far as divers Earthquakes have done but that the fire passes through some little subterraneal clefts or channels or hidden conveyances from one great Cavity or Mine to another yet 't is not improbable but that the vehemently tremulous motion does oftentimes reach a very great way beyond the places where the explosions were made Since though Seneca would confine the extent of Earthquakes to two hundred miles yet observations made in this and the last Century warrant us to allow them a far greater spread The Learned Josephus Acosta affirms that in the Kingdom of Peru in the year 1586 an Earthquake reached along the shoar of the Pacifick sea 160 Leagues and adds that sometimes it has in those parts run on from South to North 300 Leagues And in the beginning of this our age Anno Dom. 1601 good writers relate a much larger Earthquake to have happened since it reached from Asia to that Sea that washes the French Shoars and besides some Asiatick Regions shook Hungary Germany Italy and France and consequently a great part of Europe And if that part of the Narrative be certain which relates that this lasted not much above a quarter of an hour it will be the more likely that this Earthquake shook great Tracts of Land beyond those places to which the fired matter passing from one cavity to another could reach in so short a time As you will the more easily guesse if you try as I have done that in trains of Gunpowder it self the fire does not run on near so swiftly as one would imagine But though I have been in more Earthquakes then one yet since they were too sudden and too short to afford me any considerable observation I shall say no more of them but proceed to take notice that oftentimes the motion of a Coach or Cart that passed at a good distance from the place that I was in has made the buildings so sensibly shake that I could not but wonder that so great a portion of so firm and sluggish a body as the Earth could by a cause that seemed very disproportionate to such an effect be made to tremble it self and manifestly to shake firm buildings that were founded on it And this observation made me the more inclinable to give credit to their Relations who tell us that in a calm night the march of a troup of horse may be felt by attentive Scouts watching at a great distance off by the shake that the ground receives from the trampling of the horses though I formerly suspected much and do yet a little that the impulse of the air conveyed along the resisting surface of the ground might mainly contribute to the effect that is ascribed onely to the motion of the soil Before I advance to the Second Member of this Chapter it may not be impertinent to note that in peculiarly disposed bodies and especially in Organical ones a very languid motion may have a far greater effect than it could produce by a bare propagation of it self For it may so determine the motion of the Spirits or other active parts of the body it works on as to make multitudes of them act as if they conspired to perform the same motions As when a ticklish man by having the pulp of one's finger passed gently along the sole of his foot or the palm of his hand has divers muscles and other parts of his body and face put into preternatural or unusual motions And most men by being lightly tickled with the end of a feather or straw within their Nostrils have their heads and many parts of their bodies put into that violent Commotion wherein Sneezing consists And I remember that having for some time been by a distemper from which God was graciously pleased a while after to free me quite deprived of the use of my hands it more than once hapned to me that sitting alone in a Coach if the wind chanced to blow a single hair upon my face in the Summer-time the tickling or itching that it produced was so uneasy to me 'till by calling out to a footman I could get it removed that though I could well bear it as long as I was wont to do when having the use of my hands I could relieve my self at pleasure yet if I were forced to endure the itching too long before any came to succour me the uneasiness was so great as to make me apprehend falling presently either into Convulsions or a Swoon But 't is time to proceed to the second Member of this Chapter 2. Others there are that cannot believe that Local motion especially if it be languid can be propagated through differing Mediums each of which save that wherein the Motion is begun must they think either repell or check and dead it To these I shall recommend the Consideration of an Experiment I remember I made before some Learned men in our Pneumatick Engine For having caused a large and thick glass Receiver to be so blown that it had a glass button in the inside of that part which upon the Engine was to be placed upwards I caused a Watch to be suspended by a little Silverchain fastned to that button by as slender and soft a body as I thought would be strong enough to support my watch and then the Glass being cemented on close to the Receiver to prevent a Commerce between the Cavity of it and the Air the watch that hung freely near the middle of the Cavity of the Receiver made it self to be heard by those attentive Listners that would hold their ears directly over the suspended watch whose motions were thereby argued to have been propagated either through the included air or along the string to the concave part of the Glass and through the whole thickness of the Glass to the convex part and thence through the interposed air to the Ear. And this mention of watches minds me of what I often observed in a small striking watch that I have worn in my pocket For when it struck the Hours and in some postures when the balance did but move I could plainly feel the brisker motions of the Bell and sensibly the languid ones of the balance through the several linings of my Breeches and some other interposed soft and yielding bodies and this though the watch as I said was small and the balance included in a double case and though the outwardmost were of what they call Chagrine and the innermost of Gold which I therefore mention because that closest of metals is observed more to dead sounds and motions than harder metals as Silver Copper and Iron That Motion may be propagated through differing Mediums may seem the more probable by the shakings that are often felt by men lying on beds that stand in rooms close shut when loud claps of thunder are produced perhaps at a great distance off in the clouds And whether it will be fit to add to this Instance that which you have lately met with in the III. Chapter
malignity of the Plague yet I doubt they are not sufficient for so wonderfull an effect unless we take in some new Exhalations that then impregnate and correct the Air. And we shall scarce doubt of the great interest these have in the effect produc'd if we give credit to what the recentest Writer I have met with of Voyages into Egypt has lately publish'd about the annual Pestilence at Grand Cairo a City he much frequented This Authour in the account he gives of the present state of Egypt relates that a little after the middle of our June and usually upon the very seventeenth day there begin to fall towards the last quarter of the night near the morning certain drops of a kind of Dew which causes the River to be fruitfull and purifies the Air from all the Infection of Camsims by which I presume he means the Pestilence for after some lines interpos'd he subjoins The Drops or Dew purifies the Air for as soon as it falls the Plague ceases to be mortal none dies of it the Air is wholesome all Distempers cease and if any person grows sick he never dies And then he adds This Dew gives life to every thing and when it falls upon the Wheat it causeth it to continue many years without corruption or Worms and is far more nourishing than that Corn on which it never falls For this cause they never house the Corn of the Grand Seignior in the Barns till this Dew is fallen upon it that it might keep the longer without Worms As well this Conjecture as some other things deliver'd here and there in this Paper about the Salubrity of the Air may probably gain the more credit if I here subjoin what I learn'd by inquiry from a very ingenious Gentleman who was owner of one or more of the Mines that afford the Phaenomenon I am to mention Which is this That in the Tin-mine Countreys in Devonshire it sometimes happens as perhaps I may have elsewhere noted to another purpose that upon a sudden a Spot of ground and that not always narrow will be as 't were blasted by the ascending hurtfull Fumes insomuch that not onely the Grass Fern and other more tender Vegetables will be turned black and as it were burnt or scorched up but now and then Trees also without excepting Oaks themselves will be blasted and spoil'd by the powerfull Operation of these subtil and poisonous Effluvia It will probably be here expected that among the Epidemical Diseases that our Hypothesis derives from Subterraneal Effluvia I should particularly treat of the cause of Pestilential Fevers and the Plague it self But though some such Fevers may not improbably be in great part imputed to the noxious Expirations of the Globe we inhabit yet as to the true Plague it self I freely confess I am at a loss about it's Origine The sacred Writings expresly teach that some Plagues and particularly that which in David's time swept away in three days 70000 Persons have been in an extraordinary manner inflicted by God And to me it appears either scarce possible or far more difficult than those that have not attentively enough considered the matter are wont to think it To deduce the abstruce Origine strange Symtomes and other odd Phaenomena of some Plagues that are recorded in History from merely Corporeal Causes On the other side it seems unphilosophical and perhaps rather seems than is very pious to recur without an absolute necessity to Supernatural Causes for such Effects as do not manifestly exceed the power of Natural ones though the particular manner of their being produc'd is perchance more than we are yet able clearly to explicate And I think it the more questionable whether all Plagues are Supernatural Exertions of God's Power and Wrath against the Wicked because I observe that Brutes which are as well uncapable of moral Vice as moral Vertue are yet oftentimes subject to Murrains such as may without incongruity be lookt upon as the Pestilences of Beasts And 't is the less likely that these sweeping and contagious Maladies should be always sent for the punishment of impious men because I remember to have read in good Authours that as some Plagues destroy'd both Men and Beasts so some other did peculiarly destroy Brute Animals of very little consideration or use to Men as Cats c. Upon these and the like Reasons I have sometimes suspected that in the Controversie about the Origine of the Plague namely Whether it be Natural or Supernatural neither of the contending Parties is altogether in the right since 't is very possible that some Pestilences may not break forth without an extraordinary though perhaps not Immediate interposition of Almighty God provok'd by the Sins of Men and yet other Plagues may be produc'd by a Tragical concourse of merely Natural Causes But though the difficulties that incumber each of the opposite Opinions keep me both from Dogmatically asserting that All Plagues have a Supernatural Origine and from denying that Any have it yet to say something on such an occasion though I can speak but very hesitantly I shall venture to add that whether or no the true Plague be said to descend to the Earth from a higher Sphere than that of Nature yet its Propagation and Effects are at least for the most part carry'd on mainly by a malignant disposition in the Air without which some Plagues could never have been so catching as they were nor so suddenly mortal and that in divers Pestilences this malignant Disposition in the Air may probably be in great part imputed to some kinds of Subterraneal Expirations I am prone to think and that chiefly upon two Accounts The first thing that induces me to this Conjecture is that not any of the several Causes to which the Plague is wont to be imputed seems to me to be sufficient Those that fetch it from the malevolent aspects and influence of the Celestial lights besides that they suppose some things very difficult to be prov'd have recourse to Agents too remote too general and too indeterminate to be acquiesc'd in as the Causes of such particular Symtomes and Phaenomena as oftentimes accompany Pestilences And as for those other Sects of Physicians that confidently derive the Plague some from Internal Putrefaction and others from excessive Heats noisome Stinks Corrupt aliments and such other Celebrated Causes though each party alledges plausible Reasons for its own opinion yet their objections against their adversaries are much stronger than their arguments are for themselves And the Learned Diemer-broeck though his own Hypothesis seem to be more Theological than Philosophical has much enervated the Arguments brought for the several opinions lately nam'd and by him dissented from The Reasons he employs to refute all the receiv'd opinions about the Origine of the Plague except his own are divers of them worthy of so learned a man to whom though I had leisure to transcribe them I should refer the Curious my present design being onely
in the production of divers difficult Phaenomena of nature that are wont to be referred to less genuine as well as less intelligible Causes FINIS AN Experimental Discourse Of some UNHEEDED CAUSES OF THE Insalubrity and Salubrity OF THE AIR Being a Part of an intended Natural History of AIR LONDON Printed by M. Flesher for Richard Davis Bookseller in Oxford 1685. THE Preface HAving heretofore had occasion to draw together under certain Heads divers unpublish'd Observations and Experiments of my own and some of other men by way of Memorials for a Natural History of the Air I thought fit by more largely treating of two or three of the Subjects distinctly mention'd in my Scheme of Titles to give a Semplar or Specimen of what may be done upon the other Heads of the designed History Vpon this account I treated somewhat largely of the Salubrity and Insalubrity of the Air as a Subject which for the importance of it to Mens healths and lives I thought deserv'd to be attentively consider'd and have its Causes diligently inquir'd into And having observ'd that among the six principal Causes of the healthfulness or insalubrity of the Air namely the Climate the Soil the Situation of the Place the Seasons of the Year the raigning winds and Contingencies whether more or less frequent and especially Subterraneal Steams having I say observ'd that among these Causes there was one viz. the last nam'd about which I thought I could offer something that I had not met with in the Books of Physicians that treat of it I was thereby invited to set down my Thoughts and Observations by way of Conjectures which I was made to believe would appear uncommon and would not prove useless These Observations and Reflexions I referr'd for clearness and distinctions sake to four Propositions But when I had gone thorough the three first and made some progress in the fourth being hinder'd by divers Avocations to make an end of it I laid by the whole Discourse in a place which I thought a safe one but when afterwards I had some opportunity to dispatch what remain'd I found all the diligence I us'd to retrieve the entire Manuscript unsuccessfull At this surprizing Accident I confess I was somewhat troubled because whatever may be thought of the discursive part of those Papers the Historical part contain'd divers matters of Fact that I did not meet with in Books nor can now distinctly remember and will not perhaps be lighted on by even Physicians or such Naturalists as derive their knowledge onely from them 'T is upon this consideration that having afterwards met with many Papers that belong'd to most parts of the unhappy discourse I thought fit to put them together in the best order I could that I might not loose what might give some light to so important a Subject as the Theory of Diseases And this course I the rather pitch'd upon because before the Papers about the Salubrity of the Air I miss'd two other of my Manuscripts whereof the former contain'd a Cellection of Medicinal things and the second a defence of the Mechanical way of Philosophizing about Natural Things as it respects Religion And I remember'd that having formerly lost a Manuscript I was much concern'd for I purposely made a noise of it whence I suppos'd the Plagiary would conclude himself unable to make it pass for his And in effect the Book was in a while after privately brought back so that I found it laid in a By-place where I had before as fruitlesly as carefully sought it AN Experimental Discourse Of some Unheeded CAUSES OF THE Insalubrity and Salubrity OF THE AIR c. THE sixth and last thing upon which the Salubrity and Insalubrity of the Air depends is the impregnation it receives from Subterraneal Effluvia And though this be a cause not wont to be much heeded by Physicians themselves yet I take it to be oftentimes one of the most considerable in its effects The Effluvia that pass into the Air may be distinguish'd into several sorts according to their respective Natures as has been elsewhere shewn wherefore I shall now only take notice of the differences that may be taken from place and time upon which account we may consider that some of them arise from the Crust if I may so call it or more superficial parts of the Earth and others have a deeper Original ascending out of the lower parts and as it were Bowels of the Terraqueous Globe And to this difference taken from place I must add another perhaps no less considerable afforded by Time which difference relates chiefly to the second sort of Steams newly mentioned Of the Subterraneal Effluvia some are almost constantly or daily sent up into the Air and those I therefore call Ordinary Emissions and others ascend into the Air but at times which are not seldom distant enough from one another and those I call Extraordinary Emissions whether they come at stated times and so deserve the title of Periodical or else uncertainly sometimes with far greater sometimes with far smaller intervals and so may be called fortuitous or irregular But though I thought it might render what I am about to say more clear if I made and premised the two foregoing distinctions yet because in many cases Nature does not appear solicitous to observe them but at the same time imbues the Air with Steams referable to divers Members of these distinctions I shall several times though not always take the liberty to imitate her and consider the Effluvia of the Terraqueous Globe in the more general Notion that they are so I know 't is frequently observed and usually granted that Marrish Grounds and wet Soils are wont to be unhealthfull because of the moist and crude vapours that the stagnating waters send up too copiously into the Air. And on the other side dry Soils are because of their being such generally lookt upon as healthy Nor do I deny that these Observations do most commonly hold true but yet I think that besides what can be justly ascribed to the moist vapours or dry Exhalations we have been speaking of in many places the healthfulness and insalubrity of the Air may be ascribed to other sorts of Effluvia from the Soil than those that act merely or perhaps principally as these are either moist or dry PROPOSITION I. TO deliver my Thoughts about this matter somewhat more distinctly I shall lay them down in the four ensuing Observations or Propositions whereof the first shall be this It seems probable that in divers places the Salubrity or Insalubrity of the Air considered in the general may be in good part due to subterraneal Expirations especially to those that I lately call'd Ordinary Emissions For in some places the Air is observ'd to be much more healthy than the manifest qualities of it would make one expect and in divers of these Cases I see no Cause to which such a happy Constitution may more probably be ascrib'd than to friendly Effluvia
in Ireland where they are so rise as commonly to pass under the name of the Countrey Disease That these Endemical or if we may so call them Topical Distempers do in many places proceed from some excessive Heat Moisture or other manifest quality of the Air from bad Diet vulgar Intemperance and other Causes that have little or no connexion with Subterraneal Reeks I readily grant But that in some places the Endemical Disease may either be principally caus'd or much fomented by noxious Effluvia I am enclin'd to suspect upon the following grounds 1. There are some places in which the Endemical Disease cannot be probably imputed to any manifest Cause as he may perceive that shall consider how often it happens that the Causes which are assign'd of such Diseases if they were the true ones must produce the like Distempers in many other places where yet it is notorious that they are not Endemical 2. That Subterraneal Bodies may send up copious Steams of different kinds into the Air has been already made out 3. It has been also shewn that the Matters that send up these Effluvia may be of a large extent And I remember on this occasion that I have sometimes observ'd and that in more Countries than one a whole tract of Land that abounded with Minerals of one kind and within no great distance as perhaps a Mile or a League another large tract of Land whose Subterraneal part abounded with Minerals of a very differing sort 4. We have also above declar'd and 't is highly probable from the nature of the thing it self that those copious steams Saline Sulphureous Arsenical Antimonial c. that impregnate the Air may very much conduce to make it hurtfull to a humane body in the way requisite to produce this or that determinate Disease as I not long since related from the Chymist that visited the Hungarian Mines that in some places he found the Reeks ascending from them into the Air though in an elevated place and expos'd to the Winds make him as it were Asthmatical and give him a troublesome difficulty of Respiration And here let me add an Observation which perhaps will not be thought fit to be slighted by Physicians namely that some parts of the substance of the Air for I speak not of its Heat Coldness or other such Qualities do not onely affect humane bodies or at least many Individuals among them as they are taken in by Respiration but as they outwardly touch the Skin and the Skin being as I have elsewhere shewn full of Pores and those perhaps of different sizes and figures those Corpuscles that get in at them may have their operation even upon the most inward parts of the body To make this more clear and probable because 't is a thing of importance I desire these things may be observ'd 1. That when I speak of the Air I do not in this place understand that Air which I elsewhere teach to be more strictly and properly so call'd and to consist of springy Particles but the Air in its more vulgar and laxe signification as it signifies the Atmosphere which abounds with vapours and exhalations and in a word with Corpuscles of all sorts except the larger sort of springy ones and many of them may be so small and so solid or so conveniently shap'd as to get entrance at some of the numerous Orifices of the minute or miliary Glandules of the Skin or at other Pores of it Thus though paper be not pervious to the uncompress'd elastical parts of the Air yet it may be easily penetrated by other Corpuscles of the Atmosphere for I remember I have for Curiosities sake prepar'd a dry body out of a substance belonging to the Animal Kingdom which being lapt up in paper would without wetting or discolouring or any way sensibly altering it pass in a trice through the Pores of it in such plenty as to have not onely a visible but a manifest operation on bodies plac'd at some distance from it And though a bladder almost full of Air having its neck well tyed be held near the fire in various postures the elastical Air though rarefied or attenuated by the heat will rather burst the bladder as I have more than once found than get out at the Pores yet we have often made a certain substance belonging to the Mineral Kingdom that if a bladder were wet or moist as the Skins of living Men are wont to be would readily pervade it and have a sensible operation even upon solid bodies plac'd within it This Experiment that I can repeat when I will is therefore the more considerable to our present purpose because in the bladder of a dead Animal the Porosity may be well suppos'd to be much less than it was in the Animal when alive in which state the parts of the humane body are much more perspirable than one would easily believe partly because of the heat that is continually diffus'd from the heart and partly because of the copious steams that are in perpetual motion and keep the parts warm moist and supple And it is not to be pretermitted in our present instance that the bladder of Urine consists not of a single Membrane and is probably of a stronger texture by reason of the subtile salt liquor it is instituted to contain than many another Membranes of the body or the Epidermis And this is the first thing I would have noted The next is that whereas in the Instances newly recited and some others that are by and by to be mention'd the effects were produc'd when the ambient Air impregnated with Mineral Corpuscles had but a very short time perhaps not many minutes to work upon the bodies expos'd to it In those Countries that are very subject to Endemical Diseases the Inhabitants are wont to live all the year long and perhaps during their whole life expos'd to the action of the vitiated Air and how much a far shorter time will serve to make the Corpuscles that rove in the Air penetrate into bodies of no very close contexture may be guess'd by the breaking even of the bigger strings of Lutes and Vials by the numerous though invisible vapours that get into them in rainy weather and much more by the effects of such vapours when insinuating themselves in swarms into the Pores of a Rope they shorten it so forcibly as to enable it by shrinking it self to lift up and keep suspended considerable weights as I have elsewhere shewn by tryals purposely made These things may render it probable that though in a small compass of time the noxious Effluvia that rove in the Air may be too thinly dispers'd in it to insinuate themselves in any considerable number at the Pores of the Skin yet by reason of the continual contact of the Air especially as to the Face Hands and some other parts which may last day and night for many months or perhaps years there may be opportunity for a considerable number of morbifick
to deliver some few things that seem more favourable to my Conjectures than to his Opinion and were suggested to me partly by my own Thoughts and partly by the informations that to examine those Thoughts I procur'd by consulting some uncommon Authours and asking Questions of great Travellers and Navigatours By this means I came to learn that divers great Countries are usually free from the Plague that according to the vulgar Hypotheses ought to be as much subject to it if not more than England France Italy and those other parts of Europe and Asia where that fatal Disease rages from time to time in the parched Regions of Africk to which the Excessive Heats would make one expect that the Plagues should make far more frequent visits than to our temperate European Countries Leo Africanus informs us that some parts are so seldom afflicted with that dreadfull Disease that it usually spares the Inhabitants 29 or 30 years together And he expresly records that in Numidia it self if I much misremember not the Countrey 's name notwithstanding the raging heat of the Climate the Plague is wont to be produc'd but once in a hundred years Our Purchas informs us that in the Land of Negro's it is not known at all And to omit what some Travellers and Navigatours relate of Japan as if it were seldom or never invaded by the Pestilence I do not remember that in New England which contains a great extent of Land though I have had both Curiosity and opportunity to inquire after the Diseases of that Countrey I ever heard the English take any notice of the Plague since their setling there above threescore and ten years ago And as for the East Indies Sir Philibert Vernatti a Virtuoso of great fame and authority at Batavia where he resides in his ingenious Returns to the Queries sent him by the Royal Society of Naturalists answers thus to the fifteenth Pestis morbus est Indiarum Incolis incognitus The Plague is a Disease unknown amongst the Indians And of the Countries that lie yet more remote as the great Empire of China and the Kingdoms of Tunquin and of Cochinchina that great Traveller Alexander de Rhodes who spent 30 years in those parts affirms that the Plague is not so much as spoken of there And yet the same Jesuit does upon grounds probable enough estimate the number of the people of China alone to be two hundred and fifty millions a number I take to exceed by far that of all the Nations of Europe Now when I consider how vast Tracts of Land are compriz'd in those Countries some of which the Plague does not at all and others but exceeding unfrequently invade this Immunity seems to me very unfavourable to most if not all the opinions receiv'd among Physicians as also that of Diemerbroeck himself who derives the Plague from a Supernatural Cause the wrath of God against the sins of men For in Regions of such extent and divers of them very populous which are seated under very differing Climats and which are some of them inhabited by Nations that make war with numerous Armies fight bloudy battels leave heaps of unbury'd Bodies expos'd to the putrefying heat of the Sun are sometimes forc'd as well as others to live upon very unwonted and unwholsome foods that worship stocks and stones and beasts and some of them Devils whom they know to be such that are at least as guilty as Europeans of Assassinats Poisonings Rapes Oppression Sodomy and other crying Sins in these Regions I say 't is not imaginable but that great Intemperatures of the Air especially in point of Heat Stench of dead Bodies kill'd in fights unwholsomness of Aliments malevolent aspects of Celestial Bodies high provocations of the divine Justice and in short all the Causes to one or other of which the several parties of Physicians are wont to refer the Plague should be wanting any more than in our Europe and yet the Plague which is presum'd to be the Effect of one or other of those Causes is not here observed to be produc'd I know that it may be said that the Historical things I have been reciting do not onely oppugn the several receiv'd Opinions of Physicians about the cause of the Plague but disfavour my Conjectures too But if this be said I desire it may also be consider'd that my Judgment about the Plague consists of two Parts One that 't is exceeding difficult to assign the true and adequate Cause of the Origine of the Pestilence and the Other that whatever be the Cause of its First Eruption its Propagation and divers of its Symptomes may be probably enough refer'd to the depravation of the Air by Subterraneal Steams and their Effects If this be duly consider'd the Historical Observations will appear not to overthrow the First member of our Hypothesis but rather to confirm it and 't is upon this account that I have mention'd them in this place And as to the Second member it may be said that since in the East Indies and the other Countries I have nam'd as privileg'd from this raging Disease it is not observ'd to break out as it cannot be said that Subterraneal Effluvia do in those Countries promote the Propagation of it so it cannot be prov'd that they could not doe it incase the Plague were begun by other Causes But in regard I think it not improbable that sometimes the Plague is not onely fomented but begun by noxious Expirations of the Terrestrial Globe I shall add that this supposition though I confess it be somewhat disfavour'd by some of the lately mention'd Observations yet is not absolutely inconsistent with them For First it may be said that some of the Countries I speak of may be destitute of those noxious minerals to which we impute some Plagues it holding true in Minerals as well as in Plants Non omnis fert omnia tellus and to omit what I have not without some wonders observ'd of the Limits of differing sorts of Mines and Mineral Veins in very bordering parts of the same tract of Land I cannot but here take notice that though Sulphur be in many Countries usually found and that in plenty where there are other Metalline Veins insomuch that Chymists make it one of the three Principles of all Metals yet in the Mines of England more strictly so call'd I do not remember I ever met with so much as an Ounce of Native Sulphur and I could not find by divers Mineralists of whom I purposely ask'd the question that they had met with any among the various Mines they had frequented It may also happen that there may be hurtfull Minerals in a Countrey and yet not capable of often producing or promoting Pestilences there even upon moderate Earthquakes For 't is possible that these Orpimental or other Noxious Minerals may have their Beds or Veins lying so deep in the Earth that they are not ordinarily able to send up Effluvia strong and copious enough to make
Fomes of the Morbifick Effluvia being soon destroy'd or spent whereas some others may continue longer upon the Stage as having under ground more settled and durable causes to maintain them Which last part of the Observation may be illustrated by what happen'd in Calabria which Province though it have been observed to have acquired within these two or three ages the faculty of producing Manna upon certain Trees yet this great change though sudden enough had it seems such stable causes as well as of great extent that it hath lasted several scores of years and continues in that Countrey to this day I am not ignorant that the whole Doctrine propounded in the four Propositions about the Insalubrity of the Air is not at all comfortable either to Patients or Physicians But important Theories deserv'd to be inquir'd into and if true to be deliver'd though we could wish they were untrue And judicious men rather thank than blame those that have given us account of latent or unsuspected though perhaps irremediable causes of Diseases and of death or have recorded the Histories of some Poysons whereof the true Antidotes are yet unknown Uncommon Notions about Diseases may serve to inlarge the Physicians mind and excite his attention and curiosity and besides that they may keep him from too obstinately persisting in the use of receiv'd Medicins though unsuccessfull upon a Supposition that the Disease can have no other causes than those wont to be assign'd it by Classick Authours besides this I say I do not despair but that either the sagacity or fortune of this inquisitive age or at least of Posterity may by the blessing of God be happy enough to find proper Remedies even for those Diseases that proceed from Subterranean Effluvia when once by proper Signs they shall be distinctly discover'd Of which power of appropriated Remedies I have known some Instances as to the very bad Symptoms produc'd by Antimonial and some other Mineral Fumes Some of the Points discours'd of under the fourth Proposition were of affinity enough to Paradoxes to have need of being illustrated or confirmed by Observations and Experiments And therefore having accidentally retriev'd some of this last nam'd sort I shall venture to subjoin them as a Specimen though without Transitions or Applications but just as I found them thrown together in one loose sheet wherein I lighted on them But it is time to conclude with the recital of the promised Experiments Which I would immediately do but that I hold it fit to premise by way of Introduction to them that I hope the Things hitherto discours'd will appear much the more probable if we shall prove by Experiments that which seems much less likely than any thing we have above deliver'd namely that Metals completely formed and malleable may be elevated into the Air and that perhaps without any great violence of Fire in the form of Exhalations and Vapours the singly invisible Corpuscles still retaining their Metalline nature This at least as to some Metals I have endeavour'd to prove in another Tract entitl'd a Paradox about the Fuel of Flames But because that Discourse was never publish'd I will here set down two or three Experiments not mention'd that I remember in it Which I do the more willingly because it may be a Thing of no small moment in Physick if it be shewn that Fixt and solid Bodies such as Metals are may by art be reduc'd into such minute Corpuscles that without loosing their nature and all their Properties they may become parts of Fumes or perhaps of invisible Vapours or even of Flame it self Particulars belonging to the IVth Proposition EXPER. I. WE took three Parts or Pounds of Dantsic Vitriol which is blew and somewhat partakes of Copper and two Parts or Pounds of good Sea-salt these being very well powder'd and mix'd were distill'd with a strong naked Fire to force out all that could be driven over and by this means we not onely obtain'd a Spirit of Salt of a manifestly blewish Colour but there ascended also a considerable quantity of Powder which being shaken with the Liquor settled at the bottom of it in the form of a Powder which was judg'd to consist of Corpuscles of a Cupreous nature and perhaps also of some of a Martial nature But I unhappily neglected the opportunity of examining this Powder which came up in quantity enough to have serv'd for various Trials EXPER. II. By substituting English Vitriol which is green and is much more abundant in Iron than that of Dantsic and proceeding in other respects as in the former Process we obtain'd a very yellow Spirit with a considerable quantity of a yellowish Powder that was guess'd to be a kind of Crocus Martis EXPER. III. We took very thin Plates of Copper and cast them into a Retort upon an equal or a double weight for we did not always use the same of good Mercury Sublimate and luting on the Receiver gave a Fire by degrees for several hours by which means we usually obtain'd some running Mercury which seemed to be very well purifi'd and was perhaps also impregnated together with some Sublimate that had not fasten'd upon the Copper And at the bottom of the Retort we had good store of a ponderous and brittle substance that did not look at all like a Metal but rather like something of a Gummous or Resinous nature being also fusible and inflammable almost like sealing Wax This having not opportunity to prosecute the Experiment at home I put into the hands of an industrious Physician that was earnest with me to impart to him the Process and let Him pursue it for me He according to my direction expos'd this Metalline Rosin if I may so call it grossly beaten to the free Air where it did according to Expectation in a short time change Colour and turn to a kind of Verdegreece which being dissolv'd in good Spirit of Salt gave a Solution of a very lovely green Colour This being slowly distill'd ad Siccitatem yielded but a very weak and phlegmatick Liquour and the Caput Mortuum was again dissolv'd in fresh Spirit and the Menstruum abstracted as before This was done several times till the matter was so impregnated that the Menstruum being drawn off from it came over as strong almost as when it was put on This done the thus impregnated Verdegreece was diligently mingl'd with Tripoly or some such insipid and fixt additament and distill'd with a strong Fire by which means it afforded good store of a Liquour Colourless like common Water which made the Physician suppose the Experiment had miscarry'd till I having dropt into it a Colourless Liquor namely Spirit of Hartshorn or of Sal-armoniac He was much and delightfully surpriz'd to find it presently disclose a deep and lovely blew Colour What afterwards became of this odd Spirit I need not here declare what has been said being sufficient to shew that Corpuscles of Copper may be elevated in the form of