stop in that first Concoction while in the mean time they proceed farther in the publick Concoction And thus the foresaid new Opinion seems to be sufficiently refuted notwithstanding Charleton has shew'd himself so obstinate in its Defence But in regard that Glisson uses the same Words and Arguments there is no need of any farther Refutation of him although he assert the sole quantity of the Blood to be the occasion of its Motion and therein seems to differ something from Glisson CHAP. XII Of the Blood Vital Spirit and Nutrition I. THE Blood is call'd by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the French du Sangue by the Italians Sangue by the Germans Blut by the English Blood and by the Low Dutch Bloet and which is chiefly to be admir'd at there is no Synonimous Word by which that Humor may be absolutely signify'd Among the Latins indeed the Word Cruor is frequently us'd but that Word does not absolutely signifie Blood but only the Blood which flows from Wounds and Ulcers or corrupted Blood or such as remains in the Vessels after Death So likewise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek and Grumus in the Latin signifies Clotted Blood II. Now Blood is a red Iuice made in the Heart out of the Chylus for the nourishment of the whole Body III. Its Substance consists of two several Iuices by means of the Serum so united in the Serum it self through several Concoctions of the Bowels as to become one Bloody Mass together IV. One of these Iuices is Sulphury though Malpigius not dreaming of Sulphur calls the same Iuice every where Fatness the other Salt the one somewhat fatty oyly and viscous the other altogether different from all manner of Fatness I call 'em Juices so far as Sulphur and Salt in Fusion concur to the Mass of Blood And therefore in dissolution they cannot be well mingl'd without loss and tumult for Fat with watery Salt never mixes well unless some Mercury intervene so familiar to the Nature of both that both may be exactly mix'd as well with it as in it This Mercury is the Serum as in which the more watery Particles of both the said Juices are dissolv'd and mix'd by Concoctions And hence that is constituted not only out of the Watery part of the Elements alone but also out of some Sulphury and Salt particles melted therein by Concoction and so it partakes of a certain middle Nature so that therein there may be a convenient Mixture and as it were a union of the Sulphury and Salt Juices These Particles are discern'd by the Saltish Savour of the Sweat and Urine the Sulphury by the Smell of both the one by the Salt which is separated from the Urine by Chymistry the other for that stale Urine being heated at the Fire the exhaling Vapour presently burns when it comes near the Fire And therefore it is requisite that the said Serum be mix'd in a sufficient quantity and well concocted with the rest of the Juices For if it be too little or none at all the active Principles that is to say the Salt and Sulphury Juice close too strictly together and too vehemently exagitate and combat one with another and in that mutual Conflict waste and corrupt one another whence the Body either depriv'd of Nourishment consumes away or else upon the corruption of the Blood falls into Diseases and dies But if either a too watry Serum or over-raw abound then the said active Principles are too much eloin'd and separated one from another and their Combination becomes too loose so that they do not sufficiently agitate each other and hence the Blood being over-moist and subject to Corruption the whole Body that is nourish'd with such Blood grows weak and infirm Now that the Blood consists of these Principles is easily demonstrated For that â—…ulphur is in it the many oily sweâ—…t â—…at and sulphury Nourishments that we 〈◊〉 sufficiently declare out of which nothing else but something Sulphury can be extracted by the Concoctions of the Bowels and mix'd with the Blood And this farther also for that we find that the most fat and sulphury Parts of the Body are generated out of the Blood which receive their Softneâ—…s Oiliness and Tenderness from Sulphur That there is Salt likewise in it is apparent from the Salt-Meats which we feed upon from the Salt which is extracted out of the Blood by Chymistry and from the Salt which is in the Urine and is separated from the Blood together with the superfluous Serum And that the Serum is in it is visible to the Eye There are some also that add Earth to the other Principles but seeing that is nothing else but the remainder of thick Salt very crude and hard to be dissolv'd it ought not to be allow'd for a peculiar Principle as being that which cannot be melted and dissolv'd by Concoction but by a long and vehement Heat like another crude tartareous Salt as is manifest in Bricks made of Earth and bak'd in the Kiln for the Bricks next the Fire through the vehemence of a continu'd Fire melt and run like thick Glass In this mixture of a Sulphury and Salt Juice in the Serum the Sulphury Juice contributes a stronger and swifter Activity but the Salt Juice constitutes the primary Mass as that which being of a more fix'd Nature hinders the easie dissolution of the Sulphury Juice mix'd and blended with it and so retards the dissolving of the Sanguineous Mass and resists Corruption Stench and Inflammation and being prone to Fixation thence it is the Cause that the Blood being inâ—…us'd into the Substance of the Parts becomes a good part of it coagulated therein and adheres and is assimilated to it Here arises a notable Doubt to be consider'd Seeing these fat or oily and sulphury Parts of the Blood are hotter than the others and so seem able to promote the Salt parts to a stronger Activity how it comes to pass that in fat People in whom the sulphury oily Parts abound in great quantity there happens less Agility of the whole Body and less Activity of the Animal Spirits but that they are generally sloathful and sleepy and more troubled with Drowsiness Apoplexies and short Breath than leaner People This comes to pass because that in such People the oily sulphury Particles of the Blood are too much abounding above the Salt and too much enfold and blunt them with their greasie Oiliness so that they cannot boil be attenuated and be made Spirituous and hence they are less fit for the Generation of Animal Spirits in convenient and sufficient quantity so that the Animal Operations grow dull and heavy and soporiferous Effects prevail Moreover the Heat of the Sulphury Particles themselves asswages and loses its Vigor unless there happen an Effervescency in the Blood by means of the sharp salt Particles and through the stronger and smaller Particles among themselves a fiercer Heat be rais'd Which
together to burst forth into Tears X. Some few were of Opinion that Tears were a Portion of the Potulent Humors contain'd in the Brain and Veins of the Eyes and more especially in the Veins of the Corners of each Eye which bursts forth upon the Compression or Dilation of those Veins occasion'd by much Joy or Sorrow But the narrowness and small number of those Veins hereby discernable contradict this Opinion together with the vast quantity of the Lachrimal Humors which cannot be collected to that Abundance in those diminutive Vessels and flow forth in so large a quantity nor can it be so suddenly transmitted to them nor pass through them Add to this that the little Veins of the Eyes take in at their Extremities the superfluous bloody Humors and carry them to the Jugulars but pour none out from themselves because there is no passage for that potulent Matter to come to the Eye XI Nor do they differ much from the foregoing Opinion who believes the Tears to be nothing else but the Serum which is separated from the Blood which is carried to the Head when the Pores are so disposed by a certain Motion of the Spirits that it may be able to burst forth But they neither tell us what that Disposition is nor that same certain Motion of the Spirits which two things in regard they are so extreamly different and multi-cacious and cannot be naturally the same as well in Constriction as Dilatatiâ—…n in Sadness as in Joy in which contrary Accidents however Tears must flow from one and the same next Cause and not from diverse and contrary there is nothing remains that can desend that Opinion XII At this day many ascribe the Flux of Tears only to the Lymphatic Vessels carry'd to the Eyes Yet never any Person that I know of has hitherto demonstrated that manner of Lachrymation nor those Vessels themselves besides Nicholas Stenonis that most accurate Describer of Kernels who lately going about to explain that Opinion more at large not without reason affirms them to be a Serous sort of Liquor chiefly separated from the Arterious Blood but as to the manner and place of Separation his Opinion is quite different from what any body has hitherto propounded For he believes that the Blood is carried through the Arteries into the Glandules of the Eyes and that the Superfluity of it is suckt up by the Veins But that the Veins if they be squeez'd together by any Cause do not perform that Office sufficiently and then by reason of the long stay of the abounding Blood in the Glandules the Serum is separated from it in greater quantity and flows in the form of Tears through the Lymphatic Vessels proceeding from the Kernels Then he believes the Veins to be compress'd by the swelling of the Glandules caused by a more copious Influx of Animal Spirits which creeping into the Glandules through the diminutive Nerves at the disposal of the Mind as in Grief Anger Joy Sadness flow sometimes more sometimes fewer into the Kernels more than after a various manner and streighten them more or less To this cause he refers those Tears that are shed contrary to Inclination as also those which proceed from Fumes and sharp Vapors or break forth upon any violent motion of the Body and farther believes his Opinion to be mainly confirmed by the bursting forth of bloody Tears which are sometimes observ'd Certainly this new Opinion is propounded very speciously but in the mean time it does not sufficiently discover the Fountain of Tears For if we compare the great quantity of Tears so swiftly bursting forth with the diminutive Blood-bearing Vessels of those Kernels presently this Opinion will fall to the Ground at the very Threshold For how few and how small are those little Arteries which are carried to the Kernels of the Eyes The most of them are invisible Therefore though in the time of Sadness all the Veins of those Kernels which would carry back the Blood should be altogether obstructed and all their little Arteries open'd by a Solution of the Continuum and out of these not only the Serous Part of the Blood but all the Blood that was contain'd therâ—…in and carried through them should burst forth they would not be able to pour forth the hundredth part of such a quantity of Liquor in a whole hour as often in great Sadness is wept out in Tears in the space of one single quarter of an hour If it be answered that in the time of Sadness the Blood is carried in greater quantity to the Eyes and that the said Kernels swell and are more compress'd and the Veins streightned Reason will teach us the contrary For in Sadness the Pulse of the Heart and Arteries is little and contracted and the exterior Parts wax cold because the Heart sends from it self much less Blood into any of the Arteries much less into those of the Head Neither is there any reason why in Sadness it should be carried in greater quantity and more serous to the Kernels of the Eyes than to any other Parts Moreover the little Arteries of those small Kernels are too few and too narrow for so great a quantity of Blood and Serum to pass through them in so short a time as is so swiftly wept out in Tears Lastly there is nothing to cause those little Kernels more to swell or be compressed in time of Grief than at other times For as to those Animal Spirits which as Nicholas Stenonis asserts How forth at the Disposal of the Mind Sometimes more sometimes fewer as in Grief Anger Joy c. and move the Kernels after a various manner we grant that they enter the Kernels in a small quantity through those diminutive few and for the most part invisible Nerves moderately to separate the saltish symphatic Liquor from the Arterious Blood and pour it forth through the small Vessels describ'd in the foregoing Chapter for the necessary moistning and smoothing of the Eyes but not in so great a quantity as to move the Eyes and cause them so swiftly to swell or to compress them and so to squeeze out such a quantity of Tears For by the Influx of those Animal Spirits hardly any other Parts are mov'd at the disposal of the Mind then the Muscles and such parts as are mov'd by the Muscles Add to this that in Sadness the Animal Spirits flow in lesser quantity than is usual to any parts whatsoever which is the reason that the Joynts often tremble and the Sight of the Eys is darkened For the Heart contracting it self and beating but weakly as in Sadness little Blood is sent to the Brain to encrease their Generation and withal the Motion of the Brain it self being thereby weakned it sends forth fewer Animal Spirits to the rest of the Parts Lastly though we should grant what that Famous Gentleman asserts his Opinion is not thereby confirm'd but quite overturn'd For thence it follows that the more copiâ—… us those Animal Spirits
Secondly Because action is competible to the whole operating Organ but use to every part of the Organ for instance The action of a Muscle is to contract but the use of the Musculous Membrane is to contain its fibres and to seperate it from other Muscles of the Artery to bring blood to it as of the nerves animal spirits to support the fibres of the flesh Yet oftentimes use action and function are promiscously used by Anatomists And the action of a part because it tends to some end or other is often called use And also use because it excludes not action is called action But use is of greater latitude then action Hippocrates divided things that make up the whole into things containing things contained and things that move or have in themselves the power of motion Galen calls these three things Solid parts Humors and Spirits In this division the threefold parts of the body are not comprehended but only three things without which a man cannot continue entire that is alive For only the containing or solid parts are true parts of the body Yet these parts cannot continue alive except they be continually nourished by the humors Not that humors are parts of the body but the proximate matter which by coction is changed into the substance of the parts into which till they are changed they cannot be called parts and when they are changed they cannot be called humors for a bone is not blood and blood is not bone though the one be bred of the other The same must be understood of spirits which being made of the subtilest and hottest part of the blood do very much contribute to the nutrition of the body Therefore though a man cannot continue alive without these three yet it does not follow that all these three must necessarily be parts of the body A Vine consists of solid woody parts and a Juyce whereby it is nourished and yet it is evident this Juice is no part of the Vine because if a Vine be unseasonably cut abundance of it runs out the Vine remaining entire wherefore a blind man may see that it is no part if the Vine but only liqour which by further coction would be turned into a Vine Thus also when there is a Flux of blood by the Haemorrhoids Menses or any other part or when one makes water or sweats no man in his wits will say that then the parts of a mans body are voided although a man cannot live without blood and serum But if pieces of the Lungs be brought up in coughing or if piecesâ—… of the Kidneys be voided in Urine as it sometimes happens in their exculceration then it is certain that the true parts of the body are voided Besides these are parts of the body whence actions immediately proceed and they proceed not from the humors and spirits but from solids For the humors and spirits move not the Heart Brain and other parts but they both breed and move the humors and spirits for when the Heart Brain and other parts are quiet humors and spirits are neither bred nor moved this appears in a deep swoon and though there is abundance of them in the body and those very hot and fit for motion as in such as dye of a burning Fever yet as soon as the Heart is quiet they neither move through the Arteries Veins and Nerves nor are able to move the Heart or any part else which is a certain Argument that they are Passive and that no Action can proceed from them And that the humors and spirits are moved by the Heart and bred in it and other parts will more plainly appear lib. 2. cap. 11. and lib. 3. cap. 10 11. and in several other places And now though solids cannot act without the humors and spirits and by them their Actions in as much as by their quantity or quality as their heat cold c. they are able to cause this or that mutation or temper in Solids are made quicker slower stronger weaker better or worse yet they are without air yet air is no part of the body neither does the Action of respiration proceed from it but from the muscles of the breast forcing it out though in the mean time air by giving way to the motion of the muscles and passing in and out through the Aspera Arteria affords such an aptitude for respiration as without it no respiration could be performed though also by its heat or cold it may make respiration quicker slower longer or rarer according as by these mutations the heat of the parts is augmented or diminished and thereupon necessity obliges one to breath quicker or slower So the Heart and other solid Parts are not mov'd by the humors and spirits but act upon the humors and spirits they move attenuate and concoct them till at length they turn their apt particles into a substance like themselves and so apply and unite them to themselves and make them parts of the body which they were not before they were applied and assimilated For one part of the body is not nourished with another part of its whole a bone is not nourished with flesh nor a vein with a nerve c. Neither can that which nourishes the parts by any means be called a part for otherwise there would be no difference between a part and its nutriment With which Nourishment unless the Parts be daily cherished and their consumed particles restored their strength and substance would quickly waste and fail and by that failure at length their Action would be lost So that Man of necessity must have both Blood and Spirits for the support of Life hence saith the Text in Levit. 17. 11. the Soul that is the Life of the Flesh is in its Blood as being the nearest Support of the Body without which neither the Parts of the Body can act nor the Man himself live Yet it does not follow from thence that the Blood and Spirits are part of the Body For the same might be said of the external Air without which no Man can live For take away from a Man the use of external Air either by suffocation or drowning or any other way you presently deprive him of Life as surely as if you took from him his Blood and Spirits Yet no man of Judgment will say that the external Air is a part of the Body Seeing that most certainly if that without which Life cannot subsist were to be accounted a Part the external Air must of necessity be said to be a Part of our Body as well as the Blood and Spirits Moreover it is to be considered that if the Humors and Spirits have contracted any Foulness or Distemper they are by the Physicians numbred among the Causes of Diseases not among the diseased Parts Besides that if they were Parts they ought to be similar yet never any Anatomist that I ever yet heard of recken'd 'em among similar Parts For most of the Organic Parts
quit the Stones and so thrust forth the Bud which is the first thing form'd in order to the new production And the same thing happens in Pease Beans Wheat Barley Melons Cucumbers whose Seeds are wrapt up in a little Membrane instead of a Stone In like manner Womens Eggs and the Eggs of all Creatures that bring forth living Conceptions as also of Birds in their Ovary by means of the Nourishment brought 'em through the small little Arteries and invisible Nerves acquire a just bigness and such an aptitude that they may be impregnated by the spiritous part of the Male-seed Which Fertility if they acquire by Copulation and so become seal'd with the Seal of Fertility the little Cells wherein they are included in the Ovary grow soft dilate and loosen themselves as the stones of Fruits willing to quit their Seeds for new Production open of their own accords and so when they can no longer be contain'd in those little Cells by reason of their growth and the loosning of the Cells they fall of themselves into the Egg-Chanels or Tubes which are relax'd to that degree by the increase of Heat and Spirits in the Act of Copulation that they afford the ripe Eggs an easie passage toward the Womb which afterwards by the gentle Compression of the Abdomen caus'd by Respiration are gently thrust forward through the Tubes into the Womb it self wherein by reason of the narrow Orifice of the Womb they are stop'd and detain'd there to be cherish'd by its moderate Heat and convenient Moisture and the vivific Spirit latent therein and infus'd with the Male-seed may be freed from its Fetters and proceeding from power to act may begin the delineation of the Infant Structure Of which more Cap. 28 29. XXXIV Here arises a very singular and considerable Question viz. When Birds without the Coition of the Male lay their perfect Eggs which they call Wind-eggs whether mature Virgins and Women depriv'd of Men and without the assistance of Copulation may not be able sometime to bring forth their Eggs 'T is very probable that in Women of cold Tempers and not prone to Venery such Accidents will hardly fall out seeing there is not in them such a copious afflux of hot Blood and Spirits which is much promoted by intent venereal thoughts to the generative Parts that the little Boxes of the Ovary and the Tubes should be sufficiently relax'd and dilated for the exclusion and passage of the Eggs But in hot Women itching with Lust prone to Copulation and continually intent upon venereal thoughts sometimes the Parts may be so relax'd by a copious afflux of Blood and Seed to the Parts that the Eggs when mature may drop of themselves into the Tubes out of the Ovary and through them be carried to the Womb yet not so as to be there long detain'd because of the Orifice of the Womb 's being open as not being exactly shut but when it contains the Man's Seed for Conception or else the Birth But why these same Womens Wind-eggs were never observ'd by any Person before happen'd I suppose from hence for that Women do not inspect what things slip out of their Wombs or know what they are nor will they suffer Men to view those things among which if there should be an Egg sometimes it would not be discern'd by them Besides that by reason of the tender Skin wherewith it is enwrapt it might fall out broken or else be broken among the Linen with which Women dry up their Uterine Excrements and so lose altogether its shape of an Egg which else would be visible to the Eye However in the mean time this has recall'd to my memory what many years since a Woman not of the meanest quality whose Daughter being about four and twenty years of Age wanton enough yet honest was troubled with vehement fits of the Mother related to me that is to say That my Prescriptions which were administred to her nothing availing her Midwife had many times deliver'd her from her present Distemper and imminent danger of Death by thrusting her finger into the sheath of the Womb with which she kept rubbing there so long till she brought down a certain viscous Liquor out of the Womb which was often accompanied with a certain clear transparent little Bubble and so the Person in a Swoon came to her self again This I laugh't at at that time when I never so much as dream't of Womens Eggs but afterwards it came into my mind that that same Bubble was a Wind-egg of which thing I could now give a better Judgment could I meet with such a Bubble that were again to be seen Moreover it is very probable that those Wind-eggs are frequently evacuated by those salacious Women who lying with Men through some distemper of the Seed never conceive For why should their Eggs be less carried out of the Ovary to the Womb than the Eggs of those of others that conceive especially when they themselves have Eggs which are proper for Fertility if they were but bedew'd with a fertile Male-seed which is apparent from this that some Women lying with their Husbands never Conceive but lying with other Men presently prove with Child XXXV This Conjecture of Wind-eggs is yet more confirm'd by that wonderful Story related by Bartholine of a Norway Woman who after eleven kindly Labours at length in the Year 1639. being in Labour with her twelfth Child brought forth two Eggs with extraordinary Pains like to Hen-eggs only that the Shell was not so white Such another sort of Egg it was that the Woman brought forth with the usual pains of Childbirth in the Territory of Vicenza in the Year 1621. by the Report of Iohn Rodias Cent. 3. Observ. 57. Without doubt the Female-seed contain'd in these Eggs was either unfruitful or which is more likely by reason of the unusual thickness of the Exterior Membrane the Male-seed could not penetrate through the over-straitned Pores to the inner parts of the Eggs and consequently not be mix'd with the Womans Seed latent within and by that means could not frame any Embryo out of it self for which reason those Eggs remain'd unfruitful like the Wind-eggs of Fowl living without their Males Now there are three very remarkable things to be observ'd in the Eggs of the said Women 1. That being little as they are and sliding out of the Tubes into the Womb they should stay there so long 2. That they should grow to the bigness of a Hens-egg in the Womb. 3. That the Exterior Membrane should grow so hard as to harden into a Shell which is a thing scarce ever heard of nor ever observ'd by any other Physicians that we read of XXXVI We told ye before that the Egg Chanels or Tubes were so relax'd by the abundani flowing in of the Animal Spirits and hot Blood that through them the spiritous part of the Male-seed might the more easily be able to penetrate to the Ovary and the Eggs
made of a certain Iuice that falls from the Brain and Marrow of the Back-bone Thus writes Hippocrates l. de Gen. that the Seed is diffus'd out of the Brain into the Loyns and Marrow of the Back-bone Thus also writes Plato in Timaeus That the Seed is a Deflux of the Marrow of the Back-bone and Alâ—…maeon that it is a Portion of the Brain VI. The more Modern Authors who could find no such large Conveyances from the Brain and Spinal Marrow to the Stones rejected the foresaid Opinion altogether and asserted the Blood to be generated out of the Blood flowing through the Spermatical Vessels to the Stones Which Opinion as most true and indubitable for many Ages has been receiv'd and taught by all the Philosophers VII But of late Glisson Wharton and Charleton English Physicians have oppos'd this receiv'd Opinion who write that the Matter of the Seed is a more crude and chylous Humour carried from the Mesentery to the Brain and thence to the Stones through the Nerves of which they say there are a vast number inserted into the Testicles and Epididymis which is contrary however to all Experience when our own Eyes tell us thaâ—… only very few and those very small and scarce visible Nerves reach to those Parts VIII Clement Niloe produces another Opinion affirming the Seed to be generated out of the Lymphatic Liquor But in regard the Lympha never flows to the Stones out of any other Parts but while the Seed is making is separated out of that Seminal Matter and out of the Testicles themselves through the Lymphatic Vessels that take their rise within the Testicles ascends to the Abdomen and so to the Vasa Sanguifera it is apparent that the Seed is not made out of the Lympha but that the Lympha is only occasion'd by the making of the Seed as it is also an Effect of the making of bilious Ferment Cap. 13 14. Moreover if the Lympha should be carried to the Testicles as it is not and in them should be mix'd with the Matter that is to be chang'd into Seed then it would not hold proportion with the Matter so to be chang'd into Seed but only with the Ferment preparing the Matter that it may be conveninently turn'd into Seed So that Niloe does not seem to have observ'd the Motion of the Stones upward nor to have understood the use of it Cap. 13. 17. IX Hieronymus Barbatus of Padua seems not to recede far from this Opinion who Lib. de Sang. Sero writes that the Seed is not generated out of the Seed but out of the Serum Which Opinion he endeavours to support with many but such insipid Reasons as are not worth Refutation But none of these either Modern or Ancient Opinions have hit the Mark. But he who considers more seriously the Prolific Liquor will certainly find that to the making of the Seed there concurs for Matter partly Blood flowing through the Spermatic Arteries partly Animal Spirits brought through the Nerves X. That the Blood constitutes the first Mass of the Seed is apparent from the large Spermatic Arteries carried to the Stones which carry more Blood than only serves for the Nourishment of the Stones The same is confirm'd by the Spermatic Veins carrying back to the Vena Cava the Blood that remains after the Nourishment of the Stones and making of the Seed The same is also taught by Experience when upon immoderate Copulation we shall find the Blood to be ejected instead of Seed not without some kind of Titillation as Aristotle himself acknowledges and the observation of several Physicians testifies by reason that the Blood flowing in great quantity through the Arteries has not sufficient time to stay in the Stones nor Animal Spirit pour'd out of the Nerves strong and plentiful enough that the Blood could be converted into Seed in so short a space Add to this that in the Stones themselves and other Spermatic Vessels weaken'd by immoderate Copulation and the overmuch dissipation of the Spirits the Seminific power becomes debilitated so far as not to be able so speedily to convert into Seed the Blood which is brought being destitute of sufficient Spirit from the Nerves Which weakness is apparent from hence that after immoderate Copulation the Seed first generated is crude and watery And this Experience Reason supports which teaches us that the Blood concurs in the Seed as the primary and greatest part of the Matter For that in our Bodies all things are enliven'd by the Vital Spirit flowing from the Heart and inherent in the Arterious Blood and that decaying nothing can be reviv'd for that if upon any occasion that Blood be stopp'd from flowing into the parts they presently dye away Hence of necessity that enlivening Spirit must be infus'd into the Seed as containing in it self an enlivening Power chiefly requisite in the Seed which Spirit since it cannot be conferr'd without the Subject to which it is inherent that is Arterious Blood hence it follows undoubtedly that the Blood concurs to constitute the Matter of the Seed XI Now that the Animal Spirits brought by the Nerves and thicken'd in the Stones into a thin Liquor and mix'd with the Blood of necessity concurs to the Matter of the Seed is apparent from hence that there is a great Correspondence between the Brains and the Testicles in regard the Brain the Nerves and all the nervous Parts are much weaken'd by immoderate Copulation and in regard that the waste of much Seed wasts also a great part of the Animal Spirits attended by lassitude and a manifest impairing of the Strength together with sadness and dejection of Mind there is thereby a disturbance in a Man's Countenance accompanied with a trembling of the Limbs all which things declare that the Animal Spirits are plentifully evacuated with the Seed Which Seed if it were only made of the Blood such Symptomes would never attend the Evacuation of a little Seed for that a whole Pint of Blood taken from a Man does not weaken him so much as the loss of an Ounce of Seed To this we may add the Consideration of the Spinal Consumption thus described by Hippocrates Lib. 2. de Morb. The Spinal Consumption says he arises from the Marrow of the Back-bone and chiefly seizes upon new married and libidinous Brides Concerning which if you ask the Patient he will tell you that he feels as it were Flies and Emmets creeping along from the upper parts as the Head c. down to the Back-bone And when he goes to Stool or makes Water he voids a great quantity of Liquid Genital Seed nor can he generate tho' he lyes with his Wife He is the Laughing-stock of Venus and suffers Nocturnal Pollutions as well as at other times but especially when he has travell'd a sleep place or run hard he draws his breath short he loses his strength his Head akes and his Ears sound By the Description of this Disease it
mov'd XLVI Here perhaps by way of a Corollary some one may ask me what is that same Architectonic Vertue latent in the prolific Seed which performs the Formation of the Parts In the foregoing Chapter we have discoursed at large concerning the enlivening Spirit implanted in the Prolific Seed as it is the Subject of the first forming Spirit but because no Spirit of it self and by its own Power seems able to perfect Generation unless it have in its self some effective Principle by virtue whereof it produces that Effect hence the Question arises what that is that affords that active Force to the Spirit and power to form a living body and endues the Matter with all manner of Perfection and produces Order Figure Growth Number Situation and those other things which are observed in living bodies Which is a thing hitherto unknown and has held the Minds of all Philosophers in deep Suspense Of whom the greatest part have rather chosen tacitly to admire the Supream Operator and his work than to unfold him and so affirm with Lactantius That Man contributes nothing to his Birth but the Matter which is the Seed but that all the rest is the handy work of God the Conception the forming of the Body the inspiration of the Soul and the conservation of the Parts In which sense says Harvey most truly and piously does he believe who deduces the Generations of all things from the same Eternal and Omnipotent Deity upon whose pleasure depends the Universality of the things themselves But others who believe that the Bounds of Nature are not so slightly to be skipped over nor think that in the Inquiries after the Principles of Generation there is such a necessity to have recourse to the first Architect and Governour of the whole Universe but that the first forming and efficient Cause created by God with the Things themselves and infus'd and planted within 'em is to be sought out of the Things themselves more arrogantly have presum'd to give us a clearer Explication of the Matter by Philosophical Reason yet differing in their Opinions which are various and manifold XLVII For Galen calls this Architectonic Power sometimes by the name of Nature sometimes Natural Heat sometimes the Inbred Temperament sometimes the Spirit which he affirms to be a Substance of it self moveable and always moveable Aristotle distinguishing between the Heat or Spirit of the Seed and Nature asserts the Artichectonic Power to be that Nature which is in the Spirit of the Seed and therefore distinct from the Spirit it self which is inherent in the Spirit as in its Subject and acts upon the Spirit as its Matter This Nature in the Spirit of the Seed was also acknowledged by Hippocrates saying That it is learned tho' it has not learnt rightly to act Not that it is Rational but because as Galen explains it it acts of it self all that is necessary to be acted without any direction Hence Deusingius defines it to be a certain immaterial Substance arising out of the Matter so determin'd to the Matter by the Supream God that it can neither be nor subsist nor operate without it This same Architectonic Vertue others with Avicen call the Intelligence others with Averrhoes and Scotus a Coelestial Force or a Divine Efficacy Iacob Scheggius calls it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 oâ—… 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 active or forming Reason and says that by the word Reason or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he understands a Substantial Form which is not to be apprehended by Sense but by the Understanding and Reason And so while he seems to speak something he says nothing at all XLVIII The Platonics call it a General Soul diffus'd through the whole World which according to the diversity of Materials and Seeds produces various Generations as a Plant from the Seed of a Plant a Man from the Seed of a Man a Horse from that of a Horse a Fish from that of a Fish c. But Plotin the great Platonist distinguishes this same Architectonic Vertue from the Platonic Soul of the World as produc'd from that by which it is produc'd and therefore he calls it Nature flowing from the Soul of the World which he says is the Essential Act of it and the Life depending upon it Themistius says that the forming Power is the Soul inclos'd in the Seed potentially enliven'd Deusingius in his Original of the Soul calls it Nature in the Seed that is as he explains himself a Soul potentially subsisting in the Seed being in it self the Beginning and Cause of Motion But in a Body already form'd he calls it the Soul actually subsisting And so without any necessity at all distinguishes one and the same thing into two and gives it two distinct names as it either rests or acts and according to the diversity of the Subject to be form'd or else already form'd Just as if a man distinguishing between a Painter lazily sleeping or painting awake should call the one Nature latent in his Spirit as one that could paint if he were awake and the other a real Painter as one actually painting as if the Painter that slept were not as much a Painter as he that actually painted Whereas as it appears by the Effects that which is able to form a Body at first out of the Seed and that which actually forms were not one and the same thing and so by a certain continuation the form of the thing formed remains This Opinion of his Deusingius seems to have drawn from the Institutes of the Platonists who distinguish between the Soul and Being a Soul that is between the Substance of the Soul which is said to be in the Seed and the Appellation of Nature and the Soul which acts at this prâ—…sent and is the form of the form'd Body Fernelius calls the Plastic Power a Spirit but he does not mean such a common Spirit which the Physicians say is rais'd by the preparations of the Bowels out of the Humours but some other Spirit of far sublimer Excellency For says he this Spirit is an Ethereal Body the Seat and Bond of Heat and the Faculties and the first Instrument of the Duty to be perform'd And Lib. 2. de Abdit c. 10. he believes it to be something that flows down from Heaven For says he the Heaven without any Seed produces many both Creatures and Plants but the Seed generates nothing without the Heaven The Seed only prepares aptly and conveniently Materials for the begetting of Things the Heaven sends into the Matter prepar'd Form and consummate Perfection and raises Life in all Things A little after he adds One Form of Heaven within its Power comprehends all the Forms that ever were or can be of all Creatures Plants Stones and Metals and impregnated with those innumerable Forms casts as in a Mold and generates all things out of it self XLIX Others believe the Plastic Vertue to be a certain Power flowing into the Seed from the Soul of
it must not be denied but that the Soul is actually in the Seed tho' by reason of the Impediments its Action does not presently appear LIII But here it may be question'd Whether that Soul which forms the Birth be only in the Man's Seed or as well in the Womans I say that it is only in the Man's Seed for if part of the Soul should proceed from the Man part from the Woman then the Soul would prove a compound thing whereas it is meerly simple Or if it should be deriv'd all from the Male and all from the Woman then there would be two Principles of Formation of which one would be superfluous For there would be no necessity that the acting Principle of the Male should be joyned with the acting Principle of the Female for that the latter having an acting Principle in it self and a place convenient as the womb convenient nourishment and all other things convenient would not want any other efficient Principle of the Male but might conceive in it self and form the Birth out of its animated Seed with the Coition of the Male. And in Creatures that lay Eggs a Chicken might be hatch'd out of Wind-eggs without the Cock's treading Neither of which were ever heard of LIV. Aemilius Parisanus tho' he understood not this Mystery exactly yet seems to have observ'd something obscurely and therefore he constitutes a twofold Seed he had better have said twofold parts of the Seed one generated in the Genital Parts which he denies to be animated the other not generated in the Genital Parts but divided from the whole which he allows to be animated LV. Others who will not allow in Mankind any other Soul particularly than the Rational assert that That alone perfects the Lineaments of all the Parts out of the Seminal Matter conveniently offer'd and is the Architect of its own Habitation and stiffly uphold their Opinion with several Arguments and so tacitly endeavour to maintain that the Rational Soul is ex traduce or by Propagation no otherwise than as the Body is propagated Concerning which may be read that most acute Tractate of the Generation of Living Creatures written by Sennertus LVI But these Principles most Philosophers and all Divines oppose with great heat and affirm the Rational Soul not to be propagated but to be created and infused To whose Opinion we readily submit because the Soul is not of that nature that it can produce any thing of it self it has nothing to do in the Formation of the Body nor with any Natural Actions it is not to be divided into parts nor corruptible as the rest of the Body but immutable and separable from the Body which it inspires Besides that it is not created like the Bodies of Creatures which were commanded to be produced out of Earth and Water according to their kind wherein the Vegetative Soul of every one is included but after the whole Body of Man was form'd alive out of the Earth God is said to have breathed into him the Breath of Life and then he became a living Creature Whence it is manifestly apparent that the Rational Soul of Man inspired by God was not form'd out of Earth Water or any other corruptible Matter like his corruptible Body which was form'd out of Clay before the breathing of his Soul into him But that it proceeded incorruptible and simple from the immediate Operation of God without any parts by the separation of which it could be dissolv'd and dye as the Body for the same Reason perishes with its vegetable Soul and subsists of it self when its Temporal Habitation is fallen For which Reason Man is not only said to live Naturally like other Creatures but after the Image of God which sort of living is not ascrib'd to any other Creatures LVII But these latter tho' they seem to discourse rightly and truly of the Creation and Infusion of the Rational Soul yet if they do not likewise admit a Vegetative Soul in Man they are under a gross mistake nor do they unfold the first Efficient Principle concerning the Explanation of which the Question is here and not of the Original of the Rational Soul Against those therefore that will not admit a Vegetative Soul in Man I bring these two powerful Arguments First Seeing that the Rational Soul is not propagated by Generation but Created of necessity it must be infus'd and that either into a living or a dead Body Not into a dead Body for that Soul cannot inhabit a dead Body nor enliven it for its life is different from the life of the Body which perishes while the Soul departs out of the Body and lives to perpetuity Therefore it is infus'd into a living Body What then rais'd Life in the Body before the Infusion of the Rational Soul It will be said perhaps That at the same time that the Parts are to be delineated the Rational Soul is infus'd and that it is which introduces Life and is Life it self I answer Not when they are to be delineated but after all the Parts are compleatly delineated and form'd then the Rational Soul is infus'd according to the Testimony of the Scripture it self where it is said that God first form'd Man out of the Dust of the Earth observe the word Man therefore a living Creature or a Creature endued with a Vegetative Soul and then inspired into him the Breath of Life and he became a living Creature as much as to say that then was inspired into him his perpetual living and Immortal Soul Therefore as then so also afterwards the Rational Soul does not form and enliven the Body but is infus'd into the Body form'd and living I say living for that which forms the Body of necessity enlivens it and lives it self For such a wonderful Structure cannot be form'd by a dead thing nor by Heat alone which only serves to attenuate and melt the Substance of the Seed and rowse and set at liberty the forming Spirit lying hid and entangled within it and excite it to action not able of it self to form the Parts of the Body nor to adjust the order and shape of all its Parts And therefore it is not the Rational Soul but this same enlivening Spirit which Galen calls Nature we the Vegetative Soul rais'd out of the Seed it self wherein it is potentially is that which out of it self and the Subject wherein it abides and out of which it proceeded forms and enlivens the Body and all its agreeing Parts into which being form'd and living the Rational Soul is afterwards infus'd and united to it to determine and temper the Motions of the Corporeal Soul till the Body proving at length unfit to entertain it any longer it departs out of it not being the occasion of Death of it self but chas'd and expell'd from its Habitatation by the death of the Body So no way guilty of the death of the Body by its recess as by its access it contributed
thence it is apparent that it receives but few Animal Spirits Which if it did admit in so great abundance as to accomplish its perpetual Motion they would without all Question occasion a most acute Sence of Feeling therein 5. Because the Hearts of several Animals as Frogs Serpents Eels c. being pull'd out of their Bodies will beat a long time after whereas all the Parts about it being cut away as also all the neighbouring Nerves there can be no Influx of Animal Spirits into them To this purpose take a living Dog and having slit him all along from the Throat take both Trunks of the Wandring Pair through which the Spirits flow to the Heart and either tie it hard or cut it off the Creature indeed will become silent and stiff but the Pulsation or Motion of the Heart will not fail for all that nay he shall live so long till his Strength failing by degrees for want of Food he is famished to Death For he refuses Meat in regard there are no Animal Spirits which can come to the Stomach and increase Hunger 6. Because that seeing the Heart is form'd and perfected before the Ware-house of the Animal Spirits the Brain and proves conspicuous beats and is mov'd before any the least Foundations of the Brain at any time appear as is apparent in an Egg set under a Hen or any other Conception If you say that nevertheless in the Egg or Bubble certain Delineaments of the Brain are in being tho' not to be discern'd by the Eye I answer that they are not yet come to any such Perfection as to operate whereas in the mean time the Heart both operates and is mov'd before it can have any Assistance from those Rudiments of the Brain 7. Because the Animal Spirits are generated out of the Arterious Blood which are generated by no other part besides the Heart Seeing then that they cannot be generated out of any other Matter and that this Matter cannot come to the Brain but by the impulse of the Heart wherein this Matter is generated of necessity it follows that the Heart is mov'd of it self before there are any Animal Spirits in any other part and is the first that forces to the Brain Matter adapted for the Generation of those Spirits that is to say the Arterious Blood Perhaps it may be objected that the Heart is mov'd at first by those animal Spirits which were mix'd in the Seed of the Parents and from that time still are intermix'd with it which is but a frivolous Evasion For the animal Spirit concurs indeed to the making of Seed but loses its own Nature and being mix'd fermented and concocted with the vital Blood becomes one Mass of another Nature with it and so both together put on the Nature of the Seed wherein there is no longer either animal Spirit or arterious Blood but that Seed becomes a new Body generated out of both being mix'd together and changed by Concoction which particularly contains in it self neither animal nor sanguineous Spirit but a new Spirit potentially viâ—…al arising out of the Mixture and Concoction of both which if at any time it be stirr'd up in the Womb and proceed from Power to Action will immediately enliven and form Vessels and Instruments that shall produce Spirituous Blood and Animal Spirits So that there are no Animal Spirits any longer in the Seed that are able to cause the first Motion of the Heart at the beginning For as no Man in his Wits will aver that there is any Blood really in a Bone tho' the Blood as a necessary Matter concurs to its making Nutrition and Growth so no Man will say of the Seed that there is in it either Animal Spirit or Blood tho' both concur to its Composition For as in the Generation of Bone the Blood concurring with the Animal Spirit losing altogether its Sanguineous Nature becomes Bone and is no longer Blood as the Spirit is no longer Spirit as it was before so likewise in the making of Seed the Animal Spirit and Blood remain no longer what they were before whence it cannot be said that animal Spirits remain in the Seed that should be able to begin the first Motion of the Heart 8. Because the Motion of the Animal Spirits does not proceed from the Brain but altogether from the Heart and this Motion of the Heart ceasing all Animal Motion ceases As is apparent when Wounds penetrate the Ventricles of the Heart for that the Blood not being forced into the great Artery and the Heart but flowing out through the Wound of the Ventricles presently at the very same instant the Brain rests and the Animal Spirits are no longer sent through the Nerves to the moving Parts neither are they moved in the Brain which is the reason that a Man so wounded falls of a suddain depriv'd of all his principal Faculties and of all Sense and Motion The same appears in Convulsions and Fitts of the Mother affecting the Heart and such like Distempers in which frequently the noxious Vapours and Humours reach no farther than the Heart but not as yet to the Brain and so the Heart ceases to beat the Brain remaining unendamaged which nevertheless upon the ceasing of the Motion of the Heart presently ceases to be mov'd nor does it begin to move again till first the Heart begins to move But most manifestly of all does this appear in Wounds of the Head that take away some part of the Scull and the Brain it self as we have seen in the Camp For if the Patient fall into a Convulsion presently we see the Motion of the Heart ceases but if the Heart begin again to beat which is easily perceived by the Patients Pulse not before but presently after some Pulses the Heart begins by little and little again to be mov'd and after the Brain by degrees all the rest of the Members are mov'd These are all certain Signs that the Heart is not mov'd by the Animal Spirits thrust forward into it from the Brain but that the Brain and by means of that the Animal Spirits are mov'd by the Blood sent upward In the mean time I will not deny but that by reason of certain Nerves scarcely discernable descending toward the Basis of the Heart the Orifices of it are somewhat less sometimes more loosen'd or contracted as in the Passions of the Mind and for this reason that the Blood in the Ventricles is sometimes more difficultly sometimes more easily expell'd according to the various Determination of the Animal Spirits to those Orifices Nevertheless the continual Motion of the Heart does not proceed from thence tho' this be not the cause of any Impediments to hinder from performing its Motion freely and equally as in the respiratory Motion of the Breast sometimes Impediments arise from the Muscles of the Larynx too much contracted by the help of the Animal Spirits flowing thorough the Nerves tho' those Muscles are no cause of Respiration And thus I have
Parts to the Blood as to be able to pass the most narrow Passages and to be convey'd to any Parts whatever all which Parts this Spirit quickens to their several Functions and by its continual Agitation and Heat thence proceeding continually wastes and dissipates the more fluid Particles of the Parts and continually repairs and as often increases them by means of the Blood X. But the Blood as also the Vital Spirit rais'd out of it if it consists of the two Principles Sulphureous and Salt mix'd together and equally agreeing in Strength then is the Blood best and well temper'd according to Nature But as the Force of these Principles exceeds one another it is colder or hotter and its Temper varies according to the strength and prevalency of the Principle I say Colder not that any cold Quality proceeds from Salt or from a salt Spirit as from its proper Subject but because while that predominates the Sulphury Spirit is more obtunded and fix'd whence happens a weaker Agitation of the small Particles one among another and consequently a lesser actual Heat And another Reason why Salt and its Spirit may be call'd Colder is because that being cast into the Fire it only crackles but does not flame out like Sulphur or a Sulphureous Spirit XI Now out of the Blood thus compos'd of the said Principles sometimes more sometimes fewer Spirits are rais'd For if the Blood to be rarify'd in the Heart be well concocted in the other Bowels and prepar'd for Fermentation and as I may say brought to full Maturity then there happens a right Fermentation or Dilatation in the Heart by which a convenient quantity of Spirits is rais'd up with a moderate Heat but if ill prepar'd and raw then is the Effervescency less and the Dilatation more difficult and fewer Spirits rise and hence proceeds a cold Temper of the Body If over much concocted and that the Particles either Salt or Sulphureous or both are too much attenuated then the Dilatation is overmuch in the Heart and the Spirits are over-sharp and hot and hence proceeds a hot Temperature Corruption of Humors Inflammations and Fevers especially if the Sulphury Spirits prevail above the other XII By the way we must take notice that they are in a very great Error who besides the Principles constituting the Essence of the Blood in Mixture add another Spirit and assert a necessity for it to concur and be mix'd with the Salt and Sulphur in the Serum Whereas this Spirit of which they speak is not any thing peculiar concurring to the making of the Blood but only a thin and spirituous Vapour attracted out of the Salt and Sulphur it self by force of the Heat as is perform'd by Chymistry in other Things For though all Bodies are compos'd of Salt and Sulphur as their Principles united by the Assistance of Mercury yet in regard that Salt and Sulphur are not Bodies altogether simple and equal but compos'd of unequal Particles hence the Bodies that are compos'd of those Principles consist of unequal Particles some thicker some thinner others more or less fix'd and others more or less fit for Fusion and Attenuation For the Heat acting upon Bodies compos'd of these Principles dissolves first of all and more easily the thinner and less fix'd Particles attenuates and renders them Spirituous frees them also from the thicker Particles and by means of the thicker Particles agitates and moves them and those Spirituous Particles so attenuated are call'd Spirits as being endu'd with an extraordinary Tenuity and Mobility Not that they are any thing different from Salt or Sulphur concurring to the composition of the Mixture but only some thinner Substance melted attenuated and extracted by the Force of Heat out of the same Mixture which upon the absence of that Heat again condenses and is quietly united as before with the other thicker Particles not yet brought to Fusion XIII Nor are they less in an Error who hold That there is a copious Quantity of Air mix'd with the Blood as being necessarily requisite to its Perfection Which Air they pretend is mix'd four ways with the Blood 1. As being mix'd and swallow'd with the Meat chaw'd in the Mouth with which Nourishment it is so united in the Stomach that at length entring the Region of the Heart it is incorporated with the Blood 2. By entring the Mass of Blood through the Pores of the Skin 3. When it is not a little mix'd with the Blood by the drawing in of the Breath hastning through the Lungs to the Left Ventricle of the Heart 4. When by the same breathing in of the Air it is carry'd to the Vessels and Ventricles of the Brain But if the Air be necessary to compleat the perfection of the Blood then ought it always necessarily to be mix'd with it but no Air can come at the Birth included in the Womb and its Membranes and yet the Blood bred therein is no less sound and perfect than in those that being born both breath and suck in the Air. XIV Here it may be question'd Out of what things the said Principles are extracted I answer From the Aliments which contain both Sulphur and Salt in themselves and consist of them mix'd and concocted after a Specific manner Yet some are more others less Spirituous and hence arise variety of Qualities which is the Reason that some Nourishments agree better with hot others with cold Constitutions But to the end these Principles may be extracted out of the Aliments and that Blood may be made out of 'em it is requisite that the Nourishments be prepar'd after another manner that their first Mixture may be altogether dissolv'd and the latent Sulphureous and Salt Particles be exalted to Fusion and a more extraordinary Tenuity so that being freed from their first Union they may be again mingl'd after a new manner To this purpose besides their Dissolution by Cookery and Dressing being admitted into the Body in the first place those things that are hard are bruis'd and soften'd by the Teeth in the Mouth and being prepar'd by the admixture of the Spittle are swallow'd down into the Stomach In the next place they are farther fermented and dissolv'd after a specifical manner in the Stomach 3. The more profitable Chylus and more dissolv'd Particles are separated from the thicker Particles by another peculiar Effervescency and are yet more dissolv'd and attenuated in the Milky Vessels and many Kernels of the Mesenterium and by the Commixture of Lymphatic Juice and these being mixt with the Veiny Blood and carry'd to the Heart are therein dilated and so being united with the rest of the Blood become perfect Blood But when they are the first time dilated in the Heart it is not a Spirituous Blood that is presently made out of 'em but a thicker and cruder Blood which is mix'd with the rest of the Blood several times circulated through the Heart and by that means render'd very Spirituous and
by frequent Circulations and Attenuations in the Heart render'd still more Spirituous XV. In the mean time certain it is That the Chylus passing through the Heart and therein dilated loses the Form of Chylus and at the very same moment assumes another that is to say the Form of Blood XI But here arises a weighty Question Whether the whole Chylus in its passage through the Heart loses altogether the Form of Chylus and assumes the Form of Blood in such a manner as that no Part of it remains Chylus This Doubt was started by Gualter Needham who says That the Chylus dilated in the Heart remains a considerable part of it actually Chylus and that it circulates through the whole Body being mix'd with the Blood and is again separated from the Blood in several Parts for private Uses especially in the Amnion and Breasts XVII This Opinion of his he proves from hence For that frequently crude and indigested Chylus has been drawn from the Arms â—…of such as have been let Blood The same Opinion also the Observances of other Physitians seem strongly to confirm of which Bauschius has collected several in his Germanic Ephemerides 1. Of a Girl afflicted with a continual Fever whose Blood at three several Blood-lettings appear'd Milky 2. Of a sick Patient out of all whose Veins when open'd there always issu'd forth white Blood 3. Of a certain Virgin who upon a Suppression of her Courses after she had eaten her Breakfast about Seven a Clock was let Blood at Eleven and the Blood that came from her was purely white and being warm'd upon the Fire harden'd like the White of an Egg. 4. Of an Apothecary of Cambray who being prick'd in the Arm the Blood look'd red as it came forth but was white in the Porringer 5. Of a certain Person troubl'd with the Itch. 6. Of a Woman that gave Suck that lay ill of a Malignant Fever 7. Of a Woman with Child sick of a Fever 8. Of another Woman with Child And 9. Of a Maid that was troubl'd with a Suppression of her Courses from all which Persons upon their being let Blood there flow'd a white Liquor together with the Blood And Regner de Graef mentions two Stories of white Blood seen by himself XVIII But though such a long Series of Observations seems to confirm Needham's Opinion yet because those Examples are quite from the Matter it is impossible they should be able to support it For all those Cases concern unhealthy Bodies only from whom a whitish Matter issu'd forth together with the Blood Concerning which Matter there has been a sharp Dispute between the Physicians to those Patients whether it is to be call'd Flegm or Chylus whether Milk or Matter and many uncertain Conjectures have been made about it When as it is well known by daily Practice that by reason of some certain Infection of the Blood proceeding from the bad concoctions of the diseased Bowels many times upon opening a Vein the Blood will look sometimes whitish or yellowish and sometimes of another Colour Moreover if any thing of a Chylus should be mix'd with it and circulate with it then would it sometimes be seen to flow out with the Blood upon opening a Vein which was never yet seen by any Person And in my own Practice I have order'd innumerable Persons both Men and Women some with Child and others that have given Suck to be let Blood but never could observe the least drop of Chylus in the Blood that has been drawn forth Neither did any of those eminent Physicians with whom I discours'd this Point ever see the same Neither can any man produce an Example of a Man sound in Health out of whose Veins being open'd Chyle ever flow'd with the Blood or was ever separated from it Perhaps it may be objected That Reason shews us and Experience confirms it That in big-belly'd Women and such as give Suck if they are in perfect health the Chylus is separated from the Blood and pour'd forth into the Breasts of the one and into the Amnion of the other which could not flow thither but out of the Sanguiferous Vessels carry'd toward those Parts To which I answer That the Chylus that is carry'd to the Breasts and Amnion as also that which flows through the Womb and Bladder was never infus'd into Blood-bearing Vessels or mix'd with the Blood and so neither can be carry'd through the one nor separated from the other but flows to those Parts through other quite different conceal'd Parts of which Passages we have sufficiently discours'd l. 1. c. 18. 31. c. 2. of this Book Besides all which Reason is altogether repugnant to this Opinion For when the Aliments and Alimentary Humors lose their first Forms by reason of the Concoction of the Bowels and assume another Form the same thing cannot but happen to the Chylus concocted in the Heart For Example An Apple being eaten and concocted in the Stomach is altogether depriv'd of its Form and is made into Chylus which is no more an Apple and of which no particles can be again reduc'd to the Form of an Apple So the Chylus being dilated in the Heart cannot but by its strong and sudden Effervescency presently lose all its Form of Chyle and receive the Form of Blood which though it be rawer at the beginning than the rest of the Blood frequently circulated and dilated in the Heart yet is it Blood wherein there is not the least Form of Chylus remaining But some will say That Crudity presupposes that some particles of that Chylus are not altogether chang'd into Blood but still retain the Form of Chylus and are so mix'd with the Blood I deny it for that is not call'd crude Blood wherein all the Particles of the Chylus are not sanguify'd but that which is not reduc'd to a just Spirituosity and Maturity And hence the Blood which is made first of all out of the Chylus dilated in the Heart though it be cruder yet it is not a Chylous and Flegmy part of the Blood wherein there are no Particles of the Chylus remaining only it wants as yet a just Spirituosity in some measure In like manner as the Seed which is made of the Blood becomes to be crude and unfruitful in Old Men not that there are any Particles of Blood in it that are not as yet chang'd into Seed but because that Seed by reason of the weakness of the Spermatic Parts is not yet reduc'd to a just Spirituosity and Maturity For no man how quick-sighted soever observ'd any Particles of Blood in crude Seed much less shall be able to separate any Blood from it Thus an unripe Apple is call'd crude not that any Earthy or Arboreous Particles are conspicuous in it or any way separable from it but because the Spirit latent therein is not yet reduc'd to such a Thinness and Maturity as to put forth it self which Maturity it afterwards acquires by the Heat of
that the Marrow may be mov'd after the same manner as the brain That this may be certainly known first the Skull of a living Creature is to be open'd then the Vertebers must be laid open and the long extended Marrow to be laid bare that a Judgment may be made upon the inspection both of the Marrow and the Brain but before any true observation could be made the Creature would die and the inspection of a dead Carcass would signifie little And therefore Plempius upon probable Grounds believes that the Marrow or Pith is likewise mov'd because it is a kind of production from the brain which therefore should be mov'd with the brain to the end that the Animal Spirits being admitted by Dilatation may press them out again by its Contraction XXIV The necessity of the said Motion though accidental is chiefly necessary that while it is dilated it may receive the Arterious Blood out of the Arteries and by its falling again may be able to force the Animal Spirits made out of that Blood toward the Nerves and the remainder of the Blood to the Hollownesses and Veins of the Meninx neither of which Actions can be perform'd without that Motion XXV The Brain then as hath been said is the Organ wherein and by the help of which the Animal Faculties by the assistance of the Animal Spirits generated therein are made XXVI But in regard the Animal Faculties both feel desire and move there is a Question arises In what part of the Brain they every one inhabit Fernelius believes that the feeling Faculty resides in the Meninxes of the Brain because they feel and are not mov'd That the moving Faculty is seated in the Marrow of the brain because that is mov'd yet has no feeling Which opinion Plempius refutes and rightly informs us that both Faculties are generated and dwell in the Substance it self of the brain and are thence communicated to the rest of the Parts Then again as to the principal Faculties the Imagination and Memory the Controversie runs high whether they are in the whole Substance of the brain whether all in one part of it or all distinct in distinct places Aetius and some others that follow the Arabians affirm that they abide in distinct Seats and allow to the Fancy the forepart to the Reason the middlemost and to the Memory the hindmost part of the Head induc'd by these Reasons 1. Because it rarely happens that one Faculty being deprav'd the other remains sound 2. Because the fore-part of the Head receiving a Wound the Phansie is disturb'd and impair'd and the hinder part of the Head being hurt proves detrimental to the Memory Others affirm these Actions to be exercis'd in the whole brain and only differ in the manner of their operation and that the brain is variously employ'd about them Which opinion Sennertus and Plempius uphold by strong Reasons But Ludovicus Mercatus seems to unite both these opinions together For says he though all the Faculties are in the brain however we must believe that one Faculty is more predominant in this or that Cavity than another as the Spirits are more thin more perfect and more elaborate in this Cavity and the Temperature more proper for this or that operation But Experience acknowledges all these opinions to be very uncertain and that nothing can be positively determin'd either as to the Place where or the Manner how these operations are perform'd For there are many Examples produc'd by Massa Carpus Fallopius Arcaeus Augenius Andreas à Croce Peter de Marchetois and others of Patients who having been wounded in their Heads have had considerable portions of their brains which have either dropt or been taken out while the principal Faculties have remain'd safe and sound which seems not very possible if these operations are perform'd in the whole Brain or any part of it seeing that the operating Organ being grievously wounded and some part of it taken away surely those most Noble Actionâ—…s must be very much impair'd I produce an Example a little lower of a certain young Person who had a large Impostume that grew in his Brain and penetrated to the upper Ventricles who nevertheless liv'd for 7 weeks together in perfect soundness of his Senses Another remarkable Example I met with Ian. 1670. in a young Girl upon whose Head by Misfortune had fallen a Stone that weigh'd near thirty Pound weight and broke all the right side of her Head with a Fracture of the Skull and Forehead about the Coronal Suture and the Brain wounded and much endamaged withal Which Brain two days after the taking out of fourteen pieces of broken Bones without any covering of the Meâ—…inxes began to shoot upward from the broad Wound and that by degrees to such a height that it came out without the Skull first as big as a Pigeon's next as big as a Hen's and lastly as big as a Goose Egg which protubeâ—…ant part being cut away with a filthy Stench another like it shot up again and so several putrify'd parts fell off of themselves so that during the Cure the quantity of the putrid Brain that was separated from the rest amounted to the bigness of a Man's Fist in which condition the Patient liv'd six and thirty days with a perfect soundness of Mind and Memory and all the Animal Actions performing their Duties though she were in that time taken with three Convulsion Fits and a Hickup After she was dead the Skull being taken off we found a large hollowness in the right side of her Brain by reason of the waâ—…e of so much of her putrify'd Brain which extended it self all along the upper Ventricle of the same side and side-ways passing the third or middle Ventricle as far as the Sphoenoides Bone This memorable Accident shews us how uncertain all things are which are conjectur'd concerning the Seats of the Faculties either distinct or ascrib'd to the whole Brain seeing that in this Maid all the operations of Life and Intellectuals remain'd in their full force and no way impeded by that putrefaction of the Brain which was empty'd out of her Skull But this may seem little if compar'd with what Theodore Kerckringius relates of a total deficiency of the Brain for he writes that he dissected a Boy that had lain five Months and a half sick oâ—… a Dropsie in his Head in whose Skull he found no Brain but only a little slimy Water which was a thing never before as he says taken notice oâ—… by any Anatomist Though many years before him Zacutus Lusitanus tells us of a â—…ad that was cur'd of a Wound in his Head and three years after dy'd of a Dropsie in his Head which being open'd there was nothing to be found but only a pure Water that was no way offensive to the Smell nor insipid to the Taste Something like this Costerâ—…s relates of a Boy born without a Brain which Boy Fontanus and Carpus assâ—…e us that they saw the 26th of
infus'd by God and governing all the Animal Actions of the whole Body and yet be able to perceive all those things which are done in the extream parts in the least space of a moment even in the very point of time they are acted Moreover they do not believe the Seat of the Rational Soul to be so small in Man and yet in Brutes which are destitute of that Soul to be three times as big Furthermore they cannot apprehend why the Seat of the Soul should not be ascrib'd as well to the Heart as to the Brain seeing that all the Motions of the Animal Spirits and the Brain it self proceed from the Heart which when it ceases to beat all the Animal Actions fail as it happens in a Syncope and in Wounds of the Ventricles of the Heart Concerning this Matter in our Age sharp and furious have been the Contests on both sides as if they were contending for the safety of their Country and daily most terrible Paper-Disputes arise eager indeed and vehement but vain and frivolous by which the Minds of young People are more disturb'd than taught But setting aside these unprofitable Contests let us enquire into the more sensible Action of the Brain it self III. Aristotle teaches us that the Office of the Brain is to temper the heat of the Heart Which Opinion though most reject Spigelius nevertheless endeavors to assert it for Rational Galen attributes to the Brain the Office of generating and making Animal Spirits With whom most of the Modern Philosophers agree For this is most certain that the Animal Actions are not at the first hand perform'd by the Brain it self but by the Animal Spirits made in the Brain by means of which the Soul in well dispos'd Organs executes its Actions and so the Brain is the Instrument which generates those Spirits These Spirits Zabarel Argenterius Helmont Deusingius and some others as well Physitians as Philosophers confound with the vital Spirits and affirm that they differ from them not in Specie but only in certain Accidents and therefore it is that Spigelius says Not that there is here a certain mutation of the vital Spirits which destroys their whole nature but only a certain alteration of the Temperament Eâ—…t agrees with Spigelius and supports his Opinion with these three Arguments 1. The Birth both feels and is mov'd in the Womb without the aid of any Animal Spirit in regard that no Maternal Nerve runs to the Birth 2. A most subtil Spirit cannot be made in a cold Brain and full of mucous Filth for Cold stupifies the Spiriâ—…s and hinders their Actions 3. The Nerves themselves derive their Life and Heaâ—… from the Arteries which are conspicuously diffus'd through them To these Arguments others add one more that the most subtil Spirits never descend to the lower parts but always tend upwards and exhale and hence although there should be allow'd any Animal Spirits to be so subtil they would never descend into the Nerves but would always fly upwards through the Pores But though these things seem specious enough at a distance yet they neither prove nor confirm the said Sentence To the First I answer That the Birth in the Womb is neither mov'd with an Animal Motion nor feels until the first delineaments of the Brains and Nerves are arriv'd and increas'd to such a Bulk Firmness and Perfection that the Brain may be able to generate Animal Spirits sufficient and that those Spirits may be conveniently convey'd to the sensitive and moving parts and because it requires some Months to attain that perfection therefore the Birth does not move it self until the Woman have gone out half her time that is about the fourth Month and a half For what Spirits are generated before that time are very few and weak and the rest of the Parts themselves of the Body unapt for Motion or Sence Nor does the Motion of the Birth proceed nor is it perform'd by the Spirits or Maternal Nerves running to it of which there are none that enter the Birth but by the Spirits and Nerves generated in it self To the Second I say that there is no considerable Magnitude requir'd for the making of Animal Spirits but rather a Mediocrity of Heat such as is sufficient in the Brain though it be much less than in the other parts And there is a necessity for that lesser Heat which they call Cold to asswage the Heat of the Arterious Blood and in some measure to thicken its Volatile sulphurous Spirits that so the Animal Spirit may separate it self more pure from the salt Particles and may flow into the Nerves no longer beset with superfluity of viscous Vapors Moreover it is to be understood that although the Brain be said to be colder than other parts yet that it is not absolutely cold only that the Temper of it is less hot than of many other parts and that the proper confirmation of it is such as is most fit for the generation of Spirits Lastly the natural Temper of the Brain inclining to Cold is not such as stupifies the Spirits nor renders them unapâ—… to perform their Actions in the Parts but its preternatural cold Temper excluding the Blood and natural Heat by a too close constriction of the Pores is the cause that for want of convenient Matter few Spirits are generated therein and that those already generated with great difficulty and in small quantity flow through the streightned Pores and Nerves Which is the Reason that then the Actions fail by degrees not because the Actions are stupify'd as is vulgarly believ'd but because very few are generated flow into the parts For the Spirits endure no Stupefaction for Drowsiness is nothing else but a rest of the Actions in the Sensory Organs by reason of the scarcity of the Animal Spirits To the Third I answer that although the Brain and Nerves are nourish'd with Arterious Blood it does not thence follow that the Animal Spirits generated in the Brain are nothing different from the Blood and Vital Spirits generated in the Heart and carry'd through the Arteries for the nourishment of the Parts for this is as much as if a man should say The Stomach is nourish'd by the Arterious Blood generated out of the Chylus therefore the Chylus concocted therein is nothing different from the Blood Or thus The Heart changes the Chylus into Blood therefore the Blood which is generated therein is nothing different from the Chylus Or thus The Bread is turn'd into Chylus and the Chylus into Blood therefore the bread differs nothing either from the Chylus or the Blood To the Last I say That the Animal Spirits would easily exhale out of the Brain and Pith unless they were there with-held in their cool Work-house which hinders their sudden Exhalation and would flow into the Nerves which are of a firmer Substance and thus all Chymical Spirits are best kept close in cool Vessels and hinder'd from exhaling Moreover that they would not descend
which descends through the Jugular Veins differs any thing from that which ascends through the Basilic Vein of the Arm or the Iliac Veins of the Thighs unless it pass through any diseased part but is altogether equal And yet there would be some difference to be observ'd if the Doctrine of Cartesius were true Lastly says the most acute Philosoper the more subtil parts of the blood compounding these Spirits want no other alteration but the separation of the most thin parts from the less thin yet in the mean time he never lets us know what those most thin parts are 2. Nor how the Brain orders that separation from the rest of the parts of the blood 3. Nor wherefore nor how they are mov'd As to the first I have spoken in the definition that is to say that all the most subtil parts of the blood but chiefly the volatile Salt parts conduce to the making of these Spirits of which we shall now more at large discourse as also of their separation and motion IV. The Matter therefore out of which these Spirits are generated is the arterious Blood consisting of a Salt Sulphureous and Serous Iuice of which not equally all the Parts or Particles but chiefly the Salt which by a peculiar quality of the Kernels of the Cortex of the Brain are for the greatest part dissolv'd and separated from the sulphury Particles and being depriv'd of their Serosity are rendred most thin and altogether volatile so that they are able with ease to penetrate through the diminutive Fibers of the pithy Brain V. Vesalius Laurentius Columbus Sennertus Plempius Fracassarius and many others are of Opinion that besides the blood Air necessarily concurs as the Matter è qua or out of which to the generation of these Spirits and that by its transpiration through the Sieve-like breathing holes of the Ethmoid Bone it penetrates into the Ventricles of the Brain Which was formerly also the Opinion of Erasistratus and Galen But that it is far distant from Truth we find partly for that those things which have been said concerning the situation of the spungy Bones and the spungy Flesh stopping the upper part of the Nostrils partly what has been said concerning the place of the Generation of the Animal Spirits plainly demonstrate that the inspir'd Air cannot penetrate into the Ventricles of the Brain and then again that the Animal Spirits are not generated in those Ventricles Moreover the Animal Spirits are always generated out of the same and like Matter of which if inspir'd Air were a necessary part they could never be generated without inspir'd Air. But on the other side they are generated in those persons who being troubl'd with the Pose have their Nostrils obstructed with so great a quantity of Flegm that by respiration no Air can pass through them They are also generated in the Birth while it lies shut up in the Womb infolded in its own Membranes at what time the Birth does not breath nor can receive in any Air. They are also generated in Fish which though they do not breath in the Air yet abound with these Spirits as appears by their seeing feeling and nimble motion Lastly they are generated in Birds before they are hatch'd while they are inclos'd within the shell and cannot receive in any Air. From all which it is easily concluded that inspir'd Air does not concur to constitute the Matter out of which these Spirits are made VI. Now the Blood is forc'd in great quantity through the Carotid and Cervical Arteries not only into the Membranes of the Head but into Substance it self of the Brain Cerebel and Pith and in its Passage first through the Cortex thence through the Pithy Substance the more subtil salt Particles therein are separated for the most part from the sulphury or oily and serous Particles of which again the thicker Particles serve to the nourishment of the Bowel it self but the thinner are still more volatiliz'd and for the greatest part being freed from the sulphury are changed into a most subtil Spirit call'd Animal which flows out of the Fibers of the Brain and Cerebel into the Nerves and through them to the rest of the Parts of the Body VII But after what manner or by what force that separation and thsir attenuation and volatilization is perform'd cannot easily be explain'd but seems to be peculiar to the Substance it self of the Brain and Kernels of the Cortex as being a Substance which is chiefly form'd out of such a salt Matter with which some few oily Particles being mixt make up the somewhat fatty constitution thereof and hence through the conformity of that like Matter it has an affinity with that other saltish Matter and easily imbibes it after it has quitted the rest of the sulphury and serous Matter and alters it within its little Fibers to greater perfection Thus Fracassarius writes that the Cortex of the Brain is more salt and softer than the Marrow because the Cortex consists more of melted Salt but the Pith of Salt strain'd through the Cortex and consequently less serous and thence more firmly concreted which he says he has often experimented and adds an experimental Observation not improbable Now this Separation happens first in the Cortex as into whose innumerable diminutive Kernels through infinite blood-bearing Vessels the blood is plentifully infus'd out of which in those Kernels there is made a separation of the salter and most spirituous part which flows into the diminutive Fibers of the Brain inserted at the lower part into the several Kernels and so in the pithy Substance of the lower part of the Brain compos'd of those little Fibers is brought to the last persection the remaining portion of the blood returning to the Heart through the little Veins For as it is the Office of all the Kernels to separate some humor from the blood so the same thing comes to pass in these Kernels of the Cortex And as in the Sweet-bread the subacid humor is separated the bilious humor in the Liver by virtue of its little Kernels and Bunches the serous humor in the Kidneys the Lymphatic in the Kernels of many other parts or any other humor according to the various constitution of the Kernels and the Parts themselves so likewise in the Kernels of the Cortex of the Brain endu'd with a property peculiar to themselves there is a peculiar most spirituous saltish invisible humor separated from the blood which growing more spirituous in the little Fibers of the pithy Brain has gain'd the Name of Animal Spirit as being that which obeys the Soul in most of its Actions VIII Now that in the separation of any Liquor the Affinity of the Particles is of extraordinary prevalency appears from hence for that in the nourishment of all the other Parts whatever the same thing is observ'd as for example that such Particles of the blood as have the greatest affinity to the Parts adhere to them
and are assimilated into their Substance whereas the rest are separated from them and forc'd farther As in other things also we find those things mix most easily which have most Affinity Thus if Oil and Water be mix'd together and one end of a long woollen Cloth dipp'd in Water be put into the said Mixture the other end hanging forth without the Pot all the Water in the Pot will drip out of the Pot all the length of the Cloth but the Oil will remain in the Pot. Which Affinity our new modern Philosophy not without reason attributes to the agreement of the small Particles and the Pores As for example if the smallest Particles to be receiv'd be round and the receiving Pores be round then are those easily receiv'd by these because of their Affinity Also if the Pores and Particles are triangular or any other way alike agreeable but if the Pores are round but the Particles to be receiv'd triangular or quadrangular then would the one with difficulty receive the other nor would there be any Affinity And thus it is in the Brain for the Salt or Saltish Particles of the blood by reason of the Affinity of the Substance and the conveniency of the Pores are easily suck'd in by the Kernels of the Cortex and therein are separated from the rest as it were by a fermentaceous Motion and being separated are easily imbib'd by the little Fibers of the Pithy Substance of which this Substance is chiefly constituted and are more subtiliz'd but the sulphureous not so easily And therefore only a very small and thin part of the sulphury Particles having the least Oyliness is mix'd with the Animal Spirits but the rest together with the serous Particles partly goes into Excrement which is then collected in the hollownesses of the Ventricles or is dissipated in Vapour through the Pores partly together with the remaining blood being thrust forward to the extream parts of the Brain is there suck'd up by the Orifices of the smallest Veins and so circulated farther However this is to be observ'd by the way that in that same passage not all the salt Particles are separated in the Kernels of the Cortex and imbib'd by the Brain for so there would happen a dissolution of the Composition of the blood but only the more fluid and volatile but that the thicker remain mix'd with the blood and are circulated with it in the same manner as in the Kidneys not the whole Serum is separated from the Mass of the blood only the thinner part which has most affinity with the Pores of the Kidney-Kernels the rest continues mix'd with the blood and is carry'd with it to the hollow Vein IX By what has been said we understand how the salt Particles of the Blood are separated in the Brain from the sulphury and serous But because their most subtil and most volatile parts only are proper for the generation of Animal Spirits the other thicker Particles serving partly to the nourishment of the Brain partly going into Exerement now we are to see how the separation of the most spirituous and volatile Particles from the thicker is perform'd This is done after the same manner as happens in distillation of Wine when the Orifice of the Alembic is exactly clos'd with a large Sponge For the Chymists to the end they may extract and separate more powerful Spirits or more clarify'd and purg'd from its Flegm out of the Wine which is to be distill'd put a Sponge to the Alembic for so thro' the intricate passages of the Sponge the Spirits only are wheel'd and contorted while the more impure and thicker are not able to pass through and so those Parts which are not cleans'd from their Dregs but are very watery are separated and set aside while the more subtil Spirits go forth and through the Beak of the Alembic fall into the Receptacle In like manner in the Cortex of the Brain the separated salt volatile Parts of the blood are suck'd up by the diminutive Fibers which are endow'd with most obscure narrow Cavities Through which narrow Passages while those Spirits are wriggl'd and contorted whatever are lesser purify'd and thicker and more and more cast away and thrown off as the other are exalted into an incorporeal tenuity and flow into the Pith as into the next Beak of the Alembic and thence into the Nerves as being the lesser Beaks deriv'd from the greatest while in the mean time the thicker Salt less volatile Particles of the blood serve for the nourishment of the Bowel it self but the rest which are yet more fix'd remaining in the mixture of the sanguineous Mass flow back to the blood-bearing Vessels through the wider Pores and are sent back for Circulation Now this expulsion of the Spirits out of the small pory Fibers of the Brain and Pith to the Nerves is forc'd by one and the same Cause that is to say the alternate falling of the Brain after dilatation by which as by a certain compression the Spirits and Humors which are in the Brain are excited to flow forth And thus by the Cortex of the Brain and the Medullary Substance the Salt is separated from the Sulphury and Seroâ—…s the pure from the impure the subtil from the thick and that Subtility by the proper force already demonstrated of the said Substance proceeding from the volatil Salt which abounds in it is exalted to the height of volatility And hence also flowing out of the Substance and little Fibers of the Brain and Pith it ought not to be contain'd in loose Vessels hollow'd like a Pipe for out of such it would easily fly away but in such firm and more solid Receptacles or Channels in which there are the smallest and most invisible Pores and such Channels are the Nerves as through which they may pass freely to their height of volatility and tenuity X. However we are to take notice that although the Animal Spirits are made after this manner out of the said Matter nevertheless they are not exalted to an equal degree of Volatility in all men For in some they are thinner and more active in others thicker and of a slower Motion according to the vulgar Phrase either purer or impurer because the salt particles of the blood out of which they are generated are in some more in others less visible And the Brain it self in some is impregnated with a more copious in others with a lesser quantity of volatil Spirit and being hotter in some volatizes the Spirits more being colder in others thickens and fixes them more And therefore in Melancholy Spirits and such as continually feed upon thick hard salt and raw Food and whose Concoctions are for that reason worse thicker and less spirituous Humors are generated and among the rest the salt ones are less volatiliz'd whence the Animal Spirits are thicker and less active as in Country people and poor people and such as inhabit the cold polar Regions and use such a sort
of Diet for want of a thinner who are therefore slower to all manner of Animal Actions and of dull Wits Whereas on the other side they who live in hotter Regions abounding with plenty of all sorts of wholesom Diet and seldom feed upon salt or smoak'd Meats but accustom themselves to a thinner and more wholesom sort of Diet and consequently are serv'd by their Bowels with better Concoctions their Humors and Spirits are thinner and more volatile and their Bodies and Wits more nimble and active Aristotle indeed says that Melancholy People are ingenious but this is not to be understood of such as are altogether melancholy and together with a thicker blood have thicker Spirits but of such as incline to Melancholy and consequently whose Spirits are neither too thin and volatil for such are too movable and inconstant nor too thick for they are stupid but in a middle temper between both And therefore such People are neither too quick nor too redious in the transaction of Business but prudently weigh and judge of things before they proceed to Execution XI Perhaps it may seem strange to some People that the salt Particles should be made so subtil and spirituous as to be able to pass freely thro' the invisible Pores of the Nerves But they will cease to wonder when they observe in Chymistry the extraordinary Subtility and Volatility of Volatile Salt and how swiftly the Spirits of Salt will pass through the invisible Pores of the earthen Vessels Nay if they only consider how common Salt without any mixture of Water or Moisture being dissolv'd into Pickle will penetrate through the thick sides of wooden Vessels and sweat through Stone Pots overcast both within and without with a Glassie Crust as we find in those Vessels where we salt our Beef or keep our pickl'd Fish If then fix'd Salt only melted passes through the Pores of the Vessels how much more easily will the most subtil Spirit of volatil Salt pierce through the Pores of the Nerves XII Here some will object That Salts and Acids are sharp and corroding so that if the Animal Spirits were generated out of the salt Particles of the Blood and consequently participated of any Saltness they would corrode all Parts whatever by reason of their Acrimony which would occasion Pains and many Inconveniencos I answer That it is certain that the Animal Spirits are indu'd with some slight Acrimony but not so much as to occasion any sensible molestation because that exceeding Acrimony which is in fix'd Salt by reason of the sharp pungent Particles conjoyn'd with it becomes mild in that volatil and vaporous Spirit because the small sharp Particles being dissolv'd are more remote one from another and their Force is broken by the intervening Air or some steamy Vapour For example if any one go into a Cellar and draw in the Air that is all intermix'd with a most subtil exhaling Spirit or if he snuff up into his Nostrils the spirituous Vapor of Wine heated at the Fire yet shall he not feel the least grievance nor perceive any Acrimony which he would do if he snuft up into his Nostrils the Spirit it self fix'd in the Liquor So in our great Salt-Works where the Sea-Salt is boyl'd and depurated the exhaling Vapors being impregnated with the volatil Salt if they be taken in at the Mouth or Nostrils little or no Salt-Savour shall be perceiv'd therein whenas the fix'd Salt is most sharp And this comes to pass because the Forces which are conjoyn'd in the fix'd and thick Body and for that Reason are very powerful in the dissolv'd and vaporous Body are separated and thereby render'd weak and of no strength And this is the Cause why the Animal Spirits do not corrode because that being dissolv'd into a most subtil Vapor they have not so much Acrimony in them as can be troublelom to any Part. To this we add that they have a most thin and subtil serous Vapor together with so much sulphury Spirit joyn'd with them for a Vehicle which does not a little weaken and temper the Acrimony Moreover the Parts themselves through which they pass and into which they flow partake of some other Moisture which also much weakens and diminishes their Acrimony XIII From what has been said it is sussiciently apparent that the generation of the Animal Spirits is not Animal but meerly Natural and that they differ not only in some Accidents or Qualities but in their whole Kind from the Vital For in these the sulphury Juice mixt with the salt is far more prevalent in those there is very little sulphury or any other Juice apt to take Fire These are extracted out of the Chylus and veiny Blood those only out of the salt part of the arterious blood These flow visible through the large Arteries and Veins those invisible through the invisible Pores of the Nerves Over those the Soul has no power over these it has And therefore there is a vast difference between the Animal and Vital Spirits But now the Question is whether the Animal Spirits themselves do not differ one from another in Substance in Manner and Place of Generation and in Use Whether some are not generated out of the Blood others out of the Lympha or some other Matter Also whether some are not generated in the foremost others in the middle others in the hindmost Ventricle Or as Willis lately tells us whether some are not made in the Substance of the Brain others of the Cerebel Lastly whether some peculiar and differing from the rest do not cause the Sight others the Feeling others the Hearing others the arbitrary Motion and others the spontaneous Motion I answer That the Animal Spirits are not generated out of a different Matter nor in various Parts for we take the Brain and Cerebel for one part neither do they differ one from another but are all of the same Nature Composition and Condition but that the diversity of their Operations arises from the diversity of the nature condition of the Parts into which they flow as those which flow into the parts adapted for feeling as the Membrane Skin those cause the Feeling those that flow into the Eye cause the Sight those that flow into the Ear cause the Hearing those that flow into the Muscles Fibers and other Parts ordain'd for Motion cause Motion though they be the same and no way different as every Instrument is adapted to this or that proper Action In the same manner as the Beams of the Sun which though they be always the same and proceed from one Sun neither confer any other Light or other Strength or any other thing to any other Things yet produce most different effects according to the difference of the Constitutions of the things into which they flow For here they produce Barly there Trees in another place Stones here Worms or Fish sometimes Insects or other things Here they extinguish Life there they are the cause
of it here they soften there they harden As to the Motion of the Animal Spirits through the Nerves see the foregoing Chapter XIV To these Animal Spirits hitherto no other Use was attributed only that they are serviceable to the Animal Actions that is to say the principal Faculties the Senses and the Animal Motions which is not to be deny'd but besides this there seems to be another natural Use to be assign'd them which is that they conduce in a high measure to the nourishment of the Parts especially the spermatical This is chiefly apparent from hence because that as the blood continually flows out of the Heart thro' the Arteries so likewise these Animal Spirits continually flow from the Brain through the Nerves to the Parts and that naturally without the determination or appointment of the Soul even when the Mind makes no appointment at all as in Sleep and in soporiferous Diseases But altho' besides this natural Motion perpetually proceeding they are frequently mov'd by another determinated Motion proceeding from the Mind yet that detracts nothing from the continual natural Motion but that these Spirits by virtue of that may be serviceable to the Action of Nutrition as they are thereby serviceable to the Animal Actions For the blood when the Body is at rest is forc'd out of the Heart through the Arteries by a setled continual Motion to the nourishment of the Parts shall it therefore when by reason of any extraordinary Exercises or heating of the Body it is ten times swifter and more rapidly mov'd and forc'd out be no longer proper for the nourishment of the Parts Certainly no man of Reason will say that that same second rapid Motion despoyls the blood of its nutritive Quality And so likewise the more rapid determinative motion of the Spirits often altering the first continual Motion cannot be said to deprive them of their Quality necessary to the Assistance of Nutrition XV. But some will say How can the Work of Nutrition equally proceed in the Parts when sometimes more sometimes fewer Animal Spirits flow into these or those Parts For it seems that those into which fewer Spirits flow should be less those into which more Spirits pass should be more nourish'd I answer that the same thing befalls these Spirits as befalls the blood which though it be more rapidly and in greater quantity thrust forward into the Parts upon extraordinary Exercises and Heats of the Body yet does it not nourish them ever a jot the more push'd on by its ordinary continual Motion in regard that rapid Motion of it is caus'd by the great Heat by Motion and Heat the blood becomes more thin and subtil and the Pores of the Parts more loose so that the blood may not be able to stick so close to the Parts but that a great quantity of it may be dissipated So also these Spirits when they are frequently determin'd in greater quantity to these or those parts endue them indeed with a firmer solidity but no larger augmentation because the chiefest part of them by reason of their tenuity is dissipated and what is not serviceable for nourishment or is not dissipated that being pour'd forth according to custom into the Substance of the Parts and being somewhat thickned enters the extremity of the Veins together with the remainder of the Blood and is mixt and circulated together with it and carry'd to the heart Of which Circulation Rolfincius and Deusingius take notice XVI Now we are to take notice what these Spirits afford or contribute to Nourishment It has been said l. 2. c. 12. that the blood consists of a sulphury salt and serous Juice and that it is forc'd forward every way for the nourishment of the Parts Therefore in its Mass there are two sorts of Substances serving to the nourishment of the Parts Sulphur and Salt Mercury is a third for the most part unprofitable indeed for nourishment but altogether necessary for the conjunction mixture and as a Vehicle of the former But of the two former some serve for the nourishment of the fleshy and fat parts others to the nourishment of the Spermatic parts The fleshy and fat parts are chiefly nourish'd by the sulphury particles of the blood which serve to endue them with an Oily softness and something of sweetness Nevertheless there are some salt particles to render the parts more firm and solid But when that in those parts the sulphury particles predominate above the salt then are they softer and fatter where less prevalent more fleshy and firm The Spermatic parts are nourish'd by the salt particles of the blood which render them more solid and hard yet have some sulphury particles mix'd with them according to whose lesser or greater proportion and dissolution some parts are softer as the Membranes Veins and Arteries others harder as the Bones and Gristles XVII But to the end this nourishment may be carry'd on without any ob struction there is of necessity requir'd some kind of separation of the salt particles from the sulphury that the one may the better be enabled to adhere to the Spermatic the other to the Fleshy and Fat Particles and be assimilated to them This Separation is caus'd by the Animal Spirit which by its influx which as it were coagulating by a slight kind of effervescency and peculiar 〈◊〉 the salt particles separates them from the sulphury to the end they may be affix'd to the spermatic parts and by the means of the heat and a small sulphureous Vapor be assimilated to them and as the spermatic parts are more or less dry or moist and more or less of the sulphury particles are mix'd with them so the salter particles of the blood are more or less harden'd in them Thus they become altogether dry and hard in the Bones but softer in the Membranes and Fibers c. These salter particles being thus moderately separated out of the remaining more sulphury Mass of the blood that which is proper goes to the nourishment of the fleshy and fat parts So that the Animal Spirits supply the place of a subacid Rennet or Coagulum which is extracted out of Salt and salt things For that such a sowr Ferment or Coagulum causes the separation of salt and sulphury particles is most evidently apparent in Chymistry For if you mingle Spirit of Wine wherein there is ten times a greater proportion of sulphury than salt particles with Spirit or Water of Tartar which consists of Salt Tartarous particles thinly dissolv'd and melted the Mixture will be exact into which Mixture if you pour in never so little Spirit of acid Salt or Vitriol there will be presently an Effervescency by which the salt particles will be separated from the sulphury and watery and being coagulated they will fix and precipitate to the bottom Thus also by the mixture of Animal Spirits which are endu'd with a gentle subacidish quality the salt particles of the blood flowing into the parts are in a
way how to find out those Vessels The Mouth of those Rivers saith he are easily discovered if you extend never so little the whole Eye-lid in the outermost Corner For then about half a Thumbs breadth from the outward Limbus you shall meet with three in the Angle it self four below and six sometimes seven above through which a Bristle being thrust in without Dissection you shall easily find a Passage into the Kernel it self The last year discovered these Vessels to me when holding to the Light of a Candle the Eye-lid of a Sheep after I had pluck'd out the Eye out of the Orbit to sâ—…e whether it were transparent or no at what time the shining Rivulets of the Lympha clearly betray'd themselves XII The innermost Canthus is bigger particularly called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by Hesychius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Fountain as seeming to be the Fountain from whence the Tears issue in which the Glandulous Caruncle aforesaid lyes upon the Lacrymal Hole Which being corroded away by the Acrimony of sharp Humors then the Eye weeps without any constrait which is the cause of that Distemper which the Physitians call the Lachrymal Fistula the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In the Eye of an Ox besides this Caruncle there is to be found a certain brawny hard Particle smooth toward the Eye on the outward part somewhat rough affording a more easie Motion to the Membrane by which the Eye twinkles XIII Little soft Gristles lace the Extremities of the Eye-lids which the Greeks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Latins Cilia for the more ready Expansion and exact Closure of the Eye-lids Of which the uppermost is much broader than the lower XIV Within these Grisly Limbus's about the larger Corner two small Holes are obvious in each Eye called the Lachrymal Points admitting a Hoggs Bristle within the Membranes of the Eye-lids more conspicuous in Oxen and other large Animals than in Men. These close together into one Channel near the Lachrymal Hole which running forth towards the Fore-parts opens with a manifest Hole about the Extremity of the Nostrils through which that thin Liquor distils especially in cold Weather when Men drop at the Nose before they are aware And sometimes through these Lachrymal Points some small quantity of the Lymphatic Liquor squeez'd out of the Kernels flows forth like Tears without any compulsion which gave them the Name of Lachrymal Holes though they are not really the Fountains of the Tears In the Extremities of the Eye-lids under the upper is inserted a row of streight Hairs turning somewhat upward by Hippocrates call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Casserius and others call particularly Cilia which grow to a certain length set thin by Natures Law which they never exceed They are always also black and never grow grey like the rest of the Hairs of the Body nor do they ever shed but in virulent Distempers of the Part as the Elephantiasis or the Pox. Yet Aristotle affirms that they fall off from Men that are extreamly addicted to Venery These keep off from the Eyes little Bodies flying in the Air and render the Sight more perfect by slightly darkening the Eye for that if they be wanting through any Distemper or other Cause the Eye never discerns so exactly at a distance but if by any Accident they are turn'd toward the inside of the Eye they become cruelly troublesome and hinder the Sight In Oxen besides the Eye-lids there is yet another Membrane under the Eye-lids which both Men and most Animals want which is govern'd by a peculiar voluntary Motion For it is drawn with a double String to the opposite Corner the one lying hid above the other below which arises from a certain Muscle plac'd in the outer Corner which Muscle by Fallopius is taken for part of that which draws the whole Eye to the outward Parts By the benefit of this Muscle Oxen twinkle and can shut their Eyes the Eye-lid being still open when they lear least any thing should fall into the Eye XV. For more security above upon the Confines of the Fore-head and Eyes the Eye-brows are placed hanging over like a Bow with a thicker Skin and rough with the Hair lying pressed down toward the outward Parts to receive Sweat Dust and other things that fall from the Head least they should slip into the Eyes These Eye-brows by the Greeks call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ruffus calls the hairy Extremities of the Fore-head and that part of them which looks toward the Nose is call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Head of the Eye-brows the other regarding the Temples 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Tail of the Eye-brows The middle space between both Eye-brows in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the Latins because it is smooth and void of Hair is call'd Glabella Though sometimes that part be also hairy the Eye-brows meeting together at the Extremity of the Nose which Aristotle observes to be the Sight of a Person 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 austere and morose and such a Man is therefore by him call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 CHAP. XV. Of the Tears I. HAving made mention in the former Chapter of the Passages through which the Hairs flow in regard the Tears themselves together with their true Fountain have been but obscurely hitherto describ'd by the Philosophers we thought it would not be time ill spent by making a short Digression to insert into these Anatomical Exercises a more exact Discourse concerning them that whence those serous Drops distil and what they are may be the better understood As to the original Causes and matter of Tears Opinions are very various II. Empedocles as Galen testifies imagined that Tears were generated out of attenuated and melted Blood But in regard that many men can weep of a suddain and when they please it is not probable that the Blood can be so suddenly melted III. Iohn Baptista Scortias will have Tears to be generated in the Corner of the Eye from the Animal Spirits which being composed by the Apprehension of something sad is melted and distils into Tears Of the same Opinion Iacobus Tappias seems to be who writes that as Urine and Sweat are Excrements of the veiny and arterious Blood so Tears are the Excrement of the nervous Blood that is to say the Animal Spirits But in regard that only invisible Animal Spirits and no visible serous Humors can pass through the narrow Pores of the Nerves seeing also that Tears flow out at times of great Joy and Laughter when there is no sence of any Saddess lastly seeing that so great a quantity of Tears as in a short time issues forth in extraordinary Grief would destroy the whole Frame of Man If so vast a quantity of Animal Spirits should be wasted in their supply it is apparent that Opinion can no way be defended as being far from Truth IV. Georgius Nyssenus and Moletius thought Tears to be generated out
are that flow into those Kernels so much the more would be their Swelling and the Compression of the Veins and thence a greater Effussion of Tears but in Joy the said Spirits flow in great plenty to the Parts and yet in Joys Tears are very rarely shed or if they do burst forth 't is but in a very small quantity Contrary to this in Sadness fewer Animal Spirits flow into the Parts whence there must a be less Swelling and Pressure and yet Tears burst forth in greater quantity Lastly if it be objected that the Salival Liquor may be separated in sufficient quantity out of the Arteries through the Kernels and therefore the Lachrymal Juice I answer that the Parotides and Kernels of the Jaws are remarkably large and very numerous and furnished with many and more remarkable Arteries so that a more plentiful separation may more easily be made through them then through the slender and incomparably fewer Glandules of the Eyes endued with few and almost invisible little Arteries He therefore that more considerately weighs these things will easily observe that the Opinion of Nicholas Stenonis does not contain the true Cause of Tears and that unwilling Tears can never be deduc'd from it nor those which are occasion'd by swift Running Smoak and Dust c. nor bloody Tears which proceed rather from some Corrosion of the little Arteries and Veins which by reason of the narrowness of the Vessels can burst forth but in small quantity XIII Thus have many Men strangly mistaken the Fountain of this same Lympha and while they endeavour'd to discover it have fill'd much Paper with Conjectures Now let us try whether we can contribute any Light to a thing that lies veil'd under so much Obscurity Which before we undertake to perform we think it necessary to distinguish between the Lachrymal Humors and that same Lymphatic Humor which is poured forth out of the Glandules through the Diminutive Lymphatic Vessels for the moistning of the Eyes and smoothing of the Parts For this is the difference between them 1. This is more lympid and thinner than the other 2. This flows out of the Lymphatic Vessels of the Glandules the other from the Ventricles of the Brain 3. This is neither so sharp nor so salt as Tears are found to be both by the Tast and their Corrosion 4. There is but a small quantity of this nor does the quantity of it offend the Eyes as Tears does which bursting forth in great quantity many times very much prejudice the Eyes 5. This does not corrode at all but is grateful to the Eyes whereas many times Tears corrode the Cheeks and many times consume the Glandulous Lachrymal Caruncles themselves seated in the Corners of the Eyes which being eaten quite away with their little Vessels the Flux of Tears would cease or stop if the foremention'd Opinion of Stenonis were true whereas on the Contrary the Flux is then more unvoluntary and in greater quantity not to be stop'd XIV This Distinction thus premis'd we come to speak of the Tears themselves beginning with their Definition Tears are the more thin and serous Particles of the Flegmatic Humors Collected in the Brain flowing from the innermost Parts of the Eyes The Causes of the Expulsion of those Serous Particles through the Lachrymal Holes are five 1. The Plenty of Flegmatic Serous Humors collected in the Brain 2. Their suddain Colloquation or violent Agitation 3. The Contraction of the Brain and its Membranes 4. The insufficient Covering of the Lachrymal Hole by the Glandulous Caruncle 5. The Obstruction of the Spungy Bones in the Nostrils And of these Causes for the most part two or three concur and therefore we must particularly explain how those Tears burst forth in divers cases XV. In Sadness the Membranes of the Brain together with the Brain it self are contracted and hence the Serous Humors of the Arterious Blood which gain something of Viscosity from the Humid and Viscous Bowel are pressed forth out of the Kernels of the Cortex and the Substance of the Brain it self and Pituitous Kernel and the small Glandules interwoven with the Choroid Fold into the Ventricles and out of them through the Papillary Processes and the Narrownesses of the five representing Bones into the spongy Parts of the inside of the Nostrils which not being able to pass through them by reason of their quantity and viscousness the more thin and serous Particles burst forth through the narrow lateral Lachrymal Holes into the larger Corners of the Eyes and washing the Bodies of the Eyes and breaking forth make Tears But the thicker and more viscous Particles causing an Obstruction in the Spungy Bones of the upper Parts of the Nostrils are evacuated by degrees as well through the Nostrils as through the Palate And the less that Obstruction of the Nostrils grows the less becomes the Flux of Tears for that being remov'd the thinner and more serous Humors descend directly to the Palate and Nostrils neither is there any necessity that then they should be prest forth through the Lachrymal Holes by reason of the Passage being stopt so that then the Flux of Tears ceases till by reason of new plenty of descending Humors a new Obstruction happens XVI By reason of the same Obstruction Tears frequently burst forth in the Murr and sometimes upon violent Sneezing XVII There is the same reason for Tears that break forth in violent Laughter for from that alternate Contraction of the Muscles of the Head as also of the Brain and its Membranes the aforesaid serous Humors burst forth in great quantity out of the Brain and Kernels aforesaid into the Ventricles and out of them into the Mamillary Processes which Humors flow down to the Nostrils and Palate and by reaof their thicker Particles cause an Obstruction in the fungous part of the Nostrils Which is the reason that then the thinner and more serous Particles their free Descent being stopp'd bursting forth through the Lachrymal Holes flow from the Eyes and that so much the more easily by how much those Holes are so much the less exactly shut by the Glandulous Caruncles that lye over them Hence it comes to pass that according to the closer or looser shutting up of those Holes and the more or less plenty of Flegmy Humors abounding in the Brain some People shed Tears when they laugh and others not and because that Concussion of the Body or alternate Contraction does not last long hence it comes to pass that People do not shed many Tears when they laugh There is the same reason why young and stout Men who are not easily disturb'd with Grief nor have their Brain contracted besides that the Glandulous Caruncle that covers both Lachrymal Holes is stronger and larger seldom or never weep On the other side Old People Infants and Children easily shed Tears because that in the one the Glandulous Caruncle is drier more unequal and more contracted in the other softer and less
Cavity in the Optics condemns the Opinion in general As for the Mamillary Processes they are no Nerves Vid. l. 3. c. 8. Nor are the spungy Bodies of the Yard Nerves though erroneously so called besides that Hollowness in the Nerves is against Reason For they carry invisible Spirits through the invisible Pores of their Strings but no conspicuous Liquor there being no such thing ever known to flow from them either upon Wounds or Dissections Moreover seeing the Spinal Marrow from whence they derive their Original has no Cavities much less the hard and dry Nerves that proceed from it Now that the long Marrow is not hollow we have often try'd by means of a long Pipe through which we could never make any Breath to pass though the Pipe being thrust into the Division easily went to the end of it Nor do Galens Words contradict my Opinion who does not speak of any sensible Cavity but of an insensible Hollowness meaning the Pores in which respect they may be said to be insensibly hollow Therefore says Nellianus Glancanus Though the Nerves do not appear sensibly perforated yet they are esteemed capable to conveigh the Animal Spirits For that the Spirits is most subtil and the Marrow of the Nerves so spungy as to be easily penetrated by a subtil Spirit Vid. l. 3. c. 11. IV. The Substance of the Nerves is thought to be threefold The first the Internal Medullary Substance proceeding from the Marrow of the Brain The second and third is the double Membrane investing the inner Substance of which the one thinner and more inward is the Production of the Piâ—… Meninx the other thicker and more outward the Production of the hard Meninx But this threefold Substance though perhaps it may be conspicuous in the Optic Nerves in the rest is rather to be distinguished by Reason than Sense Seeing all the Nerves are only long Threads wherein there is no Pith or Medullary Substance to be seen whence some deny that there is any Marrow at all in the Nerves And hence it is that that the Nerves which seem to be composed of Threads only are numbred among the similar Parts not that they are simply so but seem to be so and are all alike in all Parts V. How the Nerves are nourished is hard to judge Vesâ—…ingius allows them Veins and Arteries for Nourishment and vital Heat For which reason Hossman will have them hollow Lindan says that all the Nerves are not only hollow but admit a little Capillary Artery Stenonis also believes that he has observed Blood-bearing Vessels between the Strings of the Nerves We have our selves observed in the Optics some slight Foot-steps of a Blood-bearing Vessel passing and expanding it self into the Net-resembling-Tunicle for the Nourishment of the Humors and Tunicles of the Eye but never in any other of the Nerves And therefore I hold the Opinion that extends to all the Nerves to be groundless 1. Because never any such little Arteries were ever discernible in any of the largest Nerves except the Optics and what Stenonis observed among the Threads I should rather think might be found in the enfolding Tunicles if there were any such thing 2. Because the narrowness of the Pores is not only extreamly streight but plainly invisible not able to admit a small Hair much less a Capillary Artery 3. Because the Pulsation of the Arteries would be a hindrance to the Passage of the Animal Spirits especially the Passage of the Nerve being streightned by the Swelling of the Artery in a violent Pulsation of the Heart 4. Because that upon the Dissection of any Nerve not the least drop of Blood appears to flow out of any Artery supposed to be within side Glisson writes that the Nerves by conveighing the Animal Spirits are not only serviceable to Sense and Motion but also carry a certain nutritive Humor for the Nourishment of themselves and the Parts which they enter and that they do not receive this Humor from the Muscles Bones Heart Lungs and Kidneys but from the Spleen Stomach and Intestines and partly also mediately from the Brain But the narrowness of the Nerves is sufficient to refute this vain Opinion and we see that the least Humor getting into them obstructs the Spirits and causes the Palsie Besides that no Juice can be squeez'd out of the Nerve when hurt at any time nor does the Nerve being ty'd with any Ligature either swell or grow languid in any Part nor is there the least Tumor to be observed either about or beyond the Ligature To this add the Experiment of Regner de Graef We laid bare says he the remarkable Nerve tending to the hinder Part of the Thighs and slit it athwart through the Middle and being freed from the Lymphatic Vessels put it into a glass Viol such as wherein we used to collect the Pancreatic Iuice the Neck of which was so narrow that the thickness of the dissected Nerve gently closed the Orifice of it least any Spirit or whatever passes more suttle through the Nerves might exhale into the Air. This Viol we fixed to the Skin in hopes that if any thing of liquid passed through the Skin we should by that means preserve it but all in vain For during the space of four or five Hours not a drop came forth nor could we perceive any sticking of the Animal Spirits to the Sides of the Glass by Condensation Moreover what Glisson propounds in the last place is remote from Truth for if any Liquor were received by the Nerves it must necessarily flow into their Beginnings but there are no Beginnings of the Nerves that open either into the Stomach Intestines or Spleen but they all proceed without Exception from the long Pith of the Brain Read what we have discoursed upon this Point l. 3. c. 11. and a farther Refutation see l. 1. c. 16. VII Wharton and Charlton admits this nutritious Juice but will have it prepared and made in the Glandules seated up and down in the Body and appointed for this use But in regard that only thick and visible Juices are prepared in the Kernels no way possible to enter the Nerves and that Juice ought to flow with a contrary Stream to the Animal Spirits and for that either none at all or at least no preceptible Nerves reach to the Glandules most certainly it cannot be the Office of the Glandules to carry nutritious Humors VIII Malpigius believes some notable Juice to be conveighed through the Fibres of the Nerves but that it is derived from the Glandulous Cortex of the Brain and for this reason he numbers the nervous Fibres among the Vessels The nervous Fibres saith he are to be reckoned among the Sorts of Vessels which being cut I have observed a certain Iuice like the White of an Egg and thickning before the Fire to flow forth in a considerable quantity But still what has been already said concerning the streightness of the Nerves sufficiently evinces the
Falshood of this Opinion the Cavity of their Fibres being such as not able to transmit the thinnest Juice IX Therefore it is most probable that the Nerves are nourished by the Arterious Blood but chiefly by the Animal Spirits For though they admit no Blood-bearing Vessels into their inner Parts yet they are nourished like the thin and thick Meninx in the Head by the Arterious Blood the Exterior Tunicles of the Nerves which are derived from the Menixes receiving through their invisible Arteries some little Portion of Blood for their Nourishment and communicating something of the same Blood by Exhalation to the inner Substance In the mean time it is unquestionable that these Tunicles but chiefly the inner Fibres are more especially nourished by the Animal Spirits passing through them vid. l. 3. c. 11 of which the more fixed Particles growing to their Substance turn to Nourishment The Arteries and Veins are nourished with the same Blood which they carry and therefore why not the Nerves which may be the reason also that they have such a quick Sense of Feeling and have their peculiar hardness and driness in regard the Spirits with which they are nourished are like a most volatil and dry Salt or like a dry and subtil Exhalation And then that besides these Spirits there is something of Arterious Blood which concur to the Nourishment of the Exterior Tunicles and communicates something by exhalation to the interior Tunicles is apparent from hence that the Nerves being obstructed though they are deprived of Sense and grow languid yet they are not deprived of Life nor dry up for want of Nourishment for the Obstruction being removed they shall after many Years be restored to their pristine Sanity I knew a Woman so paralytic on one side for thirty years together that she had no use either of her Left-Arm or Thigh besides that all that side of her was num till at length the Fright of a most hideous Tempest with Thunder and Lightning having expell'd the Obstructing Matter from the Nerves she was free'd from her Palsie and walked abroad the next Day to the Admiration of all that behâ—…ld her Which could not have been if the Nerves had been all that time without Nourishment for they must have been dried up in so many years time which they must have been had they been only nourished by the Animal Spirits which could not flow into the Nerve while obstructed A Story much like to this Valleriola reports of one that had been paralytic for several years but suddenly freed from his Distemper by the Fright of a House on Fite However those little Arteries are only derived from those that crawl through the Menixes of the Brain X. The Nerves vary in bigness according to the variety and necessity of their Use the Organs to which they run forth and the importance of the Actions which they are to perform XI The Original of the Nerves is twofold in respect of Generation and Administration In respect of the first they are generated from the Seed as are all the solid Parts In respect of the latter from the Brain or its appendent Matter For to reject the Opinion of Aristotle and others that the Nerves arise from the Heart or partly from the Heart and partly from the Brain we say that all the Nerves rise from the long Pith of the Brain contained as well within the Brain as the Cavity of the Spine Which Varolius Picholhominus Bauhinus and others testifie upon orbicular View XII From that Pith they proceed all through the Holes of the Pith and Vertebres but not all after the same manner For some pass through the Holes nearest the Place where they make their Exit some pass by two three or four Holes before they make their Egress For the more the Marrow tends to the lower Parts the more Holes the Nerves pass by before they transmit themselves XIII The Nerves some are softer and some are harder according to the Variety of the Use and Difference of Length and Situation as also in respect of the Parts which they enter Galen writes that their softer Parts are the only Parts that are sensible of feeling but that those which both feel and move are the harder XIV The use of the Nerves is to conveigh Animal Spirits to the Parts that by their ordinary Influx Nutrition may go forward and by their determinative Motion that the Parts destin'd for Sense and Mâ—…tion may be made more sensible and more vigorous Viâ—… l. 3. c. 11. To which purpose they are inserted into the sensible and moving Parts with wonderful Artifice And those that move the Muscles are inserted into their Heads or a little below or at least not beyond the Middle of which Insertion see the Reason Lib. 5. Cap 1. XV. Hence some conclude that they are the Instruments of Sense and Motion whereas they are rather the Channels to which the Animal Spirits are conveighed to the Instruments of Sense and Motion The Instruments of Feeling are the Membranes which the more Nerves they receive the more acutely they feel the fewer they admit the more dully And this appears in Palsies for though the Nerve be present yet the absence of the obstructed Spirit causes the Defect of Sense Now because the Nerves are furnished with Membranes 't is no wonder their Sense of Feeling is so quick more especially since they contain a greater quantity of Animal Spirits which are the immediate Causes of the Senses The Muscles are the Instruments of voluntary Motion which the Nerves do not move by contracting themselves but only by infusing into them store of Animal Spirits which cause the Motion Fernelius Laurentius Mercurialis and others observing in the Palsie the Sense sometimes stupified sometimes the Motion to cease and sometimes both lost thought the Motory and Sensory Nerves to be distinct and that as the one or the other come to be obstructed it causes a Variety in the Distemper But there is no more diversity of the Nerves than of the Animal Spirits only the diversity of Operations proceed from the diversity of the Parts which they enter Thus they infuse into the Eyes the Faculty of Seeing into the Ears the Faculties of Hearing c. Nay sometimes one and the same Nerve inserted into several Parts contributes to one Sence only to another both Sence and Motion Thus the Pleura Mediastinum Stomach and several other Parts feel by means of the Nerves of the sixth Conjunction and by means of the same Nerves and Muscles of the Neck the Hyoides Larynx and other Parts both feel and move But Willis observing that the Stomach Ventricle Intestines and many other Parts had a Spontaneous Motion though not arbitrary believed there were two sorts of Nerves and two sorts of Animal Spirits One that assisted spontaneous Motion by means of the Spirits generated in the Cerebel the other voluntary or arbitrary Motion by means of the Spirits generated in
Tamarisch an ℥ s. Herbs Baum Borage March Violets Tops of Hops Betony Germander Majoram an M. j. Flowers of Stoechas M. s. Cordial Flowers an one little handful Citron and Orange Peel an ʒ iij. Seeds of Fennel and Caraways an ʒ j. s. Currants ℥ ij Water and Wine equal Parts Make an Apozem for a Pint and a half to which mix Syrup of Stoechas and Borage an ℥ j. s. XI After this preparation Purge with this Potion ℞ Leaves of Senna ℥ s. White Agaric ʒ j. Anise-seed ʒ j. Ginger ℈ j. Decoction of Barly q. s. Infuse them all Night Then add to straining Confect Hamech ʒ iij. XII This done let him take this Apozem again and continue it for some time loosing his Belly every three or four days either with the foresaid draught or Confect Hamech or Cochiae Pills or Mesues and compounded Syrup of Apples highly commended by Rondeletius in this Case XIII After every Dose of his Apozem as also after Dinner and Supper let him eat the quantity of a Nutmeg of this Conditement ℞ Specier Diambr sweet Diammosch Dianthos an ℈ ij Candid Citron and Orang Peels an ʒ iij. Conserve of Flowers of Borage Baum and Rosemary an ℥ s. Confect Alkermes ℈ j. s. Syrup of Citron Rind q. s. Mix them for a Conditement XIV In the midst of these Cures peculiar Evacuations of the Head will not be amiss either by Masticatories or Sternutories made of Mar joram Gith-seed Roots of white Hellebore and Pellitory or the like XV. Great care is to be taken to provoke the Patient to sleep Therefore for his Supper give him sometimes a Hordeate or Amygdalate made with a Decoction of Barly and Lettice with which if he be hard to sleep mix one Ounce of Syrup of Poppys or more Or if these avail not of the Mass of Pills of Storax fifteen grains or of Laudanum Opiat three grains but this not often When he is not so much troubled with Waking it will suffice to anoint his Temple with Oyntment of Populeon mixt with some few grains of Opium Though Narcotics are to be used as little as may be for fear of accustoming the Patient too much to the use of them XVI His Diet must be such as breeds good Blood and corrects all the qualities of Melancholly Humors easie of Digestion moderately hot and moist prepared with Barly cleansed Borage Baum Bugloss Marjoram Raisins Betony c. avoiding Leeks Onions Garlic Cabbige Fish long pickled or dry'd in the Smoak and whatever beeds ill Juice and Melancholly nourishment let the Patient be moderate in his Diet neither too full nor too empty Let his Drink be small with a little Baum Rosemary or other such Herb mixt with it Let his Exercises be moderate His sleeping time much longer Let his Body be kept soluble And which is of great moment in this Cure let his Mind be taken off from all manner of sadness and thougthfulness and all occasions of fear and grief be avoided while his friends on the other side labour with grateful Arguments to perswade him of the vanity and falsehood of his idle Dreams and Imaginations HISTORY IV. Of Hypochondriac Melancholy A Noble German of forty Years of Age of a Melancholy Constitution having suffered deeply in the calamities of the late German War as Captivity Exile Famine and other Miseries which had reduced him to an ill sort of Diet the long use of which had begot wind roarings and distensions about his Midriff and a troublesom Ponderosity especially about his left Hypochondrium with difficulty of respiration and a palpitation of the Heart though not continual with loss of Appetite which made him sad fearful and thoughtful till at length understanding the death of his Wife he became so consternated that no perswasive and kind Language could asswage his sadness so that through continual watching restlessness horrible thoughts and want of sleep he began to rave at first by intervals but afterwards without ceasing he thought every Body came to kill him and therefore sought retirement and avoided Society No body but Servants entered his Chamber and of them he was afraid too if any other Persons came to visit him he besought them not to Murder him unprovided but to give him time to prepare himself for Death he only seemed to trust his Physitian from whom he often desired Antidotes against Poyson which he assured himself were often mixed with his Meat and took any Medicaments that were brought him IN this Person thus Distempered various Parts were grievously afflicted especially the Brain as appeared by the Delirium and the Bowels of the middle and lower Belly which the Palpitation of his Heart difficulty of breathing distention and ponderosity of his Hypochondriums and loss of Appetite plainly demonstrated II. The Symptom that chiefly insested is called Melancholly which is a Delirium without Rage or Fever arising from a Melancholly Phantasm III. The remote Causes of this Malady are Fear Terrors and Grief occasioned by Misfortunes which had long troubled and disordered the Spirits in their Motion to which an ill Diet mainly contributed For thereby Crudities were bred in the Bowels of the lower Belly thence Obstructions in the Spleen and neighbouring Parts The faculty of the Spleen was weaken'd so that not able to do its Office in Chymification and breeding Matter unfit for convenient Fermentation of the Humors it left many feculent acid sour thick and crude Humors which not able to pass the small Vessels got together in a large quantity in the left Hypochondrium about the Spleen which occasioned that troublesom Ponderosity accompanied with wind and roarings for that while Nature endeavours the Concoction of that acid Matter which she cannot well accomplish those acid Humors receive some Fermentation which begets that great quantity of Wind which not finding an easie Exit occasions those rumblings and distensions of the Parts This thicker acid and sharp Matter being carried to the Heart causes Palpitation while the Heart endeavours to expel that sharp pricking Matter from it And in regard that Melancholly Juice is not equally troublesom to all the Parts of the Heart thence it happens that the Palpitation does not always continue but comes by intervals The same Juice being expelled from the right Ventricle of the Heart to the Lungs when it comes to fill the small branches of the Arterious Veins and Veiny Artery as not being able to pass them without great difficulty fills the Breast with many Vapors and causes difficulty of Respiration But being carried through the Arteries with the Vital blood to the Brain it disorders the Motion of the Animal Spirits renders them more impure and alters them by a Specific and bad mistemper Thence those Melancholly Imaginations by which the Operations of the Mind and Ratiocination are disturbed which occasions a Delirium accompanyed with fear and sadness IV. But because that Melancholly humor is not generated at first in the Head but ascends from the Hypochondriums especially the left to
Age somewhat of a Phlegmatic Constitution was wont to be troubl'd twice or thrice a Year with Catarrhs falling upon his Teeth or Lungs which sometimes seized him with a slight Pain in his Head sometimes without any at all at length in Autumn he felt a distensive and heavy pain in the hinder part of his Head such as used to precede his Catarrh but then no Catarrh ensued however this pain increasing and being accompany'd with a giddiness after Purgation and Blood-letting by the advice of a Physitian and other proper Remedies applied the Pain abated so that the Patient went abroad again but venturing too soon into the cold Air when he found the Pain together with the giddiness encrease again he was forced to take his Bed and of a suddain was perceived to rave The Pain still more and more augmenting the second day standing by his Bed side he fell down not being able to rise but by those in the Room was put to Bed again where in a short time he fell into such a deep sleep that nothing but violent pulling and pinching him would wake him and then he only opened his Eyes a little but spoke nothing and fell asleep again The third day there was no rowsing him but when this profound sleep had continued about four days he began to wake however then he spoke but little and that after a wild and raving manner thus he lived eight days Afterwards he had a continual Inclination to sleep with his Eyes winking but could not sleep and muttered many things idly to himself sometimes lying still when he was thought to be asleep of a suddain he would endeavour to leap out of his Bed and to do something or other but was so weak that he could not In this inclination to sleep with a continued Delirium he remained eight or ten days afterwards he could not sleep at all neither had he any Inclination to sleep for a Fortnight together in the mean time the Delirium abated every day so that within that time he became sound of his Mind and recovering his strength was restored by his Physitians to his former Health during the whole course of his Distemper he had no Fever His Appetite was good even in his profound sleep for though when he waked he asked for nothing yet he took whatever was given him and digested it well By his wild Answers it appear'd that not only Imagination and Reason but his Memory was weakned The Question is what sort of Disease this Man was troubled with and with what Remedies it was to be cur'd I. THat the Brain of this Person was affected and thence his Principal and External Senses were also troubled is plain by the Relation II. That profound sleep which at first oppressed him was a Somnulent Coma which is a deep sleep arising from the benumedness of the common Sense But that heavy inclination to sleep which followed after yet with an inability to sleep was a Wakeful Coma which is a heavy propensity to sleep with an impotency so to do by reason of the Obstruction or Compression of the Vessels in the Ventricles of the Brain and a disorderly motion of the Spirits disturbing the Mind III. The Antecedent cause of this Malady was a Copious Generation of Flegm in the lower Parts which being carried to the Brain and collected in the Ventricles of it constitutes the containing Cause For that same Flegm not being able to fall down to the lower Parts as is usual but being there detained with its quantity distends the Vessels whence first a distending and oppressive Pain afterward that Flegm being more encreased in some manner compressed the Choroid-fold together with the wonderful Net hence the Vital Spirits not suffiâ—…ng to supply the want of Animal Spirits to perform the Offices of the principal and external Senses the Patient motion ceasing fell down not being able to rise again and then the external Senses ceasing a deep sleep ensued At length by the help of Nature and Medicines that obstruction of the Choroid-fold being somewhat open'd and the Vital Spirits let loose to encrease the Animal which were not yet plentiful enough besides that they moved disorderly through obstructed passages hence the mind became disturbed for that though more Spirits then before flowed forth to the Organs of the Senses yet they were not sufficient to perform the whole duty which caused that great inclination to sleep which however was still disturbed by the continual disturbance of the Mind so that though the Patient were willing to sleep he could not but as it were wak'd sleeping with continual Deliriums Lastly the Obstruction being wholly opened and the Spirits having gain'd free Passage yet very few Vapors ascending to the Brain by reason of the extream Emptiness of the Body to stay them their due time in the Brain hence followed continual Watchings which abated as more Vapors ascended to the Brain upon Digestion of more Nourishment There was no Fever because no Putrefaction of Humors molested the Heart IV. A Somnulent or waking Coma is a most dangerous Disease which kills many especially if the profound sleep extend it self beyond the fourth day in regard the most noble Bowel the Brain is most grievously affected For that Obstruction and Compression endangers the Choroid-fold for two Reasons either because the Coma for want of Animal Spirits may turn to an Apoplexy or because the hot Vital Spirits not being able to get through their wonted passages may cause an Inflammation in the Membranes of the Brain and then a Phrensie would ensue V. The principal Curative Indications are to draw back and evacuate the containing Matter at the beginning and so to open the Obstruction then to take away the Antecedent Cause and hinder a new collection of Flegm VI. Because a Man in that profound sleep can swallow nothing Glysters must be administred at least once a day Hard Frictions and Dolorific Ligatures of the extream Parts must be made use of Blood must be taken from the Arm. Cupping-glasses both without and with Scarification must be applied to the Shoulders Back and Neck The Patient also must often be waked with jogging and pinching iâ—… it be possible and that the containing Matter may be shaken off and expelled this Sternutory is to be blown up into the Nostrils ever now and then â„ž Root of white Hellebore ℈ j. Pellitory ℈ s. Leaves of Marjoram ℈ j. Pepper Castoreum an gr v. For a Powder VII His sleep abating give him these Pills â„ž Mass of Pill Cochiae ℈ j. Extract of Catholicum ℈ s. For five Pills Or if he cannot swallow them give him one dram of Powder of Diaturbith or Diacarthamum in a little small Ale Or a Purging draught prepared with Leaves of Senna Agaric and Jallop-Roots or the like VIII The Body being sufficiently Purged this Apozem or such like may be prescribed â„ž Root of Acorus Ê’vj of Elecampane Fennel an â„¥ s. of Galangal Ê’ij Herbs Marjoram Rosemary Betony
of the Sight did not proceed from any Fault of the Sight or of the Medinum or the Object II. This Malady by the Physicians is called Vertigo or Giddiness And is a Deception of the Sight which makes that visible Objects seem to turn round arising from a kind of Whirl-pit Motion of the Animal Spirits in the Brain III. The remote Cause is the External Motion refrigerating the Brain and streightning the Passages of it appointed for the evacuating of Excrements so that Flegm abounding in the Body and copiously collected in the Ventricles of the Brain constitutes the containing Cause IV. By those flegmatic Humors the Ventricles are first distended thence the heavy Pain This Flegm augmenting stops up the Passages of the Brain through which the Spirits ought to pass partly by repletion partly by compression so that the Spirits missing their direct Passage and lighting upon the obstructed Passage gets thorough in a circular Motion as Water falling with violence if it meet a Dam in its way recoils three or four times in Circles before it run by V. These whirling Spirits thus circularly carried to the Seat of the Mind intermixing with the Images of visible things which are carried to the same Mind are offered to the common Sensory with the same circular Motion and so occasion that Fallacy of Sight by which all visible Objects seem to be whirled about in the same manner as the Images of visible things VI. But this same whirling of the Spirits does not last partly because the narrowness of the Passages of the Brain is sometimes more sometimes less partly because the Spirits are sometimes thicker and sometimes thinner and pass through sometimes with more sometimes less violence which is the reason the Vertigo comes by Fits For in the Motion of the Body the Spirits are moved with more violence and in greater abundance which if they cannot pass freely and directly through the ordinary Passages of the Brain but light here and there upon the obstructed Passages causes the Fit whether they be thin or thick For the Repulse of the Obstruction puts them into a Circumgyration and the plenty and violent rushing of the thin Spirits makes them they cannot pass but the thick are stoped by reason of their thickness and therefore Drunkards and young People that abound with thin Spirits are as much liable to Giddiness as old Men whose Spirits are thicker But the Giddiness of old Men is more frequent and lasts longer because of their more abounding Flegm longer and more frequently streightens the Passages of the Choroid-Fold Therefore the Vertigo seldom happens when the Body is in Motion and is generally abated and cured by rest VII But because there are not enough of those whirling Spirits that make their way through the Passages of the Brain besides that their â—…ircumrotation hinders them from entring in sufficient quantity into the Nerves This was the reason that this Patient for want of Animal Spirits in the Muscles often fell to the Ground without being able to rise before the Vertigos ceasing the Animal Spirits flowed more copiously again into the Muscles VIII Then the Fit returns again upon the Sight of Wheels turning round Precipices c. because the Images of those things being carried to the inner Parts with that same whirling and unequal Motion affects the Animal Spirits with the same circular and unequal Motion Upon the Sight of Precipices the Vertigo returns in regard the Sight of them striking a Terror into the Beholder the Affright streightens the Passages and by that means puts a sudden stop upon the Spirits which being forced forward by those that come behind because they have not a free Passage are agitated by the Repulse of the Obstruction and forced into a circular Motion IX This Malady is hard to be cured and many times turns to an Epilepsie or Apoplexie or some other grievous Distemper of the Brain and therefore the Cure of it is not to be delay'd X. The Cure consists in removing the primary antecedent and continuing Cause and Corroboration of the Brain XI First Therefore let her be purged with these Pills â„ž Mass of Pill Cochiae ℈ j. Extract of Catholicon ℈ s. Diagridion gr ij Syrup of Stoechas a little For vij Pills XII Though not much good can be expected from Blood-letting yet least the Blood should fly up to the Head in too great a quantity it may be taken from the Arm or if it happen in the time of her monthly Customs out of a Vein of the Foot Let the Vein be opened the Patient lying in Bed and let her not see her own Blood XIII Then let her drink three or four times a day a Draught of this Apozem â„ž Root of Acorus â„¥ j. Elecampane Fennel an â„¥ s. Herbs Betony Marjoram Rosemary Calaminth â—…hyme an M. j. Sage Leaves of Lawrel Flowers of Stoechas an Ms. Seeds of Anise Fennel Caroways an Ê’j s. Cleansed Raisins â„¥ ij Water q. s. Boil them according to Art adding toward the end White-wine lb s. Make an Apozem of about lbj. s. Sometimes instead of the Apozem she may take a small quantity of this Apozem â„ž Specier Diambrae Ê’j Sweet Diamosch ℈ j. Candied Root of Acorus Conserve of Flowers of Sage Anthos Baum an â„¥ s. Syrup of Stoechas q. s. XIV In the mean time let her use this Masticatory â„ž Root of Pellitory Elecampane an Ê’j Herbs Marjoram Hyssop an Ê’s Black Pepper ℈ s. Mastich Ê’v Reduce these into a Powder and then make them into Trochischs with a little Turpentine and Wax XV. Let her Temples Nostrils and Top of her Head be anointed twice a day with this Oyl â„ž Oyl of Nutmegs distilled Ê’j Oyls of Rosemary Amber Marjoram an ℈ s. She may also wear the following Quilt upon her Head for some Months â„ž Leaves of Rosemary Melilot Sage Flowers of Melilot an one little handful Nutmeg ℈ ij Cloves ℈ j. Benjamin ℈ s. Beat them grossly for a Quilt XVI Let her have a warm Room and good Air. Let her feed sparing and let her Food be easie of Digestion not flatulent and seasoned with hot Cephalics and carminative Seeds Her Drink must be small wherein if a little Bag of Marjoram Rosemary and a little Cinnamon be hung 't will be so much the better Moderate Sleep and Exercise is best when the Giddiness is off but let her Rest in the time of the Fit Keep her Body soluble and take care that all Evacuations be regular and natural HISTORY XI Of the Night-Mare A Woman of fifty years of age in good plight fleshy strong and plethoric sometimes troubled with the Head-ach and Catarrhs falling upon her Breast in the Winter the last Winter molested with no Catarrhs but very sore in the Day-time but in the Night-time when she was composing her self to Sleep sometimes she believed the Devil lay upon her and held her down sometimes that she was choaked by some great Dog or Thief lying upon her Breast so that she
could hardly speak or breath and when she endeavoured to throw off the Burthen she was not able to stir her Members And while she was in that Strife sometimes with great difficulty she awoke of her self sometimes her Husband hearing her make a doleful Inarticulat Voice waked her himself at what time she was forced to sit up in her Bed to fetch her Breath sometimes the same Fit returned twice in a Night upon her going again to Rest. I. THe Brain of this Woman was primarily affected especially in the hinder Ventricle of the Brain near the Spinal Pith for the Muscles of the Parts seated below the Head are agrieved which appears by her difficulty of breathing and the hindered Motion of her Breast Thighs and Arms. Hence the Heart is affected with the Lungs II. This Affection is called Incubus or the Night-Mare which is an Intercepting of the Motion of the Voice and Respiration with a false Dream of something lying ponderous upon the Breast the free Influx of the Spirits to the Nerves being obstructed III. The antecedent Cause of this Malady is an over-redundancy of Blood in the whole Body whence many Vapors are carried to the Head and there detained by the Winter-cold streightning the Pores and thickning those Vapors and narrowing the Passage to the beginning of the Spinal Marrow which hinders a sufficient Passage of the Animal Spirits to the Nerves and this constitutes the containing Cause IV. For while the Passages of the Nerves are compressed by the more thick Vapors detained about the lower part of the Brain at the entrance of the Marrow into the Spine sufficient Animal Spirts do not flow into the lower Parts which causes the Motion of the Muscles to fail Now because the Motion of the Muscles for the most part ceases in time of sleep except the Respiratory Muscles therefore the failing of their Motion is first perceived by reason of the extraordinary trouble that arises for want of necessary Respiration Now the Patient in her Sleep growing sensible of that Streightness but not understanding the Cause in that Condition believes her self to be overlay'd by some Demon Thief or other ponderous Body being neither able to move her Breast nor to breath Then endeavouring to shake off that troublesome Weight as apprehensive of some ensuing Suffocation but not being able to move the rest of her Members she believes them under the same Pressure Upon which when she tries to call out for assistance but because of the streightness of her Respiration she is not able to speak distinctly she makes an inarticulate Noise with great difficulty In this Strugling she continues till the Animal Spirits detained at the lower Part of the Brain by the Compression of the Spinal Marrow and there collected in a greater quantity at length forced by the continual Flux of Spirits from the Heart violently make their way through the Pith into the Nerves and Muscles and restore Motion to the Parts Then the Patient moves her Body and wakes and by that motion those thick Vapors are dissipated and being awake she is forced to take Breath to repair the Loss which she suffered for want of Respiration But because there is yet a larger quantity of these Vapors still remaining in the Head hence it comes to pass that if she fall asleep again especially if she lye upon her Back the same Evil returns in regard those thick Vapors settle more easily toward the hinder part of the Head near the Marrow V. Now that they are Vapors and not Humors is plain from hence that the Malady is so soon mastered which could not be done so suddenly were they Humors which would rather cause an Apoplexie or some other more dangerous Evil that they are thick and not thin Vapors appears from hence because the thin Vapors would pass more easily through the Pores though narrower which the thick cannot do which requires motion of the Body to dissipate them which Motion ceasing in Sleep they stick to the Place and streighten the Pores of the Nerves But if any cold ill Temper of the Brain happen at the same time those Vapors are easily condensed into Humors by that Cold which if detained in the Head cause Heaviness the Coma Apoplexy and the like If they flow from the Head to the lower Parts they breed Catarrs with which our Patient was wont to be troubled in the Winter-time VI. This Malady is dangerous least the collected Vapors being condensed in the Head should breed a Coma Apoplexy or the like VII It consists in removing the Antecedent Principal and containing Cause and the Corroboration of the Brain VIII To purge away the Antecedent Cause or the great quantity of Humors let the Body be purged with Pill Cochiae Powder of Diaturbith or this Potion ℞ Leaves of Senna ʒiij White Agaric Rhubarb an ʒj s. Anise-seeds ℈ ij White Ginger ℈ s. Decoction of Barley q. s. Infuse them and to the Straining add Elect. Diaphaenicon ʒij IX Then because she is plethoric take away ℥ viij or ix of Blood from her Arm. X. After Blood-letting let her take every morning a Draught of this Apozem ℞ Root of Calamus Aromaticus Fennel Stone-parsley Capers an ʒvj Herbs Betony Marjoram Dodder Succory Borage Sorrel an m. j. Flowers of Stoechas m. s. Iuniper Berries ℥ s. Blew Currants ℥ ij Water q. s. Boil them according to Art adding toward the end Rubarb white Agaric an ʒij Anise-seed ℥ s. Cinnamon ℈ j. s. Make an Apozem of lb. s. XI To expel the containing Cause Errhinas snuft up into the Nostrils or a sneezing Powder of Root of white Hellebore Pellitory Leaves of Marjoram and Flowers of Lilly of the Valley greatly conduce XII To corroborate the Brain let her take a small quantity of this Conditement ℞ Specier Diambr Aromatic Rosat an ℈ ij Conserve of Flowers of Betony Sage Anthos candied Root of Acorns an ℥ s. Syrup of Stoechas q. s. XIII To the same purpose let her wear such a Quilt as this upon her Head ℞ Leaves of Rosemary Marjoram Thyme Flowers of Lavender an ʒj Nutmegs ℈ ij Cloves ℈ j. Benjamin ℈ s. Beat them into a gross Powder XIV Keep her in a pure and moderate hot Air. Let her Diet be sparing but of good Juice and easie Digestion Let her Suppers be more moderate then her Dinners Her Drink must be small her Exercise moderate and so must her Sleep be and let her be careful of sleeping upon her Back Lastly a sedate Mind and a soluble Body are of great moment in this Case HISTORY XII Of the Apoplexy A Strong Man about forty years of age both a great Feeder and Drinker complained of a heavy Pain in his Head for two Months together but took no care of himself but followed on his usual Course of Drinking Fore-noons and After-noons but at length one Morning waking in his Chamber after he had muttered out three or four inarticulate Words he fell of a sudden void of
off by one half but still obstructing the other constitute the containing Cause IV. Thus the Motion of the Left-side was taken away because that half of the Pith being obstructed the Animal Spirits could not enter into that half of the Pith nor the Nerves proceeding from it which causes a Cessation of the Actions of the Instruments of voluntary Motion or the Muscles on that side But the Sense is not quite lost but remains very dull because that several Spirits pass through the contracted Pores of the Pith sufficient for Motion yet not anew to impart Sense to the feeling Parts V. This Malady is hard to be cured by reason of the detension of a viscous and tenacious Humor in a cold Part but Youth and Strength of Body promise hopes of Recovery VI. The Method of Cure requires the Attenuation and Dissipation of the Obstructing Humor 2. To prevent the Afflux of any more 3. To take away the antecedent Cause 4. To cortoborate the Parts affected VII For Evacuation of the Flegmatic Humor give these Pills â„ž Mass of Pill Cochiae Ê’s Extract of Catholicon ℈ s. with a little Syrup of Stoechas make up vij Pills Instead of them may be given Powder of Diaturbith or DiacarthamumÊ’j or a Draught of an Insusion of Leaves of Senna Root of Jalap Agaric These Purges are to be repeated by Intervals VIII Blood-letting is not proper in this Case IX To corroborate the nervous Part of the Body and prevent the Generation of flegmatick Humors let him take this Apozem â„ž Root of Acorns Fennel an Ê’vj Florence Orice Ê’iij Betony Ground-pine Marjoram Rosemary Calamint Thime an M. j. Flowers of Stoechas M. s. Seeds of Fennel Caroways Bishops-weed an Ê’j s. Water and Wine equal parts boil them to a Pint and a half and to the Straining add Syrup of Stoechas â„¥ iij. For an Apozem Of which let the Patient take four ounces three or four times a day with a small Quantity of this Conditement â„ž Specier Diambr Diamosch Dulcis an ℈ iiij Conserve of Flowers of Sage Anthos Root of Acorns candied an Ê’v Syrup of Stoechas q. s. X. The Use of Paralitic and Apoplectic Waters will be very proper in this Case of which there are several to be found among the Prescriptions of Physicians XI If the Disease will not submit to these Remedies let him take every Morning five ounces of the following Decoction and sweat in his Bed according to his Strength â„ž Lig. Guaiacum â„¥ iiij Sassafras Sarsaperil an â„¥ ij Water lbvij Macerate these twenty four hours then boil them adding toward the end Roots of Acorns Valerian Butter-bur Fennel an Ê’vj Galangale Licorice sliâ—…'d an Ê’ij Herbs Betony Miij Ground-Ivy M. ij Thyme Marjoram Rosemary Flowers of Stoechas an M. j. Sage Ms. Iuniper-berries â„¥ j. Boil them to lb. iij. XII For Corroboration of the Head prepare this Quilt â„ž Flowers of Rosemary Marjoram Thyme Flowers of Lavender Melilot an one small Handful Cloves Nutmegs an ℈ ij For a Quilt XIII While these things are doing let the Spine of the Back be well chafed with hot Cloaths especially in the Neck about the Head and then fomented with a Fomentation of hot Cephalics boiled in Wine or else anoint the Neck with this Liniment warm â„ž Oyl of Foxes Spike Rue Goose and Cats-grease an Ê’vj Oyl of Turpentine â„¥ s. Oil of Peter Rosemary Amber an ℈ ij Powder of Castoreum ℈ iiij After Unction and Friction lay on this Plaister â„ž Pul Castoreum Ê’ij Benjamin Ê’j Galbanum Opoponax dissolved in Spirit of Wine Emplaster of Betony Lawrel-Berries and Melilot an Ê’vj Mix them according to Art XIV This Disease requires a hot dry and pure Air. Meats of good juice and easie Digestion calefying and attenuating For Drink Hydromel or Wine imbib'd with Rosemary Marjoram Betony Cardamum c. Now and then a Draught of Hypocrass or a Spoonful of Juniper-wine or Anthoswine or Aquae Vite of Matthiolus will not be improper avoid long Sleeps and Repletion and let Natures Evacuations be regular and due HISTORY XIII Of Trembling A Man fifty years of Age struck with a great and sudden Terror immediately fell down fixing his Eyes upon the Standers by but not able to speak Soon after recovering his Spirits he talked well enough but rose up with a Trembling over his whole Body From that time when he moved his Limbs the Trembling still remained which as his Body drew cold was more violent as he grew warm abated I. TRembling is a Deprivation of the Voluntary Motion of the Limbs by which they are agitated with a contrary Motion in a continued Vicissitude II. The antecedent Cause is a Flegmatic Humor contained in the Brain which being stirred by the great sudden and disorderly Commotion of the Spirits proceeding from the Terror and cast off to the Pith of the Spine constitutes the containing Cause III. For the Humor in that place contracting the Pores of the Pith prevents the free Influx of the Animal Spirits through the Marrow into the Nerves and Muscles So that not being sufficient to perfect the voluntary Motion it happens that the Limbs are moved forward by a voluntary Motion but are depressed by their own Weight so that both together cause a trembling Motion IV. This Trembling is more vehement in the Body when cold less violent when the Body is warm Because the Pores are more contracted by the Cold and more dilated by the Heat Which causes a freer or less open Passage to the Animal Spirits and consequently a more or less vehement Trembling V This Trembling is not a little dangerous for it may turn to a Palsey or may be accompanied with an Apoplexy a Carus or a Lethargy VI. The Cure is the same as of the Palsey HISTORY XIV Of a Convulsion A Maid about thirty years of Age received a Wound in her Right-arm which laid a Nerve bare but unhurt However she lay in a cold Place and by reason of her Poverty not well guarded against the Cold and besides an unskilful Chyrurgeon having stopped the Blood put a Tent into the Wound dipped in Egyptiaeum and the Apostles Oyntment which caused a most painful and vehement Convulsion in her Arm which soon after was accompanied with a Convulsion of the Thigh on the same side and of her Arm and Thigh on the other side which lasted sometimes half a quarter sometimes an Hour sometimes half an hour intermitting and returning She was in such Pain that many times it made her talk idly I. THE Nerves and Muscles of this Patient were affected as appeared by the Motion not spontaneous and that still more encrease and her Head was grieved as appeared by the Delirium II. This Simptom is called a Convulsion which is a continued and unvoluntary Contraction of the Nerves and Muscles toward their beginning III. The remote Cause was the Wound received which laid the Wound bare The next Cause was the sharp and biting Oyntment provoking the Nerve and the cold