bend the member by Contracting it self and the other by its contraction doth extend it and both extend each other successively that which is contracted doth alwayes act and that which is extended doth not act but suffer and is transferred with the part moved But here we are to except some Muscles which seem so sufficient to the motion of the part into which they are inserted How Circular Muscles are Contracted as to have no need of Antagonists as all Circular muscles whose motion is easily understood from the mathematical principles premised For since a Circular muscle hath circular Fibres and that all contraction is made secundum continuitatem lineae it followes that such muscles shut the part to which they are affixed by contracting themselves toward their Center as may be observed in the Sphincters of the Bladder and Fundament and in the Round muscle of the Eye-lids Onely it may be enquired Why those Sphincters have no Antagonists Why the Sphincters have no Antagonists as the Clausor Palpebrarum seems to have the Elevator opening the eye-lids as the Clausor shuts them Whereof the Reason certainly is this that both the Bladder and Fundament are not opened by muscles but by the quantity of Excrements contained in them which being pressed or detruded downward by the Diaphragme and muscles of the Abdomen force open the Sphincters by extending their Fibers from the Centre to the Circumference so that to speak strictly the excretion of the Urine and of the Excrements of the belly are not actions immediately voluntary as the opening of the Eye-lids is And this is all we thought necessary to be said concerning the Use of the muscles Conclusion in general and concerning the admirable Geometry observed by Nature in the Fabrique of them Should we extend our discourse to the accommodation of the Figure and motion of each particular muscle in the whole body to the Geometrical and Architectonical principles premised as we should abuse your Patience so should we disparage your Capacity of making use of the same Clue for your guidance through the whole Labyrinth of Voluntary Motion that we have put into your hands for your more easily entering into it We shall conclude therefore with this due acknowledgment that the Omniscient Creator hath made all things as in the Greater World so also in the Lesser Man in Number Weight and Measure THE CONTENTS Exercitation the First Of Nutrition A Art 1. Nutrition and Generation one and the same Act of the Soul or Virtue Formative fol. 1 2. As well in respect of the Matter as of the Efficient 2 3. The Necessity of Nutrition twofold viz. Augmentation and Conservation 3 4. The vital Flame the Efficient Cause of the Consumption of the substance of the parts 4 5. The Matter thereby consumed not the solid substance of the parts but the Fluid and chiefly the Blood and Spirits 5 6. The Manner how they are consumed is by contitinual Dispersion 6 7. And in what Quantity 7 8. The Efficient cause of their Renovation what 8 9. And what the Material 9 10. And the Manner how they are renovated 10 11. A Consectary of the twofold Expence of the Chyle ibid. Exercitation the Second Of Chylification Art 1. The Order of the meat in the stomach 11 2. The posture of the stomach in Concoction ibid. 3. The Dissolution of the meat by an Acid Humor found in the stomach 12 4. Which causeth a certain Fermentation of the Chyle therein 13 5. All parts of the Aliment not chylified at once but successiyely and the first chylified first discharged into the Guts 14 6. The Time required to perfect Chylification various according to divers respects ibid. Exercitation the Third Of the journey of the Chyle Art 1. The traduction of the Chyle from the stomach and guts into the common Receptacle through the venae Lacteae 16 2. Of which there are two Kinds one arising from the Guts the other from the Glandules of the Abdomen into which the former sort exonerate themselves 17 3. But none of either kind tend to the Liver 19 4. That the Milk in the paps is not made of Blood but of mere Chyle brought thither by some peculiar vessells because ibid. 5. There are no convenient conduits by which blood can be brought into the paps in sufficient quantity 20 6. Blood is not a fit nor possible Matter for the Generation of Milk 21 7. Milk and Chyle agree in all their manifest Qualities and are reciprocally convertible 24 8. That Chyle is imported into the womb in women with child 25 9. From the Auctority of Hippocrates and 26 10 Of Dr. Harvey 28 11. And from the Sympathy betwixt the womb and the paps 29 12. A conjectural description of the Chyliferous vessels tending from the paps to the womb 31 Exercitation the Fourth Of Sanguification Art 1. The most part of the Chyle is converted into Blood 32 2. Not by an Organical but Similary action 33 3. Whose primary Efficient is not the Liver 34 4. Nor the veins 36 5. Nor the Heart but the Vital Spirit residing in the blood 37 6. Which alone formeth the blood in a Chicken out of the Colliquamentum 40 7. The Manner how blood is first generated in an Embryo by that vital spirit 42 8. In what part of the Conception it is first generated viz. in the Chorion 44 9. In the generation of blood what are the Concurrent Extrinsecal Causes and what the Accessory Organical 45 10. The conversion of the Colliquamentum into blood by the Heat and Motion of the vital Spirit illustrated by sundry analogous Experiments and Observations 46 11. That the same Agent which maketh the first blood in an Embryo doth make it èver after in an Animal during life 48 Exercitation the Fifth Of the Uses of the Blood Art 1. Blood not the general Nourishment of the body because 50 2. The contrary opinion is subject to sundry both inexplicable difficulties and irreconcileable incongruities ibid. 3. There are sundry parts into whose substance blood is not admâ—tted 52 4. Fat men generally have the least blood and lean the most 53 5. Men perishing by Famine have their arteries and veins full of blood 54 6. The blood continueth red and florid in the habit of the body 55 7. Hippocrates cured a man of extream Leanness only by profuse phlebotomy ibid. 8. The blood is observed to be less unctuous and glutinous in the Arteries that carry it to the parts than in the veins that return it from them 56 9. There is a manifest Dissimilitude betwixt the blood and sundry parts of the body ibid. 10. The progress of Nutrition is from crudity to Fusion and Volatility not retrograde from Volatility to Fixation and so the Aliment ought to be more crude or fixed than the parts to be nourished 57 11. The blood it self is nourished and consumes the substance of the solid parts and therefore cannot be their nourishment 58 12. The First Matter of
branches in the Glandules in which themselves were terminated and that many of those small rivulets concurring and uniting make one greater channell before they lose themselves either in the Common ocean or any branch of the vena Cava Now from the foresaid various position of the Glandules it comes to pass that the Distribution of the venae Lacteae into their substance and their new propagation out of them again are so uncertain as that it hath given occasion to some Anatomists to suspect that the venae Lacteae are disseminated into very many parts of the body when indeed they only come neer those parts and then passe by them without effusing any part of the Chyle into them Now from these observations But none of either kind tend to the Liver it is very probable that all the venae Lacteae before the Chyle loseth its milky colour do exonerate themselves either into the vena Cava or some branches of it And as for the Lacteae Thoracicae our sense demonstrates that they empty themselves into the subclavian or Axillary veins branches of the Vena Cava so that none disgorgeing their fraught or chyle into any branch of the vena Portae it is most manifest that no part of the Chyle is imported into the Liver as was long believed and taught there to be converted into blood and consequently that the office of the Liver is not Sanguification Whether any of the venae Lacteae are distributed into the Paps and womb That the Milk in the Papps is not made of Blood but of meer Chyle brought thither by some peculiar vessels because in women though highly probable is yet in dispute no Anatomist having hitherto been so happy in his searches as to discover by what secret wayes or passages they tend to either We say highly probable for according to that judicious saying of Hippocrates Licetvisum oculorum effugiant ea tamen mentis acie comprehendantur though they have thus long concealed themselves from the eye of the body yet are they obvious to the eye of the Mind and the acuteness of our Reason may herein supply the dullness of our sense Now to evince the probability of this Opinion let us consider the sundry and weighty Arguments that seem to assure that the Milk in the paps is not made of blood but mere Chyle brought into them by some peculiar vessells Which though a seeming Parergy is yet fully pertinent in this place First there are no convenient wayes or conduits There are no convenient conduits by which Blood can be brought into the paps in sufficient quantity by which Blood may be in a due quantity imported into the Paps there to be whitened into Milk For 1 the Arteriae Thoracicae can adferre but a small tribute of blood into the treasury of the Paps and what they bring in is soon exhausted and carried off again by the veins according to the apodictical doctrine of the Circulation of the blood But did the blood remain in them yet would it hold no reasonable proportion to the large quantity of milk usually effused in a day which in healthy Nurses commonly amounts to two pints Because the Arteries disseminated into the Paps are exceeding small as our eyes witness and Vesalius Examin observat Fallop pag. 89. long since well observed where He saith Exiguae out ferè nullae arteriae adeunt mammas quod in mammarum cancro affectarum ablatione constat ubi paucae aut ferè nullae arteriae sanguinem fundunt cùm tamen venarum magna copia sit 2 The Arteriae Hypogastricae cannot be thought to convey blood into the Paps because they are terminated in a part far distant from their confines and empty themselves where their streams are soon swallowed up and returned into the vena Cava by the Hypogastrick veins 3 The same may be said of the Epigastrick arteries and veins So that in respect of wayes importing blood into the Paps it appears altogether unlikely that that should be the matter of Milk Secondly Blood is not a fit Blood is nor a fit nor possible Matter for the generation of Milk nay not a possible matter for the generation of Milk For 1 if blood should be imported into the paps in sufficient quantity and there extravasated certainly it would be converted rather into pus than into milk as is frequently observed in Inflammations and Apostems of the Paps 2 To what end should nature convert blood into milk when that milk is to be soon converted again into blood in the infant sucking it 3 How is it possible that the Chyle which loseth its whiteness and other qualities when it is transformed into blood should resume them again as soon as it becomes milk a privatione ad habitum is repugnant to Nature 4 Meat and drink cannot be suddainly changed into blood and that blood changed into milk but experience teacheth that the paps of nurses are filled soon after their repasts and many women feel their milk flow swiftly into their breasts almost as soon as they have drunk 5 Women that are somewhat fat have greater plenty of milk than such as are lean but if blood were the matter of milk the lean would afford more milk than the fat because the lean have larger arteries and veins and so more store of blood 6 If blood were the matter of milk then would the bodies of Nurses fall into dangerous sicknesses from excess of blood soon after they cease to give suck because being long accustomed to the generation of so profuse a quantity of blood for the supply of their milk and that daily evacuation thereof ceasing the whole body must needs be oppressed with that redundancy but they seldome complain of any Plethora therefore c. 7 If blood not chyle were the matter of milk then were it impossible the milk should retain the odour and qualities of the meats eaten since no manifest quality of the meat can be deprehended in the blood much less in what is generated of blood as being one remove further from it but the Milk doth frequently retain the odour and other qualities of the meat and drink Ergo. This is attested by the experience of Physicians who give purging medicaments to Nurses Comment in lib. Hippocr de nat pueri when there is cause to purge their children Prosper Martianus the best Commentator upon Hippocrates hath an observation of a woman who having taken a purge soon after gave her child suck and thereby endangered the childs life a superpurgation ensuing in the child while herselfe felt no effect of the medicament at all No obscure argument that the Milk deriveth its purgative faculty from the Chyle not from the blood for it were to be carried so long a journey as through the heart and arteries and therein undergoe so many and great changes doubtless the virtue of the medicine would be much weakned and dulled nor could it be derived into the paps so soon after
it was first received into the stomack Here may we seasonably recite that saying of Aristotle 7. De hist. Animal cap. 11. Si lactans pilum cum cibo aut potu angerat ad memmas pervenit in earum papillis consistens morbum inducit qui 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nominatur and that rare observation also cited by Martianm Loco eitat of a piece of a root of Cichory eaten in sallade by a nurse at night and taken out at one of her nipples the next morning But above all this Experiment is most convincing Let a nurse drink a good draught of milk tincted with Saffron and within an hour or two after express the milk out of either of her paps into a glasse or other small vessell and that milk shall have the odour sapour yea and the very colour also of Saffron 8 Nor is the Milk made of the Menstruous blood as some Philosophers have dream't because many bruit Animals have milk that never suffer the monthly flux because most new-born infants have some milk in their paps De gen anim exercit 55. as Dr. Harvey hath well remarked and because even Men themselves have been found with good plenty of milk in theirs also Schenchius affirms that he knew one Laurentius Wolfius who from his youth to the 50 year of his age had aboundance of milk flowing out of his duggs every day The like is asserted of a certain Flemming by Wallaeus and of divers others by Cardan by Benedictus by Aquapendens and other credible Authors Nay Historians report that in America there are whole nations among whom the men generally abound with milk and suckle their children To which we may adde that many nurses have their Termes while they give suck and yet find no diminution of their milk at those times more than at others So that we see how unreasonable it is to conceive that bloud is the matter of Milk Thirdly Milk and Chyle seem to be one and the same thing Milk and Chyle agree in all their manifest Qualities and are reciprocally convetible as may appear both by their mutuall agreement in all their qualities and by their easie reciprocall convertibility As for their resemblance in manifest qualities 1 They both have a fatty substance otherwise neither could be fit either to sustain the Lamp of lise or to instaurate the parts nor can the bloud contain any such fatty substance in it but what is derived from the Chyle 2 As Milk doth consist of two parts the serum and crassamentum so likewise doth Chyle whose serum is dreyned away by the kidneys and crassament by the guts 3 As Milk if kept over-long especially in a warm place or corrupted by any Acid juice doth turn sowr so also doth the Chyle and in the stomach of Calves is found a certain sowr serum which houswives use for the coagulation of their Milk in like manner the same is frequently generated in the stomachs of men which being ejected by vomitting sets the teeth on edge having acquired that sowrnesse either by corruption from excessive heat or by the admistion of a melancholy juyce 4 They are equally sweet in tast which is the reason why many brute Animals lick up the milky liquor flowing from the secundines when they bring forth their young which is indeed the nutriment of their young while remaining in the womb 5 They resemble each other in colour being both white as the sense testifieth 6 They both contain certain small Fibers that seem to be educed from the more viscous and glutinous parts of the aliment And these doubtless are those Fibers which sensibly uniting themselves in the superfice of bloud let forth into a cold vessel appear in form of a whitish film or thin skin long mistaken by Physitians for cold viscid and phlegmatique matter commixt with the bloud and if the red parts of the bloud be gently washed away from them they become distinctly visible And as for their reciprocal Convertibility that is clearly proved by this that Chyle is easily converted into milke in the Nurse and that milk again converted into Chyle in the stomach of the Infant that sucks it Now these many resemblances considered we may safely conclude that they have much more of reason on their side who conceive Milke to be nothing but meer Chyle brought from the stomach to the Paps by peculiar passages and therein promoted to somewhat more of perfection than they who think it to be made of bloud whitened in the glandules of the paps Having with so great verisimilitude That Chyle is imported also into the womb in pregnant women brought Chyle from the stomach to the Paps for the sustenance of the infant after he is born it remains now that we see whether any portion thereof be deduced also to the womb for his nourishment before he is born First therefore let us seriously consider what light hath been anciently given to this obscure disquisition by that Genius of Nature From the Authority of Hippocrates Hippocrates who hath sundry pregnant Texts to this purpose Uterum foetu grandiorem saith He comprimere mulieris ventrem lib. de Natur. pueri quod in cibo potuque est pinguissimum candidum magisque uteri calore dulcoratum in mammas tendere in uteros quoque exiguam portionem per easdem venas deferri In which words the reverend Author toucheth upon two things very considerable and pertinent 1 That the fat white and sweet Chyle is carried up to the paps by compression of the Venae Lacteae and the common Receptacle of the Chyle the swoln womb being incumbent upon them and pressing the Chyle upwards For that Compression cannot be understood of the veines and arteries in the lower belly as if they were thereby urged to disgorge their bloud into the paps for the generation of milk because a compression of those veins and arteries that are neer the Vertebrae Lumborum would necessarily hinder the course and recourse of the bloud requisite to the work supposed But as Perquet will have the weight of the Liver moved up and down in respiration to conduce to the compression of the stomach venae lacteae and receptacle from the upper part of the abdomen So will Hippocrates have it that from the lower part the compression of the womans belly by the greatnesse and weight of the child doth cause the Chylo to alter its course his words in another place being lib. de Mulier convertitur ad maemmâ—s quod est dulcissimum ex humido and flow upward to the paps Thus the Scythians as Herodotus reports had a trick to blow up the wombs of their Mares by certain sufflatoria oâ—sea like pipes to the end that their bellies being compressed by the swelling of their wombs the greater abundance of Chyle might be protruded into their udders and so their milke encreased 2 Since by reason of the same Compression the passage of
the Milk by vessels tending from the paps to the womb is not so open and free as while the burthen of the womb was lesse thence it comes that so small a quantity of the Chyle is imported into the womb as will not suffice to the nourishment of the Foetus Much Chyle therefore flowing to the paps from the Venae Lacteae and the Common Receptacle and some milk also reflowing from the womb to them by reason of this Compression mentioned it is no wonder if the paps at that time swel above measure A second memorable place of Hippocrates libr. citat to this purpose is that Ad mammas enim uterum ejusmodi venulae consimiles feruntur Cumque ad uterum pervenerit lactis formam habet â—oque exiguo puer fruitur mammae verò ubi lac exceperint attolluntur implentur A third to the same effect is this Foetus quod in sanguine dulcissimum est ad se trahit simulque aliquantulâ lactis portione fruitur Where He hinteth the true cause why it is unwholesome and dangerous for Infants to suck women with child viz. because the best of the milk is attracted by the Foetus in the womb and the worst is carried to the paps Which He more expresly declares in these words Dum mammae exsuguntur venae quae ad eas tendunt ampliores redduntur ampliores effectae quod pingue est è ventre aâ—trahunt in mammas transmittunt giving the reason why the fat and richer parts of the milk do not ascend to the paps till after the birth of the child who by frequent sucking doth dilate and amplifie the vessels formerly too small through which the milk is to pass from the womb to the paps and so make them more capable of the thicker liquor and hence doubtlesse is it that the milk in womens breasts is alwaies much thinner and wheyish while they are with child than after their delivery From Hippocrates the First let us go to Hippocrates the Second Of Dr. Harvey the immortal Dr. Harvey who by frequent dissections of praegnant and suckling Animals discovered that there is Chyle or milk imported into the womb For describing the Cotyledones or Acetabula of the womb Exercit. de Vteri membranis humoribus He saith Cavitates istae spongiae majoris loculamenta magnitudine non excedunt inque singulas earum totidem vasorum umbilicalium ramuli tenuissimi profundè penetrant quippe in iisdem alimentum foetui reconditur non quidem sanguineum sed mucosum ovique albumen crassius planè referens Unde etiam manifestum est bisulcorum Animalium Foetus ut alios omnes sanguine materno non ali And in the subsequent paragraph He adds coarctatis hisce acetabulis non sanguis sed albugineus liquor emanat eodemque expresso illa statim contracta albidiora flaccida conspiciuntur ac demum mammarum papillas aut verrucas pensiles majores referunt And a little after Opinor carunculas omnes uberum modo non sanguinem sed succum albumini similem concoquere eundemque foetui subministrare Again in another place tracing the way of this milky juice more accurately He saith ab utero per cotyledones pertingit ad carunculas placentae quas quidem si digitis compresseris ex earum una aliqua tanquam ex papilla succi istius alibilis facilè cochlearis mensura emulgetur idque nullo apparente sanguine quem attractu etiam valido numquam elicueris quinetiam caruncula sic emulcta atque inanita compressaespongiae instar contrahitur flaccescit plurimisque foraminibus pertusa cernitur Adeò ut omnibus indiciis pateat carunculas istas esse ubera uterina sive albuminis nutritii conceptacula And a little after He expresly affirms succumillum in Gravidis ante partum in acetabulis conservari post partum verò ad mammas deferri Than which nothing can be more plain more positive To the Authorities of these great men let us adde the consideration of that great Sympathy or consent betwixt the womb and paps And from the sympathy betwixt the womb and the paps so frequently observed in women Which Consent cannot be caused by nerves nor by veins nor by arteries nor by similitude of substance nor by contiguity of situation and therefore most probably by mediation of these presupposed Chyliferous vessels tending from the paps to the womb 1 Not by Nerves because the paps derive their nerves from the fourth intercostall pair or the fifth pair of the thorax and the womb is supplied with sense from the nerves of the oâ—sacrum and also from the sixth conjugation of the brain 2 Not by veins or arteries because they are both destitute of sense as Galen himself affirms 3 Not by Similitude of substance because the paps consist mostly of Glandules and the body of the womb is membranous 4 Not by Contiguous situation because the paps and womb are far distant each from the other It being therefore most certain that all sympathy betwixt parts of the body doth arise either ex Vasorum Communione or ex operis societate or both and that betwixt the paps and womb there is no communion of vessels unlesse it be of some chyliferous vessels derived from those to this and that there is a society of office betwixt the paps and womb both containing the Aliment of the child it is highly consentaneous to truth that there are such vessels though yet undiscovered by which the Chyle is carried from the paps to the womb while the infant remains therein and back again from the womb to the paps after he is born This being granted we may cleerly understand the wayes and manner of the ascent of the milk from the womb to the paps and the reflux of it from the paps to the womb so frequently mentioned by Hippocrates We may understand also how the good or evil affections of the womb are communicated to the paps and how it comes that a Cancer cured in the paps doth revive and grow again in the womb and vice versâ And thus may we understand those Aphorisms of Hippocrates Si gravidae mammae graciles fiunt repente illa abortit si gravidae lac multum è mammis effluâ—t foetum imbecâ—llum significat si solidae mammae foetum saniorem In respect of these vessels are we moreover to interpret that Rectitude of consent betwixt the papps and womb intimated in that Aphor. Gravida gemellos gerens si dextera mamma fiat gracilis marem si verò sinistra foeminam abortit foetus enim mares in dextris foeminae in sinistris magis To conclude this Disquisition therefore A conjectural description of the Chyliferous vessels tendin from the paps to the womb since it is manifest that there are some such Chyliferous vessels or ductus by which the paps and womb have a reciprocall commerce it is not improbable they are derived from the extremities of the Chyliferous veins
arme was at first surprised with Convulsions of that Arme and those ceasing there ensued so great an Atrophy of that member as nothing now for the woman is yet living remains of it but skin and bones which extream extenuation doubtless is to be referred to the want of passage for the Succus Nutritius through the principal Nerv in the Arme from the beneficial use of Cephalique Emplastres in Consumptions from ulcerated Lungs no such accident but an Aneurisme usually following upon the incision of an Artery 2 In a Phthisis or Consumption from ulcerated Lungs Cephalique Emplastres though composed of hearing and drying ingredients and in that respect seeming very incompetent for such a Disease are found by experience to be very beneficial to the sick and that not only because they stop the defluxion of humors from the head upon the Lungs but also and chiefly because they warme and corroborate the Brain and Nervs and so promote the Nutrition of the Parts Which effect cannot be expected from their Heat and Driness but from some comfortable influence transmitted to the Nervs by which they are strengthned and made fit for the performance of their office viz. the conveying the nourishment from the brain to the parts 3 As those persons are inclined to Leanness who abound with blood From the Fatness of men endowed with large open spongy and moist nerves so are those inclined to grow Fat who have large moist open and spongy Nervs for such Nervs afford much Aliment and distribute it easily 4 It is commonly observed that from wounds of the joynts and Nervs From the roscid humor exstilling from wounds of the joynts and sinewes there distills a certain roscid Humor not much unlike the white of an Egg which being not likely to come from either the Arteries or veins in respect they carry nothing but blood why may we not believe it to drop out of the Nervs Also in such wounds in issues in hollow Teeth c. there grow up frequently certain fleshy Excrescences or Proud Flesh which being exceeding sensible and subject to acute pain upon the least touch cannot but have a very neer relation to the Nervs and blood certainly is very unapt to produce such Excrescences to the Generation of which some matter analogous to the sperme is necessarily required 5 The same may be said also of Wens and Scrophulous Tumors which seem to derive their Seminal Matter from the dew or Gâ—eet of the Nerves From the Material Principle of Wens and Scrophulous Tumors and not from any humor effused out of the Arteries or veins blood being a liquor partaking of too much Asperity and Acrimony to be the material Principle of such Tumors besides we have the testimony of our sense that the rudiments of such Tumors are like Eggs included in a membranous filme which contains a humor resembling the white of an Egg but nothing like blood Moreover these Tumors frequently tend to some kind of Formation though but an imperfect one producing sometimes a mass or lump of Flesh sometimes a Worme or other such Monster which is a strong Argument that their primitive Matter is not blood but a certain juyce much milder and sweeter and brought to the parts in which they are generated by the Nervs 6 This Opinion is further confirmed by the Matter of the Seed and the Manner of its preparation in the Testicles From the Matter of the seed and the Manner of its praeparation in the Testicles For the Seed seems to be generated not of the blood as hath been vulgarly believed but of a matter much sweeter and more generous brought into the Seminary vessells from the brain by the Nervs forasmuch as the Nervs are both more copiously and more deeply disseminated into the parenchyma of the Testicles than either the Arteries or the veins which is the reason why their inward substance is white not red Again their proper Coat appears to be nothing else but a certain expansion of the Nervs inserted into them from which Coat many small Nervs are on all parts derived to the middle of the Testicles where meeting together they make the long Nervous vessell that manifestly exonerateth it self into the Chanel of the Epididymis as may be plainly seen in the stones of a Horse Bull Boar or other large Animal As for the veins of the Testicles they serve only to export the blood imported by the Arteries and the Arteries themselves though they variously diffuse themselves round about the Testicles and accompanying the Nervs tend in divers places from the inward coat to the Ductus Seminalis situate in the very middle of the Testicle and are connected thereunto yet they rarely disperse any branches untill reflecting from that chanel they have begun their progresse back again toward the Circumference of the Testicle But there they send out some surcles to the outside of the Testicle to the end that those capillary veins opening themselves into the substance of the Testicle may the more easily receive the blood effused out of the Arteries and so carry it off again Because that blood if left there would soon obstruct the parenchyma of the Testicles and disturb the praeparation of the seed Yet these Arteries no where insinuate themselves into the Nervous or Seminal Chanel or infuse the least drop of blood into them So that it is more then probable they serve rather for the vivification of the Testicles by bringing the vital blood and spirits into them than for the importation of the Seminal Matter Now the Nervs implanted in the Testicles cannot be in order to their Motion because they have none that is voluntary nor is there any need of them as to sensation and therefore it is more credible that their Use is only to bring in some certain Liquor for the making of seed Furthermore the Testicles are furnished with many Lympheducts which could be of little Use unto them unless there were some other vessells present also by which that generous Liquor is brought in whose thinner and superfluous part those Lympheducts are framed to export Add to this that the seed is a liquor much more noble and Ambrosiack than the blood as is evident even from hence that a small expence of seed doth more exhaust the spirits than the losse of twenty times so much blood Which doubtless is the reason why Heaviness and dejection of spirit do alwayes ensue after the delights of Venus and it hath been observed that in men excessively addicted to women the Brain it self is not only much debilitated but made also lax thin and watery The Gout-likewise is generally an Attendant of immoderate venery because the joynts and nervous parts being much debilitated and the roscid and Unctuous Liquor of the Nervs deprived of its milder and sweeter part the Succus Nutritius becomes too thin and sharp and so is more expeditely discharged upon the joynts 7 From the Extremities of broken Bones from the Glutinous maâ—ter
by Nature to prevent the reflux of the liquor out of the Axillary vein And from the Thighs many in like manner climb up in the company of the Crural and Iliacal veins which they encircle in some places more closely in others more laxely and in this manner they mount up to the Mesentery where together with the small branches of the Vena Portae they are terminated Again those issuing from the Liver or Bladder of the Gall do also descend in company of the Vena Portae to the middle Glandule of the Mesentery and are therein terminated But if with a more curious eye you trace these proceeding from the Liver up to their very original you may perceive them to enter the Capsula Communis of the Vena Portae and therein so to lose themselves as that you cannot discern their progress from thence yet it is probable that being included in the same Capsula Communis they follow the distribution of the same and never stray from it into the Parenchyma of the Liver because if they did how comes it that they are no where to be found in the parenchyma no not in that part of it where the Capsula Communis is Concerning the Liquor they contain there are two Difficulties viz. 1 Whence they receive it 2 Why they return it into the Receptacle of the Chyle and into the Heart The Former is solved by saying that the liquor is derived partly from the Arteries Liquor deduced partly from the Arteries and partly from the Nerves That the Arteries have some share in bringing that mild and thin Liquor into the Lympheducts may be argued thus The blood being by the Vital Heat and Motion agitated in the Arteries doth necessarily diffuse abundance of Vapours into those parts into which it is immitted and this so much the more because those vapours are repressed and kept in by the thicknesse of the coats of the greater Arteries untill they are driven into the smaller arteries through whose thinner coats they more easily transpire And these vapours thus dispersed â—re for the most part retained and re-collected by the Fibrous and Membranous parts and by that means condensed into a Liquor which makes one part of that Humor which the Lympheducts carry away For we are not to conceive that that Liquor was preexistent in the Arteries under the same form it afterward obtains in the Lympheducts and that being protruded together with the blood out of the Arteries into the substance of the parts it is in those parts separated from the blood by any kind of Percolation as the Urine is in the Kidneys because there are in all parts Veins answering to the Arteries and those ample enough to export whatever liquor is by them imported nor can any reason be given why that watery humor should be at all separated from the blood seeing it is no Excrement of the blood though it may be accounted an Excrement of the parts from which immediately it is immitted into the Lympheducts No Excrement of the blood because it is again brought into the blood and Nature useth not to lose her labour or to separate things each from other on purpose to mixe them again afterward Secondly that the Nerves also contribute some part of this Liquor to the Lympheducts Partly from the Nerves may be inferred from hence 1 that whatsoever Liquor ariseth from vapours condensed is perfectly pure thin and transparent but this liquor is not so and therefore it is necessary some other Humor should be admixt to it which gives it a greater thickness than a simple distâ—lled water usually hath For this whole liquor is more dense and less diaphanous and sometimes white like milk sometimes tincted with yellow and sometimes with blood like water wherein raw Flesh hath been washed 2 It is an opinion highly agreeable vvith Reason that the thicker part of the Liquor found in these Water-conduits is the Vehicle of the Succus Nutritius vvhich being dispensed from the brain and spinal Marrovv to all parts for their nourishment by the Nerves is assimilated into their substance leaving its thinner part vvhich before served to promote and facilitate its distribution through the slender passages of the Nerves to be infused into the Lympheducts vvhich return it into the blood for a double use viz. First to prevent the Coagulation of the blood to vvhich othervvise it vvould be strongly inclined Uses of that Liquor Secondly to promote the Mication of the blood for this thin liquor being formerly advanced to the state of Volatility or exhalation it easily united to the Vital blood and doth as easily advance the mication of it But vvhat vve here say of the derivation of one part of this Liquor from the Nerves vvill be more illustrated by vvhat follovvs concerning the dispensation of the nourishment by the Nerves OF THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE NOURISHMENT THROUGH THE NERVES Exercitation the Tenth Of the Distribution of the Nourishment through the Nervs IN one of our precedent Discourses as you may please to remember we denied the Blood to be the Adequate Aliment of the Nervous Article Fibrous That the Nervs are the vessells carrying the Nutritive juyce to the parts argued and Membranous parts of the body and transferred that noble office upon a certain milder and sweeter juice congenerous to that spermatical Matter of which those parts are first made up Lest therefore we should defraud your curiosity of such further satisfaction as this new and paradoxicall yet most reasonable opinion requires we must no longer omit to explain at least according to what light the excellent Dr. Glisson hath given in so obscure an Argument From whence and by what vessells the Nutritive juice is distributed to all parts of the body The Thesis is that the proper and adequate Nutriment of the Parts is derived to them from the Brain and Spinal Marrow by the Nervs and the Reasons asserting it are these 1 In the Palsy it is observed from the Atrophy or decay of nutrition in parts affected with the Palsy and whose Nervs have been wounded that the parts resolved do at first appear somewhat tumid or swolne by reason of the laxity of their Fibres and the easie afflux of blood unto them And yet it is manifest that swelling doth not arise from the true and genuine Nourishment of those parts because afterward they by little and little pine away to extream leanness notwithstanding the blood floweth as freely and plentifully to them then as before A pregnant argument that the vessells by which they ought to be supplied with nourishment are obstructed which vessels certainly can be no other but the Nervs because both Arteries and veins are wholly exempt from any impeachment in this Disease and the Nervs alone fail of performing their office as they ought This may be confirmed by an observation of our owne A certain woman having a Nerv pricked by an unskilfull Chirurgeon as he was letting her blood in the right