Selected quad for the lemma: death_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
death_n	body_n	life_n	nature_n	5,551	5	5.2232	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41127	Some kindling sparks in matters of physick to satisfie some physicians who are of opinion that spirits (which they call hot things) do burn and inflame the body / written formerly to a friend by Albertus Otto Faber.	Faber, Albert Otto, 1612-1684.	1668 (1668)	Wing F70; ESTC R37760	5,662	9

some measure homogeneal to Life yet without a preparation in the best manner are hardly fit to kindle or nourish Life in order to consume or expel diseases from the Body But when they are duly prepared their effects will be the better and more evident As for instance When it happens that any body is taken with a sudden fright his Life becomes weak which may cause him to swoon away then if the Life be furnished with something of its nature that is with a fiery Medicine well prepared as may be a good Aqua vitae or the like he will recover instantly and what quantity then he doth drink it will not intoxicate him but it repaireth presently into the chief residence of life to assist and go along with it The same may be seen in any man tyred out for when he drinks a good draught of Aqua vitae he gathereth strength again presently and therefore it is ignorantly spoken that it would burn a man because Fire cannot burn Fire but Fire is refreshed by Fire and they increase one another rejoycing mutually as being of one nature But Water and cold things will quench it because they have no unity with Fire nay they are death to the Fire Therefore the more any Medicine partakes of fiery qualities the more it is of the nature of Life and can strengthen it the better to expel the Disease and settle it again in its own seat The Scripture saith that the Life of the Body is in its Blood and whoever will try this must anotomize it with Fire which will manifest a most fiery Spirit or volatile Salt This Spirit doubtless is in the Blood the residence of the Life or at least its food as Wood for Fire Now observe the better every norishment is prepared the fitter it is for digestion as raw flesh would not agree with the Stomack of a Man but when it is rosted or boyled tender it is of an easie digestion So vulgar Medicines rawly and roughly wrought and compounded would hardly be so acceptable or welcome as when they are brought to a more spiritual substance by the Spagirical Anotomy of the Fire coming nearer to the nature of Life For the panting Life in reference to its weakness greedily sucks such a Medicine even as the Load-stone attracts Iron to its self And being thereby relieved and refreshed drives the Disease out of the Body and repaireth to its place And such a Medicine may justly be called a Cordial as refreshing the Spirit of Life which is no such Pottage as being well sweetened with Sugar is termed a Cordial yet void of admittance into the society of Life to corroborate the swouning Spirits as being most commonly heterogeneal to them What kind of Medicines then are the best next to that that could be wished for out of Gold Note that I have said 1. That the Blood is the seat of Life 2. That the application ought to be made to the Life 3. That the Blood contains a most fiery Spirit and a volatile Salt and 4. That the food of Life is that most fiery Spirit and volatile Salt According to these Principles experience hath taught that whatsoever has been done worthy of note has been effected either by Fiery Spirits or Volatile Salts as being ready to joyn presently with the food of Life against the Distempers and to get Victory if the Patient be not past cure All created sublunary things are divided into Animals Vegetables and Minerals And we find that the first yeelds a Fiery Spirit and Volatile Salt as well in the Urine as in the Flesh and Blood both of an excellent fiery quality and eminently medicinal In the Vegetables we find nothing more effectual than their Spirits as well their essential and volatile Salts And especially when their Alcaliis may be disclosed or extracted and brought unto that prerogative of volatility In the Minerals we find the Sulphurs of Minerals and Mettals after they are separated by Fire from the crude malignant Mercuriality who being then harmless are called Tinctures Now these sulphurous Tinctures Spirits and Salts do all partake of the fiery quality and are apt therefore to joyn with the Life which is Fire against the Distemper and root it out of the Body Therefore let no body henceforth be so ignorant as to say that a Phisitian making use of those excellent Medicines doth burn the Patient when in the mean time others go about to feed the Fire of Life with Water or rather to quench it totally Object But what shall we do when a Patient lies in a great burning heat shall we then put fire to fire Answ This is indeed the only thing that has hitherto deceived many Physitians to avoid hot things as they call them to be administred to such as lie in a hot burning fit Therefore remember what I have said of the Life as being Caelestial Fire and Light most natural to the Body without which the Body is cold dark and dead To this take notice of this instance viz. That when Iron or the like is put into Aquafortis though it feeleth coldish yet presently it grows hot and boyls without Fire in so much that a man with his bare hand cannot hold the Vessel that contains it This burning heat seems unto Man to arise from the violent action of the Aquafortish Spirit upon the Iron which the eye may easily disern Suppose thou wouldst quench this hot burning Fire by pouring much cold Water upon it as a thing contrary to the Fire though that boyling may seem to cease and be as it were quenched yet in effect it will prove the same because it will consume the Iron one way as well as the other way however more slowly and insensibly when Water is poured upon it Therefore to put cold things to this fire is not the way to quench it But wilt thou do right then give to the Spirit to eat or devour Salt thus he shall lose his strength be broken and leave boyling with consuming Here appears that the Salt is not a cold thing yet able to make peace betwixt hot things viz. the Aquafortis and the Iron In like manner when such a burning heat rises in a sick body it rises from a parallel action betwixt two things working upon one another And therefore make thy applications not with cold things immediately to the hot burning which is nothing material but only an accidental quality or symptome flowing from the action of these two fighting things aforesaid upon the Body But make thy applications to either of them two and break its strength then presently the heat will cease and this may be done with hot things so called as well as any other may think to do it with cold ones which the Salia before declared of although being in their center a meer Fire will experience and make true in so much that by the application of them the said burning will not only be quenched but the Spirit of Life mightily strengthened also and thereby enabled to overpower its enemies who endeavour to quarter in its strong-hold The Body of Man is filled every where with Volatile Salt nay it is but little else than a Volatile Salt throughout save the contents of the Stomach and its government whose fermental moisture is acid parallel to Vinegar Spirit of Sulphur or the like acid Liquors But acid Liquors and volatile Salts are enemies fighting together to over-power one another Hence when perhaps something acid falls beyond the said government of the Stomach then presently rises a fight between the said acid and volatile Salt in the region of the Blood where the said acid is a stranger falling as a Pirate into the Native Countrey of the volatile Salt whose dominion is in the Blood of which fight flows as it were an hot invisible vapour like unto the radiant shining of the Sun throughout the Body and makes the Physician believe that it is the Distemper it self when in the mean while the very root of the Distemper is hidden from his eyes Therefore he goes on to quench that burning heat with cold things so called by which only he weakeneth the natural Fire of Life and for the expectation of having quenched the said burning heat he has given to that strange Pirate a large compass to waste insensibly the Garrison of the Blood viz. the volatile Salt in it and so being deceived himself he deceiveth his Patient also not of set-purpose but being not perswaded otherwise and therefore worthy of compassion When one takes Cochinele which is like meerly coagulated Blood and dissolveth it in Water then poureth Aquafortis thereupon there will presently appear an action betwixt the said Cochinele and the Aquafortis which may serve for an Instance whereby the eye of man may discern as it were demonstratively what it effects when such an acid Guest draweth into the Blood Thus I have somewhat answered to that vulgar Objection which might have been move enlarged if my intention had been bent to that purpose yet it may suffice to such as can kindle a Fire although having nothing else but this Tinder Spark London the 9th of January 1664 5. Alb. O. Faber