and soon passing over at length grows to be a fixt and permanent disease Wherefore it seems material in this Case to accommodate th Aetiologie of those passions delivered by us in another place to unfold the Nature and Causes of this present maladie Which truly will not be of any great business or difficulty An Affection of what sort a Tympany is For supposing what we have in another place more largely set down the extensions and inflations of the membranes and hollow bowels take their origine from the impetuous invasions of the Spirits into the nervous fibres of which they are interwoven it will be obvious enough to conceive cven a Tympaine to be produeed from such a cause but being more sixt and longer or uncessantly in the act into the reason of which difference we will by and by inquire In the mean time I am induced to believe a Tympanie not the be stirred up from winds shut up within or without the Cavity of the guts It s cause and formal reason explicated for such an accumulation of winds in those places is an effect but not a cause of this disease but that it does arise inasmuch as the animal Spirits in the bottom of the belly belonging to the membranous bowels being forced into disorder by something incongruous do tumultuously rush every where into the nervous fibres and puffe them up neither do they immediately recede back from them from hence the Peritonaeum swells and the guts being blown up and enlarged they are as it were inflated the Mesentery and other membranous bowels being turgid with an impetuous Spirit are as it were raised up into a bulk moreover while these come thus to pass that the vacuities caused from the swelling of hollow bowels might be filled a portion presently of every humour within contained being rarified into vapours forthwith turns into wind wandring about those empty spaces Truly And proved by arguments and instances we have clearly enough shewn by reasons and instances in our Pathologie of Convulsions that the animal spirits puff up the membranous parts by their irregularity and so produce as it were this windie Distemper Moreover the fame is demonstrated by Anatomical observation made in dissecting a living Creature viz. inasmuch as the Trunk of the eighth pair of Nerves descending on each side by the Neck if it be taken out and bound with a thred forthwith all the stomach swells up as if it were puffed with winde An universal Tympanie which certainly can proceed from no other cause than that the animal Spirits of the fibres of that bowel and others flowing through the nervous passages inasmuch as they being cut off from their origine are driven into confusion do tumultuously enter those part and puss them up Besides these for the further illustrating of this Hypothesis I will relate a History cited by the most renowned Smetius of an universal Tympany as he calls it in a certain young man of Liege Who when he had received in a conflict under his right arm-pit a wound made by a prick penetrating into the Cavity of his breast next day and night being past he appeared in the morning after swell'd throughout his whole body not only in his breast but also in his back belly loins and in the cods besides both in his arms shoulders neck and face that he could not open his eye-lids also on the crown of his head the skin being every where swolne and tumefied the tumour was every where extended with great pain The Author calls this wonderful affection an Universal Tympanie The most renowned Sennertus relates a Case like this from his own knowledge Moreover I remember I have heard or read of the like from a wound of the breast being reveived near the arm-pit Notwithstanding The Cause of an universal Tympanie enquired into the reason of this Symptom deliver'd by Smetius and approved by Sennertus doth not at all please me for they ascribe the cause of the general Tympanie to the puffing up of the breast by the axillary wound made all that night under the skin as we see a new and moist bladder to be blown up by boyes with a quill which truly doth not only seem improbable but also we think scarce possible that the wind to be blown out of a wound of the Thorax by reason of the hole one might stopt can enter the skin and from thence passing through the whole body should make it become every where Tympanitical For besides that the wind cannot so suddenly pass from thence into all parts although it should be blown with a quill from the mouth under the skin besides while the orifice of the wound is stopt no wind can altogether be blown out from the Cavith of the breast because none in the mean time enters But assuredly the cause of that wonderful affection is this whence also the formal reason of a Tympanie is illustrated In the Breast near the Arm-pits The true cause assigned are many and eminent folding of Nerves as we have described in our Treatise of Nerves by which the nerves of the whole body communicate among themselves viz. the Trunk of the eighth pair unites with the intercostal Nerve and both with the nerves of the Spina Dorsi by branches and sprigs sent here and there Wherefore this nervous folding perchance being pierced by the point of the Sword first of all the spirits residing in that place being provok'd run into disorders afterwards a consent being immediately made thorow so many notable Nerves and transmitted to and fro every where other Spirits and then again others are sensible of the like irregularities and puffing up the membranous and nervous Fibres which every where they enter tumultuously they induce as it were a tympanitical affection throug the whole body By reason of the like fury or virulent madness imposed upon the Spirits in any place and from thence immediately diffused far and wide certain Poysons being fdrunk the strokes of weapons or of wild Beasts or a venemous bite do frequently induce a swelling together of many parts or of the whole body which swelling distemper of the Spirits is styl'd by Helmont to be Indignatio Archaas There are many other Cases and Instances by which it is most clearly evinced that the Animal Spirits being provok'd and driven into angry inclinations inasmuch as they do more impetuously enter into the nervous Fibres are wont first to swell the membranous parts and to excite many passions out of those which are vulgarly but falsely ascribed to windes so that in truth no other cause of a Tympanie can be assigned more like truth If it objected Why the belly swells in the dead that the Paunches of the defunct after some time are raised by winde into a bulk and swell like as in a Tympany I pronounce this to proceed from the putrefaction of humours and the extream dissolution of the mixture wherein all the active particles depart being freed one
dram to be strewed upon burning coals Take Gum of Ivie Of the more strong Frankincense of each two drams Flower of Brimstone one dram and half Mastich one dram with a dissolution of gum Tragacanth form Troches Take of white Amber Arsenicals Olibanum of each two drams prepared Orpiment half an Ounce Styrax Labdanum of each one dram and half with solution of Gum tragacanth make Troches for fumigation Mountebanks do ordinarily prescribe the smoak of Arsnick to be suckt into the mouth Smoak of Auripigment like Tobacco kindled in a Pipe and sometimes with good success Moreover it is in practice with the Vulgar to burn like Tobacco in a Pipe little bits of cloth stained with Arsenick such as wherewith the walls of Taverns are hung and so suck the smoak into the consumptive Lungs for cure 3. Of a confirm'd Consumption These things being thus unfolded concerning a Cough and a Phthisis beginning both as to what belongs to the Pathologie and cure it remains now lastly to discourse of a more painfull Phthisis confirm'd and almost desperate and to consult what is to be perform'd when the lungs being very much vitiated and affected with one or more filthy ulcers neither the air nor the blood do rightly pass through them but choak or corrupt the mass thereof by continually suggesting filthy corruption insomuch that a hectick feaver and an Atrophie by reason of nourishment being frustrated infest the diseased with the loss of all their faculties and by daily weakening their strength precipitate them to the grave The most certain sign of this disease growing desperate uses to be accounted a pain very troublesome with an inflammation of the throat for this symptom argues a great putrefaction of the lungs from whence the putrid effluvia's exhaling are thrown about in the narrow passage of the throat The formal reason thereof which wound and grievously irritate those tender fibres there In this case the cleansing of the lungs as also the drying up of the Ulcer are in vain designed for all hotter Medicines ordain'd for those purposes and fit enough in the beginning of a Phthisis are not to be endured in a confirmed one inasmuch as augmenting the inflammation of the lungs they procure a hectick feaver thirst wathings and other more painfull symptomes or call them back afresh For truly in such a state of this disease where onely the prolongation of life is proposed with a light toleration and an easie death those remedies help chiefly which bridle the fervour of the blood allay the heat in the Praecordia and restore the sprits and gently cherish them Hence for food Asses Milk also Water-gruel Barly-broths Cream of Barly and for drink Ptisan Emulsions water of milk distilled with Snails and temperate pectoral herbs are usually of greatest success Forms of remedies in a desperate Consumption Syrups and Linctus's which appease the inflammation of the throat and Lungs and facilitate expectoration but chiefly the more mild Hypnoticks whereby moderate rest may be procured may be frequently or daily taken The forms of these are common enough but however according to our method we will annex some of the more select of each kind Take of Barly half an ounce Decoctions candied Eringo roots 6 drams parings of Apples one handfull Raisins stoned two ounces Liquorish three drams boyl them in three pints of spring-water to two make a Ptisan to restrain thirst take it 3 or 4 times a day also in the room of ordinary drink if it agree Take the tayls of twenty Crevises candied Eringo roots one ounce a crust of white-bread Raisins stoned two ounces Liquorish 3 drams boyl them in 3 pints of Spring-water to two strain it and take 3 or 4 ounces three times a day After the same manner is prepared the Decoction of Snails Take of Snails half-boyled and cut three pound Distilled waters ground-Ivy 6 handfulls Nutmegs sliced numb 6. crum of white-bread two pound fresh milk 8 pounds distill it in a Pewter Still The same way is distilled the water of Crevise-tayls The dose 3 or 4 ounces three times a day Hypnoticks sweetned with pearl'd Sugar or Sugar of Roses Take ears of greeen Wheat as many as convenient distill them in a common still drink three or four ounces three times a day sweeten'd with pearl'd Sugar Take syrup de Meconio three ounces water of green Wheat 6 ounces mix them Hypnoticks drink two or three spoonfulls at bed-time every or every other night Take Conserve of Mallow-flowers wild or garden three ounces Lohoch de pino two ounces Eclegma's Syrup of Jujubes two ounces make a Lohoch of which take often a dram and half or two drams What hitherto we have discoursed of concerning a Cough of every kind whether it be solitary and simple or the forerunner and companion of a Phthisis also what is to be prescrib'd in every case touching the method of healing it would be easily illustrated by the history of Cures or by the Anatomical observations on those that have dyed by that disease For instances of this sort and very many examples are every where had and happen daily it pleases us here to annex a few of the more select out of the large choice of these accommodated to the chief kinds of a Cough and Phthisis And first I will endeavour to illustrate the type of a simple Cough by one history or two and which takes its rise of it self and is altogether void of the suspicion of a Phthisis It is now many years since I took care of the health of a certain Student The History of a Cough threatening a Consumption obnoxious to a Cough from his tender years and who was wont frequently to undergo the more painfull affections of it and those of long continuance This person seemed of a melancholick temper of a sharp wit of an indefatigable spirit of a constitution indifferently strong but that his Lungs originally being infirm did suffer when the blood dissolv'd into serosities In Summer as long as he transpired freely he lived healthily enough but in the Spring and Autumn when the blood changing its temperament those serous fluxes came upon him either of their own accord or from any sleight occasion he fell easily into a Cough with abundant and thick spittle notwithstanding this distemper frequently within six or seven dayes as soon as the mass of blood was purged throughly by the Lungs vanished leisurely without any great use of remedies But if to the aforesaid occasions of this disease were added some stronger causes as chiefly the obstruction of the pores and errors touching his diet sometimes a more prodigious and stubborn cough neither presently nor easily yielding to remedies and threatning nothing less than a Phthisis did come upon him then manifestly the patient for the first days suffered light shiverings in his whole body and the sense of a Catarrh in his Larynx afterwards by frequent
composing himself for sleep he began to sleep soundly he was surprized with such a difficulty of breathing that the frequency of it threatned the danger of choaking at which time also he perceived a certain palpitation about the Hypochondria as if some living Animal were underneath the midriff this distemper afterwards ended in a Tumour of the Abdomen by which he dyed In this and other cases now cited the same reason holds viz. that the animal spirits being used to make irregular excursions into the nervous Fibres of the lower belly at length do not only more often and abundantly enter into them but being impacted and hindered they abide in them and so at length induce tympanitic inflations of the bowels Truly this morbific beginning happens sooner of later The evident causes of this disease if thereupon do come the evident causes which disturb the Spirits in the bottom of the belly and compel them to frequent disorders and also do either stop the motion or pervert the temperature of the nervous Juice flowing within those Fibres in which rank are accounted irregularities in the six Non-naturals immoderate Passions and chiefly of grief and usual evacuations suppress'd drinking of cold water after some great heat or any sudden cold induced on the belly either from air or water As to the Prognosticks The Prognosticks thereof this disease is always accounted of so bad an omen that commonly the name is abhorr'd insomuch that frequently when there is no suspicion of ill from the tumour of the belly if perhaps that swelling be call'd by the Physitian a Tympanie forthwith it is concluded desperate Notwithstanding this Disease rarely kills of it self but being protracted a long space of time that it may at length more certainly kill it gains to it self an Ascites as a Harbinger of Death That we may search into the reason thereof it will be obvious enough to conceive while all the bowels are distended in the lower belly and are held as it were stiffe the passages of the blood and nervous and lymphatic humours being too much extended or compressed are much straitened and for that cause cannot freely and readily transmit its Juice from whence it follows that every humour being straitned in the passage that at length it may pass by some means it shakes off a certain serosity from its masse wherever way is given and those droppings of the humours falling into the hollow of the Abdomen excite an Ascitick Dropsie What relates to the Curatory part of this Disease The Cure the whole scope of healing is commonly bent against wind viz. Indications inculcated by practical Authors suggest the matter to be evacuated from whence the winds are raised and to remove the cause that lifts them up and the winds to be discuss'd and dissipated which do already distend the belly For these ends Purgers appointed against the humour chiefly suspected are wont to be prescribed with great confidence although with small or ill success that is to say Phlegmagogues so called another while those that purge Melancholy another while those that purge Choler whereto also are joyn'd purgers of water as weapons intended against every enemy For this disease as is manifest by our observation is wont for the most part to be exasperated with strong Purgers and seldom alleviated the reason whereof is evident enough because the nervous fibres being provok't by a sharp Medicine the animal Spirits renew their irregular excursions Remedies designed against Wind profit not and do every where more and more stretch them out rather than give any remission to them wherefore although frequent and abundant watery and flatulent stools are procured notwithstanding the Belly swells the more Moreover to dispell discusse and bridle the winde there is a more than Aeolian power prescribed Medicines commonly call'd Carminatives almost of every kind or form are sedulously administred within and without above and beneath and upon the part affected notwithstanding this disease for the most part is untamed by all these whence we may suspect that the true cause of the disease lyes as yet conceal'd because Medicines profit not that are administred indicated or suggested according to the ordinary Aetiologie or reason of it Although I cannot challenge a better successe in curing this disease or a more certain method of healing attested from experience notwithstanding in the mean while we will here proffer another way of curing accommodated to our Hypothesis and established by reasons strong enough Wherefore in a Tympany as in most other affections 3. Curatory Indications there will be three chief indications Whereof the first and chiefly insisted on is the Curatory that by recalling the animal Spirits from their convulsive affection and reducing them into order endeavours the removal of the swelling of the Belly The second Preservatory which restrains those or other Spirits from their irregular excursions into the lower Belly and together corrects the faults of the nervous liquor watering it both as to its temper or motion The third Vital by removing the Symptoms urging doth succour and sustain all the functions oppressed or weakened as much as possible may be I. The first Indication is of greatest moment The first Indication hardest on which the hinge of the whole Cure turns but it is most difficultly performed for it doth not easily appear by what remedies or wayes of administration it ought to be attempted when most weapons or medicines do little or nothing prevail against this inviolable enemy What and what sort of Medicines are good or hurtful in this Disease Phlebotomie assumes no place here but is declined for the most part as prejudicial also Catharticks insomuch as they provoke the affected fibres and disturb the Spirits and hurry them more impetuously do increase rather than diminish or cure the Tumour of the Belly in like manner Diaphoreticks impell the Spirits and the morbific particles deeper into them whereas they ought to be allured and call'd out of the Fibres The chief order of healing seems to be placed in Diureticks and the use of Clysters and also great things are expected from topical Applications because they are more immediately exhibited to the disease and as it were by contact and because they do best discusse Tumours in other places Yet not all Dissolvents are here fitting nor those which profit most in other Tumours for the more hot being given for discussing whether they are applyed by fomentation Liniments or in the form of a Cataplasm or Plaister oftner afford hurt than succour in a Tympanie for the both open and dilate the passages of the fibres that from thence they may lye more open to the incursion of the Spirits and also rarifie the particles impacted so that while they occupy a larger space an inflation and intumescency of the Belly is augmented Lastly what appertains to Alteratives which succour against other affections of the nervous kinde only a certain few are fit in a Tympanie for where
or blow inflicted upon the body The Solution of the Vnity always the cause of it for the same thing is used to be induced from cold heat wind from the extravasating of the blood and of other humours or their being heaped up together in several places oftentimes the fashioning of the member remaining as yet entire in which cases although the continued parts and chiefly the fibres and filaments are not at all cut off notwithstanding they are in every Affection of grief pulled from their usual position either by the oppression of the object or by strange particles forced like wedges and are compelled into too much tension or distorsion or divulsion and for that cause the inmate spirits being pulled from their mutual embraces and dissipated are ill at case and incur the passion of pain or grief Pleasure is opposed to Pain What Pleasure is and is a manner of Feeling clearly contrary thereunto which takes its origine inasmuch as a pleasant stroaking being made upon the organ of Sense the spirits flock thither and presently being thickly gathered together and overspread with a certain delight they do as it were exult and rejoyce together in the organ afterwards inasmuch as the spirits enter into the like triumph or rejoycing within the Corpus striatum a perception of pleasure is stirred up The greatest pleasure which is offered to the Touch It s formal Reason consists in this that the cause of Pain being removed the parts formerly affected by it may recover their wonted temper and frame for so the animal spirits being before put to flight and dispersed from one another It chiefly consists in removing of Pain they recollect themselves and rushing into the places from which they were banished with reinforced strength they prepare themselves to rejoyce From hence the Peripateticks placed the formal reason of Pleasure only in the removal of something that was troublesome as when the excesse of cold or heat is received by an opposite and more agreeable state Indeed the tangible object because it is alwayes thick and dull doth scarce any way else excepting Venery allure the animal spirits into heaps to the organ of Sense unless for that it removes their former confusion From these things so described concerning those passions What the Itch is it is easily manifest that the Itch according to the formal account thereof is neither perfectly nor fully either Pain or Pleasure but imperfectly and as beginning partakes of both For really the scabby matter being heaped up within the pores of the skin and making the solutin of Unity in many places enclines towards pain yet as it is volatile moving and hastens towards vent How the Spirits are moved in it for that cause the Animal spirits are not put to flight from the Fibres although pulled asunder neither are they driven back with sense of pain but the contrary as if being stronger than the humour infesting they were able to cast it forth they being wrapp'd up more thick but irregularly within the cutaneous fibres do twitch them together variously and draw them on that they may the sooner discharge the morbific matter and expell it forth Wherefore inasmuch as the Animal spirits being neither put to flight nor repulsed but flowing together in crouds into the organs of Touching they manage themselves there tumultuously and disorderly and as it were by tickling the sensible fibres do provoke them into small Convulsions no pleasure but a troublesom feeling nor also is it Pain but a Passion clearly diverse arises from it But as soon as by rubbing or scratching the plenty of Spirits assembled about the organ of Sense begin to be better disposed and as it were reduced into order from thence a thorough feeling of Pleasure is introduced Wherefore the Itching seems to be a middle-state between the betginning of Pain and Pleasure A certain medium between Pain and Pleasure or a passage of the Spirits from the rudiments of that towards the full compleating of this But from this Physical discourse by the by let us return to our Pathologie or discourse of the distemper From what is above said it is easie to collect the differences of this disease In the first place therefore the Psora as to its origine either is got by Contagion The difference of the Psora as to its origine or by reason of an ill Course of Diet the fierceness and supply thereof is communicated by the Chyle and Blood being vitiated or it is generated in the skin it self by reason of filth and the defect of Transpiration Whereto we may adde that sometimes Infants acquire this taint hereditarit contracted from their Parents Secondly These cutaneous Eruptions as to their form 2. As to its form vary according to the diverse Constitutions of the persons affected for in some persons of a cholerick dryer Temperament or Melancholy only a dry Scab is stirred up and inasmuch as it evaporates lessby reason of the defect of the Serum with an stching not altogether so troublesome but in others of a moister Temperament and of more unclean blood very many wheals and pustules imbued with schor and most of all itching do very much provoke to scratching and by reason of the Ulcers stirred up therewith the Itch is immediately altered into pain As to the Prognosticks although this Disease is never of it self mortal or very dangerous and always easie of Cure yet frequently it contains an evil event The Prognosticks of it inasmuch as being long continued it utterly depraves the blood and nervous Juice and from it hastily cured by reason of the matter received within while it is discuss'd from the Pores a pernicious taint is brought upon the Praecordia and Brain and other noble parts The greatest hazard from a Scab threatens Children and Cachectick persons Most dangerous to Children and ill juiced or cachictick persons as in both of which the taint is more easily impressed from this Cutaneous humour upon the nobler parts which afterwards when the outward malady is removed remaining within cannot be vanquished entirely but by a very long Course of Physick of which neither is capable nor patient wherefore such persons It s Cure all care and diligence being administred ought to be preserved from the infection of the Scab as from the Plague Coucerning the Cure of a Scab or Psora two chief Indications present themselves The first Indication curatory and each of them two-fold viz. The first intention Curatory respects these two things First that the glandulous Humour its corruptive ferment being wholly extinct may be reduced to a due temper Secondly afterwards that the Pores and passages of the skin being freed from those schorous congealings may recover their pristine frame or good temper The Second Indication Freservatory takes care to prevent these two things The second Indication preservatory viz. First lest the impurity of the Psora or corrupting Miasma's of the skin being discuss'd
PHARMACEVTICE RATIONALIS OR THE OPERATIONS OF MEDICINES IN Humane Bodies The Second Part. With Copper Plates describing the several Parts treated of in this Volume By THO. WILLIS M.D. and Sedley Professor in the University of OXFORD LONDON Printed for Thomas Dring Charles Harper and John Leigh Booksellers in Fleet-street 1679. THE PREFACE TO THE READER SInce first I began to consider the Operations of Medicines in humane Bodies and their manner of working and for some time meditating upon the entire Subject at length published an Essay of the Rational Curatory part I became affected with so vehement a desire of farther prosecuting that Speculation that in all spare hours to wit as frequently as I might be vacant from my practice I could hardly intend or admit thoughts of any other thing And that not so much that I might please others as by often turning in my mind and writing my Meditations of this Subject I might be better instructed to prescribe to my Patients For certainly the not duely weighing the Reasons by which Medicines operate renders all Physick to be Empirical and to be governed rather by Chance or Fortune than by Advice and it frequently comes to pass that a Medicine rashly administred is but casting a Die for a mans Life Wherefore that I might satisfie my self and practise Physick as is usually said with a safe Conscience it pleased me to bestow more labour in the search of the true Reasons of physical Energies and Efficacies And because in this Treatise we chiefly consider Medicines respecting certain private parts or Regions of the body and their proper Diseases therefore we have endeavoured in the first place to perform these three things viz. First that a most accurate Anatomical Description might be given of the parts if not already extant whose distempers and remedies are treated of as to the Fabrick and uses of all their Vessels Wherefore turning over the Breast and Lungs and most diligently viewing their inward recesses and apartments what thing soever observable either the Ancients or Moderns have published about these and whatsoever further by Knife or Microscope we have detected we have here set forth In which task as formerly in some others of the same nature more exactly done I must confess I owe much to the sedulous labour of my most learned Friend Dr. Edmund King and to his most dexterous Dissections And really I esteem it so necessary to lay the History of the parts as a foundation to our Rational Curatory Method that without it I did believe the whole Superstructure would be meerly phantastical and altogether unstable or at least unprofitable For surely either to practise Physick or demonstrate its Operations on humane Bodies without an exact knowledge of the parts and passages on which and by which they work would seem equally absurd as if a Philosopher ignorant of Mechanical affairs should go about to unfold and explicate the Artifice and cunning Workmanship of a Clock moving of it self according to the Theory of Natural Motion delivered by Aristotle Wherefore we have view'd with most exact diligence in the first place the Subjects of Physick or the places of Operation in our Bodies as the Circuit in which we are to move Then secondly we have not been less solicitous that according to the Phaenomena of all parts lately detected by Anatomical observation the true and real Hypotheses of Diseases should be built whereof we have designed the Remedies that not still persisting in the thread-bare paths of Ancient Physick by a certain blind and implicite obsequiousness after the manner of Beasts according to the proverb to be only guided by our Ancestors footsteps but deriving the Causes and formal Reasons of Diseases from their very Springs we every where endeavour to shew from what Disposition of Blood and Humours from what affection of Animal Spirits from what habitude of Fibres and of other solid parts every disease proceeds And these things so premised and laid instead of a solid Foundation at length in the third place that the structure of our Curatory method being rightly compacted may happily rise up and firmly consist we have gathered together most of the Medicines respecting most of the private parts and regions of the body and the peculiar Distempers thereof viz. both Simple and Compound both Old and New both Dogmatical and Empirical gathered out of the Physick-books of every Age as also those chiefly celebrated by Quacks and Nurses more choice forms of all which or at the least the chief of them and manner of using we have aptly assign'd and annex'd the reasons as to the Preparations as also the Operations and Effects of them But that all is not comprehended in this Tract that was omitted in the former which yet I had hoped might have been happens from the plenty of matter and the bulk of the work encreasing upon our hands For assuredly it is more than the task of one Man or Generation to exhibit a compleat Curatory Method and absolute in all points For if this Disquisition were more fully instituted as to its Latitude not only all the Materia Medica which is almost infinite but also the whole Body of Physick offers it self Wherefore these our Attempts court not the name of Treatises but of Essays Truly it will not be needful for many Physicians especially those who neglect the Phaenomena of Nature being intent only on their Practice and Gain to be learned about the Reasons of all Remedies but to the genuine Sons of Art this will be of value if not to direct at least to incite them to the Knowledge and serious weighing always of those things they take in hand And if these small endeavours shall instigate others better to polish that Study whatsoever Reviling I may reap from the malevolent and envious it shall never repent me of my labour For when I shall be well conscious to my self that I have not suffered my Faculties although small as the Talent entrusted with me by God Almighty to perish through sloth nor suffered them to be buryed in the earth but that they may be rendred with some Interest beside the Principal it will much please me nay I shall seriously rejoyce and triumph POSTSCRIPT WHile these were Printing the most sad message arrives that the Author most worthy of Immortality oppressed by the irresistible assault of a Pleurisie is departed from among the Living neither did the Arts profit their Master which did all others The Reader will pardon us if we for a little space celebrate the Funeral of so Sacred a Memory nor esteem it superfluous to hear in a few words what manner of person he was who wrote such things yea he will rejoyce to understand that he was equally Good as Learned that he also exercised himself in the Practice of Piety who was most conversant in that in Physick The matter requires a just Commentary but we shall briefly propound what at first came into our sudden thought while our mind
obnoxious to depravation than this Pneumonic machine of the breast The organs of breathing being hurt the breathing is hurt also through which by sucking in air we preserve the vital flame of the blood with its motion and heat For whereas the vessels of the lungs belong to the function of breathing viz. the Trachea with the Bronchii and little bladders also the heart with arteries and veins besides which there are nerves with fibres as well musculous as nervous Lympheducts and Glandules also the contents of these Vessels viz. Air the old and fresh blood with its Serum the Lympha and the animal Spirits any fault happening in any of these doth oftentimes discompose the whole Pneumonic function Nor less also the moving Organs of the breast viz. the muscles with the Diaphragma and the nerves appointed to their use And likewise sometimes the animal spirits before they enter into those nerves being ill disposed often cause great disorders in breathing When the chief function and uses of the Lungs have been to convey the blood and air through the whole frames of the parts and their inmost recesses The uses and ends of breathing which use to be hurt and every their smallest passages and every where to mingle them namely for that purpose that the venal blood returning from its circuit and diluted with fresh juice and thereby crude and as it were half extinct may as well be more perfectly mix'd and wrought together as more effectually kindled afresh in all its parts by the nitrous air from hence the chief faults about this business or function of the Lungs do most of all consist in these two things First that the blood hath not due passage through the Sinus of the heart and the pneumonic vessels And secondly because the Air is not drawn in and breathed out in a due manner into the Trachea and its passages The defects and failings of the Lung in its office There are two parts of either of these For first as to the passage of the blood sometimes the fault is caus'd within the right Sinus of the heart or the pneumonic Arteries and also sometimes caused within the pulmonary veins or the left Ventricle of the heart Secondly as to the Air the failure is chiefly in inspiring and exspiring although each function offends sometimes equally There are divers accidents of each and many causes and ways of its being done whereof we will here briefly touch upon the chief Therefore first First in respect of the blood when the blood doth not duly pass through the right Ventricle of the Heart and the Pneumonic Arteries either it happens by its own fault or by the fault of those passages and sometimes by the fault of further passages For sometimes the stream of blood stops in the nether region of the Pracordia by reason of obstruction in the other moreover sometimes the defect or fault of the air breathed in stops the free passage of the blood What relates to that fault of the blood The opinion of the famous Sylvius concerning the blood fermenting in the Lungs when it passes not quick enough through the right Sinus of the Heart and Pneumonic Arteries the opinion of the Renowned Sylvius should here be discoursed but that it would be too tedious and from our purpose For he supposes The descending branch of the venal blood moistned with chyme together with the lymphatic humour returning from the whole body hath the nature of an acid-sweet spirit and in the mean time its branch ascending impregnated with choler from the bladder of the gaul mixt into the mass of blood does participate of an oily volatile salt and so by the meeting together of these something contrary to themselves a gentle and friendly contention or boiling is stirred up in the right ventricle of the heart in which and for which the fiery parts lurking and being shut up in each being freed and set at liberty do rarifie the chyle and blood and so change and alter them that they exercise the function of life and heat as well as motion and nourishment through the whole body Which seems not likely to be true There are many reasons why I assent not to this ingenious and neatly-framed Hypothesis For besides that many do far otherwise determine about the origine and dispensation of Choler and so not without strong reasons and experiments are thorowly perswaded by eye-sight that there is not any such boiling up of the blood of a different quality and striving or contending in the right ventricle of the Heart Our opinion hereof Our judgment continues still as it hath been that both streams of blood washed thorowly with the fresh chyme do consist altogether of one kind and for that cause the milky Vessels of the Chest carry about part of the Chyle so long a journey which they pour into the descending trunk of the Vena cava just as the meseraick Veins pour the other part into its ascending trunk also that the lymphatic humor together with the Chyle is poured into the subclavian Vessels so that it may very commodiously be reduced into blood neither truly doth there seem need of other or more passages Moreover we determine that that humor rightly constituted doth agree with and is easily assimilated to the mass of blood as well as the Chyle it self made sweet without any contention raised in the heart But if the lymphatic humor returning from the Brain and nervous kind as well as from the Glandules degenerate from its due temperature and contract a sowreness as it often comes to pass then being re-infused into the venal blood it overcomes it and it precipitates it into serosities and from thence great streamings of urine do ensue Moreover we have shewed elsewhere that the Diabetes is provoked from such a cause But such a flux of the lymphatic humor is so far from exciting a greater boiling up of the blood in the right ventricle of the Heart that rather on the contrary from thence often chilness of the whole or stiffness with a weak Pulse and sometimes swoonings or convulsive fits are provoked accompanied with a plentiful and pale urine The reason whereof without doubt is that then the clear humor flowing from the brain and nervous parts turns the blood into serosities and cools it by too much diluting and for that cause the animal spirits being destitute of their vehicle either faint or run into irregular motions But truly as we altogether deny an Elastic effervescence of the blood in the right Ventricle of the Heart from contention of dissimilar parts The pneumonic circulation of the blood is stopt sometimes by the fault of the heart it self so as often as from thence the blood is not cast out into the Lungs after a due manner we determine it to happen not so much from the proper fault and defect of the blood it self as from the animal faculty For if the spirits actuating the moving Fibres of
the entire body succeeds Surely when the nervous liquor and animal spirits pass not fully and freely out of the Dorsal Spine into the whole body from thence oftentimes a pining doth arise hence Imposchumes and Ulcers arise about the Loins or the Os sacrum which in as much as they consume or pour forth the nervous liquor too much cause an Atrophy in the whole or at least in the lower parts 2. From the expense of the humour through the genital parts That humour is first either seed a too great expence whereof induces an Atrophy Another kind of Tabes Dorsalis far more frequent is also twofold viz. it either ariseth from the great or too-often loss of the genital humor or from a continual corrupt flux from the genital parts 1. As to the first it is manifest by vulgar observation that the immoderate use of Venery yea involuntary efflux of the seed if it be either great or continual produce a faintness in the whole body and at length a pining away The reason of this as we have intimated in another place is not that the seed according to the opinion of some descends from the Brain through the Nerves into the spermatic bodies and from thence by reason of a great loss thereof first the Brain and then the parts all depending on the influence of the Spirits springing from thence become infirm and pine away But seeing we have sufficiently evinced that the seminal matter is immediately supplied out of the mass of blood into the genital parts and that it is altogether the same with that out of which the animal Spirits instilled into the Brain are proceated it will necessarily follow by now much the greater portion is got to the Testicles for repairing the loss of seed by so much is the Brain defrauded of its due share and therefore at length the sunction in the whole body as well motive as nutritive doth waver and diminish Our furious Whoremongers are sensible of a great debility about their Loins and the parts placed below them to wit the Thighs and Legs do chiefly wither away the reason is because as well the provision of the animal Spirits in its first spring viz. in the Brain failing the outmost chanels viz. the ends of the spinal marrow and the Nerves springing from it do suffer first and chiefly for this defect and moreover because near the Loins the arterious blood gives out to the Testicles more excellent particles and chiefly restaurative being destined to nourish the Back and in the mean time the venous blood being for that cause decayed or consumed is enfeebled and steals from the Loins as much as possibly may be The loss of the seed causing a Consumption is sometimes voluntary The losses whereof are voluntary or involuntary of which sort the salacious and prone to Venery do suffer sometimes involuntary of which affects there are divers kinds For in some it only happens by dreams or obscene phantasms but in others besides those occasions every endeavour of the Back whether through bearing a weight or excretion of Urine or the faeces of the Belly causes the genital humor to be thrust out the cause whereof is both because the seed is watry and thin and at once sharp and provocative also because the parts are weak and not able duly to digest or retain it In the other Tabes Dorsalis above-mentioned not the seed it self 2. Or Ichor flowing into those parts from solution of continuity but an ichor or a certain putrilage is cast out abundantly from the genital parts the efflux whereof if it the great and continual doth frequently impair the strength of the whole body and by withdrawing and prodigally removing the nutritive matter it induces an Atrophy or consumption For near the spermatic Vessels or in passage from them as well in men as women there are certain Emunctories placed whose faculty is to receive the superfluous humour from the seed formed and when it abounds to send it abroad through the genital parts For this cause that those passages in either Sex may be made slippery and moist lest they grow dry The formal reason of a virulent Gonorrhea and become less sensible the Prostates in men and the Glandules about the horns of the womb in women are constituted out of both which always in the act of coition and sometimes without when the spermatic bodies abound with too much moisture a certain serous liquor sweats out and in women whose bodies are more moist and in whom nature hath made these ways for their menstrual excretion this doth oftner and more plentifully happen than to men But if these Emunctories be affected with a great debility or a certain virulency so that they corrupt this liquor sent or do not retain it enough it is not only sent away incessantly and flows out plentifully through the Pudendum but also other superfluous humours or recrements of the whole body flowing together to those weak parts are thrown forth together Also the nutritious Juice destined to the neighbouring parts flows thither and presently goes out together so that at length by reason of the loss of the nutritious Juice which flowing to the same place is corrupted and continually sent away not only pains of the neighbouring parts but of the whole body and a pining doth succeed These things are commonly known in a Gonorrhoea also in fluore muliebri or those affects from an impure bed or immoderate Venery or are caused by a blow a bruise violent exercise or any other hurt inflicted upon the Loins It is not proper to this place to deliver particularly the true rendring of the cause and curatory method of healing of this sort of passions we shall proceed to treat of a Phthisis or Tabes properly so called viz. which arises from the only or chief fault of the Lungs which was the business of our design SECT I. CHAP. VI. Of a Phthisis properly so called or of a Consumption arising by fault of the Lungs A Consumption doth so frequently and usually proceed from the Lungs being depraved that some have termed it the peculiar Disease of this Bowel and that it very often so comes to pass the reason is because as we have shewed before the pining of the body doth for the most part more immediately proceed from the blood depraved and unapt for nourishment it is manifest that as its perfection is acquired in the Lungs so from these being ill-affected the same is most of all vitiated and degenerates into a languishing and corruptible state For in the Lungs rather than in the Heart or Brain the threads of life are spun and there they are oftnest defiled or broken A Phthisis is usually defined to be A pining away of the whole body The definition of a Phthisis taking its rise from an Ulcer in the Lungs But less true because I have opened the dead bodies of many that have died of this disease in whom
is lest the spirits should saint be closed with the finger when again it is opened the blood pure enough will issue next but the bad sliding by if there be any remaining will not return presently to that orifice Besides Phlebotomy many other remedies viz. whatsoever do repress the trugency of blood and empty the passages thereof whereby the morbific matter may be suckt up are here to be used Wherefore a very thin diet is prescribed for the most part meerly of Barley and Oats and if Cathartics are altogether prohibited because they disquiet the blood and hurry it more impetuously into the part affected notwithstanding Clysters which gently loosen the Belly and draw the recrements of the blood towards the Belly ought to be daily used Moreover Juleps and temperating Apozemes which bridle the fervor of the blood and draw out the superfluous serositles thereof and which also do gently open the passages of the Breast are taken with success 3. The third intention of healing The third intention of healing is that the clamminess or viscosity of the blood may be taken away which respects the withdrawing of the clamminess or obstructing viscosity of the blood is altogether to be performed by remedies which unloose the frame thereof being too much bound and dissolve the coupling together of its salts And truly the remedies of this kind which in this respect reason and analogy would dictate are now received into use by long experience For Powders of Shell-fish the Tooth of a Boar and the Jaws of a Pike and other things endued with an Alkali Salt also Sal Prunellae for the most part are prescribed by all Practitioners as well modern as ancient I have more frequently known the Spirit of Salt Armoniac and of Harts-horn to have yielded notable relief in this disease and for the same reason it is viz. because the volatile Salt is useful that the infusion of Horse-dung though a common remedy affords oftentimes singular help 4. As to the Symptoms and their Cure 4. That the most urging Symptoms may be helpt very many remedies appropriated to these fall in together with the former for against the Feaver the same Juleps and Apozems which appease the heat of blood and withal recreate the animal spirits are of most common use to which besides in respect of the Cough and difficult breathing temperate pectoral Remedies are added The great difficulty is what ought to be exhibited against want of sleep when it shall grievously oppress for Opiates because they do further prejudice the breathing which in this disease is already hindred are scarce safely administred nay sometimes become mortal Wherefore Laudanum and the strong Preparations of Opium are to be shun'd in a Peripneumony worse than a Dog or a Snake nevertheless Anodynes sometimes and mild Hypnotics as water and Syrup of red Poppies are not only allowed but accounted specific remedies in this disease and in a Pleurisie but sometimes it will be expedient to use Diacodiates as long as strength endures and as long as the Pulse is strong and good enough For the pain of the breast if at any time it be troublesom it is expedient sometimes to apply Liniments Fomentations and Cataplasms The second curative inoication The second indication respects the maturation and expectoration of the morbific matter whose intentions are to digest the matter impacted in the Lungs if it cannot be discussed or suckt up and to throw it out by spittle requires ordinary maturating and expectorating Medicines both which notwithstanding ought to be temperate that is to say such as asswage thirst and appease the feaverish heat rather than exasperate it We have above recited in the Chapter of a Cough the kinds of these sorts of Remedies properly called Pectorals the more select Receipts and chiefly accommodated to this affect shall be annexed here beneath The Forms of Remedies 1 2. The Medicines conducing to the first and second intention are prescribed according to the following Forms Take the water of Carduus Mariae ten ounces Juleps red Poppies three ounces Syrup of the same an ounce Pearls prepared a dram make a Julep the dose six spoonfuls every fourth hour Take water of black Cherries Carduus benedictus Balm each four ounces powder of a Boars tooth a dram Syrup of Violets ten drams make it into a Julep to be taken after the same manner Take Grass roots three ounces Apozemes shavings of Ivory and Harts-horn each three drams Raisins stoned an ounce and half Liquorish two drams boil them in Spring water from three pints to two to the strained iquor add Syrup of Violets an ounce Sal prunella a dram make an Apozem to be taken thrice a day about three or four ounces For the same intention Purgation viz. that the Vessels being emptied may withdraw the nourishment from the disease or sup up the morbific matter a Purge is prescribed by many In the Practice of the Ancients against this disease even as against many others after Phlebotomy Preparatives and Purgatives were usually appointed in a constant course and of late the Chymists with greater boldness do recommend Vomits and in a Peripneumony prefer it to all other remedies Yea Phlebotomy being omitted or countermanded they place the chief Cure in stibiate Vomits than which rash advice of theirs I know not any thing may be thought of more pernicious Indeed in rustic and robust bodies sometimes this Cure has been effected without danger notwithstanding for the most part no less unsuccessful but in tender constitutions it ought to be reckoned little inferior to poyson But for what respects Purgation although it may not be presently convenient from the beginning because it is then for the most part prejudicial nevertheless the flowing of the morbific matter being finished and the effervescency of blood being appeased we may safely and gently evacuate the body with a loosning Purge Take of the decoction of Senna of Gereon four ounces Purges syrup of Roses solutive an ounce mix them for a Potion Or Take the best Senna three drams Cassia and Tamarinds each half an ounce Coriander-seed two drams boil them in a sufficient quantity of Spring-water to six ounces to which strained add syrup of Violets an ounce clarified with the white of an Egg and let it be given Purgatives are not always to be exhibited nor ever unadvisedly in this disease but frequent Clysters and almost daily are in use but let them be gentle and emollient only which easily loosen the belly without any great agitation of humours or blood For this purpose Milk or the Whey thereof is often convenient with red Sugar or syrup of Violets Or Take the leaves of either sort of Mallowes of Melilote of Mercury of each one handfull Linseed and sweet Fennel-seeds of each half an ounce sweet Prunes Clysters numb vi boyl them in a sufficient quantity of Spring-water to a pinte to which adde syrup of Violets one ounce Sugar ten drams sal
of a defect of fault in the motive organs or mixt when either parts conspire in the fault which origine every great and inveterate Asthma is wont to have of each of these we will treat in order 1. The ancient Physicians The Ancients allowed the cause of it only from the Bronchia obstructed and for the most part hitherto the Moderns have only acknowledged the first kind of Asthma judging the next cause and almost the only cause of this Disease to be the straitness of the Bronchis viz. inasmuch as the spaces of those passages being either straitned together by obstruction or compression as often as the use of breathing is required do not admit of plenty enough of Aire wherefore for the more free inspiration of aire as shall be needfull the organs of breathing do most difficultly labour with throes most frequently repeated But that some are found obnoxious to fits of an Asthma Or vapours from the Spleen or Womb but erroneously without manifest taint of the Lungs it was wont to be ascribed to vapours from the Spleen Womb Mesentery or some other bowel undeservedly enough but surely that passion without the straitness of the Bronchia or fault of those bowels we have in another place sufficiently evidenced to arise from Cramps of the moving parts and shall be presently clearly made out But in the mean time by what means it may arise also from the passages of the Trachea obstructed or compressed it lyes upon me to declare The straitness of the Bronchia After what manner the straitness of the Bronchis arises inducing the first kind of an Asthma is supposed to come to pass by an obstruction as often as either thick humours and viscous or purulent matter or blood extravasated are forced in upon them or that little swellings or Schirrus's or little Stones stop up their passages or finally that a Catarrh of a serous humour suddenly distills upon them Moreover the same distemper is thought to be raised by compression as often as matter of that kind and of every kind of them shall cleave to the passages of the pneumonic Arterie or vein Surely an asthmatical disposition depends upon these various causes and manners of disturbance but all invasions of the disease or at least the greater fits are usually provoked by reason of some accidents or occasions For while the stream of blood sliding and running down gently can be content with a small breathing it passes through the precordia without great labour either of Lungs or Breast But being boyling and passing through the Lungs more impetuously it requires a more full inspiration of aire for the freer admittance of this through strait passages presently all the breathing organs are alarmed into most frequent throes Whatever causes an effervescence of the blood is the evident cause of an Asthma Whatsoever therefore makes the blood to boyl or raises it into an effervescence as violent motion of the body or minde excess of extern cold or heat the drinking of Wine Venery yea sometimes mere heat of the Bed doth cause asthmatical assaults to such as are predisposed It is usual that those who are obnoxious to this disease oftentimes dare not enter into a Bed only sleep in a Chair or on a bed being covered with garments The reason whereof is Why Asthmatical Persons are worse in bed that the body covered and heated with bed-cloaths the blood being a little raised into a more quick motion and grown hot requires a more plentifull sucking in of air than may be supplyed from the passages of the Trachea being straitned for the more blood passes the Lungs each Systole and Diastole by so much for the enkindling and eventilation thereof the air ought to be more plentifully and quickly brought in and sent forth to which task when by reason of impediments it is not easily dispatched yet in some manner to be performed the ultimate endeavors of all the parts appointed for breathing are made use of with a great contention of the whole breast Moreover the blood being stirr'd is not only an occasion but also in some part a cause in those that are asthmatically predisposed for the vessels bringing blood being thereby more fill'd and distended within the lungs compress the Tracheal passages being already very strait and render them much more close II. A convulsive Asthma which we judged to be the second kind of this disease A convulsive Asthma and to be raised without any great obstruction or compression of the Bronchia from the mere Cramps of the moving fibres is not limited to one place or to any peculiar organ but being of a diffused energy it is extended to almost all the parts employed in breathing whereof one while this another while that or some other is in fault It s Seat manifold and diffused For a convulsive affection inciting an Asthmatical invasion hath regard to the moving fibres of the vessels of the Lungs to the Diaphragma to the muscles of the breast to the Nerves which belong unto the Breast or Lungs nay to the origine of those Nerves planted within the Brain and whilest the morbisic matter dwells in every of these places hindering or perverting the work or breathing it brings on the fits of this Disease as in another Tract we have somewhile since plainly demonstrated For the animal Spirits destin'd to the function of breathing if at any time they are very much molested and constrained into irregular motions enter inordinately into the fibres as well nervous as moving of the organs of breathing and make them for that cause one while to be contracted another while to be distended irregularly as also their solemn and equal turns of Systole and Diastole to be variously disturbed or hindered The morbific cause or matter provlking the Spirits prepared for the pneumonic work as in divers places so chiefly in these three The morbific matter consists in several places is wont to advance its force or power viz. 1. Either in the muscular fibres themselves or 2. In the branches or nervous slips or lastly within the Brain by the origine of the Nerves 1. As to the former 1. In the muscular fibres the heterogene matter being inimical to the Spirits is sometimes shaken off from the Brain into the trunks of the Nerves and from thence by their passages and slips if perhaps it shall be in very little quantity without very great or sensible hurt slides down to their lower ends And when it falls in the nervous fibres and being heaped up daily shall at length sensibly increase unto a great quantity it begins to trouble the inmate Spirits and to provoke them into asthmatical Convulsions which forthwith infest and are encreased by reason of evident causes neither do they utterly cease untill the stock of matter so accumulated be wholly dispers'd and consumed afterwards when it being renewed arises to a fulness the fits of that disease return and are for that cause
most frequently periodieal as is manifest to common observation According to this account we do deservedly suspect the cause of a convulsive asthma sometimes to lurk in the muscular coats of the pneumonick vessels also sometimes in the fibres of the Diaphragma or the Processes thereof towards the loyns It is not very probable that the nest of this disease consists within the fibres of this or that pectoral muscle although in Scorbutical persons from these also possessed with a convulsive matter we have known pains to have risen with breathing being hurt 2. But truly even as in another place we have not only demonstrated by reason 2. Within the Nerves and their ensoldings but by the observations and Histories of the sick a convulsive asthma is often incurred as often as the morbific matter sliding down into the pneumonic Nerves sticks in some place within their passages and especially about their foldings whence as often as it is accumulated to a plenitude it begins to be mov'd and shaken wherefore the spirits lying lurking and flowing into the ongans of breathing disturbed are forced into irregularity and those spirits presently affect other inmates of the fibres of the Lungs and breast and provoke them into unequal and asthmatical convulsions For this cause and the reason of the disturbance we have declared that not only invasions of this disease but also the precordia being disturb'd thereby the Cardiack passions do arise 3. 3. Near the Origines of the Nerves We have clearly unfolded by anatomical observations that the cause of a convulsive Asthma sometimes consists in the hinder part of the head near the origines of the nerves Surely I have observ'd some patients who when lying sick of other desperate diseases they were also asthmatick found it necessary to be whether in bed or chair with their head always erect or looking down but lying on their back or leaning backwards incontinently they gaped for breath as if they were dying and hardly breathed the cause whereof as appear'd by dissection after they were dead was only a huge collection of sharp Serum which was gather'd within the cavities of the brain which if by reason of the head inclining back wards it fell into the origine of the Nerves of the eighth pair presently the precordia and chiefly the breathing organs were affected with horrid cramps Moreover sometimes for this very reason it seems that Orthopnoick persons cannot lie down in their bed without danger of choaking but are constrain'd to sit up with an erect body III. 3. A mixt Asthma or partly Pneumonic and partly Convulsive Although an Asthma is sometimes simple from the beginning viz. either merely pneumonical or convulsive notwithstanding after either disease hath for some time encreafed for the most part it gains the other to it self hence it may be concluded every inveterate Asthma to be a mixt affection stirr'd up by the default partly of the Lungs ill fram'd and partly by default of the Nerves and nervous fibres appertaining to the breathing parts For when the pneumonic passages being straitned or obstructed from some cause do not admit of a free sucking in and breathing out of the air for that cause also the blood yea and nervous humour being hindred in their courses and compell'd to proceed slowly and to stagnate do fasten their feculency and dregs upon the nervous parts whence the passages of the spirits are obstructed or perverted and at length a convulsive taint accrues to them Moreover the blood being not duly inspir'd and eventilated within the precordia at length being vitiated in its temperament supplies the brain and nervous stock but with a depraved juice whose faults do chiefly punish the organs of respiration before hurt and debilitated In like manner also the evil is reciprocrated on the contrary part as oft as this disease begins by fault of the nervous stock for as much as the motion of the Lungs is often stopt or hindered by reason of Convulsions in the muscular fibres both the blood and the nervous juice being restrain'd from their usual motions do heap up dregs and filths fastening them to the parts containing them by which not only viscous humours and obstructing of the passages but even Tumours and other more solid concretes vitiating the structure of the Lungs are produced Therefore if when an Asthma being for some time confirmed and become habitual The causes of an Asthma recited shall attain to frequent fits and those emergent upon every occasion the conjunct cause thereof and also the procuring cause is placed as well inwardly in the lung it self as outwardly in the Fibres and Nerves and in the spirits imploy'd for the function of breathing Neither will it be difficult by seeking diligently each of these things to find in any case of the patient as well the chief nests as nourishment of this morbifick matter But as to the evident causes they are very many and also of diverse sorts For hitherto ought to be referred whatsoever move either the blood and the other humours or trouble the animal spirits and force them into irregularities Asthmatical persons can indure nothing violent or unaccustomed from excess of cold or heat from any vehement motion of body or mind by any great change of air or of the year or from the slightest errors about the things not natural yea from a thousand other occasions they fall into fits of difficult breathing As to the prognostick part The Prognosticks of the Disease an inveterate Asthma is difficulty or scarce ever cured notwithstanding the medicines and method of healing being rightly ordered oftentimes great succour is afforded viz. the fierceness of the fits is diminish'd longer respites are procured yea even the dangers of life it self seeming frequently to be imminent are removed This disease growing worse either threatens a Consumption or a Dropsie or some drowzy or convulsive affect accordingly as the Serum by reason of perspiration being hindred being more abundantly accumulated because the sick cannot sleep enough in their beds it is either fixed in the lungs or transfer'd into the habit of the body or into the brain it self For this very reason the diseased do find themselves better in Summer when they breath more freely than in Winter likewise better in hot countries than in cold the South or West wind blowing than the North or East Of the curatory method of an Asthma there will be two chief indications Two chief Indications or rather so many distinct methods of healing viz. Curatory and preservatory The first instructs what is to be perform'd in the fit it self that the Patient may be delivered from present danger the other by what out of the fit we ought to endeavour the taking away the morbifick cause lest that distemper be repeated more often or more heavily 1. Therefore a fit urging there will be two chief intentions of curing viz. first What is to be done in the fit that a more free
breathing be procured as well upon the account of air as of the Lungs at least so far as may suffice to support life and secondly that the organs of breathing may be withdrawn and restrain'd as soon as may be from the Convulsions begun and usually obstinately continuing 1. As to what respects the former 1 Intention to facilitate breathing let the Patient be placed in an upright position of body in a more open place and pretty airy free from Smoak and breath of by-standers then let it be indeavoured that the Lungs being made free from all obstruction and inward oppression and also external compression may be able to draw and change the breath more easily For these purposes lest the bulk of the nether bowels compress or straiten the precordia the belly is to be loosen'd by a Clyster the apparel and what ever binds about the Breast to be loosened also when in this case either from the blood swelling up inordinately within the Pneumonic vessels or from the Serum distilling out of the Arteries and Glandules into the tracheal passages they are wont to be oppressed the impetuosity and instigations of either humour ought to be restraind and appeased insomuch that if strength endure and the pulse be strong enough Phlebotomy is oftentimes convenient Moreover those things are carefully to be administred which dispatch away the Serum and superfluities of the boiling blood by urine as well as sweatings to which intention Juleps Apozemes commonly call'd Pectorals do notably conduce yea powders of shells millepedes prepared Spirits and volatile salts are successfully used In the mean time besides let there be administred whatsoever opens and makes slippery the passages of the Trachea and moves expectoration and whatsoever if need be gives stop to a Catarrh distilling upon the fame for which purposes Lambitives Lohochs pectoral Decoctions and suffumigations are good 2. As to the other intention of curing in these Convulsive fits 2 Intention to free from Convulsions the moving parts Remedies which dissipate the spirits profit for this end viz. that the organs of breathing may be restrained from the Convulsions begun and may quietly return to their ordinary task unless this succeeds of its own accord after the boiling of the blood and Serum in the Lungs be appeased we must use Antispasmaticks or remedies against Convulsions and Anodynes for medicines which are used to be administred in hysterical passions do conduce in a convulsive Asthma Spirit of Harts-horn of soot and especially of fal Armoniac distill'd with gum Ammoniacum also the tinctures of gum Ammoniacum of Sulphur of Castor of Asa fetida Syrups of Ammoniacum Sulphur Oxymel of squils and such like which because they are of an ingrateful tast or smell as it were dissipate the spirits and withdraw them from tumults do sometimes help notably But if the spirits being outragious cannot by this means be appeased we must assay Narcotics Or do bring them asleep that some of them being subdued the others may be reduced to order for surely unless a stuffing up of the Lungs with a great oppression of the Precordia do hinder Opiates do sometimes greatly profit In the dreadful fits of this disease when other medicines had effected less I have often administred successfully Diacodium as also Laudanum Tartariz'd But these may not be exhibited without great circumspection because whereas more or less they hinder breathing which already is difficult and too much hindred they frequently bring the Patient into danger of life Besides this that the Pneumonic spirits may be diverted from their Convulsions it is many times expedient to molest the spirits in other places for some of the spirits being in other places afflicted most commonly the residue as well as those that are smitten do dismiss their irregularities Wherefore Vesicatories Cupping-glasses ligatures and painful frictions bring help also for this reason vomits are successfully taken in the midst of a fit The scope of healing being now design'd after what manner the patients in an urging fit of an Asthma ought to be handled it yet remains for us to propound some more select forms of Remedies appropriated to the same ends In the first place therefore to give a stop to the flux of blood and serum Forms of Remedies and to dismiss their superfluities deriv'd from the Lungs by sweat and urine these ensuing are prescrib'd Take the water of ground-Ivy eight ounces of Rue Pennyroyal Dragons of each two ounces of sal prunella one dram and a half Syrup Byzantinus red Poppies of each one ounce make a Julep take it three or more times in a day the dose three or four ounces Take grass roots three ounces An Apozeme roots of Kneeholm two ounces candi'd Enula campane one ounce and a half barly half an ounce Raisons of the Sun one ounce boyle them in three pound of water to two pound adding to your strain'd liquor sal prunella one dram and a half sweeten it if there be occasion with Syrup Byzantinus or of Violets Take tincture of Sulphur three drams A Tincture the Dose six drops to ten evening and morning in a spoonful of Syrup of the juice of ground-Ivy or Violets Take of faecula of Aron and Briony of each one dram and a half flower of Sulphur one dram flowers of Benzoin half a dram Suger-candy half an ounce Liquorish two drams make a powder to be taken to half a dram or two scruples twice in a day with the former Julep or Apozeme or Take of the powder prescribed two ounces A Powder hony or Oxymel what will suffice make a Linctus take about half a spoonful evening and morning and at other times lick it with a stick of Liquorish Take Syrup of Horehound of Garlick of each one ounce and a half tincture of Saffron Castor of each two drams mix them take a small spoonful in the fits Take of spirit of sal Armoniack with gum Ammoniacum three drams Mixtures of snail water and of Earth-worms of each three ounces Syrup of Horehound two ounces mingle them take by a spoonful once in four or five hours Take of the powder of Hedge mustard or of ground Ivy gather'd in the heat of the Sun one ounce of Oxymel simple enough to make a Linctus 2. 2. The Indication preservatory proposes what is to be done out of the fit So much concerning the method and medicines requisite in the fit of an Asthma The other indication preservatory designing the taking away of the whole procuring causes and the morbific matter contains two parts or distinct scopes of cure both which for the most part are wont in the practice to be complicated and administred together One of these endeavours to amend the conformation of the Lungs if it be any way hurt or faulty Suggests two Intentions of healing and the other to take off the irregularities of the moving parts and spirits appointed for them We shall best answer both these intentions if
taken Tincture of Antimony or of Salt of Tartar and the simple mixture in a greater Dose for vehicles Apozemes distilled Waters and Juleps for this Intention of curing are convenient Take of the roots of Celandine the greater Apozems stinging Nettles Madder of each one ounce tops of Roman Wormwood white Horehound Agrimony Germander of each one handfull Worm-seeds two drams Shavings of Ivory and Harts-horn of each two drams yellow Sanders a dram and a half Coriander-seeds two drams boyl them in three pound of Spring-water to two pound adding of White-wine four ounces strain it and adde Syrup of Chichory with Rhubarb two ounces water of Earth-worms an ounce and a half make an Apozeme the Dose four or six ounces twice in a day Take of white Horehound dryed Centaury of each one handful Gentian and Turmerick-roots of each three drams Cinamon one dram Saffron half a dram being sliced put them into a Glass with two pound of White-wine or Rhenish-wine make an infusion the dose three ounces To this we will adde Gesners famous Antictericum Take of the roots of stinging Nettles a pound Saffron one scruple bruise them well and draw off the tincture with White-wine the dose three ounces 4 or 5 dayes Like to the former is that of Fr. Joel Take the Roots of Celandine the greater Empirick Remedies two handfuls Juniper-berries a handfull bruise them and pour on them a pound of Rhenish-wine and draw out the juice the dose sour ounces twice a day The juice of white Horehound is mightily commended by Dioscorides and the Syrup of the same by Forestus for curing the yellow Jaundice In lieu of an Elixir and other chymical liquors which to avoid nauseousness are to be taken in very small quantity to others endued with a stronger Constitution Electuaries Powder and Pills may be administred with better success Take of Conserve of Roman Wormwood of the yellow Rinds of Oranges and Limons An Electuary of each two ounces Species Diacurcumae one dram and half powder of Ivory yellow Saunders of Lignum-Aloes of each half a dram Troches of Capers one dram of Rhubarb half a dram Salt of Wormwood two drams with Syrup of Cichory with Rhubarb make an Electuary the dose the quantity of a Chesnut twice a day drinking after it three ounces of the following Julep Take of the greater Celandine-water Fumitory Wormwood Distilled Waters Elder-flowers of each five ounces Snail-water water of Earth worms compound of each two ounces Sugar half an ounce mingle them and make a Julep Or Take of the roots of stinging Nettles Angelica Gentian of each four ounces the greater Celandine leaves and roots six handfuls Wormwood Tansie Southern-wood of each four handfuls the outer rinds of twelve Oranges and four Limons prepared Worms and Snails of each one pound Cloves bruised two ounces being all cut and bruised pour upon them eight pound of White-wine let them be distill'd in a cold still and the whole water mixt Or Take of filings of Steel one pound fresh Strawberries six pound put them into a glazed pot stirring them together and let them stand a day afterwards adde of English Rhubarb sliced one pound the rinds of four Oranges sliced pour upon them of White wine six pound and distill them according to Art let all the liquor be mixt together The dose of this and of the former is three ounces twice in a day after the Electuary or any other medicine Take of Turmerick-roots Rhubarb of each one dram and a half the Bark of Caper-roots of Asarum-roots of each half a dram Extract of Gentian and Centaury of each one dram and a half Salt of Wormwood four scruples Water-cress-seeds half a dram of Rocket half a scruple Elixir Proprietatis one dram gum Ammoniacum dissolved in the water of Earth-worms what will suffice to make a mass form it into small Pills the dose is half a dram evening and morning drinking after it three ounces of the distilled water Sylvius doth much magnifie for cure of the Jaundies Sylvius his Empirical Remedies the Decoction of Hemp-seed in milk and the solution of Sope and from thence endeavours to establish his own Hypothesis as we have above intimated whereby he endeavours to deduce the Aetiologie of the Jaundies rather from an alienation of the choler than from the obstruction of its passages 2. The Second Indication respecting the altering or tempering of the blood The second Indication Remedies against the Jaundies endowed with an animal volatile Salt by which it may breed but moderately and duly separate the choler requires Medicines of that sort which depress the Sulphur and fixt salt too much advanced For these ends I know not by what chance or conduct Medicines endowed with a volatile salt as Worms Snails Millepedes yea Lice Dungs of fourfooted Beasts and Fowl are brought into practice for curing the Jaundies and not only prescribed by Empiricks but the more famous Physicians These sometimes by themselves but oftener joyn'd with Purgers and Deoppilatives become the chief Ingredients in Compositions against the Jaundies Fonseca prescribes Goose-dung gathered in the Spring-time and dryed as also the white excrement of Pullets of both which let the Powder be given in a convenient vehicle from half a dram to a whole one Take powder of Earth-worms prepared of Goose-dung of each three drams Ivory Varlous forms of them yellow Sanders of each half a dram Saffron one scruple make a powder divide it into six parts One to be taken every morning with some appropriate liquor To the Apozeme or Anticterical Tincture prescribed above Earth-worms Goose-dung and also Sheeps-dung are profitably added Take Millepedes fresh and alive from 50 to 100. Saffron half a Scruple Nutmeg a scruple bruise them together and infuse them in Water of Celandine four ounces of Earth worms two ounces express them strongly and drink it after this manner take it first once then twice in a day for a week The vulgar and Empirical remedy with us is that Nine quick Lice be taken in a morning for five or six dayes by which remedy they report to me many to be cured whenas other remedies effected little which truly can help by no other means than by restoring the volatile Salt depressed in the blood Upon the same account of succour even in this disease the flowers of Sal Armoniac Also such as are endued with a mineral volatile Salt the volatile Salts of Amber Harts-horn Soot in like manner their Spirits are frequently administred with great success Take powder of Earth-worms prepared two drams Species Diacurcumae one dram flower of Sal Armoniac half a dram Salt of Amber a scruple Extract of Gentian one dram Saffron one scruple Gum Ammoniacum dissolved in water of Earth-worms what suffices make a mass and form it into small Pills the Dose is three or four morning and evening drinking after it three ounces of the Julep before prescribed Take Spirit of Harts-horn tinctured with Saffron three drams Dose
from the other and flying about seek vent in every place and distend greatly all obstacles and chiefly the sides of the Cavities which doth not at all happen in living bodies wherefore as all Carkases do not putrifie alike so their bellies swell sooner or later more or less But while life endures no rottenness or dissolution of particles is made in an animated body that can bring about a splanchnick fermentation or swelling In the mean while we deny not that winds are generated within the offices of concoction fanguification and separation yea within all the particular cells and recesses of our whole body notwithstanding from them all unto the winds wheresoever engendred whilest the Spirits have their due influence and actuate the nervous as well as moving fibres that the sides of the howels be not kept distended and rigid and easie vent does every where lye open And the truth is in a Tympany we allow the wind to fill up the empty spaces but the spirits inasmuch as they extend the bowels by their irregularity do first cause those vacuities wherein the winds secondarily and consequently are engendreed and they inasmuch as the same bowels are still kept strutted and distended do hinder those winds from being removed And now I judge it is plain enough by what we have said The Animal Spirits and not winde the cause of the Tympanie that the animal spirits rather than the wind do raise swellings of the belly in that fort at least such short and transitory ones as happen in Hysterical and Colick fits Notwithstanding there yet remains a great difficulty after what manner the Tympanitical swelling of the Abdomen which is fixt and permanent yea for the most part immpovable can proceed from any such cause especially because the Animal Spirits being of their own nature active and very apt to motion do for the most part so affect removal that unless they be wearyed or become defunct they scarce ever lie still That I may loosen this knot by reasoning it becomes us to consider the Nervous Juice together with the substance of the Animal Spirits which is every where a vehicle to them and also a bridle for the Spirits enjoying the most subtile stream thereof do freely expatiate and lest being dissipated from one another they might fly away they are contained in and entire series When therefore theat Juice is faulty as to its temper or motion immediately the animal spirits become diversly delinquent or are perverted in the exercises of their functions as we have at large expounded in our Treatise of Paslions And lest by repeating them now I should make long Preambles I will contract into a few words what belongs to the present purpose Wherefore in the first place it is to be observed This happens by the fault of the Nervous juice that the contents of the nether belly excepting only the Liver Spleen and Kidneys are furnished with many membranous bowels which the nervous fibres for the most part weave together whence it follows that the nervous Juice whose journey is longer and the passages straiter in these parts doth find here many remora's which also may be proved from the effect forasmuch as the convulsive invasions every where stirr'd up in the Hypochondriack Colick Nephritical and Hysterical Passions do so grievously infest the Abdomen When therefore that Juice watering the nervous fibres of these parts shall be either viscid or tenacious of it self or fill them with very many feculencies for that cause it will come to pass that all the animal spirits will not easily return from thence as oft as they are hurl'd into these fibres in some part obstructed and when in this manner there is a full incursion and a small return of them at length it will happen that great abundance of the spirits remain in these fibres every day more and more impacted and hold them always distended and very much pufft up and at length by reason of the ways of their ingress and regress in those fibres being obstructed they become immovable in that place and keep the affected parts always extended and stiffe in the mean time because these Spirits there impacted within the nervous passages By the obstruction whereof the Spirits whthin the fibres are detained and made immovable and cramm'd thick have commerce whit others that flow to them in their dens therefore the affected part although it be stiffe and almost immovable yet however enjoys sense This Pathologie although it may seem to some a Paradox and uncouth I doubt not but it will deserve assent from many if it be throughly weighed that those who have been a long time obnoxious to Hypochondriack Colick and other convulsive distempers of the nether Belly do at length become sick of a Tympany The formal reason and conjunct cause of a Tympanie being delineated after this manner before we proceed to trace out diligently the more remote causes thereof it may be lawfull for us from what we have said to deliver a definition of at least a certain description of this disease viz. That it is a fixt and constant Tumour of the Abdomen equal A description of the disease hard stiff and yielding a noise upon striking taking its origine from a convulsive inflation of the parts and membranous bowels by reason of the Animal Spirits being driven into those fibres in too great abundance and through the fault of the nervous juice obstructing being hindred from their return back to which disease consequently an accumulation of winds in the empty places accrues as a complement As to what appertains to the procuring and evident causes of this disease it very seldom happeneth that they are altogether observed It s procuring causes but that insinuating it self by silent beginnings it frequently is finished or becomes deplorable before it is perceived insomuch that against this disease scarce any antidote can be appointed for while the ordinary functions are not much prejudiced the swelling of the belly is presumed only to have its origine from winde and while it is expected to vanish spontaneously it often grows into a Tympanie Wherefore that we may have timely notice of its beginning we may take notice that some previous affects dispose to it Other previous convulsive affections of this sort is first an Hypochondriack Colical and Hysterical disposition yea and sometimes an Asthmatical whose fits when they are used to be frequently raised if at length a tumour of the Abdomen follow it though it be small in the beginning a Tympany forthwith may be feared Of the former of these affects cases every where are to be met with and stand fair to common observation of the later Scherichius reports The case of an Asthma ending in a Tympanie That a man of Sixty years of age was infested with this symptome some months before his Belly was swell'd into any manifest tumour that as often as he sate at meat beginning to eat also when
boyled Salt Alum and Sulphur and after applyed Cow-dung for a Cataplasm I use to prescribe these ensuing Take of flowers of Sal Armoniack one ounce Crystal mineral two ounces A somentation Spirit Wine small and imbued with much Phlegme two pound mixe and dissolve them in a glass Let a woollen Cloth dipt into this warm be applyed upon the whole Abdomen and then let it be changed wetting it again let it be done for the space of half an hour twice a day afterwards let there be applyed a Cataplasm of Cow-dung with the powder of Dogs turd or the following Plaister Take Empl. Diasaponis that is de Minio with Venice Soap A Plaister let it be spread thin upon limber Leather and applyed to the whole Belly to be renewed once in ten or twelve dayes II. The second Indication requires mostly alterative Remedies to wit The second Indication those which stop the fermentations of the humours in the bowels of the nether Belly and the Orgasms and irregular excursions of the Spirits also those which procure equal mixtions and due motions of the Chyle and nervous Juice Of Chalybeate Medicines for which end Chalybeates are chiefly in use And truly it is wont not only in this but in many other splanchnical Diseases to have resort to the Medicines of Iron as if from thence to fetch the sharpest weapons whenas many Empiricks and Quacks who prescribe these things confidently and dogmatically observe not by what way such a Medicine doth operate or what alterations for the better may be lawfully expected from thence wherefore while Iron changed into Medicine although the Sword of Goliah is snatcht and brandisht by a blind man it is no marvel if it prove in vain or if in the stead of the disease which is an Enemy Nature it self is sometimes hurt and truly frequently it happens so when Chalybeats of which there is great variety and diversity of operations are administred without any choice or difference either of the temperament or constitution in the Patient and respect to the state of the Disease Of Medicines prepared of Iron or Steel and of their vertues and manner of working What preparations of Iron are not convenient we have in another place treated and there is no need here to repeat the same things For this disease if any of them not all of them are fit for those in which the frame of the mixture being opened the Sulphur remains still and being loosened predominates over the rest they are altogether to be excluded from this number for they do much ferment the Juices of the bowels with their notable fermentation and do so exagitate the Blood and Spirits that the whole Region of the nether Belly is lifted up into a greater bulk as if by a certain Spirit thronging violently into it Neither here are they fit from which the sulphureous particles together with the saline are chased away as in Crocus Martis prepared by long and strong Calcination For this Medicine as it is conducing to stop all fluxes rather fixes any impaction of Humours and Spirits and renders them more obstinate But there remains a Martial Remedy of a middle kind What sort may be admitted wherein the Sulphur being wholly or for the most part expell'd a vitriolic Salt remains and predominates as indeed it is in the solution of the filings of Iron or in a simple Infusion or in Mineral water in the Salt or Vitriol of Mars in our preparation of Steel with many others out of which medicines being prepared or compounded we find by often Experience that in some cases they contribute notable help For these destroy the exotick ferments of the bowels and restore the native ferments they open their obstructions they fix the blood and restrain its consistence from too much dissolution wherefore Chalybeate remedies after the same manner as certain other alteratives do perhaps something profit against the procatarctick and more remote causes of a Tympany but as to the conjunct cause they contribute little or no succour Take of our Steel finely prepared two drams Forms of Chalybeates the distilled water above prescribed two pound Syrup of the five Roots two ounces mix it in a glass let it clarifie by settling the dose three or four ounces in the morning and at five afternoon Take of the Powder of Aron-roots Crabs-eyes of each three drams Crystal Mineral two drams Vitriol of Mars a dram and a half Sugar of Rosemary-flowers two drams mix them the dose half a dram twice in a day with a convenient vehicle Hartman doth wonderfully magnifie the liquor of the flowers of Tapsus Barbatus or Mullein A liquor of the flowers of Tapsus Barbatus as a specifick remedy in this disease by putting the fresh flowers into a Vessel being strongly press'd and put into an Oven with bread being close stopt afterwards the Liquor being strained let it be distill'd in Balneo the dose one Scruple in the Decoction of Fennel-seeds and Roots Surely this Medicine if it doth effect any thing ought to be given in a larger dose Johannes Anglus commends an Electuary of Rosata Novella with Diatrion Santalon and Egges of Ants which remedy seems to promise something probable enough In imitation of this I here propound this ensuing Take Conserve of Chichory flowers An Electuary of Indian Cresses of each three drams powder of Aron-roots Lignum Aloes yellow Sanders of each one dram Crabs-eyes one dram and a half Salt of Wormwood one ounce Ants Egges one ounce the liquor of Tapsus Barbatus half a dram with a sufficient quantity of Syrup of Citron-rinds make an Electuary the dose two drams twice in a day drinking after it of the former distilled water or of the following Julep three ounces Take the water of the leaves of Aron A Julep of the Juice of Elder-berries of the water of Juniper and Elder-flowers of each six ounces the magistral water of Snails and of Earth worms of each two ounces Syrup of the Juice of Elder-berries two ounces mix and make a Julep III. Third Indication The third Indication Vital prescribes Remedies against fainting of Spirits and difficult breathing and against Watching and Thirst We will briefly annex certain forms of either kind 1. Cardiacks Take of the water of Napha Cordials Marygolds Camomile of each three ounces of Dr. Stephan's water two ounces Tincture of Saffron two drams Sugar one ounce Pearls one dram make a Julep the dose four or five spoonfuls three times a day or oftner in faintings Take Conserve of Marygolds two ounces Confection of Alchermes and de Hyacintho of each two drams prepared Pearl one ounce Syrup of the juice of Citrons enough to make a Confection take the quantity of a Nutmeg evening and morning drinking after it a draught of the Julep 2. Hypnoticks Take of Aqua Hysterica six drams Hypnoticks Syrup de Meconio half an ounce mix them and take late at night Or Take
vital flame is continued and all the particles of Blood having as it were passed the fire become more purified and more agreeable among themselves moreover they are so disposed of whilest they are kindling that while some go into Nourishment of the Spirits of the Nervous Juice and the folid parts and others less useful depart into the ferments or recrements of the bowels mean while others being more fixt abide longer in the mass of blood and sustain its consistence and by fermenting the Nutritious Juice still engender new Blood untill themselves being impoverished are at length discarded and give place to others that are fresh and Iustie Having shewed after this manner by what course Sanguification ought to be finished An Hydropick temper of the blood springs from a double respect as well by fermentation as accension of the Blood it will be easie to conceive wherein the fault confists producing an Hydropick dispdsition To wit this usually assumes its rise whensoever either or both those Conditions requisite to Sanguification ether fail or are perverted First therefore this bappens more frequently and rather Viz. First from the desect or fault of its Fermentation for that the blood being depraved in its temperature doth not rightly ferment the Nutritious Juice poured into it that so it might be changed into laudable blood For when the watery particles predominate with the earthy in the mass of Blood the Salt and Sulphur being depressed with the Spirit as all the functions both Vital and Animal from thence languish and waver so especially Sanguification it self fails and is perverted For the Juice of the Chyle commixt with the Blood when it cannot be dissolved and fermented with the particles thereof after the fashion of other liquors as often as being mixt they want ferment it degenerates perhaps into a watery acid or ropy or otherwise faulty humour which being afterwards daily encreased and at length rising to its fulness lyes heavy on the blood and oft-times almost stifles its heat from whence there is a necessity that it be forthwith discharged by some means and wheresoever it can get vent but afterwards for that the offices of separation fail in their sunctions the stock of the animal Spirits Languishng by reason of the diminished provision from the influxe of Blood the abounding Serum is deposited every where into the pores and next vacuities whether greater or lesser out of the little moughts of the Arteries from whose daily and great encrease after all the pores are filled arises that as it were fenny habit call'd Anasarca of the whole body outwardly or of some of its members Secondly not only the defect or fault of Fermentation Secondly from defect of Accension but also of the accension of the Blood induces sometimes an Hydropical disposition on the mass thereof which is clearly discern'd inasmuch as some persons inhabiting Maritime or moorish places fall into the Dropsie without any other cause or occasion than that they draw a thicker air endowed with heterogeneous vapours by which the Nitre is either driven away or obscured Therefore the blood becoming degenerate and vitiated as to its temperature because it is not duely kindled nor perfected by efflagration within the precordia doth not rightly dissolve and assimilate the Juice of the Chyle but suffers it to be perverted into a watery liquor But although in the first place the blood being depraved for this reason sometimes loses its fermenting vertue and therefore the rather and more immediately procures a Dropsie notwithstanding it is manifest the first fault thereof assumes its origine from unwholsom air suckt in and not duely enkindling the Blood because such Hydropicks removing their residence into Sunny and Mountainous places recover their health without any other Medicines Hitherto of the nearest Causes of an Anasarca and which are conjoyned to the Disease it self which namely are the depravation or defect of the mass of blood chiefly as to its fermentation and in some measure as to the enkindling thereof which latter is scarce wont to be effective but when if follows the former But what remains as to the more remote and procuring causes of this Disease to wit from which the defermentative affection arises that I may say no more of the defect or depravation of its enkindling I say that these appear so diverse and many that I judge it hardly possible to recite them all particularly notwithstanding very many or at least the chief may be reduced to these three heads to wit Reduced to three heads For that the watery distemperament of the blood doth arise inasmuch as its active Principles viz. Spirit Salt and Sulphur are not invested with their fermenting and sanguifying force or vertue I account this to come to pass either First because those particles are too much wasted by their great expences or Secondly because they are not repaired by convenient and proportionate Refections or Thirdly for that they are overwhelmed or obscured by some other duller or heterogeneous Particles being too much accumulated in the mass of Blood We will a little weigh the Reasons and ways of each of these their coming to passe In the first place the former of these is evidently discerned in frequent and inordinate Haemorrhages whereby many men although strong and formerly healthy First because the active particles of the blood are too much consumed are immediately enclined to a Dropsie more than from any other accident or occasion the reason whereof is that the blood is so impoverished through its more noble Particles issuing out in great abundance that afterwards it can neither duely ferment nor enkindle the Juice of the Chyle brought into it Moreover sometimes the same effect fucceeds although in a more slow degree from Feavers and other long maladies and languishings to wit inasmuch as the blood suffering under a long depression is so extenuated and robb'd that at length it becomes watery and defermentative Secondly the Blood sometimes deferting its genuine disposition Secondly because they are not enough repaired declines into an Hydropical one for that the nourishment being more slender than it was wont or ought to be bestowed upon it its active and sanguifying Particles are not enough repaired within its masse for so we have observed that some who have used themselves to Wine and stronger Drink after they have been reduced to homely Diet and smaller drink of water of small beer suddenly have become Hydropick It is a common observation and frequently true although of ill omen that Drunkards and darly drinkers if that wild Custom be left at length becoming sober and abstemious are much in hazard lest by reason of the usual fermentation of the blood being denressed they become obnoxious unto that Disease I knew a notable Drunkard who declared that a Priest very learned and Pious was guilty of his death because he gave him admonition to Temperance and to leave his Drunkenness Thirdly because they are buryed in duller
evident causes as we have before intimated and such differences thereof are found to be frequently fo great moment about duely instituting the Prognostick and Cure Wherefore what relates to the prognostick part this disease while it is simple The Prognosticks of it proves least dangerous among all the kinds of Diopsies and a particular one seising only the inferiour members so that the belly doth not together swell with them in much safer than an universal one An Anasarca bringing on an Ascites wherein for the most part the Urine is plentiful enough and the thirst not very intense is far more safe than an Anasarca brought in by an Ascites wherein the diseased do very much thirst and make little red and thick and for the most part a lixivial Urine In like manner it is or worse when an Anasarca comes upon a Tympanie or a Phthisis as sometimes 't is wont Lastly no slight Prognostick of this disease is taken from the complyance or the obstinateness of the Patient about Diet and Medicine For whatsoever the condition of the disease may be if the hydropick person refusing medicine will indulge his fancy we may not hope any good from thence About the Curatory part to be designed in order The Cure of it Two Indications two chief Scopes of Healing do occurre viz. First that the water between the skin be consumed by some means Secondly then provision must be made lest it be continually generated and accumulated afresh for which purpose a Physitian is to employ his labour both that the bowels of Concoction being emptyed of their Superfluities and free from obstructions may always procure laudable Chyle and supply the masse of blood in due plenty as also that the blood the principles thereof being restored to its sermentative power may orderly ferment the Juice of the Chyle continually poured into it and assimilate it into Blood The vital Indication seems not at all necessary in this disease as in many others for that very rarely in this appear swoonings of the Spirits or Watchings for which Cordials and Hypnoticks are required and there is little need of restoring Diets because Fasting and Abstinence rather help and oft-times make up the greatest part of the Cure the reason whereof is that the Vessels being emptyed through want do swallow up the waters between the skin or stagnating in other places and do discharge them forth partly by the Kidnies by the pores of the skin and other Emunctories and partly do adyantageously employ them being yet turgid with alimentary Juice to the nourishing of the body First That the first Indication being Curatory The first intends the evacuation fo the morbific matter intending an Evacuation of th morbific matter may be performed there ought to be exhibited all Hydragogue medicins as well simple as compound and also the froms of medicines recounted and prescribed in the former Chapter of an Ascites Moreover hereto belong not only Catharticks and Diureticks but also Diaphoreticks which though in other sorts of Dropsies they are very much forbidden often take place in curing of an Anasarca In a simple Anasarca we may lawfully administer strong Purgers By Purgers and frequently they much profit And truly this Disease being cured sometimes by means of a Cathartick Empiricks do much glory of their Cures and certain of their medicines become much cryed up for curing hydropical persons for if at any time it happens that they have healed one or two labouring with an Anasarca by their specifick Hydragogues and Elateriums it is enough wherewith they may always magnifie themselves and their Art although by the same medicine they have murdered a hundred Ascitical persons Strong Purgers are couvenient but not to all Wherefore although Preparations of Spurge or Elaterium Pilulae Lunares Hercules Bovii and other Hydragogues have sometimes profited in some cases notwithstanding if they be indifferently exhibited to all Hydropicks or at all to any endowed with a weak Constitution and Bowels of a brittle tone or of evil conformation they oftener cause death than remedy wherefore let it always be committed to the judgment of a prudent Physitian the time when how long and what sort of Catharticks are to be used We have before described froms of Hydragogue Purgers of every sort to wit those that exercise their power upwards and downwards and as well mild as stronger workers so that they may be referred hither and accommodated to the method of healing now proposed But if the reason be enquired The manner of their working after what manner Purgers do operate in this disease and why they more happily and much more efficaciously bring out waters than in any other sorts of Dropsie I say in an Anasarca the morbific matter which is the Lympha subsists partly in the mass of blood partly in the habit of the body within the pores and vacuities between the ends of the vessels wherefore a strong Cathartick being administred presently troubles and dissolves the mass of blood and stirres it up to the excretion of any superfluous or heterogeneous thing and irritates also the little mouths of the Arteries gaping towards the Cavities of the Intestines that the humour ejected from the blood may easier find vent through these Emunctories From hence in the first place the waters fluctuating within the blood are abundantly drained out afterwards the vessels being emptyed do presently swallow up again the waters between the skin and presently discharge them forth partly by siege and partly by Urine or Sweat in the mean time there is no fear lest as in an Ascites the morbific matter being driven and poured from the blood by the Medicine should be further forced into the places affected whence not easily flowing back again it should be more largely encreased nor lest as in a Tympany by reason of the Fibres of the Stomach and Guts being too much irritated by the Physick those bowels might be provok'd into convulsive swellings For as long as the bowels are firm and well constituted the particles fo the Medicine inflict them with no hurt but presently being brought into the blood they do not only allure waters out of it but by exagitating the mass thereof they raise the active particles formerly overwhelmed and dispose them towards their fermentative power Secondly Secondly By Diureticks Hydragogues working by Urine as well simple as the compound as also forms of Medicines prepared from either of them and the manner of their administration we have also described above which also may be transferr'd hither to save repetition And chiefly Lixivials But because not all Remedies of this kind do help alike in all the Distempers it is here observable that for curing an Anasarca Lixivials as has been frequently manifest by our observation do far excell other Diureticks For indeed now it is a common and thredbare Remedy for any one having swell'd members after a previous Purge to take twice or thrice in the day from six
together the stagnating waters and dissipate them from thence in some measure and also recall again the blood by opening the passages into those parts from whence it was banished wherefore not only the swoln members but also the whole body once or twice in a day is expedient to be rubbed with a course Cloth or with a little Brush now ordinarily prepared for that purpose 2.3 2. Liniments and 3. Fomentations With or after Frictions Liniments and Fomentations are sometimes convenient They are prepared either of Salts and other Minerals dissolv'd or from hot and discussing Vegetables with the faeces of Wine boyl'd in water the hot application whereof opens the pores moves together more amply the accumulated waters and discusses them and also enlarges the compass of the bloody Circuit the watery heap being somewhat dissipated Let the Liniments consist of Sulphur and Salts of a diverse kind or of Quick-lime and other Minerals which being powdered and mixed with the mucilaginous Extracts of sharp Herbs are reduced into the form of an Unguent to which let a fit quantity of Oyl of Scorpions be added for the better consistency Moreover this Oyl so it be genuine applyed by it self doth frequently afford notable help I knew a Boy much swell'd with an universal Anasarca who was cured by this Remedy alone for his mother I know not by whose advice anointed his whole body morning and evening with Oyl of Scorpions strongly rubbing all the parts with her hot hand by which act within three dayes he began to pour forth abundance of Urine and when he had continued pissing so for some dayes the swelling vanishing by little and little he became sound 4. 4. Baths Baths are not convenient in any Dropsie but an Anasarca and not for this unless in a Diathesis or Declination For seeing the Blood from the heat thereof encompassing the whole Body being made boyling and stirr'd up every where puts in motion the waters formerly stagnating and swallowing them up into it self conveys them variously away the danger is lest as frequently it falls out receiving them out of the habit of the body into its own mass it should depose them presently into the Praecordia or the Brain for there in noting more usural than an affection of those parts viz. an Asthma or Apoplexie to come upon Hydropicks by unseasonable bathing But when the conjunct cause of the disease viz. a Swelling becomes moderate or not much a Bath of water impregnated with Salts and Sulphur or a Hot-house by which a gentle Sweat is promoted is frequently administred with success As for the Stew it is more expedient and oft-times notably helps that the Patients be placed in fitting Seats in Salt-houses near the Furnaces wherein Mineral Waters are boyled into Salt 5. 5. Vesicatories Vesicatories send out abundantly the waters between the skin and often too profusely Touching the manner how they operate we will treat more specially hereafter in the mean time we advise that they are very cautiously to be exhibited to Hydropicks for that Epispasticks of this kind applyed to the swell'd places do make the Emissarie too open by which apertion the water in the first place bursting out draws oftentimes a great illuvies after it from the neighbouring parts whence immediately ensues a great prostration of the Spirits Moreover sometimes the place is so suddenly emptyed that being destitute of heat and spirits it is in a short time sphacelated or mortified wherefore this Medicine is seldom applyed to the Legs or the Feet of Hydropical persons where the heat is weak and the humour greatest but sometimes to the Things and Arms with security as often as there shall be need 6. 6. Escharoticks Escharoticks are administred a little safer than Vesicatories to the swell'd places because from this Emissary the flux of waters happens not so headlong and abundant at first but commencing moderately grows up by little and little to a great stream which Nature after that by degrees it is accustomed thereunt endures the better Moreover there is less fear of a Gangrene from an Escharotick than from a Vesicatory because in that application the part whose union is dissolved is defended by the Eschar against the loss of heat I have known sometimes an illiterate and rude Empirick who frequently by an Escharotick did evacuate with success the members of hydropick persons however swell'd by the ensuing manner to wit he fomented the legs evening and morning with the Decoction of Dwarf-Elder Wormwood The empirical manner of Escharoticks Cammomile and other hot herbs put into the Lees of Ale of Wine and between the times of the Fomentations he applyed a Cataplasm prepared of the masse of that Decoction with Bran after he had used these for three dayes he covered both legs and seet with a Plaister of Burgundy Pitch leaving only a small hole on each Calf about the bigness of a Nut in which places he put an Escharotick on the bare skin of the Ashes of Ashen-bark which after twelve hours being removed a small Eschar was left from whose pores water was wont at first slowly to sweat out afterwards day by day a little more plentifully to drop out and afterward the Eschar falling off it used to flow out more abundantly as from an open Spring untill it had drein'd the whole leg both beneath and above 7. 7. Pricking with a Needle There remains another manner not inferiour though less used than the former of draining out the waters between the skin viz. by the pricking of a Needle which likewise ought cautiously and minutely to be used lest a headlong and too great efflux of waters be provok'd thereby Take an ordinary Needle such as Taylors use and let it be thrust into the skin pricking over the place chiefly swelled only so far that blood follow not and so at one time let six or seven little holes be made a thumbs breadth distant from each other from every little hole the water will issue forth by drops and so it will contiually drop out untill all the swelling vanish about the place so pricked afterwards the next time after twelve hours another while after 18 or 24 hours let the same pricking be exercised in another part of the same thigh or of the other and afterwards once or twice a day in this or that member or in both together or in more places let such Emissaries of the water between the skin be excited For in truth after this manner the hydropick illuvies may be exhausted more plentifully and safely than from any other outward Chirurgery In the mean time if the new provision thereof be provided against by inward Physick the disease will be the easier cured Moreover in a desperate Dropsie life is best prolonged by such an administration for that the waters being exhausted continually by those outward Emissaries the inner inundation of life is longer protracted Not long since an old man aged seventy years overwhelmed with a
do want Bridles not Spurs But in the Plague Small-pox and Measles broke out and in malignant Feavers sometimes the blood spontaneously flowing out portends for the most part evil therefore in those affects styptic Remedies or things stopping the eruption of blood are more convenient than breathing of a Vein Thirdly 3. Or Art out-done by Nature Notwithstanding on the contrary there are cases of shedding blood by Nature which Physick can no way imitate neither if they chance to fail can be supplyed by Phlebotomy In Feavers about the Crisis of the Disease to wit after the digestion of the matter that is to say the preparation for Excretion spontaneous Haemorrhagies if coming in time do far excell any Phlebotomie which none knows the best season of Moreover the Fluxes of the Terms and Haemorrhoids happening by Natures instinct are more advantageous than the mission of blood provok'd by Art in any of those places Between Phlebotomie and spontaneous Haemorrhagies Phlebotomy and spontaneous Hemorrhagies differ as to the subject and matter there is yet a notable difference although not of great moment in Physical practice viz. both as to the Subject and Matter of either of them for in this the blood being florid and throughly Scarlet doth for the most part only flow out of the Arteries but in the other Evacuation the Blood being of a black purple with a Scarlet Cream is only drawn out of the vein Whence the stream of Blood which is one within all the vessels and throughout continuous acquires such a diverse kind of appearance seeing we have shewed in another place it is not our present purpose to make any surther search into this Aetiologie because it concerns not much to the curing any distemper out of what vessel the blood be let provided it flow out largely But that the ancients do in some cases commend Arteriotomie and prefer it to an incision of a vein the Circulation of Blood not being then known we have elsewhere discoursed how well it may be done Hitherto of Phlebotomie compared with a spontaneous Haemorrhage The use and effects of Phlebotomy now our next business is to describe the use and effects thereof as well good as bad in Physical practice Wherefore we will first shew in general what alteration of the mass of Blood this Evacuation bring then what diseases it more immediately respects either of the whole body or its particular parts About the former How it affects and alters the Blood it is obvious enough that the blood is altered by breathing a vein both as to its quantity and temperament and as to its disposition and motion The first and most common Indication of Phlebotomie is 1. Diminishes its quantity that the plenty of blood be diminished by this Administration And truly this is a vulgar Remedy to remove or provide against a Plethora Any one though of the vulgar sort growing to a full habit of body le ts blood without the advice of a Physitian Moreover Rusticks and Countrey-men for healths sake Emission of the Blood is not to be either too prodigally or too slenderly made once or twice in a year cause blood to be drawn from themselves and their Beasts But although this custom is grown so much in use with some prodigal of their blood that they breathe a Vein on the smallest occasion and sometimes without any manifest cause notwithstanding we may find many others no less obstinate against this custome insomuch that for no cause will they lose any blood unless the greatest necessities be urgent Upon this matter whereas Arguments are alleadged on either part The reasons of the former hinted at that I may in few words determine what seems fit to be ordained in the first place it is requisite we grant that letting blood is convenient against a Plethora either made or beginning for by no other Remedy are the evils of that Affection wont to be better removed or provided against Notwithstanding the necessity of this evacuation ought to be declined as much as may be because from thence as we have intimated elsewhere the blood becomes more sulphureous and less salt and for that reason it most commonly disposes all men to be feaverish and to be fat Moreover the Great Remedy Blood-letting if it be prostituted to every little occasion becomes less efficacious to any grand affections when need requires To which we may adde that according to the vulgar observation by how much the more familiarly any one uses Phlebotomy he will the more frequently stand in need of it for blood being emitted to avoid a Plethora the rest of the mass will the sooner rise to a Plethora far otherwise than is the opinion of some who dread lest the store of blood be consumed by frequent Phlebotomie for that on the contrary by this means the quantity is more encreased although the Crasis be the worser for so the blood having lost much of its balsamick Salt and preservative against putrefaction instead thereof is filled with a pinguifying and more fiery Sulphur Secondly 2. Phlebotomie amends the mixture of the Blood Phlebotomie doth frequently correct the mixture and temperament of the blood in a manifold respect For in the first place if any thing heterogeneous be confounded with its mass which cannot be rightly digested nor easily excerned and sent away a Vein being opened the blood flowing out conveyes frequently much of the portion of that matter forth with it insomuch that the rest may be either subdued or expell'd For the orifice of a vessel being opened presently the blood fermenting gathers together the extraneous particles as much as possible and excludes that portion of it self wherein many of them are heaped up From hence we may observe the blood flowing out first and last to be well enough It restores its temper when that emitted between appears corrupt Also secondly the blood declining from its temperament is frequently restored by Phlebotomie For when the mass thereof by the Sulphur or fixt Salt or both together being exalted shall degenerate into sharp salt or saline-sulphureousness a portion of the blood being withdrawn immediately a new fermentation thereof arises and very often there is a transposition made of all the particles of that sort that afterwards the Spirits may a little emerge with the volatile Salt and recover their dominion the Sulphur and fixt Salt as is fitting being subdued For this reason it is that letting Blood doth not only confer great help in Feavers but also in the Scurvy Jaundies and beginning Consumption for the blood after the vessels are emptyed like the Stomach disburden'd doth better digest and assimilate any humoursingested and the more easily throws off and separates whatever is heterogeneous But if the mixture of Blood begins to be much loosned and become very bad Some distempers of the blood admit not Phlebotomy as in the Plague and malignat Feavers we must altogether abstain from Phlebotomie for the blood
the most part remains uncurable by reason of the continual motion of the Vessel and the efflux of blood It is otherwise in a Vein whose opening is immediately stopt of its own accord for but little of contractive work lies in its Coats yea this only that its fibres being lightly opened as occasion serves the blood flowing back of its own accord is gently moved forwards and after Phlebotomy the vessel being empty they are permitted to be quiet so that in the mean time the little hole made by incision is easily glewed together Whenever Physitian or Patient do dread the opening of a vein to be administred drawing of blood by Leeches or Cupping-glasses will aptly enough and with like advantage supply the defect hereof Moreover these administractions to remove the conjunct cause of a disease where there is need rather of partial than general Evacuation or Derivation are frequently preferr'd to Blood-letting it self There is no need to dwell longer on explicating the manner and reafon of the effects of either of these operations commonly enough known but proceeding to other things we will next throughly weigh the Time and Quantity of letting Blood The opportunity of letting blood is often of so great moment Thirdly The Time of letting Blood comes into consideration that whereas this Evacuation succeeds well at one time at another it highly prejudices But there are diverse respects of time to be considered about the due performance of Blood-letting but chiefly these four The Time of the Disease the Age the Year and Day The first concerns chiefly the Cure of the Patient the others the Preservation of him First therefore if blood ought to be let in any Disease 1. In respect of the disease it will be chiefly sesonably about the beginning or encrease thereof but not at all or very cautiously in the state or declination For at that time whilst Nature is busied endeavouring a Crisis so that the Spirits are in great labour and the blood ferments very much that great endeavour of it ought not to be disturbed and in the height of the disease either Nature being Conqueress doth not want such a relief or being subdued will not endure such an Evacuation Secondly If at any time for preservation it be deliberated touching letting blood 2. In respect of age Infants Boys and Old men by the Custon of all Nations obtain an exemption also this evacuation was wont to be interdicted to pregnant Women but now most commonly prescribed Men of a vigorous Constitution and middle Age do well enough endure Phlebotomy and often times want it Notwithstanding the first and second time it ought not to be done without great occasion for that being once begun and afterwards repeated it will soon proceed into an inevitable Custom Thirdly Hence they who used to let blood Spring and Autumn 3. In respect of the Tear and its parts afterwards cannot omit this evacuation without hazard But to whom it will be either profltable or necessary to breath a Vein once or twice a year the chief seasonable times will be in the beginning of Spring and Autumn viz. when the Blood being prone to ferment anew is in danger to change its Crasis Phlebotomy seasonably administred provides lest the Sulphur and Salts being exalted it should contract a feaverish scorbutical or other peccant distemper likewise lest suffering a flux it should pour forth the serous Recrements and other Feculencies upon the Brain the Lungs or Bowels of the nether belly About the Solstices when our bodies are very cold or hot the blood as the juice of all Vegetables consisting in a more fixt state and unapt to sweel up ought not to be let out unless upon some urgent cause But whereas some precisely or rather ridiculously observe about Phlebotomy The Aspect of the Moon and Stars are here of no moment even as the Countrey-men about Gelding Cattle the position of the Heavens and the Aspects of Moon and Stars it appears altogether frivolous and for that chiefly is this Custom condemned inasmuch as counterfeit Astrologers have a Figure in their Almanacks wherein every sign of the Zodiack is allotted to every particular member of our bodies and for that cause under what sign the Moon is conversant they forbid blood to be drawn from the respective part of man They who observe without reason the Heavens do erre as the saying is the whole compass of the Heavens Moreover this vulgar error is not only absurd but frequently malevolent inasmuch as many of the common people will abstain from Phlebotomy whatever indication makes for the same if as they say the Sign be in the place of letting blood Fourthly As to what relates to the time of the Day in acute Disease 4. The time of the day about letting of Blood when a Physitian is sent for and there be indication for Phlebotomy immediately to be performed after the body is prepared he may prescribe that operation any hour in day or night but otherwise if any interval may be allowed then breathing a Vein rather is to be celebrated in a morning when the Stomach is fasting the vessels emptyed by sweat in the night the stream of blood being quietest and appearing free from any â—â—ous filth Yea although necessity urge it may be deferr'd a little untill the new Juice of things eaten be pass'd into the blood for the vessels being emptryed-will not only snatch the crude Chyle into themselves but frequently what is disagreeable or unproportionate unto the blood whence not only its motion is difordered but also the vital flame runs the hazard of being extinct I have known some by Phlebotomy administred presently after plentiful Drinking or pouring in of vinous liquors to have fallen into dreadfull swoundings away which have lasted very long untill the vital spirit being almost overwhelmed recovered it self again Moreover in the fifth place the opening the vein being indicated 5. The Quantity of the Blood to be taken away ought to be considered and its time appointed there remains still no little consideration to be had what Quantity of blood is to be let out in which point there is most commonly a fault committed while some being too audacious and others no less timerous they affix those bounds on this or that side of which for the most part consists the Right For that I may omit those who scarcely or not at all admit of Phlebotomy as I have before hinted so I cannot easily assent to their practice who fear not to draw blood to swounings Too much Phlebotomy to be avoided Besides an error of no light moment is committed within the moderate bounds while in some cases blood is drawn by too sparing a hand and in others with too free In a burning Feaver But a more spare Bleeding often hurts and fixes a feavour Pleurisie Peripneumonia Squinancy Frenzie Apoplexie and other great diseases that have their origine from a turgescency or phlegmonic incursion of
impure and also dissolved it leaves its corruptions and superfluous dross in the cutaneous Glandules which in the same place putting on the nature of more corrupted ferment they boyl up with other adventitious Juices or passing by these and are diversly thickened and so they beget not only pustulous affections but also leprous of divers kinds From hence the daily and often eating of Shell-fish and also of others and of salted meats that have been hung in the Sun or Smoak also the taking disagreeing Drinks and venemous Medicines do cause cutaneous and frequently dreadful eruptions Secondly 2. By mere stagnation The humour being heaped within the cutaneous Glandules sometimes doth not only become pustulous by a mere stagnation but also frequently Lousie Wherefore not only they that have been long in prison but also those who being of a sedentary life are used to nastiness and sluttishness do live obnoxious to the above-mentioned maladies inasmuch as the cutaneous humour being not at all eventilated is corrupted by mere standing after the manner of putrefying water and so it puts on the disposition of a corrupting ferment 3. By Contagion received from without to which moreover Supplements of putrefraction come from the blood in the like manner depraved Thirdly If perhaps these Canses are wanting that the glandulous humour of the skin neither contracts any stain from fault of the blood nor its own proper stagnation notwithstanding virulent steams communicated from without render it no less prolific as to those diseases This is manifest by common observation especially forasmuch as they that have health most and are endowed with the best Constitutions scarce ever escape free from the same if they lye in the same Bed either with a scabby person or where he hath lately lain and not only so but moreover the Linnen of the Scabby oftentimes washed with other Linnen have bestowed the contagion upon others Surely the taint of no disease the Plague only excepted is more easily or certainly propagated than this of the Mange If the reason of this be enquired into The reason of its most sudden contagion is unfolded we presently say that the liquour susceptive of the scabby taint is mightily exposed and most easily disposed unto it and indeed much more ready to either than the Blood or Nervous Juice For the glandulous humour of the skin abounding in the outer superficies of the body first imbibes every atome let in by holes and pores every where open and anticipates them from the blood Moreover that this is so soon infected with a scabby Contagion both the activity of the ferment communicated causes it and also the proneness of the glandulous liquor to degenerate For indeed the effluvia's falling from the breaking out of the scabby skin are aptly enough compared to the Yest of Ale remaining on the top as it were its outmost Coat of which if the least portion be taken from thence and mixed with other new Ale unfermented presently it ferments the whole mass how great soever and changes it into the disposition of the liquor from whence it was taken Certainly there is a very considerable energy which the particles however so small and little carryed to the highest activity are able to perform but especially if they fall into a liquor of which sort is the cutaneous made up together of subtile particles of several sorts as well partaking of the blood as of the nervous Juice and for that cause most readily apt to be fermented The Contagion when any where received presently spreads over the whole skin Wheresoever therefore these effluvia's of the Contagion abovesaid hit against any outward part of a healthful body first they will infect the cutaneous humour only planted in that place but then the particles of this so corrupted being received by the venous blood and presently delivered to the Arteries are diffused through the entire habit of the body and in a short time defile the whole mass of this Humour and make it scabby From these Causes of a Psora as well adjunct as procuring being unfolded Of the Itch. the reason of the first symptoms or breaking out in Pustules is manifest enough but as to the other viz. the Itch as it is troublesome to Sense that the formal reason thereof may be known we ought to consider to what Sensory or organ of sense it properly belongs and of what sort its passion or affection should be Concerning these things first it is sure it belongs to the sense of touching It belongs to the Sense of Feeling and that the first Instruments hereof are Teats fashioned like a Millet and their little Fibres dispersed through the whole skin as we have before declared Moreover with this sense all the nervous fibres are endowed being diffused throughout the whole body Notwithstanding whereas there are two supream passions of Touching Of what sort its Affection is and as it were generical viz. Pain and Pleasure it is deservedly doubted to which of these Itching ought to be related For the solution of which we ought to shew by what means the Animal Spirits being inmates to the organ of Touch are affected in Pain and also after what manner in Pleasure then their demeanour also as to the Itching being design'd it will easily be manifest of what Province this Passion is The chies Affections of feeling are Pain and Pleasure and in what things the nature of it and the manner of its acting do consist Let the Reader pardon me if I should by way of digression expound this more at large and even to tediousness because this Aetiology seems very necessary both to the understanding and curing of most outward distempers Pain being distinct from Sadness and belonging to the Touch is used to be defined Atroublesome feeling proceeding from the dissolution of Vnity And indeed it takes its origine as often The formal reason of Pain and in as much as any sensible thing disagreeable or improportionate being applyed to that organ of fense divides and separates the fibres one from the other and for that cause repelling the animal spirits inhabiting in them from their wonted and quiet emanation distracts them from one another and as it were puts them to flight then presently forasmuch as that outward repulse of the spirits is communicated by a continued order of other spirits to the first organ of Sense it stirres up the Spirits dwelling there into the like confusions so a perception is caused of grief or pain inflicted outwardly In truth the whole series of animal spirits which are affected with pain as it were some singular member of the sensitive Soul conceiving trouble as it were from the impression of the object is forced to be wrinkled with pain and to contract in self into a lesser dimension When a dissolution of Unity is said to be the cause of pain we must not understand it so as if this affection only were caused from a wound
the morbific matter sticking within the straiter passages cannot be impell'd straight or throughly Elastick medicines render the stoppage greater and more fixt by enfixing the matter deeper wherefore Spirit of Harts horn of Soot of Sal Armoniack yea also Tinctures Elixirs and other Medicines endowed with a volatile Salt or active particles of another kind do not only acquire heat and a troublesome thirst in the sick person troubled with a Tympanie but also cause the Abdomen to swell the more inasmuch as they melt the blood and nervous Juice and stirre the Spirits insomuch that the particles deposited by each of these are compell'd into the parts affected But truly although Medicine doth so little avail against this disease Only mild Purgers and Clysters are convenient it is not altogether to be neglected as if either it effected nothing or what is ill but it behooves us to turn every stone that by some means we may succour the Patient and at length may obtain a cure for him or at least an alleviation Wherefore in the first place because it is the custom to begin with Purgatives although the stronger do ever hurt and the gentler scarce ever prevail to discharge the conjunct cause notwithstanding these latter inasmuch as they do something substract the nourishment of the disease also make a way by which other Medicines do exert their powers they ought to have their turns in physical practice once in six or seven dayes and at other times let Clysters whose use is much better be frequently administred Hydroticks being prohibited we must rest upon moderate Diureticks whereto are adjoyned things respecting the alteration and reduction of the Spirits and Humours which truly make up the Tympanitical pharmacy Moreover in the mean time the use of Topicks is not to be neglected We will annex certain select forms of Medicines appropriated for every of these purposes For a Medicine mildly solutive let the laxative Wine be used prescribed by the renowned Greg. Horstius for a Tympanie in his book of Observations lib. iiij Chap. xxx or in its place let the following be prescribed with greater ease Take the leaves of Peach-flowers Forms of Medicines of Damask-roses of each two Pugils Broom Elder Centaury the lesser of each Pugil 1. the leaves of Agrimony Roman Wormwood of each one handful Senna one ounce Rhubarb six drams Carthamus-seeds half an ounce Dwarf-Elder two drams A solutive liquor yellow Sanders three drams Galangal two drams slice them and bruise them put them into a silk Bag in a Glass with 2 pound of White-wine Saxifrage-water one pound Salt of Tartar one dram and a half let them stand 48 hours let the patient drink from four ounces to six every third or fourth day In a hotter Constitution let the following form be taken which I have proved with success in this disease Take of purging Mineral-waters eight pound Salt of Wormwood two drams let it evaporate in a gentle Bath to two pound To this I use to adde four ounces of water distill'd from Purgers with Wine the dose from four ounces to six Or to the two pound of evaporated water adde of Mechoacan Turbith of each half an ounce Rhubarb six drams yellow Sanders two drams Cloves one dram digest them close and warm for two hours filtre it through Paper the dose 3 or 4 ounces Clysters are of frequent use in this Disease inasmuch as they loosen the Belly without any great irritation of the fibres Take of the Infusion of Stone-horse dung with Cammomile-flowers a pound Clysters Mellis Mercurialis two ounces After the same manner Decoctions and Infusions are prepared with Carminatives from Dogs-dung Take of the Emollient Decoction one pound Sal Prunella or Sal Armoniack from one dram to a dram and a half make a Clyster Take of sound Vrine one pound Sal Prunella one dram Venice Turpentine dissolved with the yolk of an Egge an ounce and a half make a Clyster 2. Diureticks Diureticks if any other Remedies promise help in this Disease Take of Millepedes living and cleansed three ounces one Nutmeg sliced bruise them together and pour upon them one pound of the Diuretick-water prescribed below Press them strongly the dose from three ounces to four twice a day Take of green Juniper-berries Distilled Waters and Elder-berries of each six pound of Firre-tops four pound green Walnuts two pound Cortex Winterani four ounces the outer Rinds of six Oranges and four Limons Seeds of Ameos Rockets Cresses of each an ounce and half Dill-seeds two ounces slice them and bruise them and adde of Posset-drink made with White-wine 8 pound distill it in common Organs let the whole liquor be mixed Take of Crystal Mineral half an ounce Pills Volatile Salt of Amber two drams the powder of Carrot-seeds one dram Turpentine of Venice what suffices to make small Pills the dose Numb 3. in the evening and morning drinking after it three ounces of the distilled water Take of the sweet Spirit of Salt half an ounce Spirits take six drops to twelve twice in a day in a draught of the same water with a spoonful of Syrup of Violets Take of spirit of Salt of Tartar one ounce take one scruple to half a dram twice a day after the same manner So also spirit of Nitre and Tincture of Salt of Tartar may be taken Take of Plantane An Expression Chervil and Clivers-leaves of each four handfuls bruise them and pour on them a pint of the former distilled water Press them strongly the dose three ounces twice or thrice in a day with other Medicines Take of Grass roots three ounces of Butchers-broom two ounces Apozems Chervil and Eringo candied of each one ounce shavings of Hartshorn Ivory of each two drams of burnt Hartshorn two drams and a half Burdock Seeds three drams boyl them in three pound of Spring-water to two pound in it strained hot infuse the leaves of Clivers Water-cresses bruised of each one handful adding of Rhenish wine six ounces make an infusion close and warm for two hours after strain it again and adde of Magistral-water of Earth-worms two ounces Syrup of the five opening Roots an ounce and a half Make an Apozeme the dose four ounces twice a day with some other medicine While these are taken inwardly Topicks also Topicks and outward Applications may be carefully administred not those which are hot and discussing but those which are endowed with particles of a volatile Salt and Nitrous to wit those which destroy the Combinations of other Salts and dissolve the impactions of the Spirits for which we propound the ensuing things If Fomentations ought at all to be admitted into use let them not be applyed too hot also let them be prepared not of those that are usually call'd Carminative but chiefly of Salts and Minerals Cabrotius cited by Helmont says That he cured one of 80 years of age whose Belly he somented twice a day with a Lye in which he