THE VANITIES OF Philosophy & Physic: TOGETHER WITH Directions and Medicines easily prepared by any of the lest Skill, whereby to preserve Health, and prolong Life, as well in those that live Regularly, as others that live Irregularly.  
Comprising moreover HYPOTHESES different from those of the Schools throughout almost the whole Art of Physic, and particularly relating to Indigestion, and other Diseases of the Stomach, Fevers, Consumption, Stone, Gravel, Suppression of Urine, Apoplexy, Palsy, Madness, Diseases of the Eyes, and others: With Variety of Medicines, and Rules whereby to make particular Choice out of them.  
The whole being a Work very useful to all, but especially to those that have any Relation to the Art of Physic.  
By GIDEON HARVEY, M. D. The KING's Physician to the TOWER.  
LONDON, Printed for A. Roper at the Black Boy, and R. Basset over against the King's Head, both in Fleetstreet; and W Turner, at the Angel, at Lincoln's-Inn back Gate, 1699.   

THE INTRODUCTION.  
HEre is no stout Dedication to any Illustrissimo for a Protector, who beyond all peradventure knows nothing at all of the matter; and tho' you should flatter him with all the hyperboles of his Family or Ancestors, and of his great Endowments and heroic Virtues, yet he would think himself not paid in full, for lending of his Name to adorn your Frontispiece. The motive of publishing this Tract, is not the intercession of Friends; for none of 'em ever had the view of any part of it. Neither would I be so unfortunate to please many of the Faculty; for that must infallibly draw upon me the Envy and Hatred of Ten times the number, besides Calumnies and Reflections▪ The chief inducement proceeds from an inclination to Mankind, to instruct them, to preserve and prolong their Lives; thereby to prevent them from using fraudulent Quack Medicines, (which are now become so Universally vendible among them) or advising with such as are wholly Ignorant, and consequently very bold. I do in no wise pretend in these following Sheets, to make a Lecture to the Learned; tho' I should think myself sufficiently rewarded for my pains, if I could arrive to the point of advancing the Art of Physic, by offering to them my Observations on the pretended and fallacious Methodus medendi, depending upon false Indications (received for true) abstracted from Diseases and their Causes, and by proposing the trials I have made of the best and most celebrated Remedies, which upon diligent inquiry in my thoughts I could not found to have contributed any thing towards the curing of Diseases, and tho' removed upon the use of 'em, I am certain aught to be ascribed only to time and strength of Nature, and to be termed Curing Diseases by Expectation. Besides, I hope by making so great a number of Doubts, and moving as many Difficulties, to have done some Service to the Art, in giving learned Men the occasion to remove them, and to take seriously into their consideration, whether all, or most part, and indeed any part of what the Ancients have transmitted to us concerning Diseases, and their pretended Remedies recited in their Books, and by others afterwards compiled into Dispensatories, aught to be received by us with an implicit Faith, so as to doubt lesle of the truth of them, than of those fine Histories of an Alexander, or a Caesar.  
After all, I must tell you, a Self-interest prevailed very much with me in the printing of this, which is, that writing an ill hand, and being puzzled sometimes to read it, and the Matter not digested into any sort of order, I might have a more easy recourse to my own Thoughts and Sentiments, being expressed in Characters more legible, and so disposed, that I could than more readily turn to them.  
I do also think myself obliged to take notice, that in the following Discourse I have very much receded from those Opinions written by me in former Treatises, whereinto the almost universally received Doctrines of Authors, and my neglect of examining of them rationally and experimentally, had led me, as you may more particularly observe hereafter, for all which Terence in Adelphis, Act. v. Sc. iv. seems to make a sufficient Apology, viz.  
Nunquam i●● quisquam bene subducta ratione ad vitam fuit,  
Quin res, aetas, usus semper aliquid apportet novi,  
Aliquid moneat: Ut illa, quae te s●ire credas, nescias,  
E●, quae tibi puta●is prima, in experiundo ut repudies.  
The Sense in English is; That no Man ever made so exact a Caculation of matters in his life time, but either the occasion of things, or length of Years, or Experience, doth offer something that's new; and gives you to understand, that what you thought you knew very well, you do not know at all; and causes you by making trials to reject that, which before you did most approve of. This I must own to have found true in myself, and particularly in reference to continual putrid Fevers, which are most common in France, and malignant Fevers most frequent in England, very few of the former being observed here. I did as near I could imitate the generality of Practisers in curing of them; I advised Bleeding as frequently as others, tho' nothing near so frequently as now they do, which is a far greater Error in malignant Fevers (as most of ours are) than in those, commonly called Continual Putrid Fevers; not forgetting cooling Apozems and juleps, that alloy the heat, and abate Thirst; sweeting juleps and Powders to drive out the Heat, that is, those nitrosulphureous and bituminous Particles that might occasion that heat, as I than thought, and not neglecting Glistering and Blistering; for I did observe, that whoever died without the application of Spanish Flies, the Vulgar did most certainly impute the Cause of that Man's death to the ignorance or neglect of the Physician, in not applying of the Tormentors. Upon the calculation of the whole matter (as Terence saith) I found by length of years, that caeteris paribus, as many as were not physically treated, recovered, and in some Seasons many more recovered than thos● that had been often Blooded, Cordialed and Sweated, Glystered and Blistered: Which wrought this Opinion in me, that all the Hypotheses of Fevers, whether seemingly true or false, were of no manner of service, to ground the practical part upon; for even ●ow do what you can, the Fever walks on from the Beginning through the Augment to the State, and if the Patient hath not been over-blooded, or preposterously purged, he may pass through the Declination to a condition of health. This being seriously observed by me, put me upon forming a different Hypothesis, and Indications conformable to it, whereunto the Indicata, or Remedies responding do evidently and sensibly abate the Cause and Symptoms, without suffering the Fever to run up to a state. I have bad very lately occasion to make observation upon a sort of malign Fever, that was popular about us. They were generally taken with Coughs, Drowsiness, movable joint-pains, commonly termed Rheumatic Pains; some did spit Blood, and afterwards Matter; they were for the greatest part free fr●m Drought, their Urinal of a good colour with a whitish Sediment, the Pulse slower than usually in the state of health. They generally said they ailed nothing, they were not sick, but they had gotten a great Cold, tho' they were suddenly reduced to the greatest weakness. Those that upon their own heads, were blooded after the fourth day, or were Blooded more than once died. Others that were blooded sparingly once within the two first days, sensibly recovered upon the using of an uncommon Antifebril Medicine. Another Mistake I have often taken notice of imp●r●ing, that what is expectorated by Patients properly Consumptive, by reason of an Ulcer in the Wind pipe, or the Bronchia (for it is not frequently observed to be in the Lungs) attended with an Hectic Fever, is all pus, or a materia purulenta, which is not possible; for should all that thick glary green●●s●, yellowish, and sometimes whitish matter be pus, that's expectorated by such, which I have seen hath exceeded the measure of a quart, and more, in four and twenty hours, it would exceed the quantity of forty or fifty very large external Ulcers, though situated near great Vessels; so that I conceive there is only some purulent matter mixed with a slime corrupted, and putrefied to an extremity, and therefore that commonly is not only attended with a stink, but all their breathing out of their Lungs, and Pores of the ambient Skin, stinks, as doth also their Victuals, if by chance they hap to vomit them up. Wherhfore I do apprehended, that all the Humours in their Vessels are corrupted and stink, and that all their Bowels are tainted: So that the French have no other word to denominate a Consumptive, than Pourie, which signifies rotten: Were it only an Ulcer, the Difficulty would not be very extraordinary, that being easily cured; for we see daily, that the Ulcers occasioned by a Pleurisy, and a Peripneumonia, are often cured very speedily of themselves, without administering any Medicines. To pretend to cure a Confirmed Consumptive, is equal to make a new Man, new Bowels, and new Humours: It is in the beginning only this Disease admits of a Cure, and which must be performed with Remedie● very uncommon.  
Before I leave this Subject, I aught to obviate a very considerable Objection, viz. A Stinking Brea●h, which some are affected with during the whole Course of their Lives, to a degree, that they are capable to perfume a whole Room, is commonly supposed to proceed from putrefyed or rotten Lungs, notwithstanding is seldom or never attended with an Hectic Fever; and as incurable as it is, is not accompanied with a rotten Cough, nor doth it taint the Bowels, nor infect the whol● Mass with Putrefaction; and therefore an Ulcer in the Lungs, Aspera Arteria, and Bronchia, cannot import that Danger, nor infect the Bowels and Humours with a Stink and Putrefaction, as the foregoing Discourse seems to insinuate. This Difficulty is easily removed: That sort of Stinking Breath, which is here instanced, doth not proceed from the lest Putrefaction of the Lungs▪ for very often those Persons so affected have very sound Lungs▪ breathe well and free, live to a great Age, and digest their Victuals very well; which is a sign also t●at neither the Stomach can be suspected to steem up such a lasting ungrateful Fum●, tho' it must be granted, that a stinking Breath may for a time be occasioned by Steams, arising from a foul Slyme in the Stomach, corrupting there, and relaxing the upper Orifice so, as it doth not close so exactly as it aught: But this is soon cured, by clearing the Stomach by a Vomit, or Purge. You are therefore to apprehended, that the Cause of a perennal Stinking Breath in those healthful Persons, is to be imputed to Slyme ousing daily and hourly out of the Glanduls of the Throat, and harboured in some deep small hollowness or crevice near the Tonsils, and sometimes on the backside of the Uuula, either towards the Right or Left Tonsil, where being kept long, and constantly meeting there with a putrid Slyme that was left there before, doth corrupt and putrefy the Slyme that ouseth thither every Moment: The Breath of the Lungs passing by, carrieth those putrid Steems with it, and so causeth that Stinking Breath, which is but very little amended by sweet perfumed Lozenges, chawing of Orange-peel, Spices, or sweet Confects. The only Palliative Remedy is, to use a strong abstersive penetrating Gargarism four or five times in a Day, especially in the Morning soon after rising, and at other times after eating and drinking, made of a good quantity of Wormwood-tops, Century-flowers, Orange-peel and juniper-berries, boiled in Vinegar, or White-wine, sharpened with Spirit of Sulphur. This, by piercing into that Crevice, or Hollowness, and wiping of the putrid Slyme, removes the Cause, and renders the Breath very tolerable for a considerable Interval, and by chance may in time wholly cure it, tho' commonly it is incurable.  
To conclude; I do wish, that what I have published in these following Papers may be as serviceable to others, as I do conceive (if I am not under a Mistake) they are, and ●ave been to me.   

THE VANITIES OF Philosophy and Physic.  

CHAP. I. Representing some Vanities of common Receipts, Herbs and Herbals.  
1. THo' all Nations are imbued with various Specific Qualifications, wherein each differ from the other, yet that of Credulity, or an easy rash and inconsiderate belief may be conceived, to be universal to Mankind, and to which not improbably aught to be imputed the sequel of the most frequent and greatest Errors, Deceits, and Impostures, most Men are daily and hourly plunged in, as the source and spring of all, as may be plainly Evidenced in each of the three subsequent Faculties, I mean Divinity, Law, and Physic. The Popish, Mahometan, Sun, Moon, and Devil Worshipping Religions, embraced by such innumerable Multitudes, also all Heresies, Schisms, pretended Witchcrafts, Sorceries, and Exorcisms, howsoever erroneous, imposing, and deceitful these all may be censured, ●low from no other head or fountain, than an easy inconsiderate belief given to the insinuations of cunning subtle little Priests; And he that gives a precipitant credit to the Language of a Seller of Lands, Houses, or other Merchandizes, doth not rarely repent his rash belief, especially when he adds to his error, his too easy acceptance of relief, from the doubtful remedies of a vulgar Lawyer: But it is the third Topick beforementioned, is designed for the chief subject of the present Discourse, which I shall endeavour to explain in its extent.  
2. That most of Men do very readily take upon trust any Remedy, or receipt, that is confidently recommended to them, can scarce be contradicted; and their fond passion in the inconsiderate belief of 'em is so great, that without any loss of time, they are to be Registered in their Book of Receipts, handed to them possibly by their Grannam, and Archive like to be locked up in their Desk, secured in a locked Closet, within a locked Room. Three such Locks being broke open by a Notorious Thief, Stole thence a Hundred Pounds in Moneys numbered, and a Book of manuscript Receipts finely covered. The party injured condoled the loss of his Remedy-Manuscript to such a degree, that it wholly drowned the loss of his Moneybag, which he would readily have compounded for the restoring of the Book, which the blank paper in it excepted, would have been overvalued at Twopences.  
3. The next recital coming within my knowledge, will give you a farther taste of this sort of foolish Credulity. The Servant of a Linen-draper had so great an Interest in her Mistress, as to borrow out of her Husband's Closet a Book of scribbled Receipts, which through a Communicative kindness to one of my Maid-Servants, was entrusted with her to be Transcribed; but the Master daily conversing in his Closet, soon miss what he so frequently eyed, and valued above all what was in it; upon a strict enquiry after the matter, his Wife as soon qualified his uneasiness, by acqainting him where this valuable Treatise was to be found, who not long after accosted my Maid several days, being delayed for want of an opportunity of Transcribing. The person being tired by unsatisfactory answers, resolved to disclose to me the cause of his so frequent Conferences with this Menial of mine; and promising to use my Authority with her, I did not doubt, but I should oblige him with the return of his Book next Morning at a certain Hour, at which time precisely he came, when I did not fail to discharge my promise, in repossessing him with his Book, which he received from me with all the respectful Reverence, that Hands and Knees could express. You will not judge it improbable, that my Curiosity should lead me to inspect these Papers, which to the best of my Memory contained an excellent way to Stew a Calves-Head with Oysters, another to make Fritters, and some other pieces of Cookery; also a Salve for Chilblains, a Plaster for all sort of Swell, an infallible Drink for the Stone, a most certain Remedy against a Consumption, and all sorts of Coughs of the Lungs, being a Syrup jumbled of most strange Materials. Varieties of other Infallibilities of Remedies equally foolish I pass by, and shall only remark the immensity of this Man's belief, by his Mournful Countenance, whilst his Book of Secrets was absent from him, and to what serenity he was restored upon his reinstatement.  
4. Suppose one of these Medicines were to be taken out of this Magazine of Health, and to be applied against a Consumption, Stone, or any thing else, the failure he would most certaintly attribute to the want of some of the Ingredients, their too long being gathered, too much or too little being boiled, or to a hundred other Miscarriages, insomuch, that it would not give the lest shock to the stability of his belief, which might not be singular in this person, but general in thousands.  
5. It would by many be Censured an Usury in a person, that from the Expense of thirty or forty Shillings, in the purchase of a Gerard's Herbal, or such like picture Book, he should expect such an excessive Interest for his Money, as the value of knowing the faces and virtues of so many hundreds, or rather thousands of Plants doth amount to: And indeed the Bargain of that Plant-Book would prove extraordinary Cheap, did what is contained in the hundredth part of it, answer to Truth in matter of Fact, which gives me occasion to make this Inference; that Herbals are sitter for Gardiners than Physicians, in furnishing the former with a Scheme of Figures of so many thousand Weeds there described, and consequently to throw them out of their Manures, as Absorbers of the juice of the Earth, that should give Nourishment to their Esculents. However, to prevent contradicting the Old Phrase, Natura nihil facit frustra, it may not untruly be affirmed, that the generality of Herbs growing in Fields, Meadows, and Hills, Nature seemed chief designed to bestow upon Beasts. It would therefore be an Employment sitter for Boys, that love Rambling and santring about Fields, and Hedges, to go upon Simpling, (as our Botanists do term it,) than for Men, to make such needless, and not unchargeable Journeys, to the remotest Hills, and Woods, only to be acquainted with some New faces of Plants, and take the Portrait of 'em, to be placed together in some bulky Volume, whose immensurable industry doth no more than equal those, that have taken the pains to abstract the Pictures of variety of Beasts, Fishes, Birds, Flies, and other Infects, in the manner of Aldrovandus and his Mimics, who in that sort have passed their Lives in doing of nothing.  
6. What respect is paid to Hypocrates and Galen, for their Services in Medicine, and to Geber or Paracelsus in Chemistry, Dioscorides may Challenge in Herbary, he being by Profession an Old Soldier, and worn out by the Fatigues of Campaigns, with the assistance of his Crutches and Stump made a shift to Perambulate Woods, Hills, and Dales, in pursuit of Herbs and Weeds, with a design to get his Bre●d, by Experimental Application in the Cure of Diseases, wherein be attained the success of Gypsies, that by foretelling the ignorant their good or bad luck, sometimes hit, and sometimes miss. Their casual hitting gives them Reputation enough, to persuade people, that their missing is occasioned by their misunderstanding the South-Sayer's Predictions, or their own forgetfulness of what was told them, so that many do readily believe these Gypsies to be never failing Prognosticators, not unlike Dioscorides his Herbal performances, who by his green Remedies observing some Disease's disappearing, made no doubt of ascribing their Cure to 'em, and as boldly to hand the Probatums to succeeding Ages, which as confidently without the lest scruple, even to this day do receive them, not thinking that length of time, change and spareness of Diet, alteration of the Air and Season, universal and particular evacuations might perform the main part; the Truth of which seems by many instances to appear to me. That Betony, Rosemary, Sage, Lavender, Mother of Time, French Lavender, Peony, May-Lilly, Lime-Tree-Flowers, and the like, upon the use of 'em, by direction of the Learned, for many Days, Weeks, and Months, have failed in the Cure of Headaches, Tremble, Swimming of the Brain, Convulsions, and other Distempers of the Head, can best be attested by the Advisers; though it cannot be denied, that some of these Diseases have gone of in very few, upon the application of the foresaid Vegetables; but whether to be imputed to the virtue of these, may be matter of inquiry: However, hit once and miss a hundred times, is a sign of no great infallibility.  
7. That a Million of Consumptives labouring of an ulcerous Disposition of the Lungs, have been frustrated by a very long use of Ground-Ivy, Maidenhair, Hyssop, Scabious, Lungwort, Coltsfoot, Sanicle, Golden-Rod, Ladies-Mantle, Bugle, and forty more, though used in all the forms and shapes; is sufficiently recorded in most of the Churchyards of this Island.  
8. The Stone-grinding and Piss-driving-Herbs, as Saxifrage, Maidenhair, Spe●dwell, Horseradish, Fennil, Persly, Broom, Gromwell, Daucus, Butchers-Broom, Cicers, Winter-Cherries, and the rest, are not much depended upon by those, that have made trial of 'em for four or five Months successively, though now and than one or other, that hath fancied a great relief, doth revive their dying Reputation. These and the like instances do aptly compare the practice of Physic to a Lottery, where one Fortunate Adventurer saves the sinking credit of that Cheating Mystery, against a hundred blank Miscreants, by being proclaimed such by sound of Trumpet.  
9 To Madder, and many other Vegetables is ascribed Opening, Stopping, Binding, curing of the Jaundice, removing Obstructions of all sorts, suppressing the Menstrua, Loosenesses, and all sorts of Bleedings, besides many other feats, that are contrary to each other. As for Annulets and other Transplanting and wondered deeds, theyare appropriated toabundance of Plants, of which, and several Physic Golden Legends the Herbarists speak wonders, if you can believe them. As for my own particular, beyond forty or fifty Vegetables, tho' I have made trial of hundreds of 'em, I found no great occasion for them, and therefore shall supersede taking any farther notice in this place.   

CHAP. II. Of the insignificancy of the Old and New Philosophy.  
1. THings in Philosophy and Medicine, which we do not know, are beyond all manner of Comparison more than those things we do know.  
2. The greatest part of those things in Medicine, which we pretend to know, is conjectural, and uncertain.  
3. Many, if not most of these things, which we do peremptorily affirm to be this, or that, to be caused by this, or that, or to cause and effect this or that, are, or may be proved, to be false, ●r erroneous.  
These Positions being only my particular Creed, whereinto the weakness of my capacity hath been wrought by thousands of instances, I shall undertake to offer only some few, the shortness of my purpose no otherwise permitting.  
1. Natural Philosophy is propounded under Two Heads, viz.. Physica generalis, & specialis; that is to say, General Natural Philosophy, and particular. The former expounds in general terms, what a Natural Body is, namely, That it is a thing extended, moved, or quiet, figured, and so or so placed, Situated, or posited. Corpus Naturale est res quanta, mota, vel quieta, figurata, & taliter, v●l taliter posita.  
2. What is all this but Metaphysics, namely, general Notions drawn from all particular Bodies? A Natural Body doth consist of Quantity, that is, extension into length, breadth, and depth, mensurability, or divisibility into Particles, (it's much as one in the Original,) of motion, or rest, of figure, and position or situation. Upon these five Topics follows a very long Cant, and of little more signification than the Predicaments, or Materia, Forma, and Privatio. But it's a wonder to my crude Thoughts, Number was jest out, since there is no complete Natural Body, but doth consist of a definite number of Particles; however ever it may be presumed, that Number is comprehended under Extension, sc. Quantitas discreta.  
3. The Physica Specialis depends upon the application of the forementioned, to every Subgenus, Species, and particular Body, and by that you are to know, what any particular Body is, of what it doth consist, and how each is differenced from the other.  
4. What sound this modern Science of Bodies makes upon an anvil, the following recital will inform you. A Smith being very sedulous in the management of his hot Iron, found himself much interrupted by the importunities of a begging Scholar, enforcing his Argument for an Alms of a small piece, with an Harangue of his Merits, arising from his being a Master of Arts, of I know not how many years standing, a Doctor in Philosophy, embroidered with Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and abundance of other Giblets of Learning. The Smith to free himself of all this impertinence, asks, what that read hot thing was, he held in his Tongues, what it was made of, and what difference there was between that and Copper; to which the Beggar replied, it was Iron, a Metal, or a Business dug out of the Groun●, that will melt, and can be hammered; and so is Copper, infers the Smith; Ergo, Copper is Iron. No Master, saith the Medicant, there is a vast discrepancy between them in their insensible particles, which are of different insensible extensions, insensible figures, insensible positions, insensible motions, and insensible immobilities. Ergo, than saith the black opponent, not two Bodies can be alike, two drops of Milk, of Water, of Wine, or any liquid may be insensibly different. Thou art a most insensible Philosopher, a Man is not a Horse, a Sow is not an Elephant, Wood is not Ch●ese, and so of all others, because their Particles are of various insensible figures, positions, etc. The most subtle Particles of the Forge fire, and the insensibilities of this Art's Master, had by this time fermented Vulcan into a torrent of Maledictions, crying out, you are a Cheat, to defraud the impotent poor of what, they may justly crave from the Charity of all Men; a lazy, slothful, unthankful Knave, enjoying the fruits of thy laborious Mother Earth, without returning the gratitude of a days Ploughing, or Dunging, which you are made for; an incorrigible sturdy Beggar; see how the sleeves of your totterdemalion Gown are crammed from the Elbow to the Ground with Piecrust, and pieces of Roast-Beef, and what's here in the bottom? a couple of Silver Spoons, two laced Handkerchiefs wet, as if newly stolen of of some Hedge. You pilfering Dog, disrobe that Friar Bacon's Livery, of with your square pancake Bonnet, and put on that Old Coat of mine there, and this Old Hat; blow the Bellowss, and I will teach you an Art beyond all your Mastership's idle soppish Arts, and Sciences, that shall get you an honest Livelihood, or else away to the House of Correction, that will soon drive out your insensible Particles, and make you sensible of what it is to Beg, Cheat, Pilfer, and Steal.  
5. To what degree of satisfaction this Globular sort of Philosophy, pretending by its insensibilities to explicate the principles, causes, and affections of natural Bodies, doth superate the old pedantic Sophistry of matter, ●orm, privation, and the four Elements, together with their assigning the effects of natural Bodies to occult qualities, may justly be inquired into, since the answer is equal, that such or such things are caused by occult qualities, or by insensible Particles, of insensible blind figures, and unknown positions. However, both the Globular and Peripatetic Philosophy afford matter sufficient to Chatter, Cavil, and trifle away the flower of a Man's time, as if designed only for an Employment to divert from Idleness and Debauchery, not unlike sending Children to School, to prevent them from Carts and Coaches in the Streets or Highways. Those do properly enough come within the saying of Sallust. Vitam silentio veluti pecora transeunt; especially when continuing in an University, and possibly in a Fellowship, till their Bodies are grown rusty with Sloth and Laziness, and their Heads turned mouldy with grey Hairs, whose Studies indeed aught to have been determined in seven Years, were it only to quicken their Industry, and make way for other indigent Students to succeed them. A Peacock in all his gaudy Plumage is a Creature lesle stately and proud, than a Master of Arts treading to the Schools in his Formalities; and though Homage be paid him in his way thither by Undergraduates, and Bachelerios, his resined Manners will scarce allow his Mastership to ●ouch the angl● of his Bonnet. Clarissime M●gister quare rides? Rideo, quia Magister sum.   

CHAP. III. Of the Digestion and Indigestion in the Stomach, and the vanity of the cause thereof.  
IT might be reasonably expected from the Tradition of so many Ages, and the Studies of six or twelve Months of so many Masters of Arts of seven Years standing or walking, before they assume the tusted Gown, that Galen's Theory would be rendered as Diaphanous, and demonstrable as Euclid; yet to my dim Oculation, Many, if not most of their Notions, seem still to be plunged in a dark Chaos; for as obvious as the Digestion of the Food in the Stomach may be, though it be the first Operation in the Body of Man, and therefore aught to be better understood, yet to me seems now, nothing can be worse explained, than by asserting the dissolution into Chyle, to be performed by the natural and adventitious heat of the Stomach, brought to it by the Arteries and warm cover of the Liver, Spleen, and other adjacents. A Share, Sea-Wolf, and other Fish, if Credit may be given to all those Writers of India Voyages have been found to contain in their Bellies a whol● Man, being thrown overboard, with all his clothes upon him, great Joints of stinking Beef, with their huge Ox Bones in them, and Carcases of Sheep with their Wool on their Backs, all which were discerned almost digested into a thick slimy Juice, without observing any sensible heat, but rather coldness. The like may in proportion be instanced in a fresh water Share, I mean the Pike, whose vigour in digesting an Ox paunch, and other Garbage, likewise Boney Fish of considerable bigness, without any sensible heat in their Bowels, or any steaming warmth, is an Argument, that enforceth the former. The heat in the Maws of Poultry, which is inferior to that of the Stomach of a Man, cannot be conceived in any wise proportionable, to dissolve the husks of Barley or Oats, and especially small pebbles, which the extremity of Fire may melt, but not dissolve, and yet the heat of the Stomach of a Horse, though much more intense, doth make much lesle impression upon Grain, which commonly slip away untouched with their Dung. It hath likewise been decided by common observation, that those who heat their Stomach at Meals with Wine, or soon after with Brandy, have a more difficult Digestion than others, who moisten their Victuals with small Beer, Wine diluted with Water, or only Water, as is usual to three fourth's of the Universe.  
2. Neither am I convinced, that those who ●scribe the Energy of Concoction to an Acid ●erment, have in any wise hit their Mark; for considering fermentation imports properly an insensible, and in some things a sensible small ebullition or simpering of any natural, or artificial, mixed, or compound liquid, soft, or consistent Body, which by rarefaction, or widening and opening the close parts, doth let out, or expel such particles, or bodies, that are Heterogeneous, whereby a depu●ation of the said mixed body is attained: And if this rarefaction, or widening, and multiplying of the pores of the Body, be protracted to too long a continuance, or performed with too great violence, the most subtle particles of that body, which are the chief constituents of it, are forced, or let out together with the Heterogeneous, whereupon a dissolution, putrefaction and corruption of the whole mixture must necessarily ensue, as appears in the fermentation of Wine, Beer, Cider, etc. which being raised too high, or continued too long, doth most certainly convert them into Vinegar. Dow, by yist or levain, is huft up (or in the common phrase doth rise) or rarefied, that is, opened, or widened in all its pores, and often multiplied, whereby the most subtle particles, or matter of the fire (being the heat of the Oven) is let in, which together with the constituent most subtle particles of the Dow, do expel the nitrous, and other heterogeneous slimy parts, which otherwise would prove very offensive to the Stomach, and in some be rendered indigestible. Now if the Dow continued too long in rising, or rise too fast, it soon falls, and is apt to turn sour, and being than put into the Oven, can never b● well baked, and doth in a short time turn mouldy.  
3. To say than, that Bones, Gristles, or any other hard matter, is rarefying in a Dog's stomach, meaning thereby fermenting, and consequently digesting, to me seems a very improper way of speaking; for fermentation doth in my Opinion ever follow Solution, in order to depu●ate and tender homogeneous, what is dissolved; how than can those Bones be said to be fermenting before they are dissolved and digested?  
4. It is to the Spittle many Physicians of good Fame do attribute the chief, or rather sole power of dissolving the Victuals into Chyle, by raising a Fermentation in the Meat and Drink, that's swallowed down into the Stomach; for being chawed, crushed, rolled, and turned about in the Mouth, it's mixed with such a proportion of Spittle, which by its Spirits and salive Particles, assisted somewhat by the native and ambient hea● of the Stomach, penetrating through the pores of the Victuals, raises a sort of a small Ebullition, whereby they are dissolved. But if you consider the nature and use of Spittle, probably this matter may appear otherwise. Spittle cannot properly be called an Excrement, which is of no use, and aught to be thrown out and expelled; but a Recrement, which is of use and aught not to be expelled, unless it be abounding, and after it hath performed what its intended for▪ Horses, Cows, and other Animals have their Mouths and Throat always moistened with Spittle, but which is seldom or n●ver expelled by them by spuration, as very often it is by the Human kind, when it's become superfluous; which is an Argument, it's no Excrement. The use of it to me appears, to moisten the several parts of the Mouth, Gullet, and Windpipe, and to keep them constantly glib, smooth, and soft; for otherwise the Tongue and Jaws by their frequent motion, and the steams that continually pass out of the Lungs in the expiration, would tender those parts so dry, stiff, rough, and unpliable, that they would become useless. The Windpipe would be so corrugated and contracted, that it would put a stop to the respiration; the Gullet would likewise through want of Spittle suffer such a straightening and roughness, that it would be utterly incapable to give passage to the Victuals. Touching the nature of Spittle, it is in no wise different from Lympha, which is contained in other Lymphducts, the Ductus Salivales being no other, and as long as it continues in the said Ductus, it's much fuller of volatile saline Spirits, which renders it limpid, fluid, and thin; but being come to the Mouth and the other parts, out of the said Ductus, those volatile saline Spirits do soon evaporate, and fly away, whereby the Spittle becomes thick, mucilaginous, and often frothy, by the admixture of extraneous Air, and other slimy Particles, it meets about the Mouth and Throat. So that if Spittle be of this nature, it must rather hinder fermentation, and consequently the pretended solution into Chyle, which that it doth, is manifest in those Melancholians, that are commonly termed Spitters, who generally have a very bad Digestion. But suppose a Man that abounds with Spittle, should spit a quantity of it warm out of his Mouth into a warm bolt head hermetically closed, containing a small bit of Meat, that had been well grinded in a warm Mortar, and than this mixture being put into a warm sand Bath, do you believe, here would hap either a fermentation, ebullition, or solution into Chyle, though it were to continued there six Weeks? Or, suppose a Man should swallow several great lumps of Flesh without chawing of it, or mixing it with his Spittle, do you not think, he would digest it into a Chyle, though it might take up some longer time, than if his Meat was chawed? What Spittle doth a Shar● or Pike mix with those great pieces of Flesh and Bones, which they swallow without chawing, and yet digest them sooner, than any other Creature could, as they are in the Water?  
4. That the Lympha in all the Lymphducts, (and the Spittle also though more sparingly) is perfused with some remaining proportion of volatile saline (that is Animal) Spirits, appears to me by the similitude of Argument, for establishing the circulation of the Blood out of the Arteries into the Veins, and thence into the Arteries again. The chief motive to me being, that the Heart throwing at every Pulsation such proportions of Blood into the Arteries, these must of necessity swell to an extremity and burst, were there not other Vessels, namely, the Veins, ready to receive and unload the Arteries; as for the swelling of the Arteries on the side towards the Trunc, and of the Veins towards the extremities of the Body, upon a Ligature made on any of the Joints; or the Arterial Blood upon Arteriotomy slowing from the Trunc, and the Venal Blood upon Phlebotomy flowing towards the Trunc, would scarce be persuasive enough to me to receive that Doctrine, since other Reasons might be given for those different Intumescencies upon a Ligature, or the different issuing out of the Blood out of the Arteries and Veins. In like manner I do suppose, that the Nervous Lympha, which is the Vehicle, and containing Liquor of the Animal Spirits, is always flowing or dripping from the Brain, and Medulla Spinalis to most parts of the Body through the Nerves; and cannot be supposed to return back again naturally, which therefore must of necessity extremely swell, and stiffen the Nerves, unless received and disburdened by some other Vessels, which in all probability must be Lymphducts, containing in substance, tenuity, clearness, penetrative virtue, and other qualities, a Lympha not unlike the gleet, that distils from a wounded nerve. Moreover, considering the valves in the said Lymphducts, opening towards the Trunc, and shutting towards the extremities, doth add to the apparency of the forementioned supposition, implying there is a circulation of the Animal Spirits and Lympha. The foresaid Lympha being received by the Lymphducts, must necessarily be much impoverished in its volatile saline Spirits, and consequently have lost its power of apporting of motion and sense, though otherwise of very great use.  
5. Neither can I conceive, that the Stomach is capable to contain any Acid juice powerful enough to dissolve Bones, Gristles, Sinews, Skin, and all sorts of Flesh without hurt, and danger of perforating its membranes, being much softer and easier to be dissolved, than Bones or Sinews. If you pour the strongest Vinegar, or Aqua fortis, upon those edibles beforementioned, and set them over any degree of Fire in a Vessel, stopped as close as if Hermetically Sealed, for the space of ten or twelve Hours, you will scarce found any Solution, or at lest not comparable, to what a sound Stomach performs in two or three Hours. Moreover, where ●ny person by sour Belches perceives his Stomach to be charged with a sour juice, his Victuals will scarce be digested, or dissolved into a good Chyle, but into that sort of slime, which Physicians term Cruditas acida. And I have frequently observed, that many upon Drinking sour Beer, or eager Wines, or using sour Sauces to their Victuals, have not only undergone a very laborious and painful digestion, but ofttimes been forced to throw up their whole Cargo.  
6. The Stomach doth sometimes receive such sorts of aliment, as Pudding, Pancake, Custard, tansy, Minced-Pie, Plum-Broath, Plum-Cakes, and the like, which in most persons will ferment, and be rarefied to a degree, that will huff up, distend, and swell not only the region of the Stomach and Hypochonders, but also their whole Belly, to an extension and uneasiness, that will oblige them to unbutton, and widen their wasteband. Those recited, and the like edibles, containing a fermentative spirit in them, seldom fail in fermenting, during which, as it suspends, or at lest retards the Concoction, (notwithstanding they seem matters so easily digestible, and incomparatively lesle difficult than Beef, Pork, etc.) yet the solution cannot, or is seldom performed with vigour, until the for●said fermentation ceases, which is perceived by the subsiding and relaxing of their drum bellies. Hence it is, that many do found, they cannot digest so easily upon drinking bitter or sour Small-beer, or strong Ale, Beer, or Wine, as a small alish smooth Beer, Water, or Wine and Water, because the former contain such a large proportion of fermentative spirits. And it is upon the same consideration, that new Drink not being sufficiently cleared of its yist, and other feculencies, proves so offensive to digestion.  
7. Since I can in no wise apprehended the dissolution of Victuals in the Stomach to be caused by heat, fermentation, or any cutting corroding acid juice, not more than Gold, which the extremity of heat will melt, and not dissolve, nor will a strong corroding Aqua Fortis touch it, yet a small proportion of fluid Mercury, (which in that form hath no manner of a corrosive sharpness in it,) with the assistance of a very little warmth, doth in a short interval of time very expeditiously and potently, by its most subtle particles insinuating into its pores, though more close than in any body whatsoever besides its self, tore it asunder, dissolve, and divide it into the minutest particles. In the same manner I do conceive, that all sorts of Victuals, be they hard or soft, are as easily and readily digested in strong and sound Constitutions, by the most subtle saline particles of the Body, (which are the Animal spirits) steaming in clouds out of those large Nerves of the sixth pair, that are inserted into the Stomach, and their numerous branches that are disseminated through its tunics, which forcing into the pores of the alimentary substances, rare them asunder, divide, and dissolve them into the minutest particuls, and being mixed with the moisture of your Drink, are converted into that juice we call Chyle, Hereunto the warmth of the Stomach derived from the Arteries, and cirrounding Bowels, is very assistant, though it hath been often observed, that some whose Stomach hath been commonly felt very cold by t●ems●lv●s, yet nevertheless had a very potent digestive faculty, that would subdue the hardest and rawest of meats.  
8. Now when the inward coat of the Stomach (Tunica rugosa) is covered with too much slime, (for it is necessary it should be covered with a little, to defend it from the sharpness and roughness of all sorts of Victuals it receives) so as to stop and plaster up the pores of the Nerves, whereby the foresaid most subtle saline Particles are in some propotion hindered from flying out, the digestion becomes slow, laborious, painful, and difficult, confecting a slimy chyle, which in process of time doth turn into many sorts of Diseases.  
9 Of those that drink thick, austere, or adstringent Wines at, or soon after Meals, or close their repasts with Quince-Marmelade, Chestnuts, Almonds, or the like, I have experimentally found, that in many, to whom either the lessening the use, or wholly weaning themselves from those Things, hath been advised, their digestion hath been soon reduced to its former Vigour, which before, by the continual closing of the Pores of the Stomach-Nerves, was exceedingly debilitated, by the foresaid cloging, and adstringent things.  
10. It is likewise as consonant to experience, that those who usually drink any Wines, not being diluted with Water, or that commonly conclude their Dinners or Suppers with Banquets of Sweetmeats, Custards, Chescakes, Creams, and Gelies, do weaken, and in time destroy their Concoction, so as few of them are found to be long livers; because those beforementioned materials containing a fermentative Juice, by raising a Fermentation, do extremely interrupt and impede the dissolution of Aliments in their Stomaches. Those Fermentations in the Stomach, upon Fermentative Edibles, are frequently causes, that produce those flushings in the Face soon after M●als, and at other times in many Women, and some Men that have weak Digestions, and contain something in their Stomaches that is Fermentable, against which drinking of Water, or Water mixed with very little Wine, hath often proved an effectual remedy.  
11. Some that have for several Years been afflicted after Meals with pain and disturbances in their Heads, drowsiness, uneasiness in their Limbs, palpitations, faintnesses, belches, huffings up, and tensions in their Hypochonders, and Bellies, have been totally cured of all their turbulent Symptoms, by throwing of all Malt-drinks, and Wine, and gradually using themselves to drink Water, when all other remedies were so far from giving them relief, that they rather aggravated their complaints. But what is more, it hath been observed, that Chronical-Coughs of many Years continuance, have been not only removed, but perfectly cured, by exchanging of Malt-drinks and Wine into Water, or into Water refreshed with a little Wine. And those that have travelled through Germany, and the Low-countrieses, might have observed, that the strongest and healthfulest Bodies are found among the Boars, who for their ordinary Drink are scarce acquainted with any thing but Whey, or clear Water, which contributing so much to perfection of digestion, may very reasonably be esteemed the true cause of their Health, Vigour, and long Life. These and many more like instances do force this concession from me, that the choice of Drinks is of greater importance than of Edibles. When Fermentative Drinks, as strong Beer, and Wine shall disturb and retard Digestion, and cold Water which suppresses Ferm●ntations (as appears in many Hysteric Women, that by drinking a Glass of fair Water, do in a moment turn of a fi●) shall in many promote and enliven Digestion, how can it than be thought, that Digestion is caused by the heat of the Stomach, or by Fermentation?  
12. Though drinking Water hath on several occasions proved successful to admiration, yet particular regard must be had to the Climate, season of the Year, Age, Sex, Custom, and other Circumstances; for should drinking Water be recommended to one, who from his Infancy hath been used to small Beer, and living in a Northern cold Climate, in a rough friezing season, and of a tender Constitution, very unhappy consequences must be expected from such unadvisedness. Wherhfore, where change of Drink shall be judged necessary, from the continual use of strong Beer, or Wine, you may descend to small Beer, Barleywater, clarified Whey, a weak Mead, thin Grewel, or the like.   

CHAP. IU. Of the passing of the Chyle into the Guts, and its depuration there.  
1 FRom what is here incidently discoursed, I return to a farther explication of the Digesture of the Stomach, where the Victuals being dissolved, and by continuance of Concoction smoothed, and brought to an equation, the Chyle doth than require depuration, which is a separation of the thinner and finer parts from the groser and feculent, by a Fermentative juice, which I suppose to be an Acid, joined to igneous Spirits, by an intermedium of some glutinous emplastic Particles, as may be discovered in Yeast, or Levain. This Fermentation (I will only suppose) happens at the close of the Digestion, and gins to rarefie and huff up the Chyle in the Stomach, whereby the lighter and thinner parts become rising and swelling, and gradually work over the Pylorus into the small Guts, the Stomach in the same proportion contracting itself into a lesser and shallower compass, as it is emptying and growing lesle full, and distended, by which means the trajection of the Chyle is facilitated, until there is nothing left, but a gross and feculent acid juice, serving to assist as a dissolvent to digest what may remain more difficult, be it some grisly or sinewy, or other tough hard part of the Victuals, Piecrust, or any thing else that is more difficult to digest, than what is already wrought over the Pylorus into the small Guts; which being performed, the same acid juice by its sharpness pricks and stimulates the Fibres of the Stomach, (contracting itself into a very narrow Volumn) throws that also, together with what it hath dissolved, over the Pylorus. Whence I do give myself a probable reason, why the latter part of the digestion is always acid, and why at that time we are subject to four belches, and how it happens, that the fullness and distension of the Stomach, which most are sensible of at the end of their Meals, doth gradually lessen, and as soon as the sour appears is quite allayed, and the digestion finished. And if I attribute not too much to fancy, I do observe, that many Persons towards the end of Concoction, do perceive an uneasiness of heat all over, especially in their Faces, extremities of their Hands and Feet, but particularly those that are weakly, as Hypochondriacks and Hystericks, who about that time, and a good while after, are subject to have flushings in their Faces, and their symptoms (as faintnesses, palpitations, roaring Winds, etc.) set into motion.  
2. Upon the dripping of the Chyle into the small Guts, the Fermentation is considerably augmented, by the meeting with the excrementitious Juices from the Glanduls of the Pancreas, and Mesentery, mixed with Gaul from the biliary Vessels, whereby the Chyle is wholly depurated of all its feculencies, which being separated, are termed excrements of the Belly. That there is such a fermentation in the Guts, appears by the tension and intumescence of the Belly, in some more, in others lesle, which may be perceived two, three, or four Hours after Meals, according to the expedition of their digestion, separation, and subsequent fermentation.  
3. As I am not very flexible to recede from the general opinion of the Ancients and Moderns, importing, that the first Concoction is performed, either by virtue of the heat of the Stomach, or by force of Fermentation, as it is asserted by most of the learned, that were cotemporaries with the famous Dr. Willis, and others that do succeed him: Neither am I willing to be thought so criminal, as to be contumatiously guilty of Heresy in Physic, yet its pardonable, if not allowable, to be Shismatical in ones proper opinion, which in all Mankind is free, and not to be compelled; and therefore I do declare, that nothing but late experiments of no small number, do induce me to retract my former sentiments of this, and many other matters in Medicines, as firmly believing, what I have expressed concerning the first Concoction, and Fermentation, as that the Sun is the cause of Daylight; though at the same time it's very possible for me to be under a mistake. But whether all this be really true, or only in appearance, I am thence provided with the solutions of hundred of difficulties, offering themselves on those subjects, and the full and plain discovery of the causes of many, if not most Diseases, and what is beyond all, not unsuccessfully conducted in the practical part, which to me is a satisfaction beyond what I have met with, either in conversing with Printed Authors, or with Men reputed very learned and experienced in the Faculty.  
4. Upon the well beginning depends the well finishing and completing, the Stomach being the beginning of the whole Body, it is from the true Knowledge of its fabric, Constitution, Action, or Operation, the knowledge of the Constitution of all the Bowels, their Actions, and Operations of the whole Animal is derived. The Stomach is the only and true tuning part of the whole Body, which being well or ill tuned, causeth a Harmony, or Discord of all the Bowels. The Stomach being strong and vigorous, performing its Office, or Action, and Operation in perfection, renders the Body Strong, Healthful, and long Lived; but in proportion, as it is defective in any part of its Office, Diseases in itself, and all other parts of the Body are engendered, answerable to the degree and quality of its defect, and to the dependency all the Bowels have on it; for being the Laboratory of the whole, whatever is ill prepared here, cannot be mended afterwards, by any of the succeeding Bowels, the Chyle being vicious or corrupted, can never be converted into good Blood, nor that into good Animal spirits, not more than you can make good Butter or Cheese out of sour or corrupted Milk. And as most, if not all internal Diseases, (Endemic and Epidemic excepted,) are Originally produced in the Stomach, they are likewise to be cured by the Stomach, internal Remedies exerting their first and stronger force upon it, the virtues whereof it afterwards transmits' to the part Diseased. Neither is it to any purpose, to pretend to cure any internal Disease, without first of all having put the Stomach into good order, which done, most Diseases are ready to go of of themselves.  
5. The Stomach bears an adequate Analogy to the root of a Tree, and may properly enough be called the root of a Man; for as the root of a Tree is the beginning of it, receives or draws the juice of the Earth, to prepare and convert it into Food for the Trunc, and all the Branches, and being well digested, transmits' it to all the parts; in like manner, when the Tree is observed not to be thriving, or the Branches to be decaying, changing of colour, withering, or dying, where do they look for the cause, but at the root of the Tree? Even so is it with the nourishing of the parts of the Body, and the Diseases they are subject unto, in relation to the Stomach.   

CHAP. V Describing Medicines to preserve Health, and their Preparations.  
BY the deduction from the preceding Discourse, my Opinion persuades me, that the weakness of the Stomach, and it's faintly performing its Office, is only occasioned by the debility of the Stomach Nerves, and its numerous branches, by being plastered up by too much Fleam, gross acid dregss, indigestible Meats, or offensive Drinks, or other matter admitted into the Stomach, which by lodging there too long, assume a corroding Quality; or by too much heat, and too little moisture, are converted into a nidorous crudity. This supposed, I do believe, and have experimentally observed, that all those Corroboratives of the Stomach, whose virtue is commonly asserted, to consist in a gentle restrictive and warming Quality, whereby those slimy Humours are more firmly cemented, such as Aromaticum Rosatum, Caryophyllatum, Cinnamon-water, those hot spicy Brandy-waters, a read Tincture of Roses, Mithridate, Treacle, all those Compound Electuaries framed of heating Conserves, Conduits, and Peptick Powders, are so far from contributing the lest strength to the Stomach, that rather a contrary effect hath ensued, and being long continued, do carry danger with them. The only means I have hitherto found to strengthen the Stomach, are proper abstersive Medicines, gently wiping of those clammy substances from the tunics of the Stomach, and the terminations of the Nervous branches, and among these I have not yet detected any thing, equal to a good Elixir Proprietatis, well prepared by a long Digestion in a Sand-bath, the proportion of the Ingredients being somewhat altered from the common, and something also substituted in place of the Myrrh: A drop of this shall exceed a pound of Peptick Powders, Electuaries, and other fop Stomachicks. Do only keep your Stomach clean, you will certainly preserve its Strength, and prevent most Diseases.  
2. It is not to be understood, where a heap or weight of crudities is accumulated, so gently absterging a Remedy can have a power to disengage the Stomach, not more than a wet Mop can be supposed to rid a Room of a heap of Rubbish, in which case something more stimulating is required, that may be used in all Seasons of the Year, be it sultry or friezing, without the inconvenience of confinement to Diet, or warmth of the Air, and without offence to the Stomach, or putting the Body into any disorder, to which purposes, the Pill I here now describe, I have Experimentally found to be effectually answering in most respects.  
3. Take one Ounce of the clearest shining Aloes, which at the Druggist's will cost about a Groat, or sometimes sixpence an Ounce, this being free from any considerable dross▪ will not require any depuration. Powder it in a Mortar, covered over with a brown Paper, having a hole in the middle for a passage to the Pestle, to prevent the little pieces of the Aloes from leaping up, while you are in the beginning of your pounding; For afterwards the paper may be removed. Observe to anoint thinly the bottom of the Mortar and Pestle, with a little Florence Oil, to keep it from sticking to the bottom. When it's reduced to a gross Powder, by grinding it with the Pestle you must bring it to a smooth fineness. Put the Powder into a small glazed flat-bottomed earthen Pan, that will contain about half a pint, pouring upon it about a quarter of a pint of fair water, wherein hath been dissolved two drams of Spanish juice of Liquorish, which is done by slicing it very small, and setting the water in a porringer over a gentle heat; place this small earthen pan into one somewhat bigger, having sand in the bottom to the height of an inch, and afterwards ●illing it up to the brim. Set them over two piles of bricks, of three or four bricks high, laid flat. The piles must stand at such a distance, that they may reach the edges of the bigger pan, to support it. Than make a moderate fire of Charcoal under it, to heat the sand, to 'cause the superfluous moisture to be evaporated, until the Aloes is brought to the thickness of Honey. Or you may by dropping two or three drops on the back side of a plate to cool, make trial, whether it be reduced to the consistency of Dow; for if it be overdone, the mass being rendered brickly, will not only loose most of its virtue, but also its aptness of being framed into Pills; and if itbe not evaporated enough, it will be sticky, and not apt to be brought to a Mass.  
4. The lesser pan being taken of, when the evaporation is sufficient, before it's quite cold, you must with a Spatula, or slice, take out the Mass, and between your Fingers, being a little anointed with Florence Oil, or Oil of Sweet Almonds, to prevent the sticking, roll it into a round ball, which you may keep in a Sheep's Bladder, being likewise thinly wetted over on the inside with the same Oil, for many Months, if necessary, without any great impair of its virtue.  
5. A small piece of this Mass being formed into six, seven, eight, or nine little Pills, of the bigness of a Pepper-corn, is a Dose sufficient to give two or three motions, according to the number of Pills, and the lose or Costive Constitution of him that takes them. The safety of this Medicine adds much to its Character, since the taking of one Pill or two more or lesle, imports as little hazard, as the taking it very often, or in any kind of Season, be it hot or cold, unless your Body be subject to a Looseness, or the Hemorrhoids, or your Constitution be thin, hot, and dry.  
6. By the addition of the juice of Liquorish the Aloes is designed to be obtused in its too pungitive quality, whereby its apt to raise the Piles, and becomes somewhat lesle precipitating, and consequently hindered from lessening expectoration, which in this Climate is so necessary in Coughs and Pththysicks.  
7. The same correction may also be attained, by dissolving the same proportion of clean Aloes, in half a pint of juice expressed from the contusion of an Ounce of Bugloss, or Borrage Roots, or a large handful of their Leaves, and stirring half a pint of warm water with them in the bruising, and clarified by subsidence, in letting it stand in a Cellar for a day or two, and pouring it of the Faeces or Dregss in the bottom. This evaporated in the same manner will produce a Mass, almost equal in goodness with the former.  
8. I cannot hitherto observe, that the use of these Pills, though frequently taken, either once in a Week, Fortnight, or a Month, according to the time, the Stomach by reason of its degree of weakness in the digestive faculty may require, doth in any wise debilitate those, that may properly use them; but on the contrary, rather corroborated their Stomach, by assisting it to throw of that heap of rubbish, and crude Humours, which those that eat and drink plentifully, and either live sedentary Lives, as many that are Educated to Professions, or others that are not used to exercise or labour, are subject to engender, especially if naturally of a weak Constitution, or of an advanced Age.  
9 For three or four days succeeding the use of these Pills, a good Elixir Proprietatis taken Morning and Evening, in a proportionable Dose, hath by my Observation ever had the good effect of preserving Health and preventing Diseases.  
10. To what I have mentioned touching the advantages of a familiar Acquaintance with those Mundifyers, both the Pills and the Elixir, the inquiry I made of a fresh coloured vigorous Dutch Burgher, I casually met in my Travels, who exceeded the Age of four score, may in somewise add a confirmation. He did aver to me Bona side, that for 40 Years last passed, he had seldom or never omitted once in a fortnight, or sometimes sooner or later, according to the direction he received from his marks of fullness and uneasiness, to cleanse with Seny stewed with Prunes, from which custom he did derive his capacity of eating a hearty Meal of any thing he liked, without advising of the wholesomeness, or easiness of Digesture, and at times of drinking a Glass of Wine to an Altitude, to accommodate his Friend.  
11. As lesser Purgatives do rather contribute strength by their consequence, so the greater being properly used, do not carry that danger with them People commonly imagine, since I have known many, that for Three Months successively, have taken strong churlish purging Pills every Morning, some few days only omitted; I may say, some have swallowed a pottle of strong Purgative Pills in a few Years, and lived in full health to a remarkable Age, and not without a libertine Mode of eating and drinking. Whence its apparent, that the toughness of the Nerves, upon which the strength and action of the Bowels only depend, doth suffer as little by the strongest Purgatives, as an India Cane by a thousand times bending, which notwithstanding will recover its former figure and full strength. It were to be wished, that bleeding could be administered with the same safety, of which it may be justly said, that the Lancet hath, and doth in proportion kill more Men than the Sword, and it's as commonly observed, that those Physicians who do so generally practise it, know little else what to do; and on the other hand their Patients are as rash and prodigal of their lives, to submit to their heedless advice. As the first and second bleedings may be of great use to many Bodies and Distempers in the colder Climates, so I have ever remarked, that the third and fourth have proved as detrimental, and not seldom fatal; having observed, that with two bleedings at most, succeeded with other proper remedies, incomparatively more continual Fevers, Rheumatisms, Pleurisies, and Phthysicks have been cured; than have survived those frequently reiterated bleedings, which in common Practice usually give the parting blow.  
12. It's a consequence an Idiot inserts, because a Person having been blooded eight or ten times in a great Distemper, doth recover his Health, he owes the benefit of it to the bleedings, whereas it aught rather to be said, neither the Distemper nor bleeding could kill him.  
13. To return from this Deviation to the use of Purgatives; though those that are strong, are required in great Diseases, they aught to be avoided in lesser Distempers, or where prevention is only intended; for all Purgatives deriving their power from a specific fermentative Spirit, or Salt, by rarefying or huffing up morbific Humours, and afterwards by stimulating the Nerves to throw them of after separation, when strong ones are taken, where no Disease is engendered, they are apt to 'cause one by fermening, or rarefying and stimulating the laudable juices or operating upon those dormant humours, which by strength of Nature, or assistance of mild preventing Purgatives, and abstersive Corroboratives, might easily have been worn of. Thus it hath often been observed, that some by taking Extractum Rudij, have soon after fallen into continual Fevers; others through a preventing care to avert the Gout, have immediately fallen into a violent fit, upon taking Elixir Salutis, Bromfield's Pills, Golden Spirit of Scurvy Grass, or the like empirical Medicines, which is not all the mischief such sort of Purgative vendibles have occasioned, as being unskilfully invented, and more unskilfully prepared, since not a few have been thrown into mortal Diseases by the use of them. Yet I stand more amazed at the folly of Mankind, that is so easily alured by vain boasting and mendacious Encomia's upon Laudanum liquidum plainly prepared, or disguised by a solution of Opium into volatile oleaginous drops, to the frequent and constant use whereof, a Man being once debauched under pretence of ease, and quieting himself of a few Gripes, Fumes, or Vapours, he can not more leave it of for a Fortnight, a Week, or a Day, than a labourer his Bread and Cheese, or a Man throw of his Coat and Waistcoat in a hard Winter, or a Brandy-Drinker forsake his Spirits and return to small Beer. Using one's self to such plain or disguised Opiates, is like making a contract with the Devil, to live easy and well for a few Years, upon condition he shall have his Soul to torture afterwards: For certain it is, that the familiar use of Opiates, after some Months, or very few Years, either doth wholly desist from being friendly, by suffering your trouble or Distemper to return in a more horrible manner, or created a new one, incomparably worse than the former, or strangles you with an Apoplexy, or some other soporous Distemper, which is most amply proved by those, that make Opium their Sacred Refuge in every fit of the Colic, Gout, or Stone, who seldom or never fail of a speedy Exit, by some incurable Disease of the Brain, in very few Years; and those that do advice such a lethiferous remedy for a common use to their Patients, have a greater title to a Halter, labeled with an Inscription of Mathews' Pills, or Pacifick Drops, than those that murder a Man in the Highway. In what manner those fits of Gout, Stone, Colic, and other sharp torturing Gripes, appear to me to be occasioned, and by what causes, I shall give my opinion after this following interlocution.  
14. I have in the preceding Discourse given you my sentiment, that to preserve Health, and prevent Diseases in valetudinary Constitutions, (for strong vigorous Bodies stand in no need of other preservatives, or preventives, than moderation in their Non-naturals, the knowledge and sense whereof, Nature hath implanted in all other Animals, as well as in Men,) not better ways and means can be used, than applying at certain intervals, to those cleansers or abstersives here before mentioned; as for Aurum Potabile, or any pretended Lapis Philosophorum, or all Faber's Quintessences, upon their just trials, they have been found to contain lesle virtue in preserving Health, than a good Chicken Broth.  
15. You may remember a caution was given in one of the foregoing Paragraphs, interdicting all Aloetics to thin, hot, and dry Bodies, and such also as are subject to the Hemorrhoids; and in regard that such Constitutions, especially when promoted in Years, do also require the keeping the Stomach clean, and free from all slimy and nidorous crudities, I do recommend a good Lenitive Electuary, not the common, which is so ill contrived, and filled with rubbish. This following description gives you the form of an easy, gentle, and effectual Laxative. Take four ounces of the best Cassia Fistularis newly drawn, and evaporated to a consistency, (the manner of doing it you may read in a Treatise, called the Family Physician and House Apothecary,) Rhubarb powdered, white Mechoacan grated and powdered, and clean Rhenish Tartar powdered, of each a quarter of an Ounce, sweet Fennil-Seeds powdered, a Dram and half, Syrup of Marsh-mallows, as much as will suffice to make it into an Electuary. You may take hereof a quarter, or half an Ounce, or sometimes a whole Ounce, dissolved in a quarter of a pint of thin grewel, barleywater, posset, or thin Chicken-broth, once in a Week, Fortnight, or a Month, according to the direction given concerning the Aloetics.  
16. Rhenish Tartar I do prefer for a Laxative, far before Cream of Tartar, which doth loose all or a great part of its solutive virtue in the preparation.   

CHAP. VI Causes of the Stone, Gout, Colic, Pleurisies, Rheumatisms, Apoplexy, etc. Assigned from a different Hypothesis.  
1. TOuching the causes of those pains, which are felt to be the ●cutest and most exquisite of any by them, that suffer the Stone, Gout, Colic, and sharp dry gripes; certain sharp subtle serositie, or rather a vitiated lymph discharged from the Brain through the Nerves on the extremities, being there locked up, 'cause those corroding Gout-pains, upon those sensible nervous parts, though sometimes serosities, and lymphatic fluors, dripping from other vessels, may 'cause great pains, but lesle sharp, and being more subject to be incrassated, may 'cause swell near the Joints. The same subtle nervous serosities, or vitiated Lympha, being thrown upon the Kidneys, tore and vellicate their most sensible membranes to such a degree, that scarce any torture can equal it, and that sometimes, though seldom, without the lest suppression of Urine, but for the most part with a total, or partial suppression, and a great sharpness of Urine, which is than called a Fit; the pain which at other times the Stone in the Kidneys doth occasion, being only a heavy obtuse pain of a long continuance, and more frequent returns, which at great intervals, as Spring and Fall, doth invite those cutting serosities to the part, and than also are the greatest Fits; for I cannot conceive that the Stone turning angular, and grating upon the Membranes, is so general a cause of a Fit of the Stone, as many of the Learned do imagine, since a Stone once removed out of its bed or seat, whereto it's cemented by a glutinous tartarous slime, can easily, if ever return to its place, and be there fastened again as before, for which reason Physicians are very cautious of administering strong Diuretics, for fear of driving the Stone out of its place. Neither do I believe, that those bloody Urines, which are so frequently made by Nephitical Patients, are caused by the corners of the Stone being moved, and ●ounding or grating of the Veins, but are rather caused by a sharp Serum corroding the mouths of the vessels, or blood may be squeezed out of the vessels by the internal swelling of the Parenchyma of the Kidneys. It doth often hap, that some of those forementioned most subtle limpid serosities have taken another channel, through branches of the same Nerve, that tends to the Kidneys, being divaricated and inserted into the great gut of the Colon, where they 'cause that great pain, (though lesle acute than the other, that part being by much lesle sensible, than the internal membrane of the Kidneys,) which is termed the Stone-Cholick. Since than this acute pain in the great Gut cannot be caused by the Stone, at that distance, it's more than probable, that those most exquisite pains in a sit must be occasioned by some other cause, which by many Arguments to me can be no other, than the foresaid serosity. Secondly, you must consider also, that all Opiates being inwardly taken, perform their Operation by exerting their power upon the Brain, in principio nervorum, in withholding the influx of the Animal Spirits, (that communicate sense to the Guts,) and streightning the Nerves, whereby pains are not only appeased in any singular part, but in all parts equally, supposing they were all in pain. Thirdly, you are to conceive, that there being a digestion performed in the Brain, in converting the Arterial Blood into Animal Spirits, there must be a solution, and afterwards a separation and expulsion of Excrements, which in part are a limpid serum, that is abandoned to the ventricles of the Brain, which are the proper receptacles of that Excrement, as much as the thick Guts are of the Excrement of the Chyle, or the Bladder of the Urine, being the Excrement of the Blood. Fourthly, this concession is also required, that this most subtle sharp excrementitious serosity, having quite filled up the ventricles of the Brain in a greater measure, than they can well contain, or throw of through those passages Nature hath ordained, the thinnest part is forced into the principium nervorum, (the other part being received into the Veins and Lymphducts) and carried either to the Extremities, or Kidneys, where it causeth the Gout or Stone, or to the Teeth, where it occasioneth a most exquisite toothache, or several external parts or joints, producing those violent pains, that are termed a Rheumatism, or to the Pleura, where those shri●king Pleuratic pains do ensue. Summarily I do believe, there scarce happens any pain, (unless caused from without,) Tumour, or Pustul, where this nervous Excrement is not a principal cause, which may be more plainly explained in another place.  
2. Against this Discourse may be objected, That the Nerves obtaining no visible hollowness, cannot be supposed, to transmit such a quantity of Limpid Serum, as must be conceived to 'cause those before recited Diseases. Secondly, That its uncommon, and not natural, ●or any sort of vessels in the Body, that are destinated to contain, and convey their natural and proper Liquors, Juices, or Humours, toconveigh any other that is excrementitious, or preternatural. To the first it's answered, there must necessarily be proportionable cavities in the Nerves, to contain such great measures of Juices, as have been frequently observed to drip from Nerves, though small ones, that have been cut through in Wounds, and much more from great Nerves; and therefore those larger Nerves near the Brain must be thought capable to contain a very copious quantity of moisture. If the Nerves when cut out of the Body and Dead, do not show any visible cavities, it is because being emptied of their Spirits, and a great part of their moisture, their pores and channels do subside and fall to a close compactness. Besides a Nerve that is cut out, and grown from a greater bigness to that of an ordinary packthread, when it's dried and condensed, it's reduced to the smallness of a fine Thread or Fiber, which when it was tumid within the Body, and fully extended, must necessarily have contained a great hollowness, though divided into innumerable very small or minutest passages. In answer to the Second, it hath been more than once observed, that purulent matter from Imposthumations in the Lungs, and Pleura, hath been evacuated through the Kidneys and Bladder by Urine, whither it hath been circularly conveyed by the veins, that have taken it up. The thinner part of the Turpentine, that by clyster hath been injected into the great Guts, hath been taken in by the vessels, and by circulation carried to the Kidneys and Bladder, as appears by the Urine, giving by its strong smell of Violets a plain evidence of it. True it is, these instances are not natural conveyances, neither is it to be understood so of the Nerves, but to be preternatural.  
3. This premised, if you apprehended this Hypothesis to be only probable or apparent, (which I do believe to be Truth, though at the same time I must own, that I do retract from my former Opinions, being thereunto induced by sundry Experiments and Observations) it must necessarily follow, that Opiates frequently used, do at length not only withhold, but entirely stop the afflux of the Animal Spirits, and closely shut up the beginning of the Nerves, whereby those acute serosities are penned in, and thrown back into the medullar substance of the Brain, which happening an Apoplexy, Palsy, Lethargy, or some other Mortal soporous Disease must unavoidably succeed; and hence it is, that in all those, who expire upon their seizure with those Distempers, the anterior Ventricles of the Brain upon dissection, do ever appear filled with such a sort of acrimonious limpid serosity, the Nerves and other vessels being either too much filled, or too much closed by subsidence, obstruction, or otherwise, to admit of a regurgitation thence.  
4. Notwithstanding though the daily, weekly, or frequent use of Opiates is most certainly attended with most pernicious consequences, yet the extraordinary and stupendious benefit it imports, even very often to the recovering a Man from the jaws of Death, when cautiously and necessarily advised in a fit of intolerable pain, a profuse Hemorrhage, an impetuous Catarrh, violent Vomiting, a fludding Diarrhaea, long and strenuous Hysterick Fits, when they begin to threaten danger, want of Sleep for many Days and Nights, and such like urgent symptoms, may give a just cause to hold a correspondency with that or the like Medicine, provided it be not too familiar, and be very well prepared, and that in the interval you prevent the necessity of calling this dissembling pacisick Friend in again, by removing the cause of those hazardous Diseases, and that the Patient have Strength, and Spirits enough to wrestle with such a fallacious and dangerous Guest, should he prove too rude. Wherhfore I accounted it the greatest boldness in so many little Quacks and empirics, even some Widwives, and Nurses also, who being entirely destitute of the necessary skill in preparing this ruffian Juice, and much more of the true knowledge of applying it, dare assume the confidence of administering they so indifferently to the loss of so many Lives, who in my Judgement can scarce have too severe a Law made against them, especially where a Man may be Murdered privately, without giving the lest jealousy, that any thing else besides his Distemper killed him.   

CHAP. VII. Hypotheses of the motion of the Heart▪ and of Respiration.  
1. I Have for a long time with an implicit Obedience submitted to the Dogmata of the Ancients, confirmed by the approbation of the Learned succeeding Ages, as appears in former writings, touching the Animal Spirits and Pulsation, which latter in the Heart and Arteries is by them resolved, to be caused by a pulsifick faculty in both, or as some will have it, originally in the Heart, and from thence derived or continued in the Arteries. This sort of explication now appears to me very negligent, and universally applicable to any thing; for to say the pulsation is caused by a pulsifick faculty, is equally to saying, that Sight, Hearing, Vomiting, or Purging, is performed by an Optic, Auditory, Emetic, or Cathartic faculty; or, to be shorter and more general, by a specific or occult faculty; from which any inquisitive person can receive but little satisfaction, or scarce make a solution of any Phaenomenon, with the lest advantage to the practical part of Physic. Wherhfore to make my marks bear the better, in resolving many doubtful Queries, and serving for a true and safer conduct in the practic, I do rather make choice to say, (in imitation of Copernicus' affirming the motion of the Earth to the exclusion of that of the Sun or Firmament,) that the Heart and the Arteries do not move the Vital or Arterial Blood, but that the Blood moves the Heart and Arteries to a pulsation; in the same manner as may be conceived, that the Air pressing and shilling the Lungs, at the same time press the Air, that fills the interstice between them and the Diaphragm, and in a great measure moves the latter to a dilatation in the Inspiration, lifting up at the same time the Belly with all the included Bowels, and crowding or condensing the ambient Air, the weight whereof (if I may so call it,) or its inclination to be relaxt again, (in endeavouring to return to its former position,) together with the fuliginous steams, that are forced out of the whole circumference of the Body, in their turn cause the retraction or repercussion of the Belly and diaphragm, in the Expiration; for its a plain and received Doctrine, that the motion of the Diaphragm, which is accounted a great instrument in Respiration, is as much natural, and more natural I may say, than it is spontaneous in Beasts and Infants, or voluntary in Men; and I do farther conceive, if there were no Diaphragm created in Men and Beasts, the ambient Air is sufficient, to set the wheels of the Lungs on going: For there are abundance of moving living Creatures or Animals, that have Lungs, and do inspire and expire, on which Nature hath not bestowed a Diaphragm. So that the great use of the Diaphragm seems to me, to be an instrument of expulsion, in causing, or chief assisting to exonerate the Guts of its Excrements by Stools, the Stomach of its offensive contents by Vomit, and the Lungs by Coughing. It may be likewise compared to a Flabellum, or Fan, that ●oves and ventilates all the internal Air contained in the great cavities of the Body. The motion of this internal Air, I do conceive, is as much assistant to the motion of the Spirits and Blood in the Arteries, Veins, and Nerves, and to the peristaltic motion of the Stomach, as the Air and Wind is to the motion of the Sea, which latter the greater it is, the higher the Waves are moved. Secondly, Natural Philosophy doth Teach us, That as much Air as is inspired and admitted into the Body by the Lungs, so much Air must necessarily be forced out of the Body, to make way for its entrance, which plainly tells us, that the inspiration by the Lungs is the cause of an universal transpiration through the whole Body, and that the same ambient Air being lately squeezed out of the Lungs, must necessarily by expiration return into the Body again, through the ambient pores, to make way for that, or else you must allow a vacuum, or voided place in the Air, which is impossible, for a place (locus vocatur, quia continet locat●●) is that which containeth and circumscribe● something, and how can a place than contain nothing, which is a vacuum? Thirdly, I take the Diaphragm to consist of two Muscles, which appears plain enough in the dissection and narrow inspection of a Bullocks Midrif, whereof one is made use of in the dilatation, and the other in the contraction of the Breast; for its absurd, to believe, that the same muscle can perform two contrary motions.  
That no living Creature can subsist without the Air, and perspiration, is allowed by all, but for what Reason, or what use or benefit the Air doth afford it, is only slightly asserted, viz. That it is for ventilation only, that is to say, it gently fans and moves the living Spirits, and therein assists them in separating Fuliginous, and other Heterogeneous little Bodies or Particles, which otherwise would choke, or suffocate the said living Spirits. In the same manner I do conceive, That the Air in ventilating the focal Fire, or any burning flame, doth assist its most subtle particles in separating and expelling fuliginous and other corpuscles, and receives them also in those places, which it (I mean the Air) leaves to fill the places, left by the said fuliginous and other corpuscles; so that a Fire or flame seems to be extinguished, or rather suffocated, through want of Air, because it hath no places to depose its fuliginous and other corpuscles into, and stands in need of its assistance for ventilation and gentle motion.  
From this premised Discourse, I deduce these consequences to myself. 1. That upon the goodness of the Air (which consists in a just temperament, a due thinness, and clearness or purity) depends chief the Health and long life of Man. Too much heat, or too great thinness of the Air moves the Animal Spirits too impetuously, and consequently disperses and consumes them, weakens the Body, and hinders all Digestions; whence it is, that people are short lived, and weakly in the Indieses, long lived and strong in the Northern Climates. Frequently and gently moving, and often changing the Air from one place to another, though only out of one room into another, seems to me to conduce very much to Health, because by those frequent removes you avoid inspiring the same fuliginous Air, which you do expire; on the other hand, they that live sedentary Lives, that are slothful, or much addicted to lie in Bed, are seldom Healthful, but commonly crazy, and dull in their senses.  
2. If change of Air generally is of so great an Advantage, it is far greater, and consequently of necessity to those, that labour under any Distemper of the Lungs, or any kind of difficulty of breathing; so that I have observed, that many cannot be cured without change of Air, notwithstanding the assistance of the best and most proper Applications, which sometimes the Air alone doth Cure, and other times being assisted with very small Remedies.  
3. That using often violent motion, and continued long, doth at last tender the Body Diseased, and is very contrary to Health; for it's observed, few of those are long livers.  
4. I am apt to believe, That in the Air are contained most subtle corpuscl●s, that are homogeneous to the Spirits, (though in some kinds of Air more, in some others lesle,) t●at nourish or multiply, increase, or are added to the Animal Spirits, whereby the Body is considerably strengthened. Lastly, I do believe, That the Air is the Primum movens externum of all living Creatures; for by inspiration it moves all the Animal Spirits, (as after my manner I have showed before) which move all the humours and muscles of the Body. Take away the Air, and Life (which consists in motion of the Animal Spirits,) ceases at the very moment.   

CHAP. VIII. Of the motion of the Blood, and the cause thereof, also of its quickness or slowness.  
1. I Return to the Heart, which to me appears for use, like unto a draining Water-Mill, serving to throw of, and disperse the water to any parts, whither the Wheelshall cast, or direct it by its impulse; in like manner the Heart is an instrument, whose principal Office is, to throw the Arterial Blood to all parts of the Body; And as the spirituous and forcible eruption of Water out of a deep cavern of the Earth at the source of spring head, together with its being highest in situation, (in respect of the declination of those places, to and over which it's impelled,) is the cause of that motion, so the Brain may very probably be esteemed the Source, as being the highest situated; whence the Animal Spirits do forcibly rush out into all the Chanals, Humours, and Parts of the Body. Wherhfore, I suppose the Brain and it● Animal Spirits, in respect of the Microcosm, to be what the Sun and its Spirits, or Particles (being its Irradiations or Beams) are, that are distributed to all parts of the Terraqueous Globe, where motion is perceived, penetrating to the deepest bottom of the Waters, and through the closest and most compact heap of Earth, into its Bowels, where Metals and other subterraneous Bodies are engendered. In like manner do the Animal Spirits penetrate, from the highest part of the the Body to the extremest parts, as Toes and Fingers, which the sense of Feeling doth attest to us; and likewise to the deepest parts of the Bowels. I do not imagine, that the Animal Spirits being transmitted through the Nerves, must arrive to the extremities of them, before they can be dispersed to all the circumjacent parts; but that the Nerves are pervious throughout all their extent, with lateral Pores, or minute Chanals, through which they burst out in their descent, giving motion to all parts movable. Neither do I believe there are any Vital or Natural Spirits, (as they are commonly termed) but they are all Animal Spirits (though in a greater Proportion in the Arteries than the Veins,) that occasion the Blood to circulate; for to me it appears improbable, that the motion in the Arterial Blood, should 'cause the Blood in the Veins to move at so great a distance from the Heart, when necessarily their motion must be spent at the Capillars, if the force of motion in the Arteries, be by experience found to be lesle and lesle, in proportion of its greater distance from the Heart. But that the same motion of the Arteries, should 'cause the motion of the Animal Spirits, seems to me much more absurd; for the Animal Spirits being incomparatively more subtle, and infinitely stronger and more forcible (as appears by moving all the Joints together with the whole Body) can in no manner be conceived to be moved by Vital Spirits, that are much more gross, and of so little force, that they cannot make the lest impulse upon them. If these Maxims be true, that Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem; And In omni genere oportet ut sit quiddam primum, Principium numeri est unum, & omnes numeri consistunt ex uno, (or if I may so say) DIVERSIS UNIS; The Brain doth justly challenge the dignity of being the first and sole principal part of the whole Body, having an absolute Empire and Command over all other parts, performing by its Animal Spirits all the Motions, Functions, Actions and Offices of, and in every Bowel, Humour, and all other subservient Parts, which are only Instruments that modify and determine the said Spirits. This whole premised Discourse is plainly proved to me, by this sole Argument. The whole body of Man is created for the external Senses, and local Motion, and these for the internal, viz. Understanding, comprehending human or rational Imagination, common Sense and Memory, which are only th●ee distinct Acts of one sole and chief Faculty of Understanding; of which, the Brain is the Seat, and the Animal Spirits the Instrumental Cause; so consequently all the Parts of the Body must be created, to be subservient to the Brain and its Animal Spirits, Secondly, That the Animal Spirits do move the Arterial Blood, and the Heart, is clearly evinced by the Observation of Passions. The Sight, or Hearing, perceiving any dangerous Object, conveys it to the understanding Faculty in the Brain; which, by retracting its Animal Spirits, do at the next instant, cause a slow languid motion upon the Blood, Heart, and sometimes wholly stop it. On the other hand, upon perceiving a pleasing Object, a crowd of Animal Spirits are impelled into the Blood, which immediately occasions a quicker and more lively motion in the Blood, Heart and Arteries, as may be felt by their pulsation: Whence it appears, 1. That the Seat of Passions is in the Brain, and not the Heart. 2. That the Animal Spirits are perfused through all the Arterial, and consequently Venal Blood. 3. That nothing in the Body, doth move so swift as the Animal Spirits. 4. That the whole Body is pervious with Pores, and most subtle Chanals, of various Figures and Dimensions. Mercury by external unction, or sumigation, is let into the Body, through the ambient external Pores, even to the Bowels, and the Brain itself, though applied never so remote. Aloes by friction about the Navel, or any part of the Belly, passeth through the Pores to all the circumvestient Membranes and Muscles, until it arrives to the Guts, where it moves Stools, kills and expess Worms. Tobacco applied to the Wrist, by penetrating through the external Pores to the Vessels, Humours and Spirits, by circulation reaches the Stomach, provoking it afterwards to Vomit, and in some Bodies violently enough. Cantharideses externally applied commonly cause sharpness of Urine, and sometimes bloody. Opiated Unguents, though applied to the Soles of the Feet, soon reach the Brain. On the other hand, I have often observed the scent of some Medicines, which I used to give in Venereal Distempers, to pass through the Body to the external Skin, which always proved a certain sign the Patient would be cured. By all which it appears, that those forementioned Externals were impelled through the ambient Pores, by the Air lately expired, and crowding into the Body again, at the next inspiration, and that those Antivenereal Medicines, were driven out of the Body to the circumferential parts, by the Air expiring. 5. That the Heart is not a principal part of the Body, but an instrumental and subservient part. 6. That the Animal Spirits are Toti in toto, & toti in qualibet parte, performing, as I said before, chief and principally, as the sole primar efficient Causes in all the Body, and in every part thereof, all the Offices, Functions and Actions, except the Rational; wherein its only Instrumentally subservient to the Anima Rationalis. I must confess, that this Paragraph is not very Philosophically expressed, neither am I endued with Sense enough to defend it from all Objections, and seeming absurdities, and therefore, aught rather to be referred to Metaphysics, or a Credendum. 7. It also follows, that we need give no greater respect to Cordials, than to Hepatics, Pulmonics, Splenetics, or to any other appropriated Medicines; but the chiefest and principal Medicine aught to be reputed a Cephalic, so that instead of saying per Excellentiam, this or that is a Cordial, we aught to say, it's a Cephalic; for all those that are commonly called Cordials, are no other than true Cephalics, and no otherwise helpful, than by relieving the Animal Spirits, and comforting the Brain and Nerves. Moreover, all the Hypochondriac and Hysteric Symptoms, as Palpitations of the Heart, various Pulsations, sometimes slow, quick, low, or intermittent, Faintnesses, Swoonings, faint Sweats, Convulsions, swimming in the Head, (Vertigo) choakings in the Throat, stifled, difficult, oppressed, and insensible low Breathe, frequent Sighing, tottering weakness of the Joints, desponding sorrowful thoughts, Urine sometimes as clear and limpid as fair Water, othertimes white, turbid and muddy, sometimes high coloured, othertimes pale; Gripe, croaking and thundering Noises about the Bowels and Guts, Vomiting, and sharp continuating Pains at the Stomach, Belchings, Yawning, Dimness, and recurring darkness of Sight, (Scotomia) noise in the Ears, creepings between the Skin, Crying or Laughing, or maddish Passions, besides many more, are all Symptoms of a diseased Brain and Nerves, preternaturally a●fected, discomposed or vitiated Animal Spirits, and are relieved no otherwise, than by Medicines, that relieve and operate upon the Animal Spirits, and immediately by them upon the Brains and Sinews; such are chief oleaginous volatile Spirits, and more especially those that consist of a penetrating durable Sulphur; for if they are only Volatile Spirits, (tho' in that form they are experimented to be very helpful) they exert, loose, and spend their Virtue before they can arrive to the Brain; and therefore its necessary they should be oleaginous and sulphurous, and consequently more lasting. It is also found experimentally, that gentle Narcotics have a great influence, in suddenly suppressing all those recited Symptoms; which being universally owned to operate only upon the Animal Spirits, Brain and Nerves, is a manifest Argument, they are occasioned by an ill affected Brain, and Vicious Animal Spirits. All these prenumerated Symptoms do accompany a preternaturally affected Brain. and must be acknowledged to proceed from vicious Animal Spirits, viz. Convulsions, tottering weakness of the Joints, sorrowful Thoughts, dimness of Sight, noise in the Ears, etc. excepting Palpitations, intercurrent and various Pulsations, which cannot be thought a Primar, but a Secondary (per deuteropathiam) Affection of the Heart, occasioned through the Viciousness of the Animal Spirits, stimulating, or othertimes retarding the Fibres of the Ventricles, and Valves of the Heart in their motion. How and by what means the Animal Spirits may be vitiated, either by the ill mixture of the constituent parts of the blood, and its impurities, and commixtures with adventitious, or other noxious Particles, will take up more room to explain, than I purpose to allow here in this small Volumn, which otherwise may easily be rendered intelligible, or applicable by every Judicious Reader in Physic, and therefore I shall forbear any further Discourse about it. 8. To corroborated my Assertion in the preceding Paragraph, viz. that Cordials aught rather to be called Cephalics, may be plainly deduced from the sudden Relief, Patients in Swoonings and Faintnesses do receive, fromthe scents of Spirits of Sal Armoniac, of Hartshorn, Cranium humanum, Sanguis humanus, of Galbanum, Assa foetida, and the like; also from the friction of the Temples, with the thinner spirituous Oil of Amber, which being admitted into the branches of the Carotidal Arteries, are conveyed to all the parts of the Brain, where they rouse up, quicken and stimulate the Animal Spirits, and disentangle them from any adhering offensive Particles, whereby the Patient being suddenly revived out of his Faintness, and Swooning, and the inordinate pulsation of the Heart reduced, is a manifest proof, that these Symptoms commonly are not depending upon any Primar Affection of the Heart, but upon the disturbance of the Animal Spirits. 9 Many have been much puzzled in some doubtful Matters relating to Infants in the Womb; as, Whether in that Station they have Respiration, and whether their Heart and Arteries have Pulsation; and consequently, whether the Blood in the Infant doth circulate, and whether the Animal Spirits exercise the same Functions which they do after it is come out of the Womb. I do conceive, the Infant, as long as it continues in the Womb, doth only live the Life of a Plant, and is like to a Sucker that receives its Growth from the Tree, in receiving its Nument and Augmentation from the Mother: it hath no Respiration, or as little as can be imagined; and consequently, that its Heart and Arteries do not undergo any Pulsation; neither doth the Blood circulate in its Vessels, nor do the Animal Spirits perform those Functions they are intended for after the Birth of the Infant. The Parts of the Infant in the Womb lying so compact and close, and every place filled up with Humours, Excrements and Internal Air, there is no room left to admit Air from without; especially being enclosed by two thick Members, and a surrounding Moat of Serous Humours: It being the External Air forcing into the Lungs is the chief Cause of Inspiration and Expiration, as I have expressed before that being excluded, there can be no Respiration in the Infant in the Womb. What I have to say concerning the Manner and Causes of Pulsation, may be best understood by a Comparison to the Sea; which (tho' it be in the calmest Season) is subject to heave up and sink down, or to be dilated and contracted, as appears by its Waves, which is not unlike the Pulsation or Diastole (Dilatation,) and Systole (Contraction) of the Heart and Arteries. The Heaving up of the Sea I will only suppose to be caused by an Expansion and Rarefaction occasioned by the Motion of the Salin Spirits of the Sea, of which it may be thought very pregnant by the strong Smell (being a part objecti the Salin Spirits acting upon or vibrating the Olfactive Organ) of Seamen's Clotheses, and other things. The Air being crowded or condensed by the swelling of the Waves, forces, them down again by the Inclination it hath to recover its former place: In the same manner I do conceive that the Animal Spirits that are copiously perfused through the Arterial Blood do expand, dilate and raresie it, which causeth the Diastole or Dilatation in the Heart and Arteries, whereby the Air that is entered by Inspiration into the Lungs and all other Ambient Parts of the Body, and filling all the Pores that are capable to receive it, is condensed and crowded; they relaxing, beaten back the Sides of the Heart and Arteries, which being streighten'd, have an Inclination to return, and than occasion the Systole, or Contraction. The forementioned Comparison differs in this, that the Arteries are moved continually, in Contraction and Dilatation, throughout their whole Length, reciprocally, all at once; whereas the Sea is moved into innumerable discontinuated Waves, that are lifted up and fall again at opposite and different times; while one Wave rises, the other falls. To which I can only answer, Were the Sea coated about with a thick strong Coat, as the Arteries in proportion are, all the Parts of the Sea, or the whole Surface, would be uniformly heaved up at one and the same time, and fall in the same Order, as the Arterial Blood doth in Pulsation.  
2. This Hypothesis (how probable soever, or true seemingly, it may be, I will not discuss at this time) implying the Necessity of Admission of External Air to cause Pulsations, explains that the Heart and Arteries of the Infant in the Womb do not pulsate regularly, or orderly; neither do I doubt but that the Animal Spirits do in some wise move the Blood, (which else by Stagnation, would be subject to Putrefaction,) tho' not circulate. And here a Question may be moved, Whether the Blood in its Circulation, or passing out of the Extremities of the Arteries, into those of the Veins, is pressed out by the Rarefaction and Expansion of the Arterial Blood by the Animal Spirits in the Diastole; whereby taking up more room, and as it were overflowing, it is squeezed out; or whether it is forced out by the Vigour of the Animal Spirits, and the Compression of the Arteries in the Systole? But than another Question must follow; How, and by what Force, is the Blood moved in the Veins, where there is no sensible or manifest Pulsation? For to say that 'tis the Force of Pulsation doth move it out of the Extremities of the Arteries, into the Extremities of the Veins, through the fibrous, intercurring, most minute Passages, or Pores, by Pulsation, or rather Protrusion: or thrusting forward, must run us into great Difficulties, if not Absurdities. For, First, Considering that the Force of Pulsation or Protrusion must be extremely abated in the aforesaid Extremities of the Arteries, and more in the Intercurring Passages, and yet more in the Extremities of the Veins, which suppose in the Toes, can you rationally imagine, that the Force of Pulsation, that is so very much diminished, if not wholly extinguished, can be sufficient to force and thrust forward through so great a Length (as reaches to so far a distance as the Heart) so great and weighty a Mass of Blood, which it must by Process encounter with in the bigger Veins, besides the Resistance it must meet with in the several Meanders, Turn and Wind, and a great many Valves (making a great Resistance) of the said Veins, that will still yet more deaden the Force of Protrusion; and yet more, if the Body by straightness of Clotheses, or lying upon one Side, suffer a Compression and Narrowness in the Veins and Arteries? Secondly, Suppose the left Ventricle, when filled, to contain two Ounces, more or lesle, of Blood (according to the Opinion of some Anatomists) in a Heart of a mean Size; and that, according to the same Opinion, by every Systole the said two Ounces are with a violent Explosion, as if it were with a Spring, thrown into the Arteries, it must follow, that by every Pulsation so much is received and impelled into the Veins, which being destitute of a forcible Pulsation to return it to the Heart, cannot possibly in the same length of time discharge it; especially, the Blood being now grown more condensed, incrassated, more fibrous, lesle spirituous, and possibly from a lower to a higher place, and through all the Valves, which as I said before, make a very considerable resistance. If than the Vein● can not receive so much Blood, as is thought to be propuls●d by two Ounces at a time, by every Systole, when probably they cannot receive a Dram or two at most, at every Systole, what must become of the remaining fourteen or fifteen Drams, that is by every Pulsation thrown out of the Heart? 
* Abating so much Arterial Blood as is taken up in the nourishment of the parts, and in the supply of matter for animal Spirits.  It must either return, and regurgitate into the Heart, upon which, either an intermittent Pulse must follow, or a total stagnation, and consequently Death. In short, to make the Veins capable of receiving as much, as by Pulsation is thrown out of the Arteries, you must grant as rapid a motion or flowing in the Veins, as there is in the Arteries, which all that have the lest sense must deny; for the Blood in ●n Arteriotomia doth spurt out of the Arteries with ten times the force, and in ten times the quantity, in the same proportion of time, and consequently is moved ten times swifter. It must than follow, that in every Diastole the Ventricles of the Heart are either not quite filled, or not entirely emptied in every Systole, which I do verily believe is so. By what is here discoursed, it appears, that very often the cause of an intermittent Pulse is the incapacity of the Veins, by being obstructed in some place or other, to receive the proportion of what is thrown into them by the Arteries; and the cause of an universal stagnation may be thought too great a repletion in the Veins, wholly excluding the reception of any Blood from the Arteries.  
3. Should it be allowed, that the Heart by every Systole throws two Ounces of Blood (which some do assert the left Ventricle to be capable of containing) into the Veins, and that they receive it; than it will follow, that reckoning only 500 Pulsations in a quarter of an Hour, there must be circulated fifty Quarts; and consequently, that the whole Mass of Blood, or all the Blood that is in a moderate Man's Body (which is thought to contain from Eight Quarts to Twelve, according to the greater or lesser quantity of the fullest, or thinnest of Men, being in Health, must be circulated or moved round from the Heart through the Arteries into the Veins, and thence into the Heart again in three or four Minutes, and about a Pint every ●ighth part of a Minute, which must require a motion more rapid, and make a greater noise, than the Th●mes under London-Bridge. Such a career in the Blood must be supposed to make more way in lesser Weeks, than the Sea and Wind together do, in carrying a Ship to the East Indies in many Months. Besides, such a violent motion would not only burst the Veins, and break the Fibres of the Blood, but chern it into Read Butter, and Blue Buttermilk. Moreover, motion causing heat, such a violence would immediately put the coldest Icelander into a burning Fever. It is observed, that the too violent and quick motion in a continual Fever, makes a separation in the Blood of the Oily sulphurous parts, swimming on the serous.  
4. That the Ventricles of the Heart are not filled by every Diastole, nor quite emptied by every Systole, appears plainly in Hypochondriacs, and Hysterics, who sometimes having a large, high and quick Diastole, (as may be felt by feeling the Pulse of the Wrist) and a low, straight, and slow Systole, shows that the taking in, must be more than the going out. Soon after the Diastole is changed from large to low, small and slow, and the Systole quick, which signifies a lesser repletion of the Ventricles, and consequently, that they were not filled as before. What can you think of a vermicular Pulse? Here you must allow, that the Ventricles are far from being filled in the Diastole, or emptied in the Systole. I do foresee, that it may be replied, that notwithstanding the Pulses do vary from large and full, to narrow and small, the Ventricl●s may be filled, because in those narrow, low Pulses, the sides of the Ventricl●s do fall, and than consequently may be filled accordingly▪ That is to say, the Fibres of the Heart are relaxed, and so the Ventricles must fall into a narrower compass, like unto a Bag that's empty, for want of something to fill it; but than, still it's a Sign they have a capacity of being filled, which they are not by every Diastole, as I have showed before.  
5. From this premised discourse it must necessarily follow, that the inslux of the Blood into the Ventricles, is the cause of shilling them more or lesle, according to the proportion of the Blood flowing in, and consequently to that, that its the Blood moves the Heart by rarefaction and stimulation, according to the proportion of quantity, and quality of the Animal Spirits its repleted with. If the Blood be thick and gross, for want of Animal Spirits to rarify and move it, the Diast●le must necessarily be slow and low, because the Blood through its thickness, cannot enter in any great quantity, nor stimulate; if it be thin, much rarified, and full of good Animal Spirits, the Diastole must be large and high, and if very stimulating, quick. So that the variation of tunes of all the Pulses must be caused, in my opinion, by the quantity and quality of the Animal Spirits, and the Blood; and the causes of stagnation, intermission of Pulses, and several other affections of Pulses, of Apoplexi●s, and abundance of other difficulties cannot so readily be assigned, and reasons giv●n thereof, but by supposing only (though it w●re really otherwise) that the ins●●●e of the ●lood is the moving cause of Pulsation, and not the Heart; which notwithstanding all Objections, whereof in the next Paragraph I shall recite the chief of them, I do believe to be true.  
6. That a Muscle is the cause of motion, its vulgar definition, or rather description doth imply, viz. A Muscle is ●n Instrument of voluntary motion, which seems to overthrew, what is by me asserted for a supposition, on which the proceeding Discourse of the cause of Pulsation doth depend; and consequently that the Heart being a Muscle, must be the cause of the motion of the Blood. To which I do answer, That the Heart cannot properly be termed a Muscle, because its motion is not voluntary, as must be owned by all, but Natural, and if so, must be moved by an Intrinsic (in relation to the Heart) moving cause, which can be no other than the Blood and the Animal Spirits, wherewith it's repleted: for Quicquid movetur, movetur ab alio. True it is, the fabric of the Heart is very like to a Muscle, I should rather say to a two fold Muscle; whose Fibres consis●ing of two different Orders, Positions, Figures and disseminations, do both meet in the Con●, exactly resembling a twofold Tendon, so that one Muscle seems formed for dilatation, or opening to admit the Blood, and the other for contraction, or shutting out, or disp●o●ing of the Blood, both these analogical muscles receiving their Animal Spirits from a branch of the sixth pair.  
7. Touching the motion of the Blood in the Veins, which to me appears, cannot be caused by pulsion of the Arterial Blood, as being moved incomparatively slower, by reason of its consisting of thicker and grosser parts, and lesser Animal Spirits, and being much hindered by the Valves, breaking the force of its mo●ion, which said motion I do suppose, is caused by rarefaction of the Blood, through the continual and forcible agitation of the Animal Spirits, by which means its squeezed or pressed forward; and furthermore, I am apt to think, that there is a kind of pulsation in the Veins, but so weak and low, that it's scarce perceptible. It is likewise my opinion, that the local motion of all the Humours, whether natural or preternatural, or excrementitious, is caused by rarefaction. Before I leave this Subject, I think myself obliged to let you know, I am not so forgetful, as not to remember, that in some former Writings, I have set down some Opinions much different, and others contrary to these I have now declared, being miss by commonly received Sentiments of the Learned, and now (as I do believe, for I shall fierce be ever positive in any thing) better informed by many Experiments.   

CHAP. IX. Of Celebrated Remedies against Consumptions.  
1. FOR the present I have detained the Reader long enough in Theoretics, I will now make bold to offer some Observations on the Practic, the Vanity whereof in many particulars, appears to me very extravagant: And in regard I would avoid being troublesome, I shall only make choice of those Diseases, that are most universal, and begin with Consumptions, I mean such as are occasioned, by an Hectic Fever, and attended with a chronical putrid Cough; namely, such as is caused by a putrid slime, and sometimes accompanied with an Ulcer in the Lungs, known by its purulent expectorations. I will not undertake here to enter into a discourse of its Causes, and Indications, that are to be drawn thence, but only recite such Remedies, to which many do attribute great Virtues, and make appear, how vain, fruitless and deceitful they are. By the way let me tell you, there are many consumptions, that may properly be so called, that are neither occasioned nor accompanied with an Ulcer in the Lungs, but sometimes in the Bronchia, othertimes in the Aspera Arteria, and sometimes with no Ulcer at all, but very often with an ulcerous putrid slime only. Passing by the gentle Purgatives, as Cassia, Rhubarb, etc. that may be necessary in the beginning, and sometimes in the Progress; I shall only examine the Remedies, that are so highly recommended against Ulcers in the Lungs, and ulcerous Coughs of Consumptions.  
2. Syrup of Turnips is a very celebrated Remedy here in England, and no where else; which after it had been used by many in proportionable quantities, at seasonable times for three Month successively, they have notwithstanding all its Praises, gone of, without the lest aba●●me●t of their Coughs, or improvement in their habit of Body. Neither can I any ways discover, whence those pretended V●●tu●s should proceed, or in what part of the Turnip its wondered strength doth lie. It's apparent enough, that the expressed boiled Juice is waterish and windy, not nourishing, nor abstersive, neither hath it such a cooling quality, as to have the lest prevalence in abating the ●●ctic Fever; so that I do look upon it to be a foolish vain Medicine. True it is, that the Sugar in it may seem to alloy the s●lin ●●ime, smooth; and lenify the Gullet, which upon t●is occasion is ●ver very rough, and so in s●m● measure seem to case that part for a li●●l●●ime; but after it hath been some little time in the Stomach, turns into a very s●●r, ●ie●ging, and almost corroding moisture, which allowing a●ter some considerable time it doth arrive to the Lungs and Windpipe, must under those qualifications tender the said Parts more rough, and rather provoke, than in the lest abate the Cough.  
3. But Ground Ivy, alias Ale-hoof, alias under several other Names, is the Catholicon of the Vulgar, and of many Physicians also, who appropriate it to the Eyes, Kidneys, Bladder, Lungs, and to the cure of internal and external Ulcers, proclaiming it the chief of all Vulneraries. These singular commendations do encourage many to use it in all their ordinary Drink; some for to cure and preserve their Eyesight, others against the Stone, Gravel, Hypochondriac Vapours; and in Consumptions supposed to be caused by an Ulcer in the Lungs, it is entertained for a None-such. Quercetan the Armenian gives you his word, that with the Juice of it boiled into a Syrup with Sugar of Roses and penid Sugar, mixed with Flowers of Brimstone into a Lohoch, he hath recovered many desperate Consumptives, who either in my opinion, were not in a proper Consumption; or Chemist like, boasted of what he never observed. All those eminent qualities of this Ground-Ivy, are supposed to flow from a diuretic and abstersive Virtue, as most Traumaticks are thought to do their feats by. But where this subtle Spirit, or bitter Salt is to be found, I am yet to seek. I have sundry times advised it to Consumptives, to be used sometimes singly in a Syrup, other times joined to Bugle, Speedwell, Sanicle, St. johnswort Flowers, China root, (and sometimes S●rsaparila) Dates and Liquorish boiled to a good strong Decoction, to be sweetened with Sugar of Roses, and taken at Horis Medicis; besides a smaller Decoction made with the addition of a few fresh Ingredients, to be drunk at other times. This though used ten or twelve Weeks successively, with a good Barley Broth and Milk Porridge Diet, I have observed to be as ineffectual, and unsuccesful, as all of the other celebrated Remedies I shall hereafter writ. True it is, that many youthful, or otherwise strong Bodies, that have been molested with a long strenuous Couch, copious and foul Expectorations, so as a sensible wasting of the Flesh and other parts hath ensued, have been restored to Health, upon taking Pectoral Syrups, and Decoctions made after the forementioned Model, whence to those Remedies the Titles of Infallible and Sovereign have been attributed, whereas the Disease was not accompanied with an Ulcer in the Lungs, or an Hectic Fever, but removed by spareness of Diet, and possibly change of Air, so that not the lest advantages have been derived from these Pectorals, but rather a detriment, If you will with me believe, that all Sugars and sugared Medicines turn sour in the Stomach, and assume a sharp fretting, and sometimes corroding quality. Is it not a daily Observation, that many Persons of the best Quality labouring under a Consumption, whose Fortunes do enable them to be assisted by a Chorus of Physicians, performing their utmost endeavours, by prescribing all the noted Pectorals, maugre all their useless efforts, are forced to yield to the fury of their Distempers? However, take notice that I do not offer this sort of discourse, to discourage any Consumptive from applying to a Physician; for considering, one so Diseased is under a Sentence of death, and to continued so, is to dye every Day, every Week and every Month, which is more terrible than a Pessilential F●ver, whereof a Man dieth but once, the advising with a Physician, who shall give you hopes every Day, Week and Month, of recovering of you, will wholly ab●t● v●ur terror, until the very fatal Moment yo● leave him, and he leaves you.  
4. St. johns-wort in its Flowers, under the notion that it's one of the chiefest Tranmatics, having by infusion in Water, Mead, or Small-Ale, and a little boiling towards the latter end, impregnated either of these Liquors with its Vir●ues, and with Sugar, or rather Honey seduced into a Syrup, is by many approved very sovereign to Consumptives; the truth whereof can be best attested, by several that have used it several Weeks to no purpose.  
5. Among all the decanted Remedies against Consumptions, I found Physicians have a great respect for Sugar of Roses, and for being a kin to that, for Conserve of Roses; of which former, it is the report of Avicem, that a certain Woman, who was in a desperate Consumption, was not only recovered by it, but made fat thereby; add hereunto a concurring testimony of Mesues, that many have been cured by it of Consumptions, that being not lesle recommended to them than the latter, viz. Conserve of Roses by Montanus, Valleriola, and Forestus, who pretend abundance to have been cur●d by using vast quantities of it; and Riverius tells you likewise, that he knew an Apothecary, that was cured of a Consumption, only by almost continually eating Sugar of Roses. On the other hand I am well assured, that most practising Physicians, if they are pleased to speak the Truth, can tell you, they have known hundreds of Consumptives, that have used it in gross quantities, without the lest benefit; as for my own particular, I am so far from believing, that any Consumptive, to whom at any time I have advised it, upon the credit of the forementioned Authors, have received any advantage, that they rather were rendered much worse by it: And my Opinion further is, scarce any thing is more unwholesome than Sugar, whose greatest use is to please the Palates of Women and Children, and to preserve Fruits and Herbs from corrupting. It cannot be denied, but that eating much Sugar destroys the Appetite, by raising fermentations and ebullitions, which extremely annoyed Digestion; sometimes causes loosenesses, Fevers, ill habits of Body, etc. and is no ways Pectoral.  
6. Of all Sweets, nothing is more Pectoral than English Liquorish, and its Juice; and if it be tru●, that most Countries afford a native Remedy for Endemick Diseases, they are subject to breed, Liquorish may very well be accounted as such in Coughs, and those Diseases of the Breast.  
7. We are than to consider the Sugar in the Conserve, and Sugar of Roses, to be intended only as a preserver to the Flowers, and their Juice; and therefore the principal Virtue must reside in the Juice; and how far that is Pectoral, or abstersive to the Ulcers in the Lungs, I cannot well apprehended, especially if it be said to be drying, binding, stopping, restringent, and consolidating, which most certainly are qualifications contrary to smoothing or absterging; for what is binding and rough, must cement, thicken, detain, bind and fasten the putrid matter in the Lungs, and entirely hinder and stop up the Expectoration, either of purulent matter, or putrid slime. So that I cannot conceive those Authors recommended those Rosy Remedies against Ulcerous Consumptions, but only against such asthey supposed to be occasioned by a Catarrh from the Brain of thin salin Rheumsupon the Lungs, which the drying and constrictive quality of the Roses might thickeen, and by straigthning the passages, put a stop to the Catarrh. That humours falling upon the Lungs do 'cause a Cough, cannot be apprehended; for being without sense, and having no Nerves disseminated through them, are not capable of being stimulated into a Cough; so that what ever is conceived to occasion a Cough, must be something annoying and stimulating of the Bronchia, or Lung-pipes. Neither is it probable, there can be any Catarrh fall from the Brain, that being shut up as close as a Box by its Membranes, and bones of the Cranium. Wherhfore those Rheums can only be thought to drip out of the Glandules of the Throat, and Aspera Arteria, upon which those astringent Medicines do seem to have an Influence.  
9 Certain it is, that such saline Rheumatic Constitutions are very subject to be extremely emaciated, against which its no wonder, if a Diet of Asses, or other Wheyish Milk, together with their Hordeata, and Amygdalata, Snail waters, Decoction of Snails, Lobsters, and yellow Saunders, proved such auxiliary Remedies; though I can never believe these Hordeata, Amygdalata, Waters, or Decoctions of Earth Worms, Snails, Claws of Lobsters, (whereby as Cardan doth writ, he hath cured many desperate Consumptions, to whom being more an Italian Romantic ginger, than a Physician, little credit can be given.) Syrup of Comfry, of Milfoil, Bugle, and the like, they being all thickners, ever cured the lest Ulcer in the Lungs.  
10. Much lesle can I believe, that ever Erastus, Fracastorius, and other Italian subtle fourbs ever cured so many Consumptives (as they pretend more out of a decoy to allure Patients, than a real Truth) with a Decoction of Guaiacum, who probably were macerated by a Pocky Consumption, which is so Epidemic among them, and no lesle endemick, being the place of its Nativity.  
11. Some are so voided of Sense, to approve of Spirits of Sulphur, or Vitriel, given in four or five drops, in a small Glass full of Plantain or Rose-water.  
12. The Narcotick Thickening and Emplastic Powder of Hali Abbas, consisting of the Seeds of white Poppy, Cucomber, Melon, Citrul, Quince, Gourd, Porcelain, and Mallows, gum-arabic, Tragant, Starch, burnt Ivory, Juice of Liquorish, Penid. Sugar, is a mere heap of Rubbish, by which V●lascus de Taranta and Forestus do each affirm, to have cured a single Patient of a proper Consumption; but aught not to be credited, that probably being only an Emaciation from such a Catarrh of a saline Rheum, as is before mentioned; notwithstanding this Powder is still in great esteem among many Physicians, who never yet observed their Patients received any great benefit by it.  
13. An Elixir Proprietatis tartarised, and so prepared, as to be very little bitter, and not laxative, used in a Decoction of Mallows or marsh Mallows in Whey, Mead, or very small Ale, is a Medicine far more commendable than any yet proposed. But the most proper Remedy I could hitherto yet discover, is a subtle penetrating Balsamic Tincture, taken in a true pectoral Decoction for a month, or six weeks.  
14. As for Asses-Milk, it is rather a medicinal Diet, than a proper Remedy; and, as I said before, by diluting and nourishing is helpful to salin emaciated Bodies, and to ulcerous Consumptives also, though if it ever singly cured one such, it hath failed a thousand times in others.  
15. Sulphur, though endued with an extraordinary Virtue against all internal and external Ulcers, is not to be understood as such, being exhibited in substance, whether in Flowers or otherwise, but aught to be dissolved and opened by a proper Menstruum.  
16. Before I conclude this Chapter, I can scarce pass by an Observation upon some deceitful Empirics, who after Patients have Laboured a long time under a proper Consumption, and a tedious fruitless cure of Physicians, have found a way to let themselves in by a specious Promise, accompanied with a large Declaration of bombast Words, that they shall be Cured in 6 or 8 Days, by only administering some common pectoral Julep or Apozem, proportionably enforced with Diacodium, or Laudanum Liquidum, by which, on a sudden procuring rest, abating the Cough by suppressing Expectoration, and through those Narcoticks putting a stop to the violent motion of the Animal Spirits, (into which they are irritated by the pungent purulent, or putrid slimy matter adhering to the Bronchia, or sides of the Asp●ra Arteria; for according to what I have observed before, the Animal Spirits are the sole causes of all motion in the Humours) the Patient hath seemingly b●en wonderfully recovered, and f●lt himself at a great deal of ease, though in effect, this way of proceeding did considerably hast●n his Death, (by locking up the matter) which though happing so suddenly, the Empirick notwithstanding, finds a way to get great reputation by it, only by telling the standers by, that they may plainly observe by the great Benefit the Patient received in so little time before his death, that had he been called sooner, in all probability, as they may judge themselves, he might have cured him. Among the rest of those Quacks, I knew one, that by many was called the Consumption-Doctor, who did confess to me, that his usual Medicine was what follows. He took of Penny-royal-water and Scabious-water, of each half a pint, therein he dissolved of Oxymel Simplex (and sometimes Oxymel scilliticum) four Ounces, and as much of Diacodium, which made a thick Julep, or a thin Syrup; hereof he would 'cause the Patient to take four or five Spoonfuls three or four times in a day. This was the same Person, and the same Medicine, by which he pretended to have Cured one Captain O Brian of a Consumption, which at that time made a great noise, and was taken notice of by his Majesty King Charle●, as the Treatise, which was written upon it, mentions; though at the same time, you are not to conceive this Patient to be otherwise troubled, than with a long chronical Cough, occasioned by Debauches; being without an hectic Fever, nor having his Lungs touched in any sort, of which, and his Leanness, he was rather recovered by the continuance of a Milk-Diet, and his detainure from Brandy● and other strong Liquors, which had caused this Distemper, though the giving seasonable Rest to his Animal Spirits by the said Narcotic did also in some measure contribute to it.  
17. Air being the life of the Lungs, a Consumption cannot be hoped to be protracted, or palliated, much lesle cured, without exchanging from a worse to a better, which is most agreeable in a dry, gravelly, stony or sandy Soil; not low, because subject to damps, nor high and mountainous, because exposed to sharp Winds, that are more offensive to the Lungs than Damps, Vapours or Fogs; neither can the Air of any place situate Westward of any great River, Bog, Marsh, Pond, or Moat, be healthful, because the Damps, Vapours or Fogs, that are raised by a Setting-Sun, continued all night, and are not discussed before the Sunrising the next day.  
18. I am fully convinced, that Consumptions in youthful Bodies, strong before their Illness, not being very much depraved in their Bowels by a foul ill habit of Blood, and other Juices (cacochymia) are curable, if undertaken six Weeks, or a month, at lest, before their expected end, and opposed by proper Remedies given frequently, and in large Doses; for I have often observed, that many Medicines have failed in their expected effects by being under-dosed.  
19 As for Issues made in the Neck, or Arms, they can bring no relief, in respect of cleansing the Ulcer in the Lungs, or correcting of the putrid Slyme, neither can External Fumigations signify much.   

CHAP. X. Of continual, putrid and malignant Fevers.  
1. LOnger Experience hath induced me to recede from my former Opinions in continual putrid, and malignant, I may say, in all sorts of Fevers, where the Blood tending to a dissolution of the mixture (I aught not to say subversion of the Crasis, or temperament, being lesle intelligible) of its constituent parts, namely of its most subtle parts, which are the Animal Spirits from the lesle subtle, and grosser, or of its sulphurous from the mercurial, and saline parts, may properly be termed Putrefaction, which is not necessary, or constantly observed, to be attended with a stink, as appears in a Gangrene of any part of the Body, that is seldom or never accompanied with a stink; though a Corruption, sphacelus, or Mortification, always is. By this separation the most subtle parts, or Animal Spirits running together, and being accumulated in greater heaps, do move much more impetuously, whereby the said mixture is more and more dissolved every minute. By this acceleration of Motion the natural Heat (whereof Local motion is the sole cause, as appears by attrition, or rubbing any thing for a long time together causes a Heat; or by the quick and violent motion of Spirits of Vitriol, being affused upon Steel, raising a great heat, i● augmented into a greater and preternatural heat, so that the preternatural heat following the dissolution of the mixture, cannot be thought to be the cause (which must precede the effect) but a consequent Symptom, and effect of a putrid Fever, whose Essence therefore cannot be said to consist in a preternatural Heat, or can it so be ●efin●d. Moreover, there are some Fevers, wherein no preternatural Heat, quick Pulse, or high-coloured Urinal is perceived, as appears in many malignant Fevers, where the mixture of the Blood is dissolved by a sudden extinguishing, or mortifying the Animal Spirits by venomous Particles commonly admitted from without, or sometimes bred within the Body, which confirms, that a Fever is not a preternatural Heat first kindled in the Heart, whereas its often kindled in other parts: As for Instance, when an Inflammation of any Bowel, as Lungs, Liver, etc. or where any great pain is raised, there the Heat is first kindled, and thence communicated to the Heart, and all the pa●ts of the Body: That there is such a dissolution in the Blood, is evident by the Blood, that is drawn of by bleeding in putrid Fevers, the parts being plainly separated one from the other. So that advising all the Coolers you can imagine, be it Snow-water, Frog-spawn-water, the coldest Spring-water, Whey, sour Buttermilk, or Juleps made of Succory, Edive, Water-lilly, or any other Waters, though enforced with Spirit of Vitriol, Sulphur, Nitre, or Salt, and a Solution of Sal prunella, they avail so little in Fevers, that they are generally found to increase them in all the Symptoms, as the preternatural Heat, high and quick Pulse, deep-coloured Urinal, and the rest are sensibly raised to a much higher pitch. Neither doth Bleeding in the lest contribute to the abatement of a Fever by cooling per fe, but by some other way per accidens, as I shall endeavour to explain hereafter. That Physicians have most of 'em, if not all, wholly abandoned prescribing such sort of cooling Juleps, as being rather detrimental, and content themselves with advising small clear Posset, thin Gruel, etc. is an Argument, that putrid Fevers are not preternatural heats, nor are they not primarily caused by them.  
2. That the Circulation of the Blood in putrid Fevers is too quick, and the Blood too much rarefied, by the too quick motion of the Animal Spirits, is very apparent, and therefore lessening the Blood by bleeding, must also lessen the Circular motion, and diminish the Animal Spirits; which being reduced to a moderate measure, as may be done by one bleeding or two, is as much as can be expected from that remedy; the Spirits being thereby rendered more free, and the Vessels more Capacious, are put into a State of performing their Office with more ease, in throwing of heterogeneous, and very offensive particles, that are got into the Blood, either from without, or bred in the Body. But should you proceed to a Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Bleeding, you will draw of so many Animal Spirits, that the remainder must be insufficient to perform their aforesaid Office, wherein the cure of a Fever doth consist; and should you tap of all, or most part of the Blood in the Body, as I fear too many do, and have done out of Ignorance or Stubbornness, the Fever would and must still continued proportionably in the same Vigour and Degree; so that this way of proceeding, must sooner kill the Patient than the Fever. As for Malignant Fevers, the most Sanguinary Physician will scarce Adventure beyond a single bleeding, which the more judicious think to be one too many.  
3. Glisters, gentle purgatives, and Laxatives, also mild Vomits, used sometimes in the beginning are not looked upon a Remedies per se, and directly opposite to Fevers, but only helpful per accidens, in removing excrementitious Humours, that otherwise might annoyed the Spirits, and deteriorate the Fever: Neither can Epispastick or Blistering Plasters be thought to be otherwise advantageous, than by stimulating the Animal Spirits, (upon which as I intimated formerly, they seem to Operate peculiarly) to throw of those heterogeneous and febril particles; for I cannot conceive, any are so wanting of Judgement, as to think, that the cause of the putrid, or Malignant F●ve● is in the Serum, whereof part is contained in those Bladders or blisters, the Cantharideses have occasioned.  
4. It remains than, that the whole Stress in curing continual, putrid, and Malignant Fevers, is by most of our modern Physicians, laid upon such Compounds, as are called Cordial and Alexipharmacal Waters, Powders, and Electuaries, also some Chemical Preparations, as Antimonium, Diaphoreticum, Bezoarticum, Minerale, Spiritus cornu cervi, Spiritus fuliginis, etc.  
5. The chief of those Cordial Alexiphamacal Waters now most in use, are Aqua Theriacalis, Aqua Prothericacalis, (perhaps the better of the two, as consisting of lesser Ingredients,) Aqua Epidemica, etc. The Electuaries are Theriaca Andromachi (which is accounted more temperate than Mithridate.) Theriaca Londineusis, and Diascordium. The compound alexipharmacal Powders are usually compiled out of some testaceous Powders, as pulvis echelis cancrorum compositus, and others of Crabs-eyes and Claws, Perl, Oriental Bezoar, burnt Hartshorn, and sometimes mixed with Radix Carlina, Contrajerva, Serpentaria virginiana (which are the chief) Dictamnum Creticum, Angelica, etc. By these, and the like, as the Goastone, pulvis Pannonicus ruber, it's supposed the Heart is much strengthened, and the Animal Spirits increased, and propoked to throw out the materia febrilis by sweat; so that they do esteem Diaphoretics to be the only true and adequate Remedies, against all continual Fevers, as the Physicians of the Southern parts do only acknowledge Bleedings.  
5. We are to observe, that the Animal Spirits are continually employed, from the beginning of a continual Fever to the declination, in subduing the Materia febrilis, which is commonly termed a Digestion, or Concoction; at the Declination they apply themselves to the separation, and expulsion of the said febril matter, which in these colder Climates is more frequently by Sweat and Urinal, and sometimes by Stool, Hemorrhage, Imposthumations, or some few otherways.  
6. If than the chief scope is to throw of and expel the febril matter by sweat, three things aught to be considered. 1. Whether Diaphor●tics aught to be used before the Declination of a Fever, at which time only they appear to be helpful in assisting Nature to throw of; for it must be owned by all experienced Practisers, that the causa febrilis, be its vicious humours, heterogeneous particles, or what other offensive matter they are please to allow, must be first subdued, or digested, and separated, before it can be expelled by Sweat; and therefore should you exhibit the largest Doses of Diaphoretics, that Nature can possibly bear, and second them by loading the Patient with a number of Bed-cloaths, he will scarcely be brought to sweeting; and if peradventure he should hap to be forced into a Sweat in the beginning, augment, or state of the Fever, it must be to a very great detriment, by diverting the Spirits from their necessary task, and squeezing the serum from the Humours, whereby they are thickened and hardened, which aught rather to be diluted at those Seasons. Moreover by putting so great a force upon the Spirits, they must necessarily be much divided, dissipated and inflamed. Secondly, whether Sudorificks given in moderate Doses, so as to be insufficient to provoke Swear, do not assist the Spirits by increasing them, (I mean, such as contain some vinous Spirits, as Epidemic, as Treacle-water) and putting them into a gentle agitation, whereby the febril matter may be subved, or digested. Vox Medicorum doth proclaim they do, and therefore they are prescribed by them from the beginning to the ending of Fevers, in no greater measures, than what nature seems to require. For my own particular, I can scarce believe, that those Spirits are, or can be rendered homogeneous to the Animal Spirits (whatever they are when a Man is in health) being now under a great disorder, and disturbance; and as for the other subtle particles, that are supposed to be in the Ingredients of the said Alexipharmacal-waters; how far they are conducing in subduing the febril matter, can best be proved by the success, ten dying under the use of them, to one that recovers, whose Recovery may rather be attributed to the strength of Nature, a due regimen in his Diet, and doing him no hurt by improper Remedies. Thirdly, supposing fictitiously, that Diaphoretics were proper, the uncertainty of their Operation would often occasion a failure of the effect that is expected from them. Purgatives and Vomitories seldom or never fail in their operations, if justly dosed: But Sudorificks and Diuretics very often, though administered in great quantities. Many quarterns of Plague-water have been drunk for pleasure at one time by several that are in health, without the lest sweat following upon it: And as many diuretic Juleps have been swallowed by Nephritics, who have not made a drop of Urinal the more after them.  
7. Wherhfore I do much suspect, that there is scarce any Remedy used, that may be truly termed an Antifebril; though there are a great many that are in common use, and yet not commonly known, or acknowledged to he such, which, if well Dosed, and often exhibited in proper Seasons, may evidently and sensibly be discovered by any heedful Physician, to subdue the febril matter, though but slowly, and therefore aught to be began to be given very early, and continued. Besides these, there are o●her Medicines, which in four and twenty hours do abate all the common Symptoms in a continual and malignant Fever, though even these, if applied too late, the Spirits being than almost wholly subdued, and the febril matter increased, and rendered indigestible, may fail in their performances. As for the Peruvian Bark, I have ●●veral times attentively observed, that the continual Fever being under very promising circumstances, hath upon the use of it changed sensibly into worse Symptoms in six or twelve hours, so that no means afterwards could be applied capable to retrieve that Error.  
8. Narcotics are seldom forgotten in this Distemper, especially where so seeming a relief is perceived on a sudden, in the sudden suspension of its Symptoms, by detaining or holding fast of the Animal Spirits from Operating upon the Febril matter, that causeth these Symptoms, which soon return with a greater fury, upon the letting lose of the said Spirits, by the dissipation of the Force of the Hypnotic Medicine. This seeming alleviation doth often encourage the Physician to a continuated use of Dormitives, throughout the whole course of the Fever, the benefit whereof is experienced, not only to consist in a longer delay of death, but also in a more certain consequence of it. Notwithstanding this great abuse doth not remove the necessary, seasonable and seldom use of Narcotics, when and where urgent Symptoms may require them.   

CHAP. XI. Of the Stone.  
1. THAT the Urinal is saturated with Sal Armoniac, its distillation doth plainly confirm to us, and that the serum of the Blood where of the Urinal doth consist must first contain the same, or else the latter could not receive it; for nihil dare potest quod non habet, and consequently that the whole Mass is thoroughly replenished with it, doth also appear from the distillation of Human Blood, which yields a plain Spirit of Sal armoniac, little or nothing at all different from the other. That Sal armoniac is the most tough Salt of all others, cannot be disputed by those, that have pounded common Salt, Sal gemmae, nitri, or any other Salt, in a mortar, these being the most friably and brittle, and consequently the lesle unfit singly to be coagulated into a Stone, whereas Sal armoniac being so tough and tenacious, especially being mixed with crude slimy mucous dregss, that remain after the imperfection of the Digestion in the Stomach, together with some sabulous Matter of the Blood, I do conceive may easily be coagulated together by a vicious, limpid gle●t dripping out of the Nerves (as I have already mentioned in one of the preceding Chapters) that are disseminated through, and are terminated in the par●nchyma, and membranes of the Kidneys. So that the pretending that Slime-adhering to the Kidneys, or its inward membrane, ●s baked into a Stone by a preternatural heat of the Kidneys, like unto Clay baked in a Kill into a brick by the extreme heat of a fire, seems a Jest to me, since it cannot be imagined, that any heat of that degree is ever felt by any nephritick Patient, or, if possible, could it be endured by him. Moreover their pale Complexions, pale Urinal, sluggishness, infrequent Urination, or making of Water, are all indications of Coldness; add hereunto, that Crystal is generally found, and probably bred in the Snow; Rocks, Flints, and other Stones in the Bowels of the Earth, where no degree of Heat was ever perceived. Wherhfore what ever extraordinary or preternatural Heat may be felt by Nephriticks about their Loins or Kidneys, is commonly caused by Gravel, Stone, or some other obstructing matter, occasioning pain and consequently heat.  
2. In what part soever this Urinous Salt, or Shall Armoniac is found, (through want of being separated and expelled by the Kidneys) be it in the Guts, Urinary-Bladder, Gallbladder, Liver, Spleen, Brain, Stomach, Lungs, in the fleshly part of the Tongue, and of the Kidneys themselves, also about the Joints, though as remote as the extremities of the Fingers, there Stones may be, and have been engendered, as is attested by a multitude of Authors. Some of these parts being allowed by most Physicians to be of a cold Temperament, as the Brain, Guts, Bladder, etc. is a second Argument, that plainly evinces, the Stone is not engendered efficiently by Heat, though it may sometimes very considerably conduce to it. But to say, there is a Lithopoetic Faculty, or an innate calculous and fabulous constitution in the Kidneys, as is asserted by so great an Author, as Fernelius, seems to me very idle; as if he would infer, that none were subject to the Gravel and Stone▪ but such as derived hereditarily a fabulous, and calculous disposition of Kidneysfrom their Parents: What satisfaction there is in the Word Lithopoetic, I cannot well apprehended.  
3. Before I recede from this subject, I aught to answer one Objection, viz. That there is not always mucous Matter concurring to the generation of the Stone, as appears in the Stone, that is sometimes found in the Gallbladder of a Man, and very often in that of an Ox, which consisting of Gall or choler, cannot be supposed to have any Slime, Phleam, or Mucus adjoined to it, being for the most part found simple unmixed, and contrary to the Nature of Mucus, or Phleam, which is always Glutinous or Viscous; I allow the whole, and make answer, that the Stone in the Gallbladder is often form by concretion, through the separating or drying away of its thinner and moister parts; in like manner Mortar drieth in some time into a Stony substance; as also doth Tartarum Vitriolatum, that's made by concretion, besides many others; on the other hand I must tell you, I am not the first, that hath observed the Gall in the Gallbladder very Viscous and roapy, through the admixture of some Slime or Mucus, that's separated with i● from the Blood, and than it will be allowed to be matter very proper for the Formation of a Stone. In the same manner a Stone in the Kidneys may be form by concretion, without the admixture of Mucous Matter, but than the Stone becomes friable, and not very hard, and of a more ready colour, whereas according to the proportion of Mucous matter, concuring to the formation of the Stone, it becomes hard and pale.  
The Stone of the Kidneys is commonly observed to precede that in the Bladder; and any Stone, though of a very small dimension, falling from thence, through either of the Ureters into the Bladder, is conceived to be the Foundation of one there, which by lying a considerable time, doth receive a daily growth from the Urinous Salt, and Slime, that descend thither. This in my opinion is not always necessary, it being possible enough for a Stone to grow in the Bladder, without having the Rudiments laid in the Kidneys; moreover it hath been observed, that at the same time one of the Kidneys, and the Bladder, have each contained a Stone.  
4. To the formation of the Stone, must be concurring. 1. Depauperated or Vicious animal Spirits, that are too weak to perform the separation and Expulsion of the abounding Serum of the Blood in the Kidneys. 2. A Serum too much Saturated with a Shall Armoniac, that's mixed with too much common Salt, which all edibles do contain in some proportion, and so do Urine, Beer, Whey, and other Drinks; for you are to understand, that Shall Armoniac is a mixed Salt, consisting of common Salt, and a Fuliginous Salt, united together, as appears by the Artificial making of Sal Armoniac, which is by mixing a pound of common Salt, to half a pound of Soot, and and boiling them in three or four pints of fresh Urines, to the thickness of Honey, which is than to be sublimed in subliming-pots into Sal Armoniac. The natural Salt Armoniac is Urinal of Chamels, Horses, or Oxen, concreaced or Evaporated by the hot Sands of Arabia into a Salt. 3. A Slime or Mucus to Cement the Salt with the 4th, which is Sabulous Dregss of the Blood, 5 narrow passages of the Kidneys. So that Salt, Salt-Meats, Pickles, and Spices, are chief materials for the Stone. 6. A Vicious gleet dripping from the Nephritic Nerves, Coagulating the materials together. This is the short Theory I do propose to my s●lf, of the generation of the Stone in the Kidneys, which is suggested to me by practical experience, though I could wish, that among so great a number of very ingenious Physicians we have h●re in England, (who are as capable, as any in the whole Universe, though not so industrious) some would take the pains, to detect a more probable Theory of the Stone, and other Distempers, which would certainly prove a great Advancement to the Art of Physic, and no lesle Benefit to miserable Patients. However, as defective and Hypothetical only this Theory may be, it conducts me much more successfully in the Practic against the Stone, and other Diseases of the Kidneys, than the common Doctrine. I do own, that this and all the other preceding Theoretic Notions might be rendered much plainer, by branching their Illustrations into so many particular Volumes; but my invincible Aversion to all manner of Prolixity, together with my weak Capacity of rendering them any more than scarcely probable, or other than merely supposititious, doth entirely discourage me from any such Attempt.  
The Practical Part of the Stone consists in these Particulars; 1. In the Means to prevent the Growing of it. 2. In the Cure of the Stone. 3. In the Removing a Fit, or Paroxysm of Pains, occasioned by the Stone. 4. In the preventing the Return of a Paroxysm of the Stone, which may be termed a Palliative Cure.  
1. Those that live Sedentary Lives, and use little or no Exercise, as most Students; and Debauchees in sharp Wines, and very new, or stolen Strong Beer, are very subject, and properly disposed to breed the Stone; but beyond all, those that eat much Salt with their Meat, or feed much upon Flesh or Fish Salted, Smoked, or Pickled. Wherhfore interposing moderate Exercise between their Studies, and abstaining from their grave Thoughts, by intermixing Cheerfulness and sober Mirth, to alleviate the Animal Spirits, which are the chief Agents of Health, and, being indisposed, or vitiated, of Diseases. This is one Way to prevent the Stone in the former; And exchanging sharp Wines into milder, and diluted with a light thin Spring-Water, and using them with a quantum sufficit, and a total Abstinence from Stolen Beer, substituted by Small Ale, will produce the like Effect in the latter. To drink Wine at Meals, as it lays a Foundation for the Stone, so using Small Drink in its stead prevents it: And in my Opinion, pure Wine aught not to be drunk, according to the Rules of Health, before the Chylification is finished, and the Distribution at hand, unto which it may be very assistant. A Fish-Diet moistened with too much sharp Wine, and a Bread and Cheese-Diet, seldom fail of administering sufficient Matter for the Stone. In short, Keeping the Stomach clean, in the manner as hath been before described, is the chiefest Way and Means to prevent breeding the Stone.  
2. The Cure of this Disease is commonly attempted by Bleeding in the Arm (though some judge it more advantageous in the Foot) in Bodies, that are moderately replete, to make room in the Vessels, which the subsequent Laxatives and Purgatives will necessarily require, as working by Fermentation, that will occasion a Rarefaction of the Humours, and consequently a Distension of the Vessels, which otherwise might 'cause some Local Disturbance of the Stone, or occasion a Paroxysm of Nephritick Pains. Among the Laxatives, Cassia Fistularis newly drawn over the Steem of a Decoction, made of Emollient or Diuretic Vegetables, is made choice of as a sacred Remedy, either by itself, or mixed with Rhubarb and Cream of Tartar, or Diasenna; which is often suspected, because the Scammony, that is an Ingredient in it, is accounted too rough, as causing too high a Fermentation, or Ebullition; or Pulvis Senae comp. maj. or Pulvis Sen. comp. min. This is judged necessary to be repeated once or twice, at convenient Intervals; which, as I have tried more than once, I have always found, not to reach the Morbific Matter, and therefore am obliged to make use of such Additions, that should penetrate without any Hazard of putting the Spirits upon a Ruffle. This being premised, the Saxifragers, or Stone-breakers, are to be introduced, with this Election and Preference, That those, which have an extraordinary Character stamped upon them by great Authors, or Physicians, aught only to be recited; for, should they all be enumerated here, to which the Faculty of Stone-breaking is attributed, a Choir of Paper would be insufficient to contain them, there being no Disease in the whole Body of Man, against which so many Simple and Compound Remedies (in all manner of Galenical and Chemical Forms) of Vegetables, Minerals, and Animals are recommended, as against the Stone; for I do believe I never met with a Physician, Apothecary, Surgeon, Empirick, Midwife, or any Old Woman, that had not an infallible Remedy against the Stone and Gravel.  
But before I make mention of any of these Stone-Grinders, it will not be amiss to inquire by what Quality, Virtue, or Means it is expected by Physicians, they should perform this great Work of Breaking the Stone in the Kidneys and Bladder. Some endeavour to effect it by Medicines, that have a Corroding Quality, by which insinuating into the Pores of the Stone, tear all asunder, and dissolve it, in like manner as Aqua fortis dissolves Silver, Copper, and Tin; Aqua regia Gold; and Juice of Lemons, and distilled Vinegar Crabs-Eyes, Pearl, Coral, etc. To this purpose, for Corroding and Dissolving the Stone, are recommended Spirit of Vitriol, Sulphur, Salt, Nitre▪ and juice of Lemons. I have experienced most of these in the Cure of the Stone, and ever observed, that within lesle than an Hour, they would certainly put the Patient into an horrid Fit of the Stone-Cholick, besides the Pain in the Back; against which, an Emollient Laxative Clyster, with the Exhibition of a gentle Narcotick at the end of its Operation, gave present Relief; and glad I was to come of● so. That a few Drops of any of those recited Spirits, well diluted with a Parsley or Fennil-water, and sweetened with Syrup of the five Opening Roots, being thus obtused, and afterwards broke in their Virtues, by passing the Stomach and other Parts, and carrying thence some slimy Particles to blunt them more, should at last, upon their Arrival to the Kidneys, be endued with a Force sufficient to crack a hard Stone, is very wondered. But to clear the Point, pour Spirits of Vitriol upon Steel, as it is directed in the Preparation of Vitriolum Martis, these readily entering the Pores of the Steel, whose Figures are adapted to receive them, move very quick and impetuously, piercing through the whole Body of the Steel in a very few Minutes, whereby not only a very great Heat and high Ebullition are occasioned, but the Sulphurous Particles, that tied the Salin together into a Body, are totally expelled; as you may perceive by the great Stink attending of them in their Evaporation; and the Remainder is turned into its First Principle of Vitriol. In like manner the Spirits of Vinegar, or of Juice of Lemons, piercing into the adapted Pores of Bezoar-stone, Pearl, Coral, Crabs-Eyes, Eggshells, Oyster and Mussel-shells, Crabs-Claws, and the like, by the quick and violent Motion of their most subtle pointed Particles, 'cause an Heat and Ebullition, and chase out the Sulphurous connecting Particles; whereby nothing is left in the Vinegar but a Tartar, (Lincus, or Faex,) and if washed, may be called a Calx extinct, though honoured by Chemists with the Name of Magistery; that is, after the Precipitation with Oil of Tartar, and the sweetening of it with several Lotions of warm Water; which in reality, is no other than a Terra damnata; and among those recited, I take the Bezoar-stone to contain the finest Earth; and next to that the Perl. As for the rest, I look upon them all as equal.  
2. Now if you can suppose the Pores of a Nephritic Stone in the Body, to be adapted in Figures, answerable to receive the pointed Particles of the Spirits of Vitriol, Salt, Nitre, Tartar, Vinegar, or Lemons, you may reasonably believe, there is a Virtue and possibility in these Acids, of dissolving the Stone in the Kidneys or Bladder, notwithstanding that they are not taken in so great a quantity, as almost to corrode, and that they do not arrive in their full force to those remote Places; yet their frequent Repetitions, and long continuance of them, under a milder Virtue, will answer their improportionable dosing, and accomplish the same effect: So that if this supposition were true, as it is most certainly false and erroneous, you are not to apprehended, that thos● Acid Stone-breakers were to perform that Work, in the time almost that you may crack an Apricock Stone, as most of these Medicine-mongers and Empirics pretend to do, in twice or three times taking. But to subvert your Supposition, and consequently to divert you from losing your labour in the use of Acids, I need only to allege to you, that they are in no wise shaped in the figures and dimensions of their Particles, proportionable or adapted to enter the Pores of a Stone bred in the Kidneys or Bladder, as you may easily make trial, by pouring of Spirits of Vinegar, (I mean, Vinegar twice or thrice distilled) Juice of Lemons, or simple water acuated with such a proportion of Spirit of Nitre, Salt, or Vitriol, as to bring it to such a degree of sharpness, acidity, or virtue, as Spirit of Vinegar, or Juice of Limon is; for above that degree, not Acid can be taken into the Body, without corroding the Stomach) upon an indifferent hard Stone, taken out of the Bladder or Kidneys, which being enclosed in a Matrass with its blind Head, and placed in a warm Sand Bath for Twenty Weeks together, at the expiration of which, you may take out the Stone, so far from being pierced by the Acids, that it's grown much harder than it was before▪ But what is more, should you pour the strongest Aqua Fortis, or Regia, or Spirit of Vitriol not diluted upon it, and let it stand as long as you please, the Stone will come out harder than it was put in. As Gold and Silver cannot well be reduced, or dissolved into a Calx by ignition, but by amalgamation, and immersive (as the Chemists term it) Calcination by corrosive Acids; so on the contrary, the Stone that's bred in the Bladder and Kidneys, cannot readily be dissolved into a Calx, by an immersive Calcination, but by Ignition. 
* Because the Sulphur, that tieth the constituent parts of the Stone together, can only be consumed or destroyed by fire, whereas no acid will, or can attempt upon Sulphur.   
3. That all Acids (Quatenus Acids, and pierce) are Enemies to the Nerves, nervous Parts, (as Membranes, Tendons. etc.) and to the Animal Spirits, common experience doth attest; whence it is, that most Men, upon only tasting of a very sour thing, being Potable or edible, are apt to make sour Faces, and to shiver, or to undergo small Tremble all over, (which are small concussions of the Nerves, Tendons, and circumvestient Membranes of the Body) by pricking of the Membranes; and though this Pricking in tasting of any very sour thing, is only perceived by the Nerves and Membranes of the Mouth, it is nevertheless felt all over by the continuity and contiguity of all the Nerves, nervous Parts, and Membranes of the Body, like unto two, or more unison Fiddle strings, whereof one being touched, causeth the same sound in all the others; or like unto a Cord that's extended, which when smartly struck at one end, makes the whole Cord shake as far as the other end; whence I do infer, that what ever expulsion, whether by Vomiting, Stool, or Urine, (and sometimes per accidens sweat) is occasioned by the force of Acids, is by pricking, stimulating, or irritating the Nerves, or nervous parts, by their rigid Pointed Particles, and a faculty, (which all Acids possess, contrary to all suliginous and armoniac Salts) of precipitating of them, and consequently throwing of them down the Ureters; and therefore I doubt not, but that in some kinds of suppression of Urine occasioned by th● Stone, Gravel, Mucus, Crumbs of Blood, and at some seasons, Acid Medicines may be of great use, among which, I do in my opinion prefer this following.  
℞ Aceti Vini albi Gallic● destillati, (vel s● 〈◊〉 sucet 〈…〉 citri, cujus posterioris usus praestat) ℥ j Ol. amygdal. dulc. rec. extract. ℥ i ss. probe & diutine cum Sacohar. candi vel Sacchari Althaeae. ℥ ss. triti. vin. alb. gall. ℥ iiij. M.  
This proves very diuretic in many, and that by stimulation, as I have said before. But it's observed of Juice of Lemons, that if frequently used, its apt to 'cause a Thrush in the stomach, by its too sharp, or rather somewhat corroding quality, occasioning sometimes Vomiting, or a violent Looseness, for which reason the Juice of Citron is preferred, consisting of an acid not so acute, and yet not lesle diuretic. However, White-wine Vinegar distilled is experienced to excel either of them in the diuretic Faculty, and many others, as being much more penetrating, and consisting of Particles more subtle and Volatile. Though Vinegar is vulgarly reputed a potent restringent, yet it cannot deserve that denomination so much as Spirit of Salt, Nitre, Juice of Lemons, or the acid of Tamarinds; and to speak the truth, it cannot properly be termed Adstringent, which is a quality that's binding, pursing, (drawing together like a Purse) and contracting, proceeding from austere Particles, such as are perceived in Allom, Juice of Slows, and the like; but nothing resembling that, can be discovered in Vinegar, not more than in Juice of Lemons, or Spirit of Salt. True it is, that all Acids 'cause an Asperity or Roughness by their acute Particles, pricking the Nerves and Membranes, that are nervous expansions, which by a sort of resistance rise up into those minute Points, 
Like unto a Goose-skin.  thereby endeavouring rather to expel and throw out; whereas the others by their Austerity, though occasioning a Roughness, yet it is such, as doth detain, and bind in whatever they contain: What is in Vinegar, but an Acid Spirit, united to an Acid Tartar, melted as it were per deliqueum into a moisture or Liquor? Vinegar is so far from binding, that it renders any thing, to which its united, more piercing, expulsive, and solutive also, as appears in Sal Tartari Sennerti. Colocynthis steeped in Vinegar, is rendered mu●● more purgative, than when macerated in Brandy or Wine. Three Grains of Laudanum Opiatum taken to cause Sleep, and drinking upon it a Draught of any Julep, that contains an Ounce of distilled Vinegar, or only as much Oxymel Simplex, shall occasion a deeper Sleep, than if ten or twelve Grains of Laudanum had been swallowed, whereout probably some would never awake again. Others upon drinking of sour Beer, (being of the same nature as Vinegar) are immediately put into Gripes and Looseness. However I will not be positive in this, or scarce in any thing else; but to me, the Adstringent quality in Vinegar seems a vulgar Error of some Ages.  
That Acids (excepting those that are merely Austere) are the chief and most proper Medicines (I will not say certain, for they don't prove always so) for Expulsion, and promoting or irritating the Expultrix Faculty efficiently in the Animal Spirits, and Instrumentally in the Nerves and Membranes, may be Instanced in Vinegar, which in a greater quantity provokes Vomiting, in a lesser, Stools and Urinal, and Sweated in those that are disposed. It is certain, that Prophylactic Waters made by Infusion, and not distillation, being commonly well impregnated with Vinegar, and Acetum theriacale are imcomparatively more ready and potent in half the proportion, in promoting Sweat, (which also is by expulsion) than Treacle-water, (wherein is contained only the Phlegm of some Acids, the heavier and stronger part not coming over the Helm in distillation) Aqua Epidemica, or Protheriacalis. One Dram of Virginian serpentary, being macerated in Vinegar, shall raise a quicker and more copious Sweat, than three Drams infused in Wine or Brandy. Cream of Tartar, and Tamarinds, by their pungent Acidity, move the Expultrix Faculty of the Guts to Stools. juice of Lemons, Citrons, Oranges, Spirit of Tartar, Nitre and Salt, prompt the Kidneys to expel Urinal, etc.  
4. Spiritus tartari, Nitrum tartarisatum, and Tartarum Vitriolatum, are by most that have made trial of them, accounted the most powerful of Diuretics. But there being so offensive an empyreumatic stink in the Spirit of Tartar, proceeding from a remaining Admixture of some lixivial Earthy Particles, imperceptible to the Eye, whereto the Empyreum is almost inseparably adherent, causeth its use to be much neglected, which however may be removed, by mixing the Spirit with fine wheaten Flower into a Paste, and that equally mixed with the Caput mortuum of Vitriol, and so drawn of twice or thrice in a Glass retort, or mixing the Spirit of Tartar with Golchotar, i e. Calchantum rubefactum, and drawing it over once or twice in the same manner; wherein you need not to fear, that any Vitriolic Spirit will mix with it, in regard that the degree of heat, that will be sufficient to raise the Spirit of Tartar, is not by much intense enough, to force out the Spirit of Vitriol. After all, a pure Acetum destillatum is not much inferior to it.  
5. By what means those Magisteries of Crabs-Eyes, of Mussel-shells, Egg or Oyster-shells, operate those pretended effects of forcing down Urinal, and breaking the Stone, is my next business to inquire. It is commonly concluded, that whatever drives down Urinal forcibly, doth break the Stone by often dripping upon it, like the ●ropping of a Gutter falling often upon a Stone under it, doth by length of time make a hole into it. Gutta cavat Lapidem non vi, sed saepe cadendo. It is than inserted, that those recited Magisteri●s are potent Diur●ties, (which my little experience doth wholly contradict,) but whether they do their work by cutting, hammering, or dissolving the Stone tota substantia, aught to be considered. It cannot be pretended, that in those Magisteries, and particularly in that of Crabs-Eyes, there is anything besides a fine Earth, the acid Particles of the Vinegar, having entirely driven out the sulphurous Particles of the Crabs-Eyes, and seated themselves in their rooms and Pores; which they had left; so that you are not to apprehended, that the Vinegar is thereby sweetened, because the Alcalious Particles (which in them aught not to be so called, for they are not such) are mortified or broken, and thereby the Liquor, wherein the acid Particles were, remains insipid; not, this is quite otherwise; for the same acid or Vinegar Particles are still in being, having only changed their place; for put the whole solution together, viz. the insipid Liquor, and impregnated fine Earth of Crabs-Eyes into a Glass retort, and being placed in a Sand Furnace, you will by distillation with a smart heat, have your Vinegar returned to you again, not at all, or imperceptibly little impaired in its sharpness, or lessened in quantity; so that this pretended Magistery, Solution, immersive Calcination, or what else you are pleased to call it, is nothing else, but a concentration of the Spirit of Vinegar, in the entirely destroyed Crabs-Eyes, which being washed of from the saline acid Particles of the Vinegar, or first being precipitated by the instillation of Oil of Tartar, and afterwards washed with repeated lotions of warm water, is left not worth a straw, and fit for nothing but to make a very indifferent Fucus, or Cosmetic, which that of Eggshells doth by much excel. Wherhfore Crabs-Eyes by Triture upon a Porphir reduced to an Impalpable Powder, and exhibited in a convenient Vehicle, do in a Moment remove that troublesome Symptom, improperly called the Heartburning, by admitting the acute Particles of the almost corroding acid Liquor (floating in the Stomach, and vellicating its Nervous Tunicks) into their minute Recesses, whence the Sulphurous Particles were so suddenly chased; and if upon this the Patient takes twelve or fifteen Grains of pure crystallized Salt-Petre, (not Sal Prunellae,) in a Draught of Barley or Milk-water, at a few Minute's distance, he shall perceive the Crabs-Eyes, with the contained corroding Particles, sensibly precipitated into the Guts.  
6. Crystallized Nitre is certainly the most wondered Salt of any, and the most active and potent Diuretic, or Piss-driver, of all the whole Catalogue. It is a Salt entirely consisting of Sulphurous Spirits or Particles, concentered or closed up in a very little Saline Matter: It's Activity and quick impetuous Motion is beyond all others, except Mercury; for no sooner can you touch your Tongue with it, but immediately its subtle piercing Particles enter the Pores of the Moisture residing in the spongy Recesses of your Tongue, and of the Spittle about it, which they divide, attenuate, expand, and dilate, or raresie so very quick, that your Mouth seems to run over with Moisture in an Instant. This Nitre, or Crystal Mineral, being taken in a proportionable Dose, in a sufficient quantity of a suitable Vehicle, doth soon after raresie, attenuate, and tuinesie all the Humours, Liquors, Serosities, and Moistures it meets with in the Stomach, and other Bowels and Passages, whereby the thinner Parts are separated, thrust forward, squeezed, and expelled towards the Kidneys, and thence to the Ureters and Bladder; so that I have not yet found any thing comparable to it for a Piss-driver. Tha● I do prefer it thus unprepared before Sal prunellae, is, because by the melting and inflaming Sulphur upon it, a grea● part of the most active and penetrating Spirit●▪ and most subtle Particles are driven out, and consequently much enfeebled. But perhaps you may reply, That their crude Particles are by the inflaming of the Sulphur expelled, and the Nitre thereby digested; which is all fantastic. Beside this extraordinary Virtue, these Crystals Mineral have a Power so surprising in ●he Thrush of the Mouth, Internal, and External Inflammations, and many other Diseases, that 'tis a great Wonder to me, it is not more taken notice of in Physic.  
7. To return to the Remainder of Enquiry into the Manner and Ways, whereby these Virginal Earth's of the aforesaid Testaceous Magisteries do drive down Piss; upon the strictest Search my slender Capacity can make, I do not found any thing to attribute that Faculty unto, except to little cutting pointed Sands of those Earth's, that by pricking the Membranes of the Stomach, Guts, and other Parts, they stimulate them; and by Contiguity, and Continuity of Parts, stimulate all the Membranes of the Body to expel lose, separated, and floating Serosities to the Kidneys and Ureters. That by pricking one Membrane, you do, as it were, prick all the rest, appears in the Instances above-written, of a Touch upon a Cord extended, or a Sound made upon one Unison; or by the pricking of the Membrane of the Tongue by any very sour Taste, all the Membranes of the Body seem to be affected with the same little Punctures, as appears by sudden small Shivering all the Body over; as likewise, in another Instance of the Bladder, which often, upon having made Water newly, the Air from without presses into it, to fill up the Vacuum in some measure, whose Nitrous Particles wherewith it is repleted, do prick the Membranes of the Bladder; upon which, a sudden Shivering (which is an Attempt or Endeavouring of Expelling) happens all over the Body, by the propagated Sense of pricking to all the Membranes.  
8. 'Tis in this respect, that Glass being powdered, is also recommended for a potent Diuretic, by reason of those acute cutting or pointed Particles, that are supposed to be in it, which pricking and stimulating (being likewise accompanied with Weight, that contributes very much, and therefore aught to be administered in greater Quantities, than are usually given) the Tunics of the Stomach impel Serosities to the Kidneys in manner before expressed. Upon the same Consideration it is, that Lapis judaicus, Lapis Nephriticus, Lapis Spongiae, Medlar-stones, and probably Peach and Apricot-stones, Mountain-Crystal, Lapis Lyncis, little Stones that are found in the Stomach and Gallbladder of an Ox in the Month of March, in the Liver of a Wild-Boar, in the Head of a Perch, and in the Throat of a Carp, and the Stones that are taken out of the Kidneys and Bladder of a Man, and indeed all other hard Stones, that being reduced to a Powder, do still retain some acute cutting Particles; for if any hard Substance be finely pulverised, and afterwards grinded into an Alcool, or impalpable Powder, upon a Porphir▪ so as all the Points of the Minute Particles are obtused, and entirely broke, it loseth all its Diuretic Virtue. Wherhfore it is, that the Magistery of Crabs-Eyes, and other Testaceous Bodies are so far from being Diuretic, that they prove Emplastic, and consequently putting a stop to all manner of Expulsion. For the Reasons alleged I am of Opinion, that Crabs-Eyes, Coral, Bezoar, and the rest of Testaceous Bodies are destroyed by all manner of Preparations, (whether in order to Magisteries, Tinctures, Salts, or Deliqueous Oils,) except moderate Pulverisation, which renders them more susceptible of Acid Salts, whereof the Moisture or Liquor being disrobed, now serves for Increase of Serous Matter, that is to be expelled to the Kidneys for the Matter of Urine, or the Ambient Pores of the Body for the Matter of Sweat, whereunto the Membranes are stimulated by the Acid Spirits, wherewith the Testaceous Powders are impregnated  
9 Among the precited Stones, Dogmatists pay the most Respect to the Nephritick Stone, and Crystal; which latter, when brought into a Powder, by how much it retains more hard, subtle, acuated and pointed Particles, so much the more it is adjudged to exceed Glass in a Diuretic and Saxifragous' Quality, both operating in the same manner, and by the same means: As for the N●phritick Stone, there are such wondered Stories recorded of it, that I am almost ashamed to offer the Recital of them; and at the same time, am surprised at the unlimited superstitious Belief of Mankind: Before I proceed, I aught to give you some Description of it, that you may not be imposed upon by a false one. The best of these Stones are brought from Turkey, and the Spanish West-indieses, which they call Igiada▪ though some slight ones are sometimes taken up in some Parts of Bohemia, Spain and Carniola▪ Others are of a very considerable Weight and Bigness. They are fine Stones to look upon, of a dark green Colour, clouded, though some are of a lighter Green; the Surface feels always greasy. 'Tis reported by some, that this Nephritick Stone being grinded into a fine Powder, or prepared probably by Calcination, or making it red-hot in a Fire, and afterwards quenched in strong Vinegar, whereby it is easily reduced into a subtle Powder, and given to the quantity of a Dram and an half, in Fennil or Parsley-Water, doth in a Moment remove the violent Pains in a Fit of the Stone; and being taken three or four times, doth in a wondered manner dissolve the Stone into a Slime, Mud, Gravel, and Crumbles, as they pretend to instance in the perfect Cure of abundance of Nephriticks in Germany, where their Wines, and the common Excess in drinking of them, do in abundance of People breed Stones in the Bladder and Kidneys. They add further, That if it be given in too large a Dose, or taken too often, it breaks so fast, that the Mud and Gravel, into which it is dissolved, come down so fast, that they are apt to damn and choke up the Ways, as containing too little Room to give Passage to so much Rubbish.  
10. But the Excellency of this Lapis Nephriticus consists more in the External Use of it, than Internal, the various Narratives whereof appear wholly incredible. Authors tell you, That being worn on the Wrist, many have been cured by it, who could not receive the lest Benefit from any other Internal Medicine. Another Author tells you, That by wearing a piece of this Stone about the Neck, next the Skin, a Person that was miserably troubled with the Stone, which though stubborn to all manner of Remedies, yet in a short time was so dissolved into Gravel, that was not only avoided at the Bladder, but by the Corners of the Eyes, through the Pores of the Skin by Sweat, and by Stool also. The same Author confirms the Truth of this, by the like Success upon a great many others. Monardes' lib. d● occult. Medicam. propriet. adds, That a certain Duchess, whom he names, had undergone three Fits of the Stone in a short time; but upon wearing Bracelets made of this Stone, she had been freed of them for ten Years together. The same Author reports further of a Nobleman, that was afflicted with the Stone; who, upon the wearing the Nephritick Stone about his Arm, was used to throw of such vast quantities of Gravel, that he was forced sometimes to leave it of, for fear the avoiding so much at a time might do him some Hurt. The Excellencies of this Stone are farther displayed, by their producing several Instances of Persons, that have been cured of otherwise incurable Catarrhs, or Defluxions of Rheum upon the Lungs, of Dropsical swelled Legs, of any sort of Suppression of Urine, and of Aedematous Swell in other Parts; all which was effected by expelling Urine in great quantities: And as a Proof that all this was to be attributed to the Virtue of this Stone, they tell you, That upon leaving o●f the wearing of it, those Distempers would return, and as soon cease again, as the Application of the said Stone was renewed. They further add, That sometimes it would move Stools as violently, as if caused by a strong Purgative. But one great Inconvenience they mention the wearing of this Stone is attended with, viz. of causing a very troublesome Itching all over the Body; which would at any time be removed by leaving of the Stone for two or three Days, but return again upon the Re-application.  
11. Chemists set no lesle Value upon the Stone, that is taken out of a Man's Bladder or Kidneys, and is called by them Ludus Paracelsi; the Preparation whereof consists only in calcining it with a vehement Fire into a Salt, and letting it turn into an Oleum per Deliqueum, by standing in a Cellar, or other damp place. Whatever Virtue may be supposed to be in the aforesaid Stone, is to be attributed to the Shall Armoniac that is in it; which, whether it be not destroyed by Calcination, may justly be doubted; and therefore, the Urine newly made by an healthful Young Man, using Wine, doth seem to be endued with a greater Diuretic and Stone-breaking Power: To which purpose, I have known several Nephriticks have chosen to take several Draughts of their own Urine (as having an Aversion to that made by others, who possibly may be diseased of some foul Distemper, or other) for many Days together, with good Success: For which Reason, Physicians do rather choose to recommend Goat's Urine, which is impregnated with much more Shall Armoniac, than that of any other Animal; and herein they all agreed, being thereto induced by the manifold successful Experiments upon Nephritick Patients, that it excels all other Diuretic and Stone-breaking Medicines. The aforesaid Urine must be saved, by tying a Bladder to the Goat. Others prefer the Blood of a Goat dried, as not only containing a great quantity of Sal Armoniac, but it's other Particles being dried, are hardened into Cutting Acute Sands. Both the one, and the other, aught to be used in large Doses, frequently repeated, and continued for several Weeks, if any great matter is to be expected from them.  
12. In Conclusion, my Opinion touching the Virtues of those prenumerated Stones is, That Flints being rendered brittle by Ignition, and Extinction in Water, or Small Beer, or Wine, wherein a good Lump of Sal Armoniac hath been dissolved, and afterwards grinded into Powder, taken in large Doses, in a Draught of the same Liquor wherein it hath been quenched, may be endued with a far greater Power to drive down Urine, Slime and Gravel, and dissolve the Stone by a long continuated Use, than any of the most celebrated of them.  
Because those that are troubled with Gravel or Stone, are almost perpetually upon dribbling, which is increased by all sorts of Moisture they can or do drink, whether binding, stopping, attenuating, laxative, or endued almost with any Quality, be it ever so contrary to the Stone, or Gravel; for it all runs to the Kidneys, as being the Parts affected, (as I shall further explain below:) And for that Reason, almost every thing is by the Physicians called Diuretic, tho' operating by Qualities wholly repugnant to that sort of Evacuation. Hence it is, that Porcelain (tho' adstringent, and binding, and consequently, contrary to a Diuretic) is in Consil. Cratonis mentioned, to expel the Stone to a Miracle; and by Rondeletius said to break the Stones of the Kidneys. And Knot-Grass, as astringent as it is, is by Matthiolus Com. in 4 cap. lib. 4. in Dioscorid. Solenander, and Mizaldus Cent. 4. Distinc. 4. asserted, to expel the Stones of the Kidneys and Bladder. Also, Rupture-wort, not lesle binding, and restringent, is highly recommended by Rondelet in Consil. 150. Craton. Gesner, and Quercetan. in Pharma. rest. cap. 10. for a most effectual Plant to break the Stones in the Kidneys. And Moss that grows on the Ground, a potent Restringer, is by Durandes in Hort. Sanitat. Heurnius, and Lonicerus, mentioned to be a certain Stone-breaker. Plantain, that noted Adstringent, by Mr. Ray; and Oaken Leaves, a greater Adstringer, by Platerus; and Cinquefoil, by Scroder, are recommended for Diuretics, and Stone-breakers; besides many other Adstringents that can be named. Moreover, it may be taken notice, that most other Vegetables, Animals, and Minerals are highly commended, tho' specifically appropriated to some part or other: As, among Cephalicks; Pyony, by Trallianus, Dioscorides, Durandes, Lonicerus, and Fernelius; Betony, by Galen and Matthiolus; Calamus Aromaticus, by Tabernae Montanus and Solenander; the Rind of a Bay-Root: And among the Pulmonicks, or Thoracicks; Maidenhair and Carduus Benedictus, and all other kinds of Thistles; Eryngo, Figgs and Liquorish: Among the Cordials, White Dictamnum, and most (if not all) Aromaticks or Spices, which you may found mixed in the celebrated Compound Diuretic and Stone-grinding Electuaries, and distilled Waters: Also among Spleneticks, Tamarisk, Spleen-Wort, Roots of Capper; Mugwort, and others, among the Emmenagoga; most of the Hepaticks; among the Antiscorbutics, all, or as many as can be found, tho' more particularly, Black Radish, and Horseradish; all the Vulneraries, chief Golden-Rod, and Speedwell; besides a great Number of Miscellanies, appropriated to several Bowels, and particular Diseases; as, Birch-Tree, Guaiacum, Dropwort, Grass-roots, the five opening Roots, and their Seeds, Burnet, Saxifrage, Horse-Mint, Samphir, Ashen-tree-wood and Bark, the Juice of Birch-tree, Nettle-Juice and Seeds, Valerian, Orris, Elicampane, Bramble-roots, Soapwort, Bastard-Rhubarb, Asarabacca, Wake-Robin, Baise, Onions, Squill●, Garlick, Cabbage and Colewort-leaves, Lovage, Garden-Madder, Birchwort, Restbarrow, Featherfew, pennyroyal, tansy, Origan, Spignel, Poley, Calaminth, Hyssop, Pellitory, Germander, Groundpine, Vervain, Southernwood, Strawberry-leaves, Willow-leaves, Water-Germander, Wild Thyme, Skirrets, Chamomil, Lark-spur, and St. John's wort-Flowers; besides abundance of other Roots, Leaves and Flowers, which by one approved Author or other are all esteemed Diuretics, and Stone-grinders, as well as all Carminative Seeds, viz. Parsley, Fennil, Cummin, Anis, Dill, Carui, Daucus, Cardamom, Marsh-Parsley, Lovage, Seseli, Gromwel, Parsnips, Macedonian Parsley, Broom-seeds, Coriander, Garden-Cress, Basil and Fennel-Flower, the four greater and lesser cold Seeds, of Mallows, and Marsh-Mallows, Cotton-seeds, Linseed, and Foenugrick-seeds, etc. Lupins, all manner of Vetches, Millet, Read Cicers, Bay and juniper-berries, Berberries, Winter-Cherries, Hips, Bitter Almonds, Peach, Apricot, Cherry, Plumb, Walnut, and Hazelnut Kernels. Among Gums and Rosins; Gum-Elemi, Arabic, Dragant, Olibanum, Bdellium, the Gum of a Cherry, and Plumb-Tree, Gum-Lac, Therebinthin, Amber, etc. Among the Animals; the Ashes of an Hedgehog, of an Hare, of Swallows, of an Ass' Liver, of the Feathers of a Goose and a Ring-Dove, and of Earthworms; the Skull of a Man, powdered; the Jawbone of a Pike, and the Parings of an Horse's Hoof, powdered; Mouse-Dung, seven or nine for a Dose; Pidgeon's Dung, Pullet's Dung, Sow's (Millepedes vel Aselli) Grass-hoppers dried, Beetles, the Powder of an Afterbirth dried in an Oven, the inward Skin of a Cock's Maw dried, the Guts of a Swan, the Powder of a young Pigeon dried in an Oven; the Powder of the Bird Vvagtail, dried by the Smoke of a Chimney; the Ashes of a Troglotite Sparrow, (of which abundance of Authors speak Wonders;) the Blood of a Fox, drunk warm, as it comes out of the Veins; the little Bone taken from the hinder Knee of an Hare, (greatly extolled by Forestus and Fernelius;) Cantharideses, which some Authors tell you, may be given in a total and long-continuated Suppression of Urine, caused by the Stone, which if not removed, the Patient must die; and therefore as a desperate Disease requires a desperate Remedy, some that have more Courage than Discretion, have adventured to give it in a Dose, from half a Fly, unto a whole one, powdered, in a Draught of clarified Whey, Emulsion of the four greater cold Seeds, or Skimmed Milk once boiled up, and grown to be lukewarm, with very ill Success; for considering, that the Patient's Strength is reduced to a very low and deplorable State, before it is administered, if peradventure the venomous Medicine hath wrought through, so as to strain or squeeze out some Drops of Urine, which appears bloody also, it hath left such a painful burning Strangury, which, with the Addition of the Nephritick Pains, and Defect of Spirits, hath soon put an end to the miserable Sufferer; so that it had been better to let a Man die, than to kill him: But where that Medicine doth not pass, it doth infallibly torture the Patient out of his Life. However, if any be fond of the Use of them, they must either toast them, and half, or wholly calcine them into Ashes, which than will have entirely divested them of their Diuretic Faculty, no other Virtue remaining in them, than what is in the other Ashes; or calcine them by Corrosion, which is dissolving them in Spirit of Salt, or Nitre, whereby their venomous Quality is much infringed, and the Diuretic in a great measure preserved. The Toasting is in holding them over an hot Fire in an Earthen Pan, and there stirring them, until they fall almost into Powder, which doth greatly abate their Venom, together with some part of their Diuretic Power. In the same manner Beetles (Scarabaei) may be served, being not very much inferior to the aforementioned Cantharideses in their Pissing Faculty. The Case being well considered, where Diuretics exhibited in large Doses, and frequent Repetitions, do not answer the End, 'tis most certain, the true Cause of the Suppression of Urine is mistaken; and consequently give what you please of that kind, it will prove unsuccessful; for a very small Remedy, if it hits the Cause right, doth ever bring sudden Relief; and therefore in such Cases, we aught to use our greatest Industry, in enquiring what other Cause may in all probability 'cause such a Suppression, and not persist in an Opinion, the first Appearance of the Distemper hath put us in. Cantharideses may be an useful Medicine externally applied, but a very suspicious one internally given. I do remember, I have several times made Trial of infusing two Drams of them in a Quart of French Brandy, and being filtered through a Paper, have given thereof, from one Spoonful to two, in clarified Whey, or Ptisane, against inveterate virulent Gonorrhaea's, but I could never found I advanced much in the curing of them.  
I have here got together a large Catalogue of Diuretics and Lithontriptics in Simples, yet it is not a complete one; for upon a further search of Authors, it may be increased to double the Number, so that as far as I observe, not lesle than the whole internal Materia Medica, even the addition of Purgatives and Vomitives, (which seldom move Stools without provoking Urinal) cannot be sufficient to make up a full and complete List of Piss-drivers and Stone-grinders. The cause of increase of so great a Number of these, I can assign to no other, than to an incautelous Credit Physicians have given to all sorts of People, that upon pretence of being troubled with this or that sort of suppression of Urinal, Strangury, or other symptoms of the Stone, have declared a relief they received from this or that Remedy, though never so contrary, improbable, or preposterous (as you may perceive by the aforesaid recital of Simples, and other Compositions thence framed), without examining the bottom, the possibility, or probability, and manner of acting of such like Remedies, in respect to the Indications, that aught to be taken from the Disease itself, the Causes thereof, the Symptoms, and chief from the Actio laesa of the Kidneys, which cannot well be performed, without the true knowledge of the Function or Action of the Kidneys, and their Modus agendi, which (and indeed the Function of all the Bowels, and the Modus agendi) in my weak opinion is slubbered over, or at lest very insufficiently discoursed, so that its scarce possible to give any good Judgement of it. In order to that, I shall presume to set down some Positions, which (to speak modestly) you may please only to take for Suppositions. 1. That the Antecedent cause of a laesa mictio is very often in the Kidneys, and consequently that the cause of a total or partial suppression of Urinal, a Strangury, a Diabetes, (which is an Aucta mictio) Ardour Urinae and other Symptoms are in the same part. 2. The Office or Function of the Kidneys being chief the separation, and excretion of the superfluous serum, all, or most liquid or potable Matter, that's admitted into the Body more, than is necessary for the Blood to be supplied with, doth naturally and by Inclination (if I may so speak) flow, and tend or is impelled by the Spirits, or (if you like the Expression better) by the parts of the Body to the Kidneys, especially if in any wise preternaturally affected; the reason is, because the Spirits (I mean the Animal) chief flowing to secure any part that is in distress, and they being the only and chief impulsors of all the Humours in the Body, it must follow, that all Potables, be they adstringent, gross, thick, thin, sharp, sweet, sour, or endued with any other quality, must be impelled to that part, whither the Spirits flow most▪ which must be to the Kidneys, if preternaturally affected. Hence it is than, that Physic Authors observing all manner of Simples and Compounds being either potable of themselves, or given in any thing that is potable, do provoke Urine in those, whose Kidneys are any wise preternaturally affected, have taken in so many hundreds of Simples and Compounds, to the almost innumerable Number of Diuretics and Lithontriptics, tho' far from being to be esteemed as such, either by Reason or Experience; for to assert that Adstringents (as many of the reputed Diuretics are) do move Urinal otherwise, than Medlars do Stools (per accidens) comprimendo, cannot be thought reasonable: And daily Experience doth prove, that many Diuretics, that are supposed to be properly such, are taken in large quantities, by those that are in Health, without adding a drop of increase to their ordinary measure of Urinal, as appears by those, that have continued the infusion of Millepedes in their Drink for a considerable time, and in others that drink great quantities of French and Rhenish Wines, without any proportionable increase, and sometimes scarce piss before the next day, which, as I said heretofore, renders the operation of Diuretics very uncertain; whereas other Evacuatives, as Vomitories and Purgers, have a more certain operation in most Bodies.  
As to the Modus Agendi of the Kidneys in their Function, I cannot imagine, that the Serum is separated from the Blood in their Parenchyma, colando (as it is commonly expressed by Physicians) by being strained through their narrow passages, as if it were by a Sieve; because the Serum is so throughly perfused and mixed with the Blood, which in many bilious Constitutions is as thin, if not thinner than the Serum itself, that consequently the Blood must pass with it, which would always occasion a bloody Urin. So that there must be another sort of separation, conceived by me, to be efficiently performed by the Animal Spirits, which you are not to apprehended to be singly floating in the Nerves, like Air in a Bladder, but that they are contained in a most subtle piercing Lympha, as may be perceived by the wound of any Nerve, which gives occasion to the said Lympha to drop out, and is than called a Gleet of a Nerve. This Spirituous Lympha, that's perfused through the Body of the Kidneys, doth by its most piercing subtle Particles, coagulate the more sulphurous and glutinous Particles from the abounding salin Armoniac, (that are dissolved in the Serum) which by having some repugnancy and contrariety against them, it doth, together with the Serum precipitate down the narrow Chanals of the Parenchyma of the Kidneys to the Ureters, whence by stimulation, and their own weight, they are moved to the Bladder. That the aforesaid Function is performed efficienter by the Animal Spirirs, is proved by several Instances of the same Import, viz. some may remember many Years past, I Published a Treatise, Entitled the Case of a Nobleman (than) lately deceased, wherein was given an account of a puncture of a Nerve in the Plexus Nervorum, that's near the Groin, occasioned by the wound of a Sword, that passed slaunt thwart the Abdomen down thither, upon which a copious Gleet ensued, and soon after among other direful Symptoms, a suppression of Urin. This those Physicians, as Learned and Famous as they were, could impute to no other cause than the Stone; but they were deceived by their Conjectures, as appeared plainly afterwards, upon the defection of the said Nobleman's Body after Decease; his Kidneys, Ureters, and Bladder being found clear of all manner of obstructions, either by Mucus, Gravel, or Stone, though the Kidneys were exceedingly wasted, and shrunk into a much lesser Dimension, than commonly is found in Men. Upon this fatal Mistake, and consequently wrong Indications, the forementioned six Physicians did very boldly prescribe the most powerful of Diuretics in very large Doses, and long continuated frequent Repetitions; until by chance, one of their Medicines having a power beyond their Expectation did give a check to the Gleet, that by derivation had deprived so great a proportion of nervous Lympha, (wherein the Animals do reside) from the Kidneys, as not to leave a sufficient quantity in them, to make separation of the salin Armoniac Serum for Urinal, which therefore aught rather to be called a suppression of the Serum in the Kidneys, than suppression of Urinal, and aught not to receive that Name, before its arrival into the Bladder. But what followed? The Animal Spirits being returned to their former Function, and meeting with a great quantity of Serum, (that had not been separated during the long interval of suppression) mixed with the Blood, that was extremely attenuated and fused by the preceding Diuretics, they separated and excerned such a prosluvious torrent, as caused a most violent Diabetes, which by my prescriptions was removed in a very little time. Further more you are to take notice, here was not only an abolition, or at lest a diminution of the separation of the Serum, or Urinal, as it is improperly called, but an Atrophia, or defect of nourishment in the Kidneys, caused through want of the spirituous Lympha, or animal Spirits; so that as I hinted in one of the former paragraphs, these are the efficients (causae efficientes, but in no wise materiales,) of nutrition, separation, and excretion of all the parts of the Body. Add to the former Instances several others of the Gleets. I have before and since observed, occasioned by the cutting through of Nerves in a Wound, and punctures of Nerves in the Arm upon unskilful Bleedings, which though they did not effect so entire a suppression, as the puncture of a Nerve near the Kidneys, yet they have caused an evident diminution of Urinal, and an Atrophia in that part, into which they were inserted.  
Several other suppressions of the Serum in the Kidneys I have now and than met with, that were mistaken for suppressions of Urinal, occasioned by the Stone, to the fatal ruin of the Patients, among which I have given an account of one very remarkable in a Treatise called, The Art of curing Diseases by Expectation. I shall here make a short discourse upon the Aetiology of the before-cited Disease, wherein the use I make of the Hypothesis lately set down touching the modus agendi of the Kidneys in the separation and excretion of the Serum, will plainly appear. The Patient there mentioned was of a healthful robust Constitution, and fleshy habit of body, much on Horseback, and scarce at any time long sedentary; his Appetite was much to salt Fish, Pork, Beef, Cheese, and other substantial Food. His Blood upon phlebotomy in the Arm appeared florid, thick and glutinous, with very little Serum. He felt constantly from the beginning of his Illness a weighty pain about his Loins, and pulsatory also; his Urinal was pale, crude, dreggish and turbid, made at pretty long intervals, and in very small quantities, because the Serum was not, neither could it be separated in the Kidneys: For his Blood being engendered out of a thick glutinous Chyle, and this out of gross, glutinous Aliments, must necessarily be resinous, or thick and glutinous, and consequently as impossible and unfit to mix with an obtuse Serum, as Rain-water with Therebinthin, unless something be added to the Water to tender it piercing, whose sharp points may divide, cut and insinuate into the pores of the viscous Resin. Though the Patient did drink great quantities of Liquor of one kind or another, the greater part of the Serum it produced, was thrown out by insensible perspiration, and very often by copious Sweats, whilst a small proportion would crowd into the Kidneys, and yield matter for that little Urinal that was made. This glutinous, thick and fibrous Blood must be impelled through the Extremities of the emulgent Arteries with great difficulty, and very slow, and with greater difficulty and slowness into the extremities of the emulgent Veins, whereby a fullness and distension must be occasioned, that caused the weighty obtuse and pulsative pain in the Loins, through the defect of a just and sufficient Circulation, which could not but raise great distentions in the hypochonders, unequal pulsations, and other Symptoms, too many to be here discoursed of by retail. From no other Remedies, but such as obtain a power to remove that clammy, stringy Constitution of the Blood, could any benefit be expected; though on the contrary, improper lithontriptic diuretics were advised, impelling the Blood more into the Kidneys, and cramming them, whence the pain increased, and the Serum was more damned up, until at last the Patient being injudiciously sent to the Bath, those hot acidulous Waters inwardly taken, put a quick period to the whole matter.  
Neither is it always a want of salin armoniac Serum, or defect of its permixture with the Blood, that are the causes of a suppression or abolition of the separation and excretion in the Kidneys, is evident in an Ascites, or Dropsy, where there is salin Serum in abundance, and so thoroughly mixed, that the Blood is but little thicker than Water, and so little glutinous, that the lest drop will scarce stick to any thing; yet notwithstanding very little Serum is evacuated by the Kidneys into the Bladder, which redounding therefore so much in the Vessels, is thrown into the Legs (which are than improperly called pedes oedematosi) thighs, scrotum, or the capacity of the Belly. So that the suppression of Urinal, as it's commonly termed, is the most frequent cause, and which mos● Physicians do agreed unto, of an Ascites and Pedes oedematosi, succeeding a long Ague Chronical cachexia, Jaundice, continuated debauches of Brandy, or other strong Liquors and great Haemorrhages. Though in mo●● sorts of such Dropsies, the most potent o● supposed Diuretics are used, and lixivia Remedies, as Lies of Broom-ashes, and others taken to excess, yet not more Urinal, but rather lesle is expelled, and the Dropsy increased. In some of these cases, I have know● monstrous hydropical Swell reduced b● a month or two's drinking of the Bath Waters, which, at proper Seasons of the Year, ● Course of Spa would have performed i● lesle time. The cause of this kind of suppression can only be imputed to the Animal Spirits, or the spirituous Lympha being vitiated. But in regard that this subject, together with the examination of its Remedies that are not lesle numerous than those against the Stone, would take up too much room I chose to reserve it to another time.  
Among that farrago, and mixed heap of Diuretics, and Lithontripticks, there remain I should reduce them to a more choice an● select number, such a● are chief in use, and most celebrated among Physicians, and afterwards give you my slender Opinion upon their modus agendi, or manner of Operation.  
The Roots of the most approved are the five opening Roots, but more especially parsley, Restharrow, black Radish, and Horseradish; among the Leaves, White Saxifrage, and Burn●t Saxifrage; the chief Seeds, Berries, and Fruits, are, Grumwell-seeds, Burdock, Broom, Daucus, Persly, Fennil, Anis, etc. Winter-cherries, Hips, and juniper-berries, more particularly Read Cicers; In the number of Animals, Millepedes, or Sows; and among the Stones, Salts, and Minerals, Ludus, or the Stone taken out of a Man's Kidneys, or Bladder, Goat's Blood, and Goats Urinal; Lapis judaicus; Cineres lep●ris combusti, vitrum ustum, sal succini, sal prunellae, and Tartarum vitriolatum.  
The principal of the most famed Compositions are Electuarium Lithontribon, and Electuarium justini, the description whereof you may read in Cordus and Wecker's Dispensatories, being a rude and unaccountable empirical hodgpot of abundance of Carminative Roots and Seeds, some deobstruent Roots, most sort of Spices, some Gums, etc. as ill proportioned, as may be.  
Among the Magistral Compositions, by this following Syrup Horatius Augenius doth affirm to have cured Six Hundred of the Stone, which is above Five Hundred Ninety and Nine more, than I do believe.  
℞ Rad. Saxifr. Rusc. Ering. Levist. Onon. Alth. Gram. Foes. Petros. ā ℥ ss Raphan. sylv. ℥ ij. fol. Beton. Pimpin. Alth. Urtic. Puleg. Nasturt. Calam. Polygon. Min. Pariet. an m. 1. fruct. Alkek. No. xx. Sebest. No. xv. còrt. rad. Lauriʒiij. Sem. Ocym. Bardan. Petros. Daue. Sesel. Mil. Solis anʒij. Uvar. pass. liquir, anʒuj. Capil. Ven. Polytric. an m. 1. Coq. S. A. in Aq. Capil. ven. lb x. in duplici vase ad lb vj. e quibus cum Sacchar. fin. lb iiij. & Mell. despum. lb ij. f. syr. perfect coct. & aròmat. Clnam. ℥ j & Nuch. Mosch. ℥ ss. m.  
Montaguana recommends the following Electuary to that degree, that he doth avow, there can be no Stone, which by it cannot be broke, and grinded into Sand.  
℞ Sem. Apii, Petros. gran. Mil. Sol. Rad. Sax fr. Polii Mont. Aristol. rot. anʒj. Lap. Spong▪ Judaic. Lync. anʒjss. Vitri combust. Sang. Hirci praep. anʒiij. liquirit. pulv. ʒss. Oxymel. compos. Sacchar. alb. ā lb ss. Acet. Scillit. ℥ ●●. M. pro Electuario.  
The five Opening Roots, Grass-Roots, Carminative Seeds, with other Roots, Barks and Seeds like them, are supposed to contain a subtle hot Spirit, or subtle moving Particles, which by putting the Animal Spirits upon a quicker Motion, do by attenuating and rarefying the Blood, separate the Serum from it, and consequently make Matter for the Urine, which being driven down, acquires them the Name of Diuretics, that can not otherwise deserve the Title of Stone-grinders, than by ofent dripping by or upon Stones, may in Length of Time make little Holes into them, and tender them brittle.  
The millipeds containing a subtle acidulous Spirit, are thought not only by precipitating the Serum to be very diuretic, but also by piercing into the Pores of the Stone, whose Figures seeming to be adapted for the reception of those acid pointed Particles of the Sows, become thereby Stone-breakers. But considering their preparation, they are not only thereby deprived of those few subtle acid Spirits, that fly away by the drying of them in an Oven, or otherwise, which is one way of preparation; or are wholly destroyed in their Substance and Virtue, by the other way of preparing them, which is, by washing them well in Rest-harrow-water, next soaking them throughly in Spanish Wine, which being poured of, they are to be put into an Earthen Pot or Pipkin, very closely covered and stopped, and than to be dried in an Oven after the Bread is drawn, which if it be not done with a very mild heat, and several times repeated, they will be apt to be stewed, and never fit to be reduced into Powder; others do choose after washing of them in White-wine, to dissolve them in Spirit of Vitriol, whereby not only the Spirit of Vitriol is obtused and impaired, but the acidulous subtle Spirit of the Sows amortised. This solution is pretended to dissolve the Stone in the quantity of five or six Drops, given in Persly-water, or such like Vehicle. In my Judgement millipeds need no other preparation, than washing the dirt and slime of them with fair Water, after which they are to be but just broken, or very little bruised in a Stone Mortar, and about the number of two or three hundred put into a Matrass or Bolt-head, and pouring three Pints of White-wine upon them; the Glass Vessel being closely stopped, they are to stand 24 Hours, and the Wine is to be filtered of, the Remainder is to be dried in an Oven in an open Pipkin, and than reduced to Powder; hereof from Two Scruples to Four may be taken in nine or ten spoonfuls of the impregnated Wine. That this will prove diuretic to those, that are Nephritick, is often observed, though I have known them taken, being bruised and steeped in Ale, for their ordinary Drink, for a quarter of a Year together by those, that were troubled with running Eyes, dimness of Sight, Bloodshed, and Inflammations of the Eyes, Dropsies, Jaundice, Physic, and other Distempers, without any abatement of those Diseases, or causing more Urine than ordinary; so that People need not be so scrupulous in their Doses in any other Distemper, but that of the Kidneys, whither they, as all other Diuretics, are apt to carry all gross slimy Humours, they meet with in their passage. Many will put seven or eight of 'em in a Mortar, bruise them into a mash, and pour a Glass of White-wine upon them, and drink it of without straining. Others hung four or five hundred of them in a Linen Bag in a Firkin of Ale, and after a Fortnight's Infusion, drink the Ale for their ordinary Drink.  
From a pretended Observation, that Goat's Blood will break the hardest of Stones, which is a Diamond, most Physicians prefer it beyond all other Lythontriptics, advising it to be taken warm, as it comes out of the Veins: this requires some further preparation according to the Sentiments of Vulgar Authors, which is feeding a young Goat with Persly, Fennil, Carret and Parsnip Tops, Cabbage Leaves, and the like supposed Diuretics, for three Weeks or a Month about the Spring; though others prefer the Autumn, near the Vintage, at which time a Goat is apt to feed much upon Grapes, if he can come at them, whereby they think his Blood is rendered the more diuretic, and cutting. Being than killed, they prefer the Blood, that comes out of his Veins, about the middle of his Bleeding, before that which flows out first or last. No Blood of any Animal doth sooner coagulate in the Air, and dry into a hard, brittle, and sandy substance. On the contrary, the Blood of a Stag only will not coagulate at all, but continues fluid. Now whether the Blood of a Goat being drunk warm, will not so coagulate in the stomach, as to occasion a great weight, pain, and indigestion there, whereas the Blood of a Stag consisting of more Volatile piercing Salts than any other whatsoever, cannot coagulate, by reason of the said copious Volatile Salts, which at the same time will tender it the more diuretic, and piercing: so that two Drams or more of Stag's Blood warm, as it comes out of his Veins, with four or five Ounces of Goat's Urine, will make a more potent Medicine, than any of that kind. Many in a Fit of the Stone, and the Colic thence caused, by drinking their own Urine (which is much worse than that of a healthful Youngman) have suddenly removed both to a wonder, and continuing the use of it Mornings and Evenings for several Days together, have rendered the Stone brittle; but this sort of Urinous Draught is attended with a great inconvenience of taking away the Appetite, and weakening Digestion. Beyond all doubt the Urinal of a Fox is stronger, and more piercing than any of the before mentioned, as feeding chief upon Blood and Flesh, which abounds much more with Volatile Armoniac Salts, than most sorts of Herbs.  
As for Alcalious Salts, or such as are by Fire rendered lixivial, as the Ashes of several Animals, their Hair and Feathers, also Dungs, and several Chemical Salts of Vegetables and Minerals, operate by an abstersive stimulation, and shrinking or contracting the Vessels, whereby they propel the Humours, and precipitate those that are acid: But all lixivials are experimentally found to abate the Appetite, and extremely disturb the digestion of the Stomach.  
The read Cicers (which are no other than read Pease, and little different in substance and taste from Common Grace Pease) that are in so high esteem for moving Urine, perform it not otherwise than by a flatuous Spirit, whereby they distend the Bowels and Vessels, and rarefie the Humours contained in them, that are forced forward to gain more room; which is no more than what a Decoction of Tares, and most sorts of Vetches, Pease, Horse-Beans, and Cabbage can, and some of them do effect in a more powerful manner.  
It is to be further observed, that all Diuretics, of what kind soever, must be used with the highest Caution in the Stone, Gravel, or any kind of Suppression of Serum, or Urine, jest by forcing and bringing down gross Humours with them, they cram and choke up the Passages more than they were; for which Reason they are rarely prescribed singly, or in great Doses, and frequent Repetitions, in a Fit of the Stone, Gravel, or Suppression; but either mixed with those Remedies, that have a Power by their Mucilaginous and Unctuous or Balsamic Particles, to smooth, relax, widen, and tender the Passages slippery; as, Oil of Sweet Almonds and Linseeds; Mallows, Marsh-Mallows, Pellitory of the Wall, Bear's-Breech, Violet-Leaves, borage and Bug-loss; or giving small Doses of the milder sort of them, and seldom, etc. And in a Fit, they choose to confine themselves only to Mucilaginous and Emollient Medicines; also to Balsamicks, as Therebinthin, Lucatellus' Balsam, Balsam of Tolu, of Peru, etc. by Mixture with some other balsamics, or gentle Diuretics, made into Bolusses, Electuaries, or Pills, and sometimes Elixirs, and Tinctures; at Intervals advising Clysters, Emollient and Carminative, and now and than Narcoticks; also Half-Baths, up to the Middle, and whole Baths, besides Bags and Cataplasms.  
The Prevention of the Return of Fits consists in gentle proper Purgatives and Laxatives, followed by proper Diuretics; Mineral-Waters, whether wholly Diuretic, as the Sulphurous Waters at the Bath, Sunning-Hill near Windsor, Heywood-Hill near Totteridge, Islington, Richmond, Astrop, Deptford, Henden, and other Waters; or both Purgative and Diuretic, as Dulwich-Waters, Barnet, Epsom, Chigwell, Pancras, Acton, Pescot-street at Windsor, Stretham, etc. operate by Quantity, Weight, and Stimulation, some by Fermentation and Rarefaction, and others by Quantity, Weight, Stimulation, Fermentation, and Rarefaction.  
To conclude the whole Matter, I could never yet, among all these forementioned Remedies, found any beyond proper Oleous Balsamic Volatile Elixirs, and Tinctures; and these aught to be framed of Ingredients as various and different, as the Causes of Suppression of Urine, and Generation of the Stone and Gravel in the Kidneys, may be supposed.   

CHAP. XII. Of Madness.  
1. I must own, that among the whole Catalogue of Diseases, nothing seems more abstruse, and inexplicable, than that Preternatural Disposition of the Brain, that is attended with a Madness; either without a Fever, as a Mania; or with a Fever, as a Phrenitis; or any sort of Delirium, as a Paraphrenitis with, or without a Fever, which doth affect the Brain only secondarily, and per Deuteropatheian, as the two former do primarily, and per Protopatheian. In all these are Laesa the Imaginatio, Sensus Communis, and Memoria. The Manner or Modus of their Laesion cannot well be understood, without first apprehending the manner, how they are performed in their natural State, which is the great Difficulty, that neither all my Reading, nor the Meanness of my Capacity can remove. I am apt to conceive, there is properly called (without any Necessity of terming it Analogous) a Sensitive Memory, Common Sense, and Imagination in all Animals, in some more, greater, or more exquisite, and of greater Power, than in others. A Dog seeing a piece of Meat held to him, at a greater distance than he can be supposed to smell it, the Ide● or Impression which at another former time the said piece of Meat, or something like it, made upon his Sight or Smell, is an Argument of Memory, or else would no more run at it, than to a Stone, or a Log; the distinction he makes, that it is neither a Stone or Logg, or any thing else, but a piece of Meat, signifies he hath common Sense, and many Dogs though they are not hungry, and cannot eat it, they will run at a piece of Meat, or a Bone, carry it away into some retired place, and there bury it, whither they will repair, to dig it up and eat it upon the return of their Hunger, all which implies evidently, they are endued with Memory, common Sense, and Imagination; which appears plainer, when a Dog hath been observed sometime to bark, walk about, return to the place he left, and do several other Actions as if he were awake, in his Sleep, caused by Impressions or Ideas made in his wakeful time, that move his Animal Spirits when sleeping; the variety of which motion excited by those impressions, imply Imagination, Common Sense, and Memory, which is further confirmby the Madness or Mania, Dogs, Hogs, and other Beasts, feeding upon Carrion and corrupted Food, are subject unto, depraving their internal senses, so as to commit Violence to all Creatures, they formerly were familiar with: And lastly their sensitive Passions, (so termed in distinction to those, th●t are excited by the intellective or rational Faculty) as Love, Fear, Anger, hatred, is a sign they do know, and distinguish, which are Acts of the Internal Senses. The Love of a Dog is easily perceived by his Fawning, his Fear is discovered by the holding a Stick at him, his Anger by biting, and his Hatred, which is a continuated Anger, by his Aggressing of Cats, Rabbits, Bears, Bulls, etc. And among all Beasts, the exercise of the Internal Senses, and Sensitive Passions is most remarkable in an Elephant, as may be observed in the several wondered Relations, very credible Authors do make of them. For a little digression the affinity of the Subject puts me upon this Query, Whether a Maniac or a Madman biting another Man, or a Dog, may not have the same Influence upon the Man, or Dog that's bit, in causing him to go Mad, and occasioning an Hydrophobia, as the biting of a Mad Dog has upon a Man, a Dog, or a Hog? Though it be probable, that the venomous bite of either is reciprocal, yet I never heard it confirmed by experiment.  
Without ascending so high as the Intellective Faculty, comprising the Rational Memory, Common Sense, and Imagination, I shall for the present endeavour to satisfy myself in the Modus of these sensitive, or Animal Internal Senses, by the following Notion. I will suppose, that all external Sensation (of the external Senses) is performed by an Impression, or rather Pressure, made by the sensible external Object upon the Sensory or Organ immediately, and mediately by that, upon the sensitive Nerve, be it Seeing, Hearing, etc. Or it may be conceived thus; Sensation is the perception of any sensible Object: All Perception is by Contact: All Contact is by corporeal Impression, and Impression by local Motion. Here ariseth an Objection, that it's not likely, that a visible Object at fifty or threescore Leagues distance, as the Peak of Tenariff, should reach so far, as by Contact, Impression, and local Motion, to affect the Tumica Cornea or Sight; or that the fixed Stars, Which are more remote beyond all Comparison, should reach the Eye, so as to make a corporeal contact upon it. The Answer contains no difficulty, if you will suppose that no obsect is visible by itself, but by light or Lumen, and that Lumen is a circular Emission or Emanation of luminous Particles from Lux (which in reference to the precited Instances is the Sun) and is extended as far above the Sun probably, as it is to us below it. The Interception of the said luminous Particles by coloured, figured and quantitative Bodies, and their being by them in the Interception modified and determined, do thence reach to our Eyes. And why should not Light be as diffusive, or dispersive a Body as Air, (filling so vast a Region as it doth) being much more subtle than it, as passing through every poor of it? Light hath quantity, viz. Longitude, Latitude, and Profundity as much, and as properly, as Air, or any other Body. Being condensed by a thick Convex Glass, it hath Weight or Gravity, a● might be experimentally found, were the Glass artificially weighed) No lesle than Air condensed in a Retort by a Pump. Light rarefies the Air, which Darkness condenseth. The Light, and Colours, which are only Modifications of the Light, (for without Light, all things are dark, and of no Colour,) make a Pressure upon the External Tunick of the Eye, (consisting chief of the Filaments of the Optic Nerve, whence it is this Membrane or Tunick becomes the most sensible of any in the whole Body, scarce enduring the softest Touch of any external thing without an exquisite Pain,) which is very perceptible to those, that look against the Light of the Sun; this being continuated to the Optic Nerve, and thence to its Beginning, is what I understand by Sight.  
But here an Objection may be offered; Quicquid recipitur, recipitur ad modum Recipientis. The Sensitive Nerves, as the Optic, Auditory, etc. being all of one Composure, Constitution, or Temperament, and the Spirits that actuate them, being all the same, must receive the Impression of Sensible Objects all alike, and after the same manner; and consequently Light must be tasted, or a Sound must be seen, etc. which is false.  
To this I give in Answer, That all Sensation is by Contact, that is, by a real or material Action, and not by immaterial Species, or Emission of Animal Spirits, which are vain Expressions. The said Contact i● the same, and made in the same manner, but the Positions and Figures which it makes upon the Nerves, and its minute fibrillous Parts, are different as much, as the Figures upon a piece of Dow, (which is the same in comparison throughout all its Parts,) made by several Stamps; so that the Figures made by a visible Object upon the Pores of the Optic Nerves, and upon the Spirits included in them, are different from those that are made upon the Nerves of other Senses by other Sensibles. 2. That the Sensitive Nerves do differ each from the other in Softness, Bigness, Density, and other Qualifications. 3. That the immediate Sensation is not in the Nerves themselves, and the Animal Spirits contained in them, but in their invisible minutest Terminations, or subtlest Fibrillae; and therefore I assert, that the Sight is in the Tunica Cornea, the Hearing in the Tympanum or Drum, as much as the Sense of Feeling is in the External Cutis: For supposing that the Tunica Cornea, and indeed all the Tunicks of the Eye, are Expansions of Nerves, and composed of innumerable most minute Chanals, that communicate with the Ports, wherewith all the Humours of the Eye are pervious, and all filled with Animal Spirits; the Positions they are pu● into, and Figures that are impressed upon them, are continuated to the Optic Nerve, and thence to its Beginning in the Brain. I will not here undertake the Task of an Oculist, in explaining the Concentration of the Optic Spirits about the Pupil, and the several Changes of Figures they undergo by Reflections in the Humours of the Eye, but pass ov●r to the Hearing, the Seat whereof (as asserted before) I take to be in the Drum, and the Terminations of Fibres of the Auditory Nerve in it, upon which Pressure being made by the Air containing the Sound, and continued to the Beginning of the Auditory Nerve, is the Cause of Hearing. Wherhfore I can in no manner be persuaded, that the Sound made upon the Drum, beating the Hammer (Malleus) against the Incus (Anvil,) and propagating the Sound to the Internal Air contained in the long crooked Passage beyond it, is by the Means thereof carried to the Auditory Nerve; the Use of the said Internal Air being rather to keep the Drum stretched, (as a Bladder is kept distended by the Air that is blown into it,) and magnify the Sound by the Hollow, containing nothing but Air, as you may observe in a Military Drum, the Hollowness whereof doth exceedingly magnify the Sound that is made upon it by any sort of Percussion. That these little Bones placed in the Hollow of the Air, are so instrumental to Hearing, I cannot well understand, but do rather conceive their Use to be for a Stabiliment or Fulciment of the Hollow, and keeping the Drum, and the Circumvestient Membrane of the said Hollow distended. Hence it is, that the Drum of the Ear being by moist Wether, or damp Southerly and South-West Winds somewhat relaxed, the Hearing is dulled, and not so sharp as it is in clear dry Wether, when the Wind gently blows Easterly, or North-East. Moreover, when the Drum hath been extremely stretched by a near violent Noise, Thunder, or Great-Gun, so as it cannot return to its due Straightness, but must fall into a wrinkled Skin, the Hearing is either wholly lost, and destroyed, as it hath happened to several having a thin dry weak Drum, upon a near and extreme sharp Sound; or is so obtused, that they can hear but very indistinctly. The like Accident may hap to the Sight, when any very Luminous Body makes too long and too near an Impression upon the Tunica Cornea, whereby being too much thinned, and distended, it doth 'cause a Blindness; to prevent which, Nature hath framed the said Horny Coat thicker and stronger, than any of the inferior Tunicks of the Eye, the Use whereof (namely the Tunicks) I take chief to contain the several Humours, which reflect or turn back the visible Object, or Pressure made by it, to the Tunica Cornea, as the Quicksilver on the backside of the Looking Glass stops, or returns the Object to the Surface of the Glass.  
The most excellent of the External Senses is the Sight: It's Organ, that wondered Machine of the Eye, consists of a greater Number of fine smooth polished Parts, than any of the other Senses, and is more in Use and Exercise than all of them together; for a Man that is awake is always seeing, and is commonly accounted awake, because we observe his Eyes are open; so that necessarily a far greater Proportion of Animal Spirits, and the finest and subtlest of them, is consumed by Seeing, than by all the other Senses conjunctly; whence it is, that Sleep being destinated for the repair of the Animal Spirits, we always perceive the necessity of it approaching first in our Eyes, which makes People commonly say, they are so sleepy, they cannot keep their Eyes open; and therefore we do as commonly conclude a Man to be in sleep, because his Eyes continued shut. It is no wonder than, if blind Men can abstain longer from sleep than others, or that their other Senses are much more exquisite, than in those that can see; because that great flood of the finest Animal Spirits which the sight doth require, is distributed to the other external Sensories. Their internal Senses are also much stronger, in regard many blind Men have been observed to have stupendous Memories, and wondered Fantasies: Thence it is likewise, that when a Man hath a desire to call any thing to mind, which he had almost forgotten, or to think very seriously upon a Subject, he is apt either to shut his Eyes, or look down to the ground, whereby a proportion of the optic Spirits are kept in the Brain, to assist the internal Senses. Moreover, because so vast a supply of Animal Spirits is required, to be transmitted to the Eyes for Sight, Nature hath framed the Optic Nerves bigger, than any in all the Body, b●ing the only Nerves, that have a perceptible hollowness in them, and thereby rendered capable to give passage to such great Floods of Spirits; not only to supply for that long continuance of Seeing, but also to supply that variety of Parts, which is greater than those, the Organs of Hearing, Smelling and Tasting do consist of. I expressed, that commonly a Man seethe, or useth his Sense of Seeing, as long as he is awake, by reason of the constant readiness of visible Objects, that will crowd in upon the Sight; he doth not in like manner always hear, or his Hearing is not always in exercise, though he can always hear, by reason there is not always a Sound or Noise in Being, to crowd in upon him. And though it is possible for a Man to consume or spend abundance of Animal Spirits, by hearing a continual Noise from Morning to Night, so as thereby to make him sleepy, yet it seldom doth hap, because Nature can better endure the waste of Auditory Spirits, which are incomparatively grosser than the Optic, the loss and wasting whereof being much greater, and a greater abundance being required for the Sense of Seeing is the cause, why we always perceive the necessity of Sleep in our Eyes, before any of the other Senses, in which also the like necessity is perceptible, in regard, that when a Man grows sleepy, he doth not care to hear, or use any of his other Senses. And though by much stirring or local Motion, and other Labours, the wasting of the Animal Spirits in the Joints, doth occasion sleep, yet it's always first perceived by weight or drowsiness of the Eyes, because they are deprived of their due proportion of Animal Spirits, that were transmitted to the Limbs, and wasted by their continuated Exercise.  
Before I recede from this Subject, its convenient I should explain, what I mean by describing all Membranes to be expansions of the extremities of Vessels, in order to make it appear, that the Seat of all the External Senses is in the Membranes, and not in the Nerves. That the cutis or ambient Skin of all Animals is a Membrane, cannot be doubted, when it's looked upon, after it's dressed by the Tanner of Fellmonger into Leather. That it consists of the Expansion of the Extremities of all the Vessels, as of Nerves, Arteries, Veins, and Lymphducts, is evident by its exquisite Sense of Feeling, and by the lest superficial hurt of a Scratch, causing small owsings of Blood, and by Sweat, the extremities of the Nerves importing feeling, as the extremities of the other Vessels lets out Blood and Sweat. By expansion, I do not understand a flat spreading out of the ends of the Vessels, as if it were Dow expanded by a Rowling-pin, but I do apprehended the said Vessels towards their terminations, to be divided into thousands of small Filaments, and glued together in the Cutis, by a glutinous substance, (engendered out of the Humours, brought thither by the aforesaid Vessels) that is not so stringy or sibrous, as to be call●d Flesh. It is fierce denied by any of the Learned, that the Ambient Skin is the chief Seat of Feeling; for though other Membranes, as the Periostium, the Internal Membrane of the Kidneys, and most of all the Tunica cornea, and next to that, the drum of the Ear, are of a much more exquisite Sense, than the Skin, as consisting of a far greater proportion of Nervous Expansions, and consequently too tender, and therefore not so proper to distinguish all sorts of Touches or Impressions, as hard, soft, rough, smooth, hot, cold, etc. which Impressions are thence continuated, by the nervous Filaments to the bodies of the Nerves, and at the same Instant to the beginning of them, and thence to the Common Sense, which doth distinguish these Touches or Tacts into specifications of hard, smooth, etc. And here by the way, it may be observed from the instance of some Paralytics, who have lost the Sense of Feeling in some of their Joints or Members, though their mobility or motion remains entire, that for the most part those Nerves, that proceed from the Brain, bring the Sense of Feeling, and those from the Medulla Spinalis are causes of local Motion, which is an Argument, that the Spirits that flow immediately from the Brain, are much more subtle, than those that are derived from the Marrow of the Backbone.  
What I say here, is not to be understood so generally and absolutely, which made me only intimate, that for the most part, and not all, the Nerves immediately proceeding from the Brain, do only bring Sense; for some of them do also convey motion, but withal a motion so agile, nimb●● and durable, or frequently repetible, beyond what any of the Spinal Nerves do or can perform, as appears in the nimble and frequently repetible motion of the Eye and Eyelids, of the Tongue, etc. Neither do I exclude the Spinal Nerves, from transmitting Sense and Motion together; but am to be understood, that these fine Spinal Branches of Nerves, and consequently containing Spirits more subtle, that are disseminated through the Cutis, being the Seat of the Tact do communicate the Sense of Feeling, and the other that are more gross, and dispersed through the Bodies of Muscles, cause Motion.  
That the Sense of Feeling is more exquisite at the ends of the Fingers and Toes, proceeds from the greater concourse of fine capillar Nervous Terminations in those extreme parts.  
The spongy Membrane of the Tongue, which appears to be an expanded Contexture, out of the Filaments of the gustative Nerves, and of the Extremities of the Coats of Arteries, Veins, Salival and Lymphducts, is likewise found to be the Seat of the Taste, especially about the Tip, where there is a greater concourse of Nervous Filaments.  
In like manner, I do conceive the Drum of the Ear to be a thin subtle Membrane, composed of the Filaments of the Auditory Nerve, and the extremities of other Vessels, that are inserted into it. The sound that from without makes its pressure upon the Drum, being enlarged by the hollow 〈◊〉 the Tortuous narrow passage, is carried by those Filaments to the Trunc of the said Nerve, and thence continuated to the beginning of it, and to the Common Sense: So that the sound to me doth not appear, to be carried down to the further end of the said tortuousPassage, and thence to the Auditory Nerve, not more than the pressure of a luminousObject upon the Horny-coat, is continuated to the Crystalline and vitreous Humour at the bottom of the Eye, to be thence communicated to the Optic Nerve, with which it doth not seem to have any immediate Communication; for as I said before, the humours of the Eye wrapped up by the several Coats to keep them together from dropping asunder, seem to me only intended, to modify and reflect the Object back again to the Horny tunic, whose contexture is chief of the numerous Filaments of the Optic Nerve. The Tunica Cornea to be aptly disposed to receive the Pressure of visible Objects, must be kept up distended by the watery Humour (humour aqueus) under it, which if it be any thing lessened, either by evaporation in a hot Season, or by a Fever, so as to relax the said Tunic, the Sight immediately grows dim upon it; and if it wholly runs out by a Wound, so as the Tunic happens to fall in wrinkles, than the Sight is wholly lost. In old Men the Sight becomes dim, and so it doth often upon a continual Fever, by reason that by length of Time, or Age, and by Exiccation, the humour aqu●us is somewhat diminished, and the Tunick thereby is somewhat relaxed, which makes it seem thicker, and consequently not adapted to receive so vigorous an Impression.  
It may likewise be observed, and is now generally so received, that the Seat of Smelling is not in the Olfactory Nerves (I do not mean those that are commonly so called by the Ancients, that had mammillar terminations, (Processus mammillares) which are now taken to be rather carriers of of some Excrements of the Brain) but in the internal Membrane of the the Nostrils, through which the Olfactory Nerves are expanded in Filaments.  
Since than it appears, that Nature having placed the Seat of all the other external Senses in external Membranes, as parts to which the external sensible Objects do first arrive, and make their first and most sensible Impression; it is a persuasive Argument to me, that the Seat of the Sight is in the Tunica Cornea, or Sclerotica, being the most sensible, and consequently chief consisting of Expansions of the Optic Nerve, whereas the Tunica Uvea or Choroeides, consists more of a contexture of Terminations of other Vessels. It will not be impertinent here to offer a few seeming Reasons out of a great many, that induce me to suppose the Cornea the Principal Seat of Vision, without excluding the necessary concurrence of every Tunic and Humour of the Eye, a great Fault in any of them being as capable to occasion an abolition, diminution, or depravation of Sight, as the lest considerable Wheel in a Watch being disordered, may 'cause it to stand, move too slow, or too fast▪  
I have before asserted, that all Sense is by immediate Contact of any corporeal sensible Object. The Touch, Smelling, and Taste are by simple Contact, their Objects consisting of grosser Particles; but Seeing and Hearing are, as it were by a double Contact, that is, by reflection, because their Objects are more subtle, and without a due reflection, could not be perceived by the Eye or Ear; for by Reflection the sensible Object is much strengthened, and consequently obtains a greater force to move the Sensorie. The found made upon the uppermost Skin of a Drum, would not be so strong, or make such a sort of a found, were it not reflected by the undermost Skin. Wherhfore Light, or any luminous Object, being a Body the most subtle of all others, must necessarily require a due Reflection, before it's powerful enough to move the Sight. It's allowed by most, that Light passeth in Rays, that is in Lines of continuated luminous Particles through the Cornea, and Humour Aquens, to the Foramen Uveae, where being contracted, or gathered closer, they make a conical Figure.  
The Cryst●llin being the most Diaphanous, Compact, thick, and fullest of Pores, is capable to be crowded with a great quantity of ●u●inous Rays (not unlike thick Glass, 〈◊〉 by condensing the Rays do magnify the Light) that are reflected or turned back by the Humour Vit●eus, which in colour and capacity of receiving luminous Beams, through want of suitable Pores, may aptly be resembled to Quicksilver behind a Looking-Glass, reflecting luminous Objects. That those Rays are reflected by the Humour Vitreus is seemingly at lest proved to me, by the seeing of those false Appearances of Flies and Motes in a Suffusion, which appear to the Sight to be floating in the Air before the Eye, or Tunica Cornea: For supposing that the Light carried those little Flies or Bowls directly down to the Crystalline, and thence to the Vitreus, Retina, and Optic Nerve, how can they appear floating in the Air, or on the outside of the Cornea, unless they were reflected back again from the Vitreus to the Cornea, to make their Impressions there? All Refractions, which in Optics are vulgarly imputed to a duplex medium of different Natures, are double, or broken Reflections, as appears in a Stick, that's partly in the Water, and partly in the Air; so that a Refraction not being possible without Reflection, it follows, that where a Man seethe every thing double, by reason of the removal of the Crystalline Humour out of its place by a fall, blow, or other violence, the visible Objects are refracted, by a part of the Crystalline that retains its place still, and partly by the Medium that is in that part, whence the Crystalline was removed.  
To show, how these sensible Impressions are at the same instance carried to that part of the Brain, where the Internal Senses are s●ated, is my chief Design; and in Reference to that, I have been the more particular in explaining the external Senses, and the Modus sensationis. I do conceive than, that the Nerves do consist chief of congregated Filaments, drawn in to length, besides others that are lateral, and that the beginning of the Nerves are Filaments of the medullar part of the Brain, (whereof its only supposed it doth consist) congregated and gathered together into one united body, which by being afterwards divided into so many lesser congregated Bodies, doth constitute each of the beginning of the said Nerves. Wherhfore I do apprehended, that an impression made upon any of the sensories that consist of Nervous filaments, the impression by continuation (in the manner formerly mentioned in the Instance of a Cord) is carried to the beginning of the Nerves, and thence to the united body of the Filaments of the Medulla cerebri, were one object is distinguished from another, which I term communis sensatio, or sensus communis. I will likewise suppose, that besides those prolonged Filaments, the Nerves are filled with innumerable lateral ones, of several figures, and minute dimensions, the various positions of which being actuated by Animal Spirits into several representations, impressions and figure's, if permitted to remain so, is Memory, and when compared, and variously composed, one to another is Imagination. So that I do conceive Memory to be the basis, and antecedent to Imagination, as common Sense is of Memory, which I cannot apprehended to be other than various Acts of the Cognoscitive, or Sensitive faculty. I do very well know, that applying the same Assertion to Rational Memory, and affirming that Memory is the basis, and antecedent 'Cause of Rational Imagination, admits of a considerable Objection, viz. That very often Persons of the weakest Memory have the strongest Imagination, and the best Judgement, and that the Memory may be lost, though the Imagination and Judgement solely depending upon that, continued entire; which I do deny, for as much of the Memory of things as is lost, so much of the Imagination must be lost; for supposing that you have entirely forgotten the Idea of a Horse, Cow, or Dog, you can never frame any Fancy or Imagination of them; so likewise if your Common Sense is so far abolished, that you cannot conceive or make a distinction of the impressions those Animals made upon the Filaments of your Brain, it is not possible for you to remember them. Probably than this Inference may be made, that the greater Memory a Man hath, the greater must be his Fancy, Knowledge, Wit and Judgement; which is otherwise observed, in regard that very often the greatest Memories are not attended with the greatest Wit and Judgement. That they are attended with the greater Knowledge is most certain; for a Man that remembers a great many Objects, or Subjects, must know so many more than another, who doth not remember so many; though for what concerns his Fancy, Wit and Judgement, they may be quicker, or nimbler, and more agreeable to right Reason in one of a weaker Memory, but no farther, and of no more Subjects than the number he remembers.  
It may be abjected against what I asserted before, that Common Sense, Memory and Imagination, are only three several Acts of one Faculty; that Madmen often retaining their Common Sense and Memory entire, and having only their Imagination depraved, is an evidence they must be three distinct Faculties, whereof one being depraved, doth perform depraved Acts, and the others that are entire, do perform Acts as they they aught; wherefore since a found Act, and one that's depraved, cannot proceed at the same time from one and the same Faculty, it sollows, they must be three distinct Faculties. I do Answer to this, that the Common Sense and Memory in a Madman are depraved, to the same proportion his Imagination is depraved; for to him a Horse may appear to be a Cow, or he may and doth remember things to be otherwise than they were first represented to him. The fame Animal Spirits, the fame Nerves, and medullar filaments of the Brain, do all act in the exercise of the internal Senses: And that perceiving of sensible Objects (which is the act of Common Sense) the retaining them, (being the Act of Memory) and the composing them variously together (which is the Act of Fancy) should be other than Acts of the same Sensitive or Cognoscitive Faculty in Beasts, or of the Rational Faculty in Men, I can in no wise apprehended.  
In regard the Memory of Beasts) though some of them have a Brain of greater dimensions than a Man) is so little capable of retaining many sensible Impressions, which are certainly material; and whereas a Man is capable of retaining of innumerable and infinite impressions of Words, Languages, and all things sensible and intelligible, it cannot be conceived, but that the Rational Faculty, and consequently the Soul must be immaterial; for should you suppose, as commonly it's taught, that the Memory is only an Impression made upon, and retained either by the soft substance of the Brain, or upon its Animal Spirits gathered into a soft Cloud; were the Brain of as large an extent as a Church, and could harbour as many Spirits, that nor these could be capacious enough to retain a tenth part of things, which a Man is capable of remembering. So that I say, the Rational Faculty must be immaterial, that is, cannot be performed by a material Organ, as the Brain, and its material Animal Spirits; and therefore its impossible for any Man to conceive the manner of operation of the Rational Faculty, as long as the Soul continues confined and immerged in a material or corporeal substance: And were the Soul of Man material, as some do believe for want of true Reason, it could be capable of discerning and remembering no more Objects, than the Soul of a Beast, the Brain of some Beasts being as organically and aptly framed, as the Brain of a Man, and in some the Animal Spirits much more sine and subtle.  
From this Discourse I do infer, that the Cognoscitive internal Senses, (which are subservient to the Rational Faculty, comprehending a Rational or intellective Common Sense, Memory, and Imagination) in a Mania are only affected; for the Intellective being immaterial, can in no wise be subject to be affected by any thing that is material; neither could any material Remedy have a power to act upon an immaterial Disease of a Man, as Madness must be termed, were the Intellective part touched, more than upon the immaterial Madness of a Devil.  
This premised, I am of opinion, that the Animal Spirits in the Brain being irregularly and violently moved, is the cause of a Mania, by putting those sensible Impressions, that are made upon the lateral minute Filaments of the Brain, into a disorder, and changing their Positions, which occasions the Common S●nse, Memory and Fancy to be so depraved: That the Fury and Heat, which Maniacs are so frequently impelled into, are occasioned by the continuated, quick, and impetuous Motion of the Animal Spirits, which thereby are grinded into very sharp cutting, piercing Points, that disunite the lateral Filaments, stimulate, prick, cut, and pierce those Filaments of the medullar part of the Brain, and of the Nerves, and by the foresaid rapid Motions the whole sensitive Machine is put into a Flame: That their continual wakefulness proceeds from the abundance of Animal Spirits (the cause of which shall be explained below) the Brain of Maniacs is furnished with, the waist of Spirits, their paucity, Feebleness and slow motion, giving commonly occasion for Sleep. That they are in no wise subject to Fevers, taking Cold, Obstructions of any of their Bowels, or scarce any other Distemper, or any preternatural Symptom, except over-wakefulness, (vigiliae immoderatae) is to be imputed to the Rapid Motion of their Animal Spirits, attenuating their Blood, promoting of its circulation, rendering the Body pervious, and free from all Obstructions of the internal and external Pores; their Blood being more salin and dry, than sulphurous, is not so much exposed to a febril Putrefaction: Though it must be observed, that very often before Mani●cs fall into their Distemper, there is a great Calm and slowness of Motion in the Animal Spirits, which occasioneth a very slow motion in the Humours about the Bowels, and very often a Stagnation, that disposes them to a particular sort of putrefaction, whence gradually proceeding some putrid, salin, sharp, acuated or pointed Particles, that oppress the Animal Spirits, dull their Motion, and 'cause such a disorder in their Blood, that is productive of such Symptoms, which commonly Melancholic Hypo●hondriacs are troubled with as Sighing, heavy, sorrowful and desponding Thoughts, palpitations of the Heart, Frights, Fears, Sloathfulness in stirring, Languidness, etc. These forementioned putrid, salin Particles, as they arise, and separate gradually, and are afterwards mixed with the whole Mass of Blood, increase the prenumerated Symptoms, until at length great Crowds issuing thence, do so violently move, stimulate, impel, and hurry the Animal Spirits into a Tempest and Fury, whence soon after those other Manical Symptoms do follow.  
A Mania or Madness, though it be only a Symptom, and the chief and most urgent of the others, that are associated with it, is as all other chief Symptoms, commonly called a Disease by a Metonymia Adjuncti pro subjecto. By the same tropical manner of speaking a Fever, or rather Fervour, is called a Disease, from the burning heat that doth often accompany it, though it be but a chief Symptom. This I thought fit to observe, to prevent your judging it a mistake in me, in calling a Mania, and many, if not all chief Symptoms a Disease▪ which is a very common way of speaking among most Physicians.  
That in Maniacs the functions of the Bowels, and other parts are performed with greater vigour than in others, appears by their digesting almost any thing that's edible, by their copious Excretions by Stool, Urine, and Swea●, by their wondered and almost incredible strength of their Limbs, so as sometimes the strength of a Madman, shall exceed the united force of four or five Men, that have their Senses entire. Their Hearing, Seeing, and other Senses are much more exquisite (though depraved) than in others, in regard Madmen will hear the lest noise, and see the lest Object, beyond what they could do when they were Compotes. The Cause and Reason of all which is the abundance of Animal Spirits, that are contained and engendered in Madmen, insomuch that it may be presumed▪ the greatest part of their Blood is spiritualised, or converted into Animal Spirits; for without supposing this vast plethory of Spirits, it's impossible they should be always, Night and Day, using their Tongues and Limbs in so furious and violent a manner, without any long intermissions of Rest or Sleep. This Plethory ariseth from the almost perpetual, violent, quick and nimble motion of the Animal Spirits, piercing, grinding, and subtilizing the greatest part of the Blood into Spirits similar to themselves.  
If a Madman, after he hath continued in a long raving Fury, falls into a long intermission of Silence, hardly to be provoked out of it, that must be ascribed to the great expense and waist of Animal Spirits, by his long fit of Fury, which he is forced to repair, by giving the remainder of his Spirits time to breed more.  
His reciprocal seasons of Madness, intermixed with intervals of Rational Discourse, in some for a longer time, in others shorter, may be attributed to the variety of motion in his Spirits, which sometimes moving regularly and naturally, are the occasion of the latter, to wit his lucid Interval, whereas he is impelled into the former by Fits, as frequent, as there is a new sallying out of a crowd of the forementioned putrid falin Particles, mixing with the Blood, and upon its arrival to the Brain, mixing with the Spirits.  
I have been obliged to make an expatiation in the Theory of the external Senses, to the end I might more easily explain the manner of natural Operation of the Internal, thereby in some sort to apprehended the manner of their preternatural Operation in a Mania; which I did the rather, that I might give myself the occasion of examining the practic part, relating to the curing of Diseases of the Eyes and Ears, as w●ll as of the Brain. If I have not been so successful in these most difficult and abstruse Matters, as I could wish, or as others of a much better capacity might have been, I hope I may be excused for my attempt, were it only for proposing the Subjects, and giving others an opportunity to exercise their Industry and great Abilities. However, I shall presume to give you an Account of what use I make of the said Theory.  
First, In relation to the Eyes, the laesion of the Sight is either caused by the fault of the Optic Nerves, and their expan●●d Filaments, the decay, waste, and vicious constitution of the Animal spirits, or the vicious disposition of the Tunics of the Eye, but especially of the Horny-coat, or by the fault of the Humours, I mean the aqueous, vitreous, and crystalline, whose Office I did only suppose is, to support and keep the Tunics justly distended, and by Reflection, to return the visible Impression to the Horny-coat.  
I do only pretend here to take notice of some defects of the Horny-coat, the Humour aqu●us, and Optic Nerves; for should I here insert, what may be practically observed, concerning all or most Diseases that are incident to the Eyes, and their several Coats, Humours, Muscles, and Optic Nerves, a large Volume would be scarce capacious enough to contain it.  
The forementioned Tunic being of too thin a texture (from the tenuity of the Nervous Expansion) and the extreme subtlety of the Optic Spirits, and the tenuity of the Aqueous Humour making too little resistance to the luminous Particles, coming from a great distance; the said luminous Particles being too much thinned, and lo●ing some part of their Lustre, are thereby not congregated enough, by reason of the rarity of the foresaid Tunic and Humour, and consequently have too little force to act upon them; whereas in a Tunic, that is of a more compact texture, and consisting of more numerous, though much straighter Pores, the luminous Rays are much easier gathered together, and consequently may operate from a greater distance. This laxity of the said Tunic and Humour is two fold; one natural, and the other adventitious, by reason of some Disease, as a Fever, Consumption, etc. The former is in no ways to be meddled with. The latter either ceaseth upon the removal of the Disease, that caused it, or if it should continued, may be remedied by washing the Eyes daily with water, wherein a very little Salt-Petre, or rather Sal Prunellae hath been dissolved; or you may two or three times in a Day drop into the Eye, a drop or two of this Solution, viz. two Grains of white Vitriol dissolved in two Ounces of some clear Well-water; wherefore you are to take notice, that most common Eye-waters, that are cried up for Sovereign Remedies against all, or most Diseases of the Eyes, are strictly to be avoided in all short Sights, whereby they would be rendered much worse. Such sort of Waters are usually distilled from Fennil, Celandine, Eye-bright, Rue, Vervain, Male pimpernel, Hogs-Fennil, etc. Besides, in short Sights the distension of the Horny Tunic is too weak and slack, by reason of the lose texture, and thinness of the said Tunic and Aqueous Humour, upon which the seeble and almost spent Rays, that arrive from a great distance, can scarce act or exercise such an Impression or Motion, as is necessary for Sight. On the other hand, where the said Tunic is of a good Texture, and fully distended, Objects are perceptible from a much remoter distance: But where the forementioned Tunic is grown too thick, and consequently lesle diaphanous, and lesle porous, that Sight is neither good at a distance, nor near, as it's often observed in old Folks. Moreover, in those the Humour Aqueus is very much thickened, so as to deny a full and free passage to the luminous Beams; the said Humour is also become lesle turgid, and of small compass, whereby the Horny Tunic becomes lesle distended, and a little flatted, so that the visible Object must necessarily act very feeble upon it, the Rays not being sufficiently congregated, through its defect in convexity. Add hereunto, that in them the Optic Spirits are grown few, gross, and fumous, which renders the perception of the Object dim, and cloudy.  
To preserve the Eyesight, is to retard, and hinder it from becoming such, as it is in old People; that is, 1. By rendering the Animal Spirits light, subtle, clear, and more copious. 2. By attenuating the Horny Tunic, and the watery Humour. 3. By avoiding straining of the Sight, by exercising it long and often upon very small, shining, dispersing, or very distant and remote Objects.  
The first of these means consists in keeping the Body clean of gross Excrements, which gave so frequent occasion to the Ancient Physicians, to invent Pills peculiarly appropriated to the Sight, and distinguished with Names referring to it; As Pil. Lucis majores and minores; and others, as Pil. Aureae, sine quibus, Cochiae majores and minores, etc. I cannot think, any of these Compositions hath any more regard to the Eyes, than to the Toes; but because in the mass of Pil. Lucis maj. and min. is contained a very small proportion of Eye-bright, mixed with Aloes, and Colocynthis, together with a great many contrary Ingredients, which serve for nothing else, but to clog the Medicine, and all this is to be made into a Paste, with Juice of Fennil, they thought they had reason enough, to expect from them and the others forementioned, all the Virtues, whereby to preserve Sight, and cure the Eyes of all Diseases past, present, and to come; but what is a greater wonder to me is, that still there are many Physicians, that allow a very great respect to the said Pills in Diseases of the Eyes, whereas most certainly a good Extractum Rudij, or Catholicon well composed, and made up, will serve abundantly better, cheaper, pleasanter, and more effectually in any Disease, that may require strong Purging; so that were all those Colocynth and Scammoniack Compositions, which modern Dispensatories are crammed with, thrown out, it would be much more profitable to the Patient, and lesle troublesome to the Apothecary.  
What I mean by keeping the Body clean, is to take now and than those Pills, which are recommended in the foregoing part of this Treatise, without adding the lest grain of Eye-●right to them. Besides this, its necessary to abstain ●rom all gross, windy, steaming 〈◊〉, Saltfish and Flesh, sour Sauces, strong Drinks, ●●edi●g chief upon Meat of a goo● Juice. and that yields but little Excrement, and using Drink that's clear, well digested, and moderate in strength. Nothing hitherto hath been observed a greater Enemy to Sight, than Wormwood, which being used in Drink, or otherwise, hath been the occasion of dulling the Sight in some, and of Blindness in others; yet notwithstanding Dioscorides commends it for a sharpener of the Sight, and therefore little credit aught to be given to these old Authors in many of their Characters. Onions, Leeks and Garlick, come not much short of that Plant. All raw Salads are experienced hurtful to the Sight, by contributing matter for Crudities, and being windy. Weeping in Women, a long sorrowful and melancholic Disposition, and too much gravity do lessen, condense, and blunt the Optic Spirits, which aught to be serene and agile. Living in a dark House in a foggy Air, work effects little different from the ●ormer. Too much Sunshine reflected from a sandy Ground, hath been the cause of Blindness in many that live in Spain. Very hot Countries contain more Blind, than those that are temperate, or cold, tho' in the latter, they are not commonly quick or fa● Sighted, excess of Cold condensing the Optic Spirits too much. As Weeping and great Debauche●s do often furnish their Eyes with an outward glazie Coat, so they do not seldom according to the common Phrase, drink their Eyes out. It may probably be said, Visum debilitant Balnea, Bacchus, Amor, as well as Corpora: And on the other hand, whatever may be said to preserve the Body in Health, doth preserve the Sight. Smoak and Dust are none of the lest Enemies to the Eyes.  
The attenuating the Horny Coat and the Humour Aqueus, (which at the same time attenuates the Optic Spirits, depurates and renders the foresaid Tunic and Humour clear and diaphanous) is commonly attempted by inward and outward Medicines, that have a power to discuss Winds, and move Urine, proceeding from their subtle Particles, that are supposed to be very attenuating, and consequently diuretic, and discussive. These Medicines are usually called Oxydercica, that is, sharpners of the Sight, from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, acutum & 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, video. Such are accounted all the greater and lesser hot Seeds, but chief Fennil and Duncus, Elicampane, Orange-peel, Masterwort, Calamus aromaticus, Virginian Snakeweed, Cubebs, Galangal, Rad. cyperi longi, & rotundi, Paradise Grains, Cardamum, Zedoary, sem. sileris montani. sem. seseli Massiliensis, Nutmegs, and most sort of Spices. On the other hand, all Antiscorbutics, especially Mustard and Garden-Cresses, are accounted pernicious to the Eyes, and Ginger, Pepper, and parsley, as discutient as they are, offend the Sight, and so do most Sowrs. These following are esteemed specific Oxydercics, viz. Eyebright, the greater Celandine, Vervain, Fumitory, Valerian, Avens, Rue and Clary, than which last, nothing can be found a greater Darkner of the Sight, and more offensive to the Eyes; for b●ing put into Wort to ferment with it, renders the Drink the most inebriating, and discomposing all the Senses, beyond any other vegetable, excepting Darnel. And yet being outwardly applied, is very excelling in thinning the Coats of the Eyes, and watery Humours, and very discutient in clearing the Sight from dimness or cloudiness. As great an Author as Platerus is, he recommends Radishes and Mustard for specific Sight sharpners, than which common experience doth most certainly convince us, nothing can be a greater Enemy to the Sight: which informs us, that we are not to take things upon trust so slightly, as most Physicians and others are apt to do, without comparing them with the Rules of Experience and Reason.  
Those forementioned Aromatics, Seeds and Roots, are discutients of Wind by their subtle Particles, which they perform by attenuating of gross Humours into Bubbles, which breaking, emit those Winds, or crude mixed Airy Spirits, that afterwards are sometimes avoided upwards or downwards, or are impelled into the Vessels; these mounting upwards, do for a time much disturb the Sight, until they are either discussed by the Spirits, that are in the Eyes, and assisted therein by a further continuation of the use of the said attenuating Aromatics, and Seeds. Hence it is, that very often those attenuating Oxydercics do tender the Sight much worse, and sometimes in Phlegmatic Constitutions usher in Blindness at first, though othertimes also the continuation of them may discuss the Winds they first raised; wherefore a great deal of Caution aught to be used in the Application of them: So that it appears plainly, that the same Oxydercics may remedy the Sight, and keep of Blindness in some; though in others they most certainly 'cause Dimness of Sight, and Blindness.  
Diuretics, by carrying of the Salts of the Blood by Urine, (they by drying up the Aqueous Humour, and corrugating or condensing the Horny Coat, thicken and lessen the former, and harden the latter in Old People, whose Eyes therefore do appear thick, dull, flat, slow in Motion, etc.) have been experimentally found very advantageous, not only in preserving and meliorating of the Sight, but in preventing and removing many Diseases incident to the Eyes. Among those Millepedes or Sows moderately used either in Ale, or otherwise, are universally, and by common Experience, preferred beyond all others; for being copiously furnished with very subtle penetrating light Spirits, they do not only carry of Salts by Urine, but attenuate and discuss what is gross in the Watery Humour, and all the Tunicks, and subtilise the Animal Spirits; which Qualities seem to tender them specific to the Eyes▪  
Some do use Ground-Ivy in their ordinary Drink, to preserve their Sight, to no great purpose: But in Valerian and Vervain (a quantity of one or both being added to the Wort before, or while it is working) many do affirm to have experienced a great Power, in preserving their Sight, and removing Dimness. To mend the Taste of such sort of Ale, a moderate Proportion of Elicampane-Root, Orange-Peel, or a few Daucus-Seeds might be added. Bean-Stalk Ashes, to the quantity of five or six Ounces, if they are clean, put to a Firkin of Small Ale after the working, jumbling them well together, and allowing them four or five Days to settle to the bottom, did they not blunt the Taste of the Drink so much, would prove more powerful, than any of those Vegetables.  
As for the Externals, I should be loath to advice any Person to Compounded Eye-Waters, to preserve his Sight: The Washing the Eyes daily with clear Spring or Rain-Water is sufficient. Water that hath stood long in a Leaden Cistern, is accounted hurtful, there rising a very sharp offensive Steem in Length of Time from the Lead, that mixeth with the Water.  
Those whose Eyes are weak from thei● Birth, aught to avoid tampering with any sort of Oxydercicks, Internal, or External, their Weakness of Sight depending much upon a natural Laxity of the Optic Nerves, and Tunicks; their Humours of the Eye being also thin, and their Optic Spirits lose, and not compact; all which may be easily rendered worse by uncertain Remedies, and never or seldom better, though their Growth in Age, Change of Climate, or Diet, may considerably contribute towards the Melioration of their Sight. A Weakness of the Eyes, that Sickness might have left, doth often go of with the Weakness of other Parts, by the Recovery of Strength of the Brain and Bowels. But if that Weakness should singly remain, than besides due Evacuations, general and particular, Recourse may be had to proper Internal and External Oxydercicks, which aught to be chosen with the strictest Caution.  
Among Diseases of the Eyes, I do accounted a Suffusion, Cataract, and Gutta Serena the most dangerous; and an Ophthalmia, or Inflammation, the most painful, and often an Antecedent 'Cause of the others.  
A Suffusion, or Hypochyma, seems to me to proceed either from some subtle Winds, or Windy Spirits, sallying out of the Arteries, or Pores of the Nerves, and breaking into the Watery Humour of the Eye, there causing very minute Bubbles of various Figures, which being actuated or moved by the Luminous Rays, (for when a Man's Eyes are shut, whereby the said Luminous Rays are excluded, he is not in the lest sensible of them,) do produce those Appearances of little Bowls, Flies, and other small Shapes, floating or flying to and from before the Eyes.  
There are commonly observed two kinds of those Suffusions: The one arising from Crudities of the Stomach, or Flatuous Hypochondriack Humours of the Bowels, is not durable, though often returning by Intervals. Those little Figures, that do deceitfully impose upon the Sight, moving much quicker, than in the other kind, and meeting together, join into a Cloudiness, that quickly vanishes, by reason that those Windy Spirits, which issue through the Pores of the Arteries, being of a Vaporous or Watery Composure, are much lighter, move nimbler, and are much easier discussed, than those Windy Spirits, that are pressed out of the Pores of the Nerves, which being of a more faline, tough, heavy, and compact Mixture, consequently durable, and constantly abiding, (because not easily discussed,) make Representations of larger Figures, and are moved much more slowly; and consisting of clammy or viscous most minute Particles, are very apt to unite; whence it happens, that their Representations are disposed to grow daily bigger and bigger. These Viscous Windy Spirits are subject to be precipitated, or impelled to the Pupil, or Foramen Uveae, by the constant passing of the Luminous Particles in Beams or Rays towards the said Foramen Uveae, where they are concentrated, or gathered together in the Figure of a Cone, the said Foramen forming the narrow End of the Cone, as the Cornea Tunica doth the broad. So that it is the said Viscid Nervous Winds, impelled by the continual passing of the Luminous Rays to the Foramen Uveae into an united Body, which at length doth form that Preternatural Skin, called a Cataract, being a discernible Cause of Blindness, in Contradiction to a Gutta Serena, the Cause whereof is not externally discernible, but commonly ascribed to gross Humours, obstructing the Hollow of the Optic Nerves, and stopping the Influx of the Optic Spirits. I cannot but wonder, whence those gross thick Humours should be sent, or how conveyed; not from the Medullar part of the Brain, where Arteries or Veins are scarcely discoverable, and whose very Compact Substance is not more susceptible of of any thing that is gross, than the Beginning of the Optic Nerves: Besides, such sort of slimy gross Humours might easily, in the beginning of a Gutta Serena be melted down, and carried of by the common Head-Purgers, which are generally very strong and churlish; as Pil. Cochiae maj. and min. Pil. Arabic. e duobus. Elect. Indum maj. & min. and all their compounded Hieras. So that to me the Aetiology of this, and almost of all the rest of the Diseases of the Eyes, seems gratis dictum.  
It is more apparent to me, that the most frequent cause of a Gutta serena is the nervous Lympha, (which is the Vehicle, or rather is the Materia constituting the grosser Particles, which united with the subtler and most subtle Particles, separated out of the best and finest parts of the Arterial Blood, do compose the Animal Spirits) being grown too gross, thick and viscous in the Optic Nerves, stagnatethere, and makes a Dam, thereby hindersing and putting a stop to the influx of the Animal Spirits, from the Brain to the Eye, which aught not to be termed Optic Spirits before they arrive thither. By this supposition, a Gutta serena seems to be a Palsy (Paralysis) of the Optic Nerve; all other Palsies, whether universal or particular, being engendered by no other cause, than by the stagnation of the Nervous Lympha, (being rendered gross and viscous) in the beginning of the Nerves in the former, and in particular Nerves in the latter. After a proper Purge or two to clear the Passages, and make room in the Vessels, how little advantage can be expected from frequent Cathartics, though violent, or any other Remedies vulgarly in use against a Gutta serena, or any other Palsy, may be easily understood from the forementioned Hypothesis; for should you purge ad infinitum, you can never pretend to draw of that coagulated Nervous Lympha, but rather by drying all the Humours in carrying of the moister and thinner part, you must necessarily tender it worse, which by long continuance doth turn into a hard substance, much tougher than the Nerve itself, or the toughest Leather, and consequently must be incurable. And much lesle advantage can be hoped from any of the celebrated Eye-Waters, some whereof are pretended to have cured those that have been blind 20 years, and go under the Name of some Queen's or Lady's Eye-water, all which is no more to be credited, than the Achievements of a Knight Errand; for you may as reasonably pretend to break the Stone in the Bladder by applying Millepedes to the Sols of the Feet, as to dissolve a Gutta serena by an Eye-water, if you consider the great distance from the Horny Tunic (to which they are to be applied) to the Optic Nerve, the several Coats and Humours of the Eye, the extreme tenderness and sensibility of the said Coats, and the necessity of an extraordinary piercing Remedy, which ●ure I am, is not greatly to be found in those Aromatics, Se●ds, and Oxyd●rcic Leaves, of which most Eye-waters consist, and are very repugnant to the qualities of Aloes, Honey, Tuthia, white Vitriol, Sugar candy, Sugar of Lead, and other Materials, that are often ridiculously enough added to them, I do know, that sometimes, once possibly in two or three Ages, a Gutta serena hath been removed by an accidental Salivation, othertimes by a sudden violent Fever, that by rarefying all the Humours, and putting the Animal Spirits into a violent motion, the viscous Dam hath been pierced through, and violently expelled. But these are means, that if imitated, do s●ldom or never attain the success hoped for.  
Besides the cause forementioned, Convulsions, and Tumours of the Muscles of the Eye near the heads of them, have caused a Gutta Serena; the former, by contorting the Optic Nerves, and altering the Figures and Positions of their Filaments, which I do remember occasioned a Gutta Serena in the Lord G's Lady, when living in the Pall-Mall, upon the taking of Vinum Benedictum (Maledictum sometimes) prescribed by her Physician, at the request of the Patient I presume, and probably ill prepared, and overdosed by the Apothecary, contrary to the directions of the Doctor: The latter perform this unfortunate effect, by compressing the Optic Nerve, which sometimes is removed, but not always.  
A Gutta Serena may sometimes be removed with great difficulty in the beginning, praemissis universalibus, by potent, sulphurous, and oleous internal Medicines, which under that shape, may preserve a great part of their Virtue until their arrival to the Brain and Nerves, and possibly some of them may externally be let in by the Vessels of the Head, but than those Internals must be frequently exhibited in large Doses, and continued for a long time, even to the brink of a Fever, or some other contrary Distemper; and this is the only Method to cure all other sorts of Palsies, which I have followed more than once.  
A Cataract is best cured in the beginning, and whilst it continues to be a Suffusion. Internal means are as necessary as external. Sugar of Lead, b●ing w●ll prepared by digesting Spirit of Wine with it, and abstracting it afterwards by distillation, and dissolved in a convenient Vehicle, is not only an excellent Topic in this Disease, but in many others of the Eyes, especially in an Ophthalmia, taraxi●, and Chym●sis, Ulcers of the Tunics, and Epiphora, etc. for there is a Spirit in Lead, b●i●g w●ll corrected and managed, i● the most discutient and penetrating of any in respect to the Eyes; besides, the Salt, contains a great Sweetness, and is endued with many singular Virtues.  
An Ophthalmy I do suppose to be occasioned by Evaporations of the Lympha, contained in the capillar Nervuli, disseminated in the Tunica conjunctiva, being grown very sharp and corroding, (as is formerly mentioned) which Evaporations being condensed into small drops or gleets, and meeting with other Juices, 'cause an effervescency and coagulation, to which pain supervening invites other Humours, that together produce such a sort of Inflammation. I have often observed, that the application of cold Medicines (as whites of Eggs, Conserve of Roses, and other Restringents) hath so little abated the Distemper, that it rendered it much worse. This Disease is sometimes painful to extremity, and very often of a long continuance, insomuch that I have known it protracted to nine or ten Weeks, and doth not seldom leave other mischievous Diseases behind it.  

What Concerns the Practical Part of a Mania or Madness.  
Bleeding frequently repeated in the Arm and Foot, also at the Haemorrhoids, is commonly advised as an universal and necessary premiss, to answer the Indication of the Plethory of Humours and Spirits, th●t most Madm●n are subject unto, occasioned by their greedy and ravenous Appetite; notwithstanding if used more than necessary, it doth certainly 'cause a moping, and still leave a desipientia and depravation of their Internal Senses, so that there must be a great caution used in this particular. I do very well know, that by bleeding substracting the matter, whereout that abundance of rapid and furi●●● Animal Spirits is engendered, the disorder of 〈…〉 is often l●s●ened, but soon ●●●urns again: 〈◊〉 the replenishing of the Body. By abating of the Blood, t●e Spirits are diminished; and consequently the heat of the Brain, which the violent motion of the Spirits occasion, must be in some measure moderated. However, I can look upon Bleeding not otherwise, than a concurring remedy, or a remedy per accidens, and doth not directly answer the Indication of clearing the Body, and particularly the Brain, of those putrid, acute, pungent, saline Particles, nor doth it make that change upon the Bowels, so as to prevent the engendering the same again, which is the chief Indication in the cure of a Mania.  
Strong Purging by Senna, Turbith, and Scammony, and particularly by black Hellebor, is what the pretended Masters of Mad-houses do most depend upon, as some Physicians do upon Antimony, in the form of a Regulus, Glass, or a Crocus Metallorum, whereby they endeavour not only to throw of the Saburra or heap of gross excrementitious Humours, but by stimulating and shaking of the Nerves through the Vomits and stools it moves, they do expect these slimy putrid Particles should be thrown of from the Brain and Nerves: And in this some have been successful, tho' but in few. The inconvenience lieth here, if by too frequent strong Purgations, you do drain the gross saline Humours of their Serum, which doth both tender them fluid, and dilute their Acrimony, you do excessively sharpen those Humours, increase the Obstructions, and by violently fermenting of them (which strong Purgatives most certainly do) force them to steam up those putrid pungent Particles, whereby Maniacs are rendered much worse; wherefore it's more advisable, after a smart Purge or two, to depend upon moderate Purgatives, as Pil. Tartar. Querc. Pil. Stomach. cum gum. Diasenna, etc.  
After all, Bleedings and Purgatives being only aniversal necessary premises, the chief Indication is to rectify the Bowels, so as to prevent the engendering those gross saline Humours, and to clear the Brain of the foresaid pungent Particles, whereby the several parts of the Brain may be reduced to their natural figures and positions, and the exercise of their Function. I do not perceive, that practical Authors do recommend any Remedies of that kind with any confidence, neither do I found many Compositions described in Dispensatories for that purpose, and those that are, differ little from such as commonly are advised against Hypochondriac Melancholy, and are to be used for a long continuance, the tediousness of which Course doth not only tyre the Physician, but the Friends of the Patients also, who therefore commonly commit them to the care of such, as make it their business, and are willing to be watchful over them, and keep them quiet and in a low moderate Diet, intermixing gentle Purge, and Bleedings at Intervals, whereby some are recovered. Now and than when they are very furious, and overwakeful they give 'em Opiates. Some use Cupping to the Shoulders, with and without scaris●cation; others use opiated Ointments to their Temples, and bathing of their Heads being shaved, with Decoction of Cephalic Herbs, Flowers, and Seeds, etc.  
I have had the fortune to cure several, in a little more or lesle than six Weeks, by Bleeding of 'em twice or thrice, and Purging them gently with Minerals. In the Intervals I gave them An●ihypochondriac Tinctures, composed chief of Minerals.  
Maniacs, whose Figures and Positions of the Filaments of the Brain and Nerves have been much changed, and displaced by a long continuance of their Furies, are incurable. I might add a great many Observations to this Head, but the shortness of my time obliges me to come to a    
FINIS.