yet a greater difficulty to imagine that a Parliament holden in the first of Queen Mary which was not above 28. or 30. years after the Collegiate Statute was made should pass another Act in confirmation of this only on a presumptive evidence that there had been such a One made when reallyit never had been so in rerum naturâ and that this they did is very evident which making much to our purpose and likewise to the abrogating of the Act made in 3 H. 8. I shall take the pains of transcribing Whereas in the Parliament holden at London on the 15 th day of April in the 14 th year of the Reign of our late Soveraign King Henry the VIII th and from thence adjourned to Westminster the last day of July in the 15 th year of the Reign of the same King and there holden It was enacted That a certain grant by Letters Patents of incorporation made and granted by our said late King to the Physicians of London and all Clauses and Articles contained in the same Grant should be approved granted ratified and confirmed by the same Parliament For the consideration whereof be it Enacted by the Authority of this present Parliament That the said Statute or Act of Parliament with every Article and Clause therein contained shall from henceforth stand and continue still in full strength force and effect any Act Statute Law Custom or any other thing made had or used to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding 4. 'T is certain that this Act of Parliament hath been owned as such by all the grave Judges and Lawyers of this Land upon every Trial betwixt the Colledge and the Empiricks And though in Dr. Bonhams Case the Colledge was overthrown yet it was not for that the Judges question'd the legality of the Act of the 14 th and 15 th of H. 8. for the Lord Chief Justice Cook Justice Warburton and Justice Daniel of the Common Pleas Bench were so far from doubting the Authority of that Act that they plainly tell us in that very Case that the Censors had their Authority by Letters Patents Act of Parliament which are high matters of Record and in the 4 th of King James there was a recovery upon this Statute against one Gardener and in the 7 th of King Charles the First there was another recovery in the Common Pleas against one Butler and in the 8 th of the same Kings Reign a Writ of Error was brought in the King-Bench and there Judgment affirmed both Courts owning the Statute of the 14 th and 15 th of H. 8. where the Colledg Charter was confirmed and in 1651. there was another recovery in the Common Pleas upon the same Statute against Trigge And though Mr. H. tell us of one single Judge that would not admit of the Colledge Patent as established by Act of Parliament in the time of the late Usurper who could scarcely have affection for a Society of men established by Regal power of whom several had expressed so great Loyalty to their Soveraign yet very prudently he omits his reasons lest we should observe so much of partiality if not bribery in him that it might justly be suspected that Interest not Judgment obliged him to such an Opinion but allow Mr. H. what he desires from this instance doth he seriously think that this is as authentick as the Judgment of all the Judges of the Kings Bench and Common Pleas which I just now intimated and the High Court of Parliament in the First of Queen Mary I am apt to believe he cannot however if he doth I am sure he will scarcely perswade any other into such an opinion unless it be those of his own Association who would gladly have it so But to give the Gentleman all the advantage he can desire to his circumstantial Argument that there is not to be seen on the top or bottom of this Roll the Kings Royal Assent I make a question whether this will carry his Cause because the Kings Signature is sometimes endors'd on the back side of the Roll and if he did really put himself to the trouble of searching I wish he would have informed us whether he found this Roy le veult endors'd upon every single Roll of the other 13. Statutes made in the same Session for 't is a little odd to conceive that one poor single Statute in the same Session where 14 were passed and that not the first or last but the 5. in order should be solely question'd especially seeing Mr. Pulton in the preamble before those Statutes assures us that the King by the assent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons assembled had ordained made and enacted certain Statutes and Ordinances in manner and form following of which number this is One. Mr. H's second circumstance to prove that the Collegiate Patent was never established by Act of Parliament is this because he saith that it doth militate against the Spirit of an English Parliament the great Sanctuary of publick freedom To this I need return no other Answer but only desire Mr. H. to read over the foremention'd Statutes of 14 and 32 H. 8. and 1 Mar. and then tell me whether the Parliaments of England did not judge without any breach of Magna Charta that learned and experienc'd men were the fittest to pass a judgment of those brought up in their own profession and doubtless had Mr. H. understood the nature of humane Societies and the necessity of Laws for their government he would not have betrayed his weakness and ignorance so much as he hath done in this Argument In the same page he tells us that it might be an easie matter to impose upon a Printer a Copy of a Bill instead of a Statute especially about matters of Physick whose concerns in those dayes were but in few hands and the Professors very inconsiderable persons and that after it had been once printed for a Law how easie was it for the Lawyers unawares to accept it and Mr. Pulton to reprint it without further enquiry To these surmises I answer that Mr. H. would have done well to have told us the men that durst impose upon a Printer a Copy of a Bill instead of a Statute or given us an instance of a Printer that was ever so audacious or adventurous to do it if he cannot 't is strange that he should trouble the world with such idle and wild supposals that never had any better foundation than in an ill-contriv'd fiction which doubtless can never obtain greater credit with any judicious man seeing that all Bills which pass both Houses of Parliament are fairly engrossed and offer'd to the King to Sign which being done Copies of those Bills are taken out by the Clerk of the Parliament who diligently and faithfully examines them with the Printer by the original Records and then are the Copies of them committed to the Press Now by this conjecture of Mr. H. both the Clerk of the Parliament
to certain points maxims or rules c. but how if I should tell him that from his own principles it may fairly be deduced that the same maxims and rules are still remaining for if his notion be true that the Colledge hath made no improvement in Physick and are only to be esteem'd the Sectators of Aristotle and Galen no doubt but they retain the same maxims they there espoused although let me tell him for his better information that there are several discoveries in the Physiological part of Physick so clearly demonstrated in our dayes by those great and renowned Physicians he so much contemns that we must deny even credit to our senses if we will not give in our suffrage to the certainty of them which have been so far from rendring our Art more conjectural that they have obtain'd the universal consent of all the ingenious of our Faculty witness the Circulation of the blood its sanguification by the vital spirits and not by the Liver as the Ancients and all later Physicians believed till the incomparable Doctor Glisson discharg'd it of that office the motion of the Chyle through the lacteal vessels discover'd by Asellius it s discharging itself into the common receptacle and from that through the ductus Chyliferus valves of the subclavian veins into the mass of blood happily found out by the industrious Pecquet the Lymphaticks by Dr. Jolive the Ductus salivales and lachrymales by our learned countrey-man Doctor Wharton and that excellent Anatomist Steno and many others which I shall ere long have occasion to mention which doctrines had they been discover'd in the dayes of those Greeks and Arabians he talks of would have been so far from everting all maxims in Physick that I rather think they would have been engraven in letters of Gold and the Authors have had Statues erected to their memory And truly if we well look into the profession of physick we shall not find it so Conjectural an Art as Mr. H. pretends for Medicine strictly so called is very little conjectural as to the rules of it though as to the particular application of those rules to the hîc nunc of a single patient it may be but that is no more than is in Divinity and Law and indeed in all the professions of the world The errors of a mans life consisting in the ill usage of avowed and undoubted principles and misapplying them to particular instances But still as to the Theory of our Art as far as it is strictly Medical it will not be found as I just now mention'd so Conjectural as our Adversaries pretend for as to the subject Physick treats of 't is certain and well known to every one of the Faculty and the end and design of the same is no less agreed upon on all hands and for the general description and Diagnosticks of diseases who ever yet contested about them it being universally agreed that there are such distempers as Apoplexies Epilepsies Pleurisies Gout Stone Feavers Quartane Agues c. which are so specifically differenc'd by their descriptions and diagnosticks that not only Physicians but Nurses are able to know them And for the Pharmaceutick part of Physick so far as it relates to the use of such remedies which by experience have been found of great benefit in several diseases of humane bodies who hath not readily embraced it I might likewise inform Mr. H. that we are generally agreed as to the Causes of diseases so far as they relate to air diet and the rest of the non-naturalia so that 't is plain Physicians have had a standing rule to judge by these 2 or 3000 years nor will they want such a rule to the worlds end But the matters of debate are of a more remote consideration and not so truly Medical as Philosophical I mean the Physiological principles which are borrowed out of natural Philosophy to the building up of an Art which might in all parts be complete And though our Adversaries would pretend that these principles are wholly conjectural yet possibly if they be attentively considered it may be found that our contests as to these are rather verbal than real differences about the focus or minera morbi or it may be about what hypothesis such a humor may be best explicated by whether Galenical Spagirical or Sylvian I shall therefore endeavour to shew both in Acute and Chronical diseases how little our Art may be esteem'd conjectural from such debates as these For instance suppose that the Galenists shall teach us that intermittent Fevers or Agues proceed from excrementitious choler flegm or melancholy congested in some minera of the body and according as those humors do sooner or later tend towards a state of putrefaction and commotion whereby they are conveyed into the blood and ferment therewith do cause those febrile paroxysms to return sooner or later And the Willisians shall tell us that the Essence of the one consists in a more retorrid constitution of the mass of blood being too much impregnated with Saline and Sulphureous particles the other in a more acid and austere one which being deprived of its sweet and balsamick nature is apt by reason of its penury of spirits and too great exaltation of its terrestrial and tartareous parts consisting of salt and earth to degenerate into a fluor and induce a sowrness upon the whole mass the third in a more debile constitution of blood than the former insomuch that the greatest part of the nutritious juyce is perverted into a fermentative matter which occasions the Fits to return so much sooner than in a Tertian or Quartane And the Sylvians as strongly contend that these Intermittents have their focus in the Pancreas and derive their original or primary cause from the vitiosity of the pancreatick juice which at different periods according to its various constitution doth discharge its self through its common ductus into the intestines and there fermenting with an ill affected bile and phlegm doth produce not only the various symptoms that accompany these Agues but the different species of them And thus in continued Fevers the one shall tell you that the putrefaction of the humors in the Veins and Arteries is the immediate cause The other too great an exaltation of the Sulphureous parts of the blood which immediately breaking forth into an effervescence procures that distemper we call a Fever The third shall tell you that the saliva bile and lympha being ill affected and continually circulating through the heart do there excite the foremention'd effervescency which occasions this distemper And thus in most Chronical affections as Hypochondriack melancholy Scurvey Gout Rheumatisms Hysterick affections Madness c. The Sylvians shall tell you that these and many others of the like nature do own their original to a preternatural fermentation of an acid juice or lympha with different subjects or from diversity of acids fermenting with one and the same subject from whence they would explicate all the
us the nature and manner of concoctions excretions and motions of the bloud and humors the true and sound constitution of all the several parts which being compared with those that have been found in morbid bodies so much deviating from the sound ones have not only given greater light to the discovery of many diseases formerly unknown but likewise engaged learned men to a diligent invention of appropriate Medicines most likely to prevent and cure those formerly latent distempers Who would ever have thought of Cancers Gangreens Inflations and Dropsies of the womb Inflammations Ulcers Scirrhous tumors of the Lungs Liver Spleen Sweet-bread c. if Anatomy had not discover'd them And as for the doctrine of Pulses there is no man judicious in our Faculty that will not freely acknowledge that great Indications are to be taken both for the exhibition of Medicines and passing prognosticks from a diligent observation and exploration of them how easily may we thereby judge of the strength or debility of our Patients The indications or contra-indications for Cordials Juleps Phlebotomy Purgation c. All which are of no small moment to the better cure of diseases but how was it possible to deliver any artificial rules concerning them till the structure of the Heart and Arteries was understood And therefore it is that Pliny doth deliver an account of the original of this skill which he derives from Herophilus that great Anatomist concerning whom he saith quod Arteriarum pulsum in modulos certos legesque metricas primus redegerit ejusque varietates edocuerit as was more fully observed in the foremention'd speech of the learned Dr. W. Needham And though Mr. H. was so confident as to tell us that nothing hath been done of late by Anatomy which may conduce to better cure give me leave to acquaint him with some discoveries which may fully evert this so ignorant and ridiculous assertion As for instance since the discharge of the Liver from its sanguifying office and affixing sanguification to the vital spirits residing in the bloud it hath been clearly demonstrated that most diseases do derive their original from some ill affections of the mass of bloud and not from the morbid constitution of the viscera which are parts usually but secondarily affected whereupon our remedies that have been primarily indicated have had their chief respect to the reduction of the bloud to its due and native Crasis and not to the application of Topicks to those parts which never give the first occasion to the foremention'd dyscrasie for these are generally in their healthful genuine state until the sanguineous mass doth affix some preternatural recrements upon them wherefore the application of Epithemes unguents emplasters c. are sound in several of the foremention'd cases not so serviceable as was formerly thought as particularly in those diseases which were believ'd to derive their original from a calida Epatis intemperies the primary cure of which depends upon the discharge of those bilious or sulphureous parts of the bloud by venae-section which are too luxuriant therein or else upon the reduction of them to their pristine state by internal and appropriate remedies and not upon Topical applications I might farther discourse of Dropsies Scurvy and other distempers of the like nature which were imagin'd to derive their original from the viscera but that the judicious Reader by considering that one case I mention'd may easily be induc'd to believe that in these also the bloud and not the viscera is the primary seat of the disease I could likewise inform Mr. H. of the great advantages that might accrue to Physick by that excellent discovery of the circulation of the Chyle with the mass of bloud it being well known that bloud appearing with its Chyle swimming upon it hath till of late dayes been taken as Sanious and consequently the person from whose arm it hath been drawn being possessed with the fancy of a Surfeit may have put himself upon methods of physick to cure a fictitious disease and thereby laid a foundation for a real one And doubtless not only this but many other late Anatomick discoveries might tend very much to the better cure of diseases as for instance the commixture of the air with the mass of bloud which hath been experimented so absolutely necessary to the maintaining of Animal life that neither the motion of the bloud nor spirits could be preserved without its continual supply nay though some time their motion hath been impeded yet upon a fresh and speedy communication of air to the Heart and bloud they have both recover'd their pristine state Which puts me in mind of two excellent observations to this purpose intimated by the ingenious Doctor Thruston in his Treatise de respiratione who there tells us of an experiment of that accomplish'd Physician and accurate Anatomist Doctor Croon who stifling a Chicken till she seem'd quite dead yet a good while after by blowing air into the Lungs revived it The second was an experiment perform'd by the no less accurate Anatomist Doctor Needham who in a dog dead and opened after all cessations of pulse recover'd the motion of the heart meerly by blowing up air into the receptacle of the Chyle which from thence by its ductus was transmitted into the mass of bloud Now doubtless from these experiments and others of the like nature much might be collected for the improvement of the practick part of our Art especially in those cases where we are apt to be too severe in keeping our Patients from those reviving gusts of air which probably might tend much more to the depuration of the bloud and refreshment of the animal spirits than the greatest Cordials that could have been exhibited Which puts me in mind of what great relief I have seen instantly given to Hysterical Patients in acute diseases by allowing them fresh gales of air And no less to a young Gentleman in a deep Consumption who was speedily and even to the wonder of all that knew him recover'd to a healthful state by riding five or sixscore miles into the countrey to take the Air. And within these few dayes discoursing with the learned Doctor Bradey Master of Caius Colledge in Cambridge and an eminent practiser in this Town upon this subject he was pleased to acquaint me with a very notable observation in confirmation of this assertion viz. in a Patient of his who being very highly Asthmatick and Hysterick and thereby necessitated to keep her bed six winters together found constant and speedy relief in the paroxysms of the foremention'd distempers by undrawing the curtains of her bed putting out the fire in her chamber and letting in air and that which was very remarkable was that in the greatest of her extremities if the wind lay in the window and the casements were opened she found so great advantage thereby that not content with what passage Nature had made in her nostrils for air she would dilate them with her fingers that it might
passed its due deflagration and is fitted for expulsion we ought then to afford her some gentle assistance by some mild Diaphoretick or lenient cathartick accordingly as we observe at that nick of time the tendency of her motions But if we find that in this state of the Fever there is no Crisis or at best but an imperfect one attempted by Nature the Patients pulse being very weak and his spirits low we must then be very cautious of any evacuation by Sweat or Stool it being not to be attempted without manifest danger of the Patients life And therefore we should rather allow her time and attend her diligently until the blood being reduced to a more orderly motion and the spirits recruited she may gradually make secretion and exclusion of the morbifick matter in order to the obtaining of her due and native temper than encrease the too great and unhappy confusion she is already under by exhibiting any high Diaphoreticks or Catharticks this being a time that nothing of medicine is to be allowed unless it be some very temperate Cardiack In the declination of this distemper an exactness of diet is to be observed and at length some gentle purgations to be prescribed to exterminate the reliques of that febrile matter which probably may be already protruded out of the Meseraick Arteries in order to its discharge by the intestines lest it should be again resorbed and a relapse ensue thereupon upon which account we do likewise as strictly forbid the Patients over-hasty eating of flesh-meat until their Urines appear in colour consistence and hypostasis like to those who are in a healthful state and then we direct them to begin with broths and so gradually to adventure upon a flesh diet To this purpose hath the learned Doctor Willis acquainted us in that excellent book of his de febribus Now pray let sober and judicious men consider what apparent hazards and dangers they must necessarily adventure upon by employing any but Physicians well skill'd in their Faculty seeing 't is apparent by the foremention'd account of Fevers which I have faithfully acquainted them with what diligence and judgment ought to be made use of in every state of this disease that so the Patient might happily be restored to his pristine health and temper But now let us suppose that in the first attack of this distemper an Empirick should be sent for who being ignorant of its nature should presently exhibite some of his well rectified spirits of strong liquors compleat Aqua vitae Punch Analeptical and refocillating wines c. can any rational man imagine that these hot and fiery medicines should be any ways proper to bridle the tumult and ferociency of the blood which being already too much exalted by hot and bilious parts abounding in it doth rather require a discharge by venaesection c. or attemperating by cooling medicines than an advancement to a higher pitch of luxuriancy by the forementioned Chymical liquors which doubtless can do no less than inflame and fire the whole mass of blood in a moment whereas 't is evident that Phlebotomy Clysters c. being made use of or large proportions of Whey and other cooling liquors freely drunk in the first assault of these Fevers have often prevented their farther encrease but to expect the like advantage from the forementioned rich and spirituous drinks would prove as fruitless if not foolish as to undertake the quenching of an house on fire by throwing on gunpowder and fire-balls Now if this mischief must necessarily attend these Empirical prescriptions in the first attack of these Fevers what may we expect from them in their augmentation I dare assure you little else but thunder and lightning phrensies heart-burnings Convulsions c. especially seeing that the most prudent management of these Fevers in this state of the disease can scarcely calm the impetuous motion of the inflammable parts of the blood And if we farther proceed to the State of this distemper how much sooner may these Empiricks dispatch their poor languishing Patients whose only security depends upon their precedent management that so a perfect and salutiferous Crisis might ensue which if it should not happen but their universal medicines are made use of how certainly must the sick bid adieu to their Relations this being a time when neither Cathartick or Sudorifick much less any hot or vinous medicines can be used without manifest endangering the Patients life And for the declination what care must be used for some time that the Patients eat no flesh-meat or broths made of the same lest an unhappy relapse should ensue how can we then imagine that their spirituous medicines or Aqua vitae's impregnated with brisk and active vegetables may then be allowed of But 't is possible they will tell me that they are not without other Chymical preparations which they use upon such occasions and in such distempers as we discourse of viz. their Elixir vivisicans their pulvis Catholicus diaphoreticus Aurum vitae diaphoreticum Elixir grande Cordiale c. which one of the most candid and ingenious of that Society hath told us that they are to him with some others that he hath mentioned quasi tot medicinae columnae c. To this I answer if this be so I wish that Mr. H. would tell us how he durst pretend to the world that one single medicine should suit all palates and constitutions and that others of his Tribe should no less ignorantly than confidently engage that their private Arcana will perform in helping all curable diseases what in reason may be expected from all other But give me leave Mr. H. to tell you that I very much suspect that neither you nor any of your fraternity do well understand the exhibition of your own remedies they being rarely to be administred as I before shewed in putrid Fevers by reason that there are usually contraindications to their exhibition both in the beginning augmentation and state of them lest in the two former they should occasion too violent an ebullition of the blood and in the later wholly impede her Crisis For I would have them to understand that these Fevers are usually but Natures instruments to discharge the luxuriant and bilious parts of the blood when they are apt to exceed their due bounds and limits which if prudently managed by an Artist in the Faculty she will gradually deflagrate this morbifick matter and being over-burdened with it will both separate and exclude it and this much more happily and opportunely than if she were disordered by any of your Jovial powders or Solar diaphoreticks Nature wisely observing her proper periods and times when this secretion and exclusion of the recrements of the blood should be made to the greatest relief and advantage of the Patient whereas your medicines as I before intimated do usually disturb all her regular actings and make a confusion in the very crasis of the blood and therefore are as wisely administred to cure this