Selected quad for the lemma: woman_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
woman_n	child_n	mother_n	womb_n	3,217	5	9.6644	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A89219	Healths improvement: or, Rules comprizing and discovering the nature, method, and manner of preparing all sorts of food used in this nation. Written by that ever famous Thomas Muffett, Doctor in Physick: corrected and enlarged by Christopher Bennet, Doctor in Physick, and fellow of the Colledg of Physitians in London.	Moffett, Thomas, 1553-1604.; Bennet, Christopher, 1617-1655.	1655 (1655)	Wing M2382; Thomason E835_16; ESTC R202888	187,851	309

doubt hapned upon these causes That Cyprus aboundeth in Cypres and Firr-trees Sardinia in Alom and Copper Mines Anticyra is replenished with true Hellebors and Thasus is full of deadly Ughes which either kill a man or make him mad when the savor infects him fully as it doth in such hot and dry Countries The aire may be also infected with the smoak of Charcole newly kindled whereof Quintus Catulus died or with the smel of new morter which killed Jovinianus the Emperor in his bed or with the snuf of a candle wherewith many have been strangled or with the aire of a pan of coles throughly kindled by which as Aemylius Victor studied in the City of Parma he suddenly fell down dead By the smell of a snuf of a candle many become leprous and women miscarry of children What light is best to study by of oyle wax dears suet and tallows the very smel of roses cureth headach and of some flowres drunkenness The smel of a wantlowse may kil a child in the mothers womb the very smel of Physick cureth many First therefore in the election or choice of aire observe this that it be pure and void of infection for pure aire is to the heart as balm to the sinews yea it is both meat drink exercise and Physick to the whole body Meat whilst it is easily converted into spirits Drink whilst it allayeth the thirst of the lungs and heart which no drink can so well quench exercise whilst it moveth humors immoveable otherwise of their own nature medicine or Physick whilst it helpeth to thrust forth excrements which would else harden or putrifie within our bodies the vapors whereof would so shake the bulwark of life and defile the rivers of blood issuing from the liver that we should not live long in health if happily we lived at all Next to purity of aire we must chuse that also which is temperate For natural heat is not preserved saith Galen but of aire moderately cold And Aristotle saith That Countries and Cities and houses which by interposition of hils on the North side be seldom cooled are subject to mortality and many diseases Yet must it not be so hot as to dissolve spirits procure thirst and abundant sweat to the hindring of urine and decaying of strength and appetite But as I said before of a middle temper because as nature is the mother so mediocrity is the preserver of every thing Who sees not a dry Summer peeleth and a dry winter riveleth the skin and that contrariwise an over-moist aire puffeth it up with humors and engendreth rheumes in the whole body Thirdly That aire is best which is most seasonable Namely warm and moist in the Spring hot and dry in Summer cooling and dry in Autumn cold and moist in Winter which seasons falling out contrarily as sometimes they doe especially in Islands infinite and unavoidable diseases ensue thereupon For if the spring-aire be cold and dry through abundance of Northeast winds dry inflammations of the eys hot urines fluxes of bloud by nose and bowels and most dangerous catarrhs to old persons follow upon it If Summer be cold and dry through the like winds look for all kinds of agues headaches coughs and consumptions Contrariwise if it be too hot and dry suppression of urine and womens courses together with exceeding bleeding at the nose is to be feared If Autumn be full of Southern and warm blasts the next Winter attend all rheumatick and moist diseases If Winter on the contrary be cold and dry which naturally should be cold and moist long agues humoral aches coughs and plurisies are to be expected unless the next Spring be of a moist disposition Again consider also how any house or City is situated for the aire is qualified accordingly Namely if they be placed Southeast South and Southwest and be hindred from all Northern blasts by opposition of hils they have neither sweet water nor wholsome aire but there women are subject to fluxes and miscarriages children to convulsions and shortness of breath men to bloudy fluxes scourings and Hemorrhoids and such like But Cities Countries or houses situated clean contrary towards the North-west North and North-East and defended from all Southern gusts and blasts albeit the people there are commonly more strong and dry yet are they subject through suppression of excrements unto headaches sharp plurisies coughs exulceration of the lungs phlegmatick collections rupture of inward veins and red eyes Likewise in those Countries young boyes are subject to swelling of the codds young girls to the navel-rupture men to the diseases above named Women to want and scarcity of their natural terms to hard labours ruptures and convulsions and to consumptions after childbearth Easterly Towns especially inclining to the south and houses are more wholesome then the westerly for many causes first because the aire is there more temperately hot and cold Secondly because all waters and springs running that way are most clear fragrant pleasant and wholesome resembling as it were a dainty spring and verily women there conceive quickly and bring forth easily children prove large well coloured and lively men healthful strong and able to any exercise But Western cities and houses barren clean of Eastern gusts have ever both troubled waters and unwholesome winds which mingled with the waters obscure their clearness and maketh the inhabitants weak heavy and ill coloured hoarce-voiced dull witted and wanting as if they were entring the house of death quickness and vigour But Avicen of all others declares this most at large who shewing the boldness and goodness of aire by the situation describes them in these words Houses having their chief or full seat Eastward are very wholsome for three causes First because the Sun rising upon them purgeth the aire very timely Secondly because it stayes not there long to dissolve spirits but turneth westward after noon Thirdly because cold winds are commonly as ushers to the Sun rising by which all corruption is killed that either was in the aire or lay on the ground Westerne places are worst situated First because the Sun bestowes not his maiden head and kingly heat upon them but a hot and scorching flame neither attenuating nor drying their aire but filling it full of fogs and mists Whereupon it falls out that the inhabitants are much troubled with hoarseness rheumes measils pocks and pestilence Southern seats are commonly subject to catarhs fluxes of the belly heaviness want of appetite haemoroids inflamation of eyes and their women conceive hardly and miscarry easily abounding in menstrual and mighty pollutions their old men are subject to palsies trembling apoplexies and all humoral diseases their children to cramps and the falling evil their young men to continual putrified agues and all kind of rebellious fevours In Nothren countryes through the driness coldness and sharpness of the wind women do hardly conceive and dangerously bring forth or if they be well delivered yet commonly

about the rump on either side thereof and are as many take it very restorative The Matrix The matrix of beasts yea of a barren Doe so highly esteemed is but a sinewy and hard substance slow of digestion and little nourishment Eyes Eyes of young beasts and young birds are not unwholesome being separated from their skins fat balls and humours for then nothing remaineth but a sweet tender and musculous flesh which is very easie of digestion Ears Snouts and Lips The Ears Snouts and Lips of beasts being bloudless and of a sinewy nature are more watrish viscous and flegmatick then that they may be commended for any good or indifferent nourishment Pinions and Feet The Pinions of birds and the feet of beasts are of like disposition yet the pinions of geese hens capons and chickens are of good nourishment and so are the feet of young hogs pigs Lambs and Calves yea also a tender Cow-heel is counted restorative and Heliogabalus the Emperour amongst his most dainty and lustful dishes made Pies of Cocks-combs Cock-stones Nightingales tongues and Camels heels as Lampridius writeth Galen also for men sick of agues boil'd Piggs-pettitoes in barly water whereby each was bettered by the other the Ptisan making them the more tender they makeing the Ptisan more nourishing and agreeable to the stomack That sodden Geese feet were restorative Messalinus Cotta by trial found out if Pliny may be credited The Tails or Rumps of Beasts are counted by certain unskilful Physitians yea of Dr. Isaac himself to be hard of digestion First because they are so far distant from the fountain of heat Secondly because they are most of a sinewy constitution to which if a third had been added that they are but covers of a close-stool perhaps is arguments would have been of some indifferent weight For indeed the farther any part is from the heart it is fed and nourished with the more fine and temperate blood also the extremities or ends of sinews are of strong wholesome and good nourishment but as for the Tails and Rumps of Beasts it is indifferently mingled of flesh sinews and fat so that the very Anatomy of them shews them to be a meat agreeable to all stomacks and verily whosoever hath eaten of a pye made onely of Mutton Rumps cannot but confess it a light wholesom and good nourishment The Rumps of Birds are correspondent having kernels instead of flesh but when they are too fat they overclog and cloy the stomack Udders The Udders of milch beasts as Kine Ewes Does and She-goats are a laudable taste and better then Tripes because they are of a more fleshy nature Lean Udders must be sod tender in fat broth fat Udders may be sod alone each of them need first a little corning with salt being naturally of a flegmatick and moist substance Stones The Stones of a Bore work marvails saith Pissanellus in decayed bodies stirring up lust through abundance of seed gathered by superfluous and ranck nourishment Indeed when Bucks and Stags are ready for the rut their stones and pisels are taken for the like purpose as for the stones of young Cocks Pheasants Drakes Partridges and Sparrows it were a world to write how highly they are esteemed Averrhois thinks that the stones of a young Cock being kept long in good feeding and separated from his Hens do every day add so much flesh unto our bodies as the stones themselves are in weight Avicen as much esteemeth Cock-sparrowes stones or rather more But the Paduan Doctors but especially Doctor Calves-head giveth that faculty to the stones of Pheasants and Partridges above all others Skin The Skins of Beasts yea of a roasted Pig is so far from nourishing that it can hardly be well digested of a strong stomack Some Birds are sodden or roasted without their skins because they are black and bitter as Rooks Dawes Cootes and Moor-hens and howsoever others are spared yet the skin of no Bird turneth to nourishment but rather to ill humours or filthy excrements Nay the very skin of an egg of a nut an almond a prune a raisen or a corrin and generally of all fruit is so far from nourishing that it cometh out of the strongest mans body either whole or broken as it went in CHAP. XIIII Of Milk FOrasmuch as childrens stomacks and old mens bodies and consumed mens natures be so weak that not onely all flesh and fish but also the fruits of the earth are burdensome to their tender and weak bowels God tendring the growing of the one the preservation of the other and the restoring of the third hath therefore appointed Milk which the youngest child the weariest old man and such as sickness hath consumed may easily digest If we would define or describe what Milk is it seemeth to be nothing but white blood orrather the abundant part of blood whited in the breasts of such creatures as are ordained by nature to give suck appointed properly for children and sucking little ones but accidentally for all men sick either of consuming diseases or old age That womens Milk is fittest for young children it may easily be proved by the course of nature which converteth the superfluity of blood in a woman bearing her child within her to the brests for no other purpose then that she should nourish her own babe For truly nothing is so unperfect defectuous naked deformed and filthy as a man when he is newly born into the world through a straite and outstreatched passage defiled with blood replenished with corruption more like to a slain then a living creature whom no body would vouchsafe to take up and look on much less to wash kiss and embrace it had not nature inspired an inward love in the mother towards her own and in such as be the mothers friends Hence it cometh that mothers yet hot sweating with travail trembling still for their many and extream throws forget not their new-born Babes but smile upon them in their greatest weakness heaping labour upon labour changing the nights trouble with the dayes unquietness suffering it to taste no other milk then that wherewith in their bellies it was maintained This doth a kind and natural mother if she be of a sound and indifferent strong constitution for her child and thus did Eve Sara Rebecca and Rachel yea all women which truely loved their children and were both able and willing to feed their own There be many reasons why mothers should be afraid to commit their children to starnge women First because no Milk can be so natural unto them as their own Secondly because it is to be feared lest their children may draw ill qualities from their Nurses both of body and mind as it fell out in Iupiter whom whilst his Mother committed to Aega Olens daughter and Pans wife to be nursed by her the Country woman living only upon goats milk could not but be of a strong lascivious nature which left such an impression in the child

that growing once to the age of a stripling he was in love with every fair wench lay with his own Sister forced his own Neices left no fair woman unassaulted if either bygold or entreaty or craft and transforming himself he could obtain her love Nay when he was full of womens company he loved boys and abused himself unnaturally in companying with beasts The like also is recorded of Aegysthus who being fed in a Shepheards Cottage only with goats Milk waxed thereupon so goatish and lecherous that he defiled not onely Agamemnons bed but also neighed in a manner at every mans wife Nevertheless if the Mothers weakness be such that she cannot or her frowardness such that she will not nurse her own Child then another must be taken sutable to the Childs constitution for a fine and dainty Child requireth a Nurse like to it self and the Child of strong and clownish Parents must have a Nurse of a strong and clownish Diet. For as Lambs sucking she-goats bear course wool and Kids sucking Ewes bear soft hair so fine Children degenerate by gross womans milk losing or lesning that excellency of nature wit and complexion which from their Parents they first obtained Neither is womens Milk best onely for young and tender infants but also for men and women of riper years fallen by age or by sickness into compositions Best I mean in the way of nourishment for otherwise Asses Milk is best for some Cowes Milk and for others Goats milk because the one cleanses the other loosens and the third strengtheneth more then the rest Goatsmilk is also better for weak stomacks because they feed on boughs more then grass Sheeps-milk is sweeter thicker and more nourishing yet less agreeable to the stomack because it is fatter Cows-milk is most medicinable because with us it looseneth the body though in Arcadia it stayeth the belly and cureth consumptions better then any other milk Finally the milk ofany beast chewing the cud as Goats Sheep and Kine is very ill for rhumes murs coughes fevers headache stoppings and inflamations of any inward part for sore eyes also and shaking of sinews Avicen saith that their Milk is hurtfull to young men because they are cholerick to sore eyes headaches agues and rhumes because it is full of vapors to convulsions and cramps by reason of repletion to resolution or palsies by over moistning to the stone and obstructions because the cheesy part of it is very gross Of Beasts not chewing the Cud Camels milk is the sweetest and thinest of all other Mares milk the next and Asses milk of a middle temper not so thin but that it nourisheth much nor so thick as that easily it will curdle All milk is thinnest in the Spring and thickest in Sommer because then the wheyish part is resolved by sweat and all meats then obtain a dryer faculty Signes of the best Milk There be four wayes in women and beasts to know the most nourishing and substantial milk namely by the colour smell consistence and taste For the best milk is of a pearl-colour neither blue transparent nor gray but white clear and confused the consistence of it is neither thin nor thick hanging like a row of pearls upon ones nail if it be milked on it not overhastily running of In taste it is not soure bitter salt sweet sharp nor strong but sweet yet not in excess and pleasant after an extraordinary kind of pleasantness yet Galen affirmeth that if milk could be tasted when it is first concocted in the veins and breasts it would seem sweeter then hony it self The smell likewise of it is pure and fragrant though proper to it self and void of loathsomness Causes of good Milk Also it is much material to the goodness of milk to have speciall regard to the Diet of those creatures whose milk we use or chuse for our children Galen reporteth that a friends child of his having lost his good Nurse by an untimely death was put out to another who in time of dearth being forced to feed chiefly upon fruit and roots and Acorne bread infected her child as she her self was infected with much grevious and filthy scabs And I pray you what else is the cause that many children nursed in the Country are so subject to frets sharpness of urine and the stone but that their Nurses for the most part eat rye bread strong of the leaven and hard cheese and drink nothing but muddy and new Ale It is also recorded that a young man sick of a Consumption used the milk of a goat to his great good so long as it fed in his own field but afterward feeding in another field where store of Scammony grew and some wild spourge he fell into a deadly scowring and felt no nourishment Furthermore care is to be taken of their health that give us milk for as an unclean and pocky nurse which woful experience dayly proveth infecteth most sound and lively children so likewise a clean sound and healthful nurse recovereth a sickly and impotent child Nay which is more no man can justly doubt that a childs mind is answerable to his nurses milk and manners for what made Iupiter and Aegystus so lecherous but that they were chiefly fed with goats milk What made Romulus and Polyphemus so cruel but that they were nursed by She-wolves What made Pelias Tyrus and Neptunes son so bruitish but that he was nursed by an unhappy mare Is it any marvel also that Giles the Abbot as the Saint-register writeth continued so long the love of a solitary life in woods and deserts when three years together he suckt a Doe What made Dr. Cajus in his last sickness so peevish and so full of frets at Cambridge when he suckt one woman whom I spare to name froward of conditions and of bad diet and contrariwise so quiet and well when he suckt another of contrary disposition verily the diversity of their milks and conditions which being contrary one to the other wrought also in him that sucked them contrary effects Now having shewed what milk is best and how to be chosen let us consider how it is to be taken and used of us First therefore if any naturally loath it as Petrus Aponensis did from the day of his birth it cannot possibly give him any good nourishment but perhaps very much hurt in offending nature If contrariwise any with Philinus love nothing else or with the poor Bizonians can get no other meat or with the Tartarians and Arabians feed most often and willingly on milk let them all remember these three lessons How Milk is to be eaten and used in time of health First that they drink or eat the milk of no horned beast unsodden for so will it not easily curdle nor engender wind but Womens milk Asses milk and Mares milk need no other fire to prepare it for it will never curdle into any hard substance Secondly to be sure that milk shall

Brabant they are eaten as the roots of Turneps and Parsneps boiled in flesh-broth which correcteth their binding quality and maketh them of good and wholesome nourishment Bulbocastanea Earth-chesnuts are far bigger then Earthnuts and the flowers of them are white where the others be red About Bath there is great plenty of them and they are of like nourishment and use with the Earthnuts Intubum sativum latifolium Endive especially that which hath the longest largest softest and whitest leaves is of good nourishment to hot stomachs not only cooling but also encreasing bloud if it be sodd in white broth till it be tender but if you eat it raw in salads as it is most commonly used then it only cooleth and lyeth heavy in the stomach because it is not freed from its crudities Vacinia palustria Fen-berries grow not only in Holland in low and moist places but also if I have not forgotten it in the Isle of Eli. They are of like temper and faculty with our whortles but somewhat more astringent Being eaten raw or stewed with sugar they are wholesome meat in hot burning fevers unto which either fluxes of humors or spending of spirits are annexed Likewise they quench thirst no less then Ribes and the red or outlandish Gooseberrie Mora Rubi Idaei Trambois or Raspis are of complexion like the Blackberry and Dewberry but not of so astringent nor drying quality Furthermore they are more fragrant to the Nose and more pleasant in taste and of far better nourishment to hot stomachs for cold stomachs cannot convert them into any good juice Allium Garlick was so odious or hurtful to Horace that he makes it more venemous then Hemlocks Adders bloud Medea's cups yea then the poison of Nessus the Centaure which killed Hercules Contrariwise the Thracians eat it every morning to breakfast and earry it with them in warfare as their chiefest meat Whereat we need not marvel considering the coldness of their Country and their phlegmatick constitution Let us rather wonder at the Spaniard who eats it more being a hot Nation then our labouring men do here in England Whereby we may see how preparation begetteth in every thing another nature for the Thracians eat it raw because of their extreme coldness but the Spaniard sodden first in many waters or else rosted under the embers in a wet paper whereby it is made sweet and pleasant and hath lost more then half of his heat and dryness Thus is Garlick medicine and meat medicine if it be eaten raw but meat and nourishment being rosted under the embers or stickt like lard in fat meat or boiled in many waters broths or milks By which way also his fuming and diuretical quality is much corrected Yet beware lest you eat too much of it lest it engender little worms in your flesh as it did in Arnulphus the Emperor whereof he died It is very dangerous to young children fine women and hot young men unless the headdy hot and biting quality thereof be extinguished by the foresaid means Cucurbitae Gourds eaten raw and unprepared are a very unwholesome food as Galen saith exceedingly cooling charging and loading the stomach and engendering crudities and wind But being boiled baked or fryed with butter it loseth his hurtfulness and giveth good nourishment to indifferent stomachs The seed of it being husked and boiled in new milke is counted very restorative in hectick fevers Grossulae Uvae crispae Gooseberries being thorough ripe are as nourishing as sweet and of the like temper not only encreasing flesh but also fatting the body They should be eaten first and not last because they are so light a fruit When they are almost ripe they are restorative being made into Codiniack or baked in Tarts Soure Gooseberries nourish nothing serving rather for sawce to please ones taste then to augment flesh Grossulae transmarinae Red Gooseberries or bastard Corinths commonly called Ribes of Apothecaries and taken of Dodonaeus for the Bears-berry of Galen is almost of the like nature with Gooseberries but more cold dry and astringent by one degree because they never wax sweet in our Country They are very cordial and cooling in Agues being eaten either in Conserve or Codiniack yea nourishing also to hot stomachs Lupularii asparagi Hop-shootes are of the same nature with Asparagus nourishing not a little being prepared in the like sort which is before described though rather cleansing and scouring of their own nature Alliaria Jack by the hedge as it is not much used in Medicines so it was heretofore a very ancient and common meat being therefore called Sawce alone Country men do boil it and eat it in stead of Garlick being no less strengthened and nourished by it then the Persian children were with Town-cresses I allow it not for indifferent stomachs unless it have been steept in divers warm waters and then be eaten as Garlick may be eaten moderately for it is hot and dry more then in the third degree Porra Leeks are esteemed so wholesome and nourishing in our Country that few thinke any good Pottage can be made without them That they engender bloud no author denies but they say it is gross hot and evil bloud Nevertheless if they be first sodden in milke and then used in meat they are unclothed of all bad qualities and become friendly to the stomach and nourishing to the liver The Grecians made such reckoning of Leeks as our Welsh men do yea he ever sate uppermost at Apollo's feast that brought thither the greatest headed Leek Some impute that to his mother Latona her longing for Leeks whilst she was with child of Apollo Others say that Apollo did so highly esteem them because they engender much bloud and seed whereby mankind is much encreased which opinion I like best of hearing and seeing such fruitfulness in Wales that few or none be found barren and many fruitful before their time Porrum sectivum Palladii The unset Leek or Maiden-leek is not so hot as the knopped ones because his fuming quality is diminished by often cutting Lactuca Lettice is not more usually then profitably eaten of us in Summer yea Galen did never eat of any other Garden herb save this for ought we read whereby he delayed the heat of his stomach in youth eating it formost and slept soundly and quietly in age eating it last It is better sodden then raw especially for weak stomachs and if any will eat it raw correct it with mingling a little Tarragon and Fennel with it The young loaft Lettice is simply best but you must not wash it for then it loseth its best and most nourishing vertue that lieth upon the outmost skin only pluck away the leaves growing near the ground till you come to the cabbage of the Lettice and it is enough Long use of Lettice causeth barrenness cooleth lust dulleth the eyesight weakeneth the body and quencheth natural heat in the stomach but moderately and duly taken of hot natures it encreaseth bloud seed