in these occasions is onely safe is right expedient and euer necessary CHAP. IX Wisards THe mentione of witchcraft doth now occasion the remembrance in the next place of a sort of practitioners whom our custome and country doth call wisemen and wise-women reputed a kind of good honest harmles witches or wisards who by good words by hallowed herbes and salues and other superstitious ceremonies promise to allay and calme diuels practises of other witches and the forces of many diseases But these being of the same nature with those before mentioned to vse spels and as they before so these now sometimes onely superstitiously vaine sometimes diuellishly assisted I will referre these vnto them and onely dismisse them both with a short historie Anno 1602. a poore boy of Pychley in Northamptonshire was sodainly surprised with a vehement conuulsion drawing his head and heeles violently backward and in that sort carrying his whole body into a roundnesse tumbling vp and downe with much paine and inward groning The parents of the child posed with the strangenesse presently accused witchcraft sent for a wisewoman her wisedome came vnto them At the same time it fortuned my selfe to be in the towne with a patient of mine a worthy and vertuous Lady there inhabiting who moued me to see the bewitched child and vpon the motion together with her Preacher then liuing in her house I went vnto the place where the child lay There among other standing silent and vnknowne I beheld the fits heard also the wisewoman wisely discoursing and among other things of the like nature declaring vnto the cōpany that the lungs of the child were as white as her kercher With this and some other such like kercher learning I silenty departed When I was returned vnto my patient I there professed my opinion concerning the manner and nature of conuulsions with their seuerall causes amongst the rest not omitting the strange accidents which did oft fall out in such diseases by wormes Not long after when the cunning of the wisard was now growne without profite stale and forsaken the child auoyded a great and long worme and immediatly after recouered without other helpe or meanes and so hath continued euer since Thus the serpent beguiled the woman and the woman beguiled though not Adam many foolish sonnes of Adam At length a poore worme gaue them demonstration of their ridiculous folly Such teachers are fittest for such schollers whose grosse ignorance is euer so farre in loue with it owne preiudicate conceite that though they were brayed in a mortar yet cannot this loue be beaten out of them for any loue of truth or reason I did not therefore trouble them with my patience to instruct them nor they molest me with their impatience to heare CHAP. X. Seruants of Physitions Ministring helpers NoW to fulfill our iust computation of Emperickes and therewith to conclude their mention and number the last but not the least that offer themselues ordinarily in this kind and name are suchas either by oft seruing Physitions or by
ignorance whereof the chiefe vse is not the benefite of the sicke but the colour of fraud and comodity by deceit Touching the oracles of Fortune pretended in the vrine and their floating fauours in so low an ebbe those that too commonly in their owne experience find good drinke to steale their wit out of their braine may haply imagine it thence descended into the vrine I leaue them there to seeke it that want it so much and deserue it so litle The mention is vnworthie mention Concerning the looking of vnborne babes in an vrinarie glasse and the making of old fooles in loue with their owne reflexion to vnmaske the common illusion in this kind I will briefly point vnto the discouerie of the folly whereinto entring their serious cogitation due recognition they may more amply after exercise satisfie themselues whom their owne fatall stupidity doth not detaine or resolute obstinacie preoccupate The conceptions of women together with the accidents accompanying the same do necessarily bring forth generall alterations vnto the whole body partly by the consequent stoppages of the body and partly by distracting the naturall heate and spirits from other parts vnto that new intentiō whereby is added either quantitie or qualitie or both vnto the bloud and humors and from thence the vrine receiuing different tincture substance doth manifestly report the ods Yet for that this sodain productiō of change in the body issueth from conceptiō only by accident therof being truly and immediatly no cause it selfe but an occasion onely mouing other causes as commonly or more cōmonly moued both by diuerse kind of other obstructiōs beside also by other distractions of the naturall heate spirits by criticall intentions concoctions maturations of diseases therfore is the confused alteration of the vrine found vpon conceptiō indefinite can be no special note of cōception This is also further manifested by the alterations and effects themselues following conception which not onely in differing bodies but in the verie same are seldome the same but cōmonly farre vnlike yea and oft contrary at one time from themselues at another This women themselues in their owne experience must needs witnesse seldome obseruing the changes of bodies after cōception in all alike oft each in themselues finding the particular manners of their owne alteration farre discrepant This their oft deceit in themselues mistaking and vncertaintie in themselues commonly doth testifie sometimes suspecting thēselues with child when they proue diseased somtimes doubting diseases being only with child Since then conception is neither in it selfe a sole nor a separate cause nor any true immediate cause of the alterations of the body following therupon but onely the occasion mouing other causes and those causes are as indifferently also moued by many other occasions besides vnto the same effects their generalitie doth discharge their proprietie in this particular and the common indication in the vrine any speciall signification proper vnto conception alone This demonstratiuely proueth the vncertainty of the signs of conception that are common with other in the vrine Now concerning the small certaintie of the signes that are therto supposed peculiar the inward dispositions and affectiōs of inward parts which by the outward sense cānot be deprehended are by three waies or meanes soly to be detected The first is the action or function proper and ininherent in the partie The second is the proper excretions proceeding fromht he partie The third is a distinct feeling or paine in the part The proper functions of any part can neuer be disioyned from the part and therefore appeare not in the vrine Paine or other sense feeling are euer vnseparable companions with their patient parts whereof the vrine hauing no sense can haue no part and therefore therein also is vnsignificant It onely then remaineth that the affection and conception of the wombe soly doth discouer it selfe by the determinate excretions therto peculiar The peculiar excretiōs of any part do bring testimony vnto the truth of their indicatiō either by the cōcomitance of part of the substance of the part or of part of some substance either naturally orby some il dispositiō adherent to the part or of the ordinary recrements of concoctions or other preparatiōs or operations of nature in the part Whether excretions in al these kinds proceed frō the womb how with what differences distinction it is not here necessary to determine It is sufficiēt that the proper indicatiō of the dispositiōs of that part must necessarily be deriued from the excretions therto appropriate which therfore proueth the vrine no right prognosticator of any affectiō therof issuing frō other different vessels It may be obiected that by the contiguity of the wombe bladder and the neare termination of their extremities the expulsiue facultie of the seminarie vessels mouing sometimes with the vrinarie may thereby mixing their recrements connexe their indications This is true yet not alwaies but rarely and seldome true and therfore vncertainly hapning doth doubtfully promise or signifie The expulsiue motiōs and offices of the seminarie parts are not so ordinarie so frequent so common as the vrinarie neither doth their raritie in their motion alwaies then meete or consent with the vrine and sometimes also meeting therewith it giueth notwithstanding impertinent indication vnto the inquisition of conception other common recrements after conception no lesse or rather more descending then those which are onely consequents of conception And thus is made apparent the falshood and deceit of the ordinarie profession of the prediction of conception by the inspection of vrine which also the most ingenuous and iudicious writers and authours from their owne long proofe experiēce haue euer generally exploded as impious imposture The true Artist doth promise nothing beyōd that which reason doth demōstrate art habitually performe the deceiuer by faire pollicitations bewitcheth simple credulitie ridiculously to delight in his owne wrong and grosse collusion It is verie worthy note and memorie that a great and learned clearke Cornelius Agrippa retracting his former wont therein doth ingenuously confesse of his affectation and circumuention of common admiration by his supposed magicke and Astrologicall skill and it doth well fit and settle instruction and satisfaction in this our particular also though of another kind I haue bene saith he from my childhood by my parents carefully iustituted in Astrologie and in riper age and vnderstanding afterwards spent therein no small time At length by long and certaine proofe I found it wholly compound and founded of meere fictions and toyes of vaine imaginations wearied therefore and grieued with my time and study so long and so idlely spent I laboured to cast away the irkesome and vnpleasing memorie thereof out of my mind and neuer in my thoughts to entertaine it But the violent and forcible importunacie of great and mightie Potentates who vsually preuaile to abuse