Zenexton Ante-Pestilentiale. OR, A short Discourse OF THE PLAGUE: Its Antidotes and Cure, According to the PLACETS of the best of Physicians, HIPPOCRATES, PARACELSUS, and HELMONT.  
By W. Simpson, Philo-Medico-Chymic.  
Opera danda est Chirurgo, ut vires gemmarum, herbarum, radicum, ac seminum coelitùs infusas ad pestem, accurate cognoscat.  Paracels. Chirur. Magn. p. 22. 
LONDON, Printed for George Sawbridge, at the Sign of the Bible upon Ludgate-hill, 1665.   

TO THE READER.  
Candid Friend,  
I Have ventured here into a Bottom, which, whether it sink or swim in the Vulgar Opinion, I matter not; I have exposed myself to Public View in the penning of these few Lines; a Hazard I confess sufficient to have discouraged a Tyro, to lie open to the Carpings of some, and to the Criticalness of others biased and prepossessed persons; had not my Genius been born up by the satisfaction of the Truth of what I writ, and that from a good end, and therefore have candidly imparted those grand Secrets of Hypocrates and Helmont against a Disease, that at the writing hereof was on the increasing hand. And therefore I shall say to the  Reader, that I thought in my own breast I should do no small piece of Service to my own Country (especially in such a Juncture as this) in describing the Nature and Essence of this so direful a Disease as the Plague: and also that we might not only know where the Malady lay, but also be instructed where to find a Remedy; Therefore I have set open one Gate into the Magazine or Treasury of Chemical Medicines, whereby we may be furnished with at least some Spagyrical Antidotes, which may, by the blessing of God, be useful in their places: I shall, I confess, much wonder if many Erratas be not committed both by Me and the Printer, seeing I have endeavoured to huddle it up in haste, having not had past eight days time since I begun, and that too snatched from my other Affairs of my Elaboratory, repairing of Houses, and other domestic and abroad-Business. Some perhaps will be ready to impeach me with Tautology in repeating the words Idea, Ferment, Archaeus, etc. so often over, to which I shall truly say, That I was ready to accuse myself thereof, but could not without impairing the sense leave them forth: for, though as to myself I could well have often forborn them, yet I espied a flaw often if they were omitted, which might easily invert the sense of the sentence; therefore I rather let them pass. If this be favourably received, its probable it may give encouragement to the divulging of somewhat else in Chemical Physic, viz. the fruits of my daily Labours in the Spagyric Science. In the interim peruse this with an  judgement, and pass not sentence till thou knowest thou art a competent Judg.  
Farewell. Thine, W. Simpson.   

Zenexton Ante-Pestilentiale, etc.  
TO give an account to the World why I attempt so difficult a Task as to treat of the Pest or Plague, that greatest of Contagions that ever was in the World, whereby God is pleased to permit multitudes of people to be swept away, and thereby, as it were, to thin the Earth: And not rather leave it to riper judgements and more mature understandings, whose grey-haired Experience, if nothing else, might be deemed to set off these Arcana Naturae abstrusiora or more hidden secrets of Nature, with a better and more resplendent lustre. I say, the reasons why I set upon this Work, which some may (and that perhaps not enviously) think unproportionable to my shoulders, is;  
First, Because I have not seen, as yet, another step forth with his Bow and his Sling against this great Goliath, which may probably (if not prevented by Divine Providence either raising up Instruments who may show forth his Wonders that he has planted in Nature, or by a more immediate hand stay the Fury thereof:) may, I say, knock down thousands of people ere the sting thereof be dinted; and therefore calls for some to stand up whose Names are written in the Volume of Nature as well as of Grace, to show forth the Wonders of the Most High.  
2. Because God has not left us destitute of means even in the most deplorable cases (unless he has determined the ruin of a Family, a Town, a City, Country, or People through the crying sins thereof) and for that purpose has planted in his wonder-works of Nature such a Treasury as therein to be found a Remedy for every Malady, which are not often handed forth to the unworthy, though otherwise never so industrious, upon selfish interest; who are like those that grope for light at noonday, who in the midst of light are yet in darkness: but it pleaseth God the Primitive Author and Fountain of Nature to enlighten those in Him accepted persons with his gift of light and knowledge in the things of the outward Nature, so as they may be enabled through his inspiring light, from whom every good and perfect gift proceedeth, to single forth those Specific Remedies as they lie in the bosom of Nature against every Malady and Infirmity (to which Humane Nature in its outward being is most prone) who likewise are taught to exalt those Medicinal properties according to the intention of Nature to their highest energy and efficacy. We therefore who are Sons of Pyrotechny, and wait for our Diploma from the Most High, are, by the blessing of God succeeding our endeavours, in a better capacity of making our grand inquests into the secrets of Nature, the Handmaid of God, than those loiterers in the Vineyard; I mean the Galenists, who like the angry Wasps neither work themselves nor yet would willingly suffer others, lest by the fruits of their Labours, (which at length will overcome) the dronish Galenists in time be degraded, who now according to all probability (seeing a better light to Physic springs up from the anatomising Art of Chemistry) are at the declining hand.  
3. The third reason may be from the imminent danger and extraordinary urgency and necessity of the present time, whereby this Nation is threatened with one, if not more, of that trine of those epidemical sweeping Judgements, which God permits to come upon the face of the Earth, when his wrath is stirred up by the exorbitant vanities and crying wickednesses of a People; so that many Moses had need to stand in the Gap and cry, lest the Vials of wrath be poured forth after an extraordinary manner upon a gainsaying People: And seeing, as the Wise man saith, that, of the Most High cometh healing, and that the Lord hath created Medicines out of the earth, and he that is wise Will not abhor them. And that God hath created the Physician: And therefore the Wonders of God in his creation of Medicines out of the earth, ought not to become as Ciphers through ignorance and unworthiness, but, by the strength and enabling power of God, to improve our Abilities and Talents which he has bestowed upon us that we may not hid them in a Napkin, but improve them to the utmost every one in his capacity and order, in his generation, to do what good he can; for we are here as Stewards every one entrusted with a Talon to improve, which who lays out to the best advantage and doth the most good in his place, receives the greatest Reward of the Heavenly Donor.  
4. The last reason, and that which as to my own particular was instar omnium, was, the bent of my own Genius, which I confess has been captivated amongst the rest of my Spagrrick Inquiries after a peculiar manner to search for an Antidote and Cure of some highly malignant Fever, which I was apt to think might ere long appear upon the Stage of the World as an epidemical Disease, and certainly the Plague is the highest and most malignant of Fevers. It was the current, I say, of my own inclination, prompted by an inward hand, that led me that way, that I could not but take notice of: It was that amongst the rest of my Fireworks that put an edge upon my desire of doing good in my generation, that I might not be found in idleness, drolling away my precious time either in vanities or in empty speculations, but in experimental essays of those Medicinal Virtues which otherwise lie dormant under their shells and husks; seeing God keeps his Jewels of hidden Energetical Virtues, such as are Healing Endowments of things, under Lock and Key, as I may say, and will not let them go unless the Artist have the Key from him, who thereby is let into the secret Meanders of beautiful Nature, and sees the many, and yet orderly wind and turn in that great Labyrinth, where indeed Healing is seen to be the gift of God.  
Now that I may buckle to the Point, and in short but compendious discourse (waving prolixity) may signify the essential nature of the Plague, its manner of surprising and destroying the body: also the probable way of Antidote and Cure, if curable, that so we may not appear altogether barren in the Theory.  
The Plague therefore is a certain virulent and contagious Ferment conceived from without or within the body, seizing upon the vital Archaeus, or spirit of life, with a kind of fear and terror, and boils in the blood; and in its fermenting, impresseth its malignity upon all the principal parts and humours of the body, whereby the blood presently putrefies, and sends forth bubo's, sores, stigmata, etc. the immediate badges of its mortification, and so works in the blood and spirits till such time (which is speedy) as the vital Lamp burns dim and shortly becomes extinct, much like a malignant combustible halituous Mineral Sulphur which is sometimes found in Mines under the earth, which blows forth a Candle, and sometimes stifles the vital fire of the Laborators.  
First, I say, it is a virulent and contagious Ferment, viz. A poisonous and infective operating power: now Ferments are certain powers in Nature whereby all things are put into a way of change either for good or bad; for, Ferments are the Parents of transmutation out of one form into another, or from one degree to another, whereby things are brought on to their highest energy either for good or bad; by Ferments fixed things are made volatile, and volatile fixed; they are the keys of Nature whereby great changes and alterations are made in bodies.  
Now every thing that has a vegetating life has also a ferment implanted in it which is a certain working power whereby the wheel of Nature becomes stirring and active in that being and demonstrates its self in the several gradations of the same thing both in its production, increase, (acmn) full growth, declining, and at length passing off the stage into another form.  
Now as Ferments are indemonstrable à priori, inasmuch as they are certain original operative powers which God has implanted in every natural being, and therefore there is not any thing (prius, or) before them by which they might be evidenced what they are; but they show themselves sufficiently that they are, and what they are by their fruits, effects and symptoms, which are demonstrations à posteriori, and sufficient to evince the truth of their existency; as for instance, that natural digestive power which God has placed in the stomach of all creatures, whereby the Aliment that is taken in, though of several sorts of food, is all reduced by the analyzing virtue thereof into an acid cremor, (though taken in with other properties of sweet, bitter, etc.) and so turns all into a primitive prepared juice for the nourishment of the body after its transits through other digestions, fitted for the same purpose to bring the nutriment on by several degrees to become a balsamic spirituous liquor fit for irrigating and nourishing the solid parts, which no solitary heat, though never so artificially contrived, could without these innate digestions or ferments, ever bring to pass; therefore they demonstrate themselves to be and to do, what no other things can be or do besides themselves.  
In like manner the Pest as also some other Diseases are entia realia, viz. real beings, which have a beginning, an increase, and growth, a fullness of stature, whereby they either conquer that which they rise up against, viz. the vital spirit, or they are conquered and begin to decline and are as other natural beings transmuted into other forms. Now I say, the Pest is not demonstrable à priori, though the spirit o● the humane life as considered in its integrity and soundness is pre-existent before the seizing of the virulency of the pestiferous ferment, yet than they are as two distinct beings which at their encounter strive for masterhood, as two Antagonists or Champions striving to vanquish one another. Insultat hostem, etc.  
And though the Pest have a real existency in its self, as for instance, its lying dormant in rags, vestments, flax, walls, etc. Wherein it has yet all the lineaments and proportions lurking within its own sphere, and as really the same being of the Plague or pestiferous ens, as if it came in combat with the vital spirit, yet I say, as to us and as to the effect it would work, it is as nothing or a mere dormitant ens that lieth buried in its ashes, unless it be contempered with our humane Mummy and then it becomes an actual and fermental pestiferous entity, producing its various effects, and symptoms within the sphere of the Microcosm, mostwhat to the ruin of the vital structure; and doth not as most other diseases which with the suine of the vital flame extinguish also themselves, but outlives the ●●fe and skips into another body to ●ct the same scene over again, after ●s tyrannical a manner as ever, viresque acquirit eundo.  
It is a poisonous ferment to the life, and therefore in its fermenting or working it inverts the whole frame of Nature, and what other diseases effect in a long time by, as it were, often biting and nibbling and obscuring the vital flame, till at length they worm out the life: this like a nimble Arsenical combustible Mineral Sulphur, sets roughly upon the vital Taper, and with a quick malignant Blast extinguisheth it, and that, as it were, it devours over operto.  
2. This contagious Ferment is conceived either from within, or from without the body: from within, as when an Idea of fear impresseth it● character upon some more than ordinary putrid excrementitious matter residing in the Intestines or in the ultimate digestion, and the Idea clothes its self with corporiety in the putrid excrement of the body and the putrid matter becomes spiritful in the Idea, and both together become by irritating and invigorating one another, a fermental poison which makes its onset upon the vital Archaeus, entering the lists of contention therewith; and, by this virulency that they have one wrought the other into, it becomes contagious, so that every spark and vibration of this fermental fire retains the Idea and platform of the whole pestiferous contagion; Vnica prava pecus, etc.  
For though one who is infected with this pernicious and most-what mortal Disease doth infect another, yet doth it rage never awhit the less in the first, nor is it in the second, or he who is infected at the second hand any thing less, though but a spark of the first or original; so that every vibration (though as to conception never so little) of a fermental contagion retains the seed, and that the whole platform of the Disease itself, inasmuch as every ferment is as an Imp or Scion of a Fruit-tree which hides in itself the image of the whole Tree, and wants but time and the conspiring of seasons (Art having Nature for its groundwork) to show forth the Idea of the same Tree it was taken from, both as to leaves, flowers, and fruit: so that seeds are small in bulk even scarce imaginable, and yet these, according to the appointment of God in Nature have ferments annexed to them, whereby the Ideas of things assume to themselves the elemental water for a body, wherein they display the lively images of what lay dormant and not perceivable before in their minute corpuscles of Seed.  
All which solves us this Medical Phaenomenon, viz. How it comes to pass that those who most fear having the small Pox, spotted Fever, and such like diseases which have a degree of virulency in them, and therefore are a kind of Pest in an inferior manner; how such, I say, who are most afraid are the soon infected, as I knew a Physician who had such an inbred fear against the small Pox, that he would scarce, if at all, venture into a house where any was troubled with that disease; and yet, for all his curiosity of avoiding plates, was snatched with it at length even in the flower of his years and ●ied. I say, it appears to me from what is laid down afore, what may ●asily lose this knot, and that is, The Idea of fear or terror may so work upon an excrement even of any of the digestions (for every digestion has its way of separating the impure from the pure which is nutrimental) as to cause that excrement yet to degenerate further, even to a putredness, and in that ●ntred matter the Idea becomes corporeal, and the putrid matter in the Idea becomes active and pestiferous, and both become fermental, and so work upon the blood and spirits, defiling them with that inherent inquination, and spreading Miasm, whereby the vital flame burns dimly, and at length becomes (through the prevalency of the fermental Miasm) quite extinct.  
Hence it also appears that every Disease that has any thing of a venenum or venom in it, as all manner of malignant Fevers, are also fermental, and therefore apt to propagate themselves by contagion o● infection; some more, some less according to the degrees of the conceived virulency.  
And as the noble Helmont saith (whom I confess to have given the greatest light to these conceptions) that every Disease, as other natural Beings, are constituted of an efficient and a material cause, which two make up the complexion and essence of a Disease as well as of other positive Beings: for every Disease (saving some casual obstructions which may also forerun other more complex Diseases) has a root or beginning either in the digestions, liquid juices of the body (as blood and other nutritive humours) spirits or solid parts, and after that a growth or spreading into branches or symptoms which carry along with them the Idea of the efficient and procatarctick or irritating cause which was forged in the Minera morbi; so that the symptoms are proportionate to the efficient, and bears the badges thereof as receiving its signature therefrom: even as the fruit of a tree is answerable to the Idea lodging in the root, a Pear-tree bears the Idea of the whole both in the root and in every Scion, and the fruit thereof is Pears answerable to specific difference of it from other trees and fruit. For the outward natural life of the body, if considered as in health and its integrity is as a flourishing Tree that puts forth, grows florid, and fruitful.  
Which has all the digestions in right frame every one in their order, and all its organs depurated and free from obstructions and offending sordes; the blood freely circulating with its crimson hue in its own twisted Meanders of veins and arteries, the motion of all the parts brisk and lively, and all conspiring in that one point of co-incidence, the health and flourishing of the body.  
But if the seeds of Diseases (as commonly through the evil access in nature they do) become sown and grown up together with the life, than they break the former harmony of health and life, and shoot forth branches or symptoms answerable to their seeds or roots which disturb the oeconomy of the natural digestions, and pervert the order and method of nature, and at length subvert the whole frame of the Microcosmick fabric; and that much the sooner if the inseminated morbid seeds prove acute (as in all sorts of common Fevers;) venomous, fermental, and contagious, as in small Pox, spotted and camp-Feaver, and all other malignant Fevers (the greatest of which the Plague:) these presently put to flight the vital forces, and strangle Nature with her own cords, by baffling the digestions and stifling the vital powers.  
As from within the body, so likewise from without may that  guest take ●nne, which appears by the many ways that contagious Disease may arrest the body; as for example, the pestilent odor may lurk in old rags, garments, paper, sweep of houses, stonewalls, or any other body whose texture renders it capable of retaining those contagious Effluvia's, which rebound either from infected places or persons, and, for aught I know, even in the body of common Salt itself may the pestilent odor reside, because that Salt in its coagulation acquires an impure halicuous sordes, whereby it exasperates the Scurvy, and may be retentive of a malignant fracedo or contagious hogoo.  
Those bodies which will not admit of the pestilent odor, amongst Metals Gold (though it may lurk in the sordes that casually may adhere to Gold) and, it may be, polished Silver; amongst Minerals possibly Mineral Cinnaber sulphur, and that also all Pearls, precious Stones, and Amber, which three last besides the politeness of their external surface (which will not easily, no more will other polished bodies admit of that venomous vapour) their intrinsic specific virtues may be a defence to them against that virulent odor, whose virtues also may probably make them become tutelary to those who use them; as, for instance, a piece of red Amber which a Spanish Chirurgeon (as Helmont relates) used as his only Zenexton or preservative for three years together being Master of the Pest-house, which he used to rub upon the seven principal and Planetary Pulses, viz. upon both temples, wrists, ankles, and left breast, wherewith he was preserved, as Helmont observes, though the rest of his assistants taken away by the Plague.  
Now as the Plague is (as by what is declared) a virulent and contagious Ferment conceived both from a pestilent Miasm arising from within or from without the body, so it seizeth upon the vital Archaeus or spirit of life with a kind of fear and terror. For a noxious Ferment cannot work nor show its propagating symptoms upon a cadaverous body, inasmuch as a dead body cannot be infected nor can be stung with any Viper or Serpent, because it wants a vital principle (which we call an Archaeus) for the venom or infection to work upon; so a potential or actual Cautery, the last whereof may stigmatize and burn a dead body, but neither of them is able to raise a blister, swelling, or other vital symptom, and that because all blisters, swell, pustuls, inflammations, pains, or other symptoms which arise from infection or from biting of venomous beasts are vital products, whose spring is immediately from the very fountain of life, the Archaeus itself, which disgusting those virulent impressions, and hostile exotic Ferments, as also all outward casual perplexing accidents of bruises, bites, wounds, burn, scaldings, dislocations, etc. doth show its own vital strength in opposing the injury done to it by those vital symptoms of swell, fieriness, frequent pulses, and protrusion of the adjacent latex to the injured part, as buckets to allay the scalefire.  
The Archaeus therefore is that in us which first feels and perceives the pestilent ens, and becomes infected therewith, shaping an Idea of fear and terror upon the most degenerate excrement of the body, which is (as Helmont saith) the Tartar of the blood, which speedily contracts a pestilent fracedo, and becomes the seminary of this most-what mortal Enemy, by putting on the form of a Cadaver or dead body, whence the Archaeus becomes more powerfully invigorated in its own primitive frightful Idea, which also gives entrance for the seminal pestilent character to lord it over all the digestions, by putting a stop thereto, and causing an inward putrefaction to overspread the whole body; whence mortal symptoms and at length death itself ensue.  
Now the Plague surpriseth the Archaeus with an Idea of fear after a twofold manner, viz. both by an external fear, as I may call it, which comes from the hearing of such a mortal, unfrequent, tyrannous, infectious Disease stirring abroad, whence oftentimes a present horror shakes a man at the unexpectedness and uncothness of such news, and those who are most startled with the novelty thereof, are the soon apprehended thereby; for Ideas of fear and terror are not mere empty nothings, nor yet mere entia rationis, nor are idle, but become more active by induing forms, and assuming corporiety in the putrid excrements of the body, more readily I say, and more actually in some persons than others.  
For we see there are some constitutions and tempers so far different from others, that though they may have Ideas of sorrow, heaviness, melancholy by external crosses, and thwarting providences, yet those Ideas seize not upon the body, so as to put an anxiousness and restlessness upon the spirits, nor to become a Remora to the digestions, and induce a tabes from a fretting nature, but are laid aside and they are cheerful even in the midst of otherwise grieving Ideas.  
Whereas on the other hand, some are of such a fearful nature, that Ideas are not only begot in their imaginative part, as well from privative as positive objects; but also these Ideas hue forth to themselves shapes and assume corporiety, so as to become real morbid Entities, to the prejudice of health, nay, hazard of the life itself; hence wastings, and consumptions from solicitous, anxious, & careful thoughts or Ideas, which often accelerate old age, and make a man become grey and withered, before he be well arrived to the prime of his years. But I have not time to exspatiate.  
And as from an external fear, so also from an internal fear, the Archaeus may be surprised with a venomous and pestilent ens; as when from some infectious air, contaminated with unwholesome smells, the Archaeus secretly and inwardly (and, that it may be, without the expectation or supposition of the party) is seized upon with a strange kind of fear and terror, which it keeps lurking within its own bosom, and so hatcheth its own Cockatrice-eggs, which at length become a lethal poison to itself: With this Panic fear, the Archaeus of the wisest and the soberest of men may be insensibly taken, so as not only to shape and foster a Morbid Idea, but also, that that sickly Idea should incorporate itself into an excrementitious matter, and become at length determined in a common and more inferior Disease, or else in a virulent Ferment, which works retrogradely upon the whole frame of Nature, and hastens the terror of terrors, Death.  
Of the like nature with this fear of the Archaeus, which begets the Pest in the vital part, is also those fears (though seizing after another manner) which surprise the Archaeus of those who have a secret antipathy against any particular thing, who can give no rational account why they have such a fear or horror upon them at the presence of such an object, nor why they disgust such or such a thing with an utter detestation; as for instance, that some will sweat, tremble, and fear at the sight of Cheese; another will have dread at the sight of a Cat; a third will have an Idea of horror at the sight of a Toad; another will sweat, tremble, and be in a kind of Agony at the presence of a Paper put under the bottom of a Pie, which though not seen by the eye, yet the Archaeus is such an acute discerner of things, that can by an intuitive kind of inspection, presently discover what is friendly, but chief what is inimicicious to it; not that the object is really so as it is apprehended by the Archaeus, for than it would be so to all, which jet, we see daily experience saith to the contrary.  
Therefore these disgusts are certain irregular Ideas wherewith the Archaeus has been either originally from the conception tainted, which Ideas become so familiar, as that they co-incide with the very essential and constitutive principles of the Archaeus, and so are naturalised therewith, as that they seem to hang both upon one root, or basis; or else in time through customs or casual accidents, they become implanted into the very initials of the Archaeus, and so become natural: As for instance: when a man takes a disgust at a thing, he has either eaten too much of, or that has had some nauseating quality therein, whereat the Archaeus has been offended, and roused up the natural forces in the stomach and intestines, to expel it, either upwards or downwards, then presently it shapes an Idea of hatred and utter detestation there-against, insomuch that though it was very well pleased therewith before the Surfeit, yet after it utterly hates and rejects; yea, and though the same should under a disguise be so palliated as to be taken into the stomach, yet then the Archaeus seeing, and, as it were, sensibly feeling it, sets itself strenuously against it, by conceiving of Antipathetical or discording Ideas, whence to execute its commands (at whose beck all the powers, faculties, and humours of the whole body are) it rallies up its forces, makes its onset upon the deceitful enemy that took him unawares, and is not quiet till he have thrust him out by head and shoulders.  
If then these ordinary and frequent Ideas work thus powerfully upon the Archaeus of persons, even in the common transactions between meats with other objects, and the stomach with its legislator the Archaeus, so as to cause sometimes strange and antic gestures, as in the biting of a Tarantula, that Spider of Apulia, whose strange and heteroclite venenal Idea doth take such impression upon the Archaeus of the bitten or infected person, as that (sub jugum trahitur Archaeus) it brings the Archaeus under its hatches, signs it with its own character, which is so fermental, as that it presently insinuates into the whole Archaeus, and so consequently into all its clients, that it rests not, putting the body into antic postures of dancing, till by the suitableness of some peculiar tone of music which pleaseth the Tarantula (that impressed the Ideal-venom) he falls into such a fit of dancing, as that together with the motion of the body, the virulent matter which it has got in the body, is wrought out by sweat and transspiration, and the poisonous antick-Idea becomes worn out by the access of the other pleasant Idea, that the Archaeus is brought into from the consonancy and harmony of the Nusick which at length worms out the other.  
So likewise that strange fermental venomous Idea, that is communicated to a man from the biting of a mad Dog, which causeth a hydrophobia, which is very plain, that what is done, more than what would have been from the bites of another Dog, is purely Idea; for we see that a common wound from a Dog or other beast (unless itself be venenous) has no such symptoms as accompany the wound of a mad Dog, or other venomous creature, but is only a solitary wound, curable by ordinary Balsams; but from the venom of the biting of a mad Dog comes a kind of madling Idea, which has its dimensions and lineaments almost exactly from the madling Idea of the Dog; so that it is plainly Ideal, and also Fermental both in the mad Dog, as also in the bitten Person; insomuch that the madling Idea of the ●og by the medium of the bite, insinuates its self through the Mummial Ferment into the Archaeus, and becomes so prevalent, as that it shapes its own ●dea therein, and works the imaginative part into a likeness with its self: whence most-what the same ●oving madling symptoms arise in the one, as in the other. And also we see that in the giving of Opium crudely prepared, what strange Ideas, phantasms, wheeling motions are represented, much like those Ideas & labyrinthal thoughts which are impressed upon those who are sometimes in the beginnings of Fevers, Agues, etc. without any using of Opium, as if the Archaeus in such Diseases had shaped 〈◊〉 its self such a stupifying and floating wheeling Idea, as is in Opium itself; which appears plainly to me, as if the Archaeus had a power of forming in it most kind of Ideas that are wrapped up in the bosom of Plants, and Animals, either from its own exorbitant power, shaping them in its own Forge, by its own Vulcan; or by propagation from the Plants and Animals themselves Opium given well prepared, we se● how it allays the fretting, fumings boiling, and painful Ideas in Fevers, and other Diseases, by the refreshing Idea whereof, the (otherwise disturbed, fretful, and incensed) Archaeus becomes quieted, lays aside its fury, and is as a meek Lamb pleasantly reposed by the charming Idea of that well-prepared vegetable juice.  
All which instances (and many more I might urge if I had time) do clearly evince the truth of what I assert, viz. that there is an Archaeus which sits at the stern of all the digestions, in which also are represented various kinds of Ideas, or shaping in the imaginative part, which being roused up by an executive power, or Archeal fiat, become such real Entities, as are able ●●ough both to disturb the order ●nd frame of Nature, and to be determined in Diseases: And further, that of those Ideas some are ●rulent, others not, and amongst ●●ysons, those who consist in a vi●●ent Idea, are the most noxious 〈◊〉 humane life; such are all malignant and pestilent odours, which ●●rce the Archaeus to fabricate an ●●ea of fear; which Idea is invigorated, by acuating itself upon the ●●acedinous odor of the Tartar of ●●e blood, which is an excrement ●f the fourth digestion, and therefore the most susceptible of virulent impressions.  
This Idea therefore of Fear, which ●●prizeth the Archaeus of some ti●●erous and low-spirited people, ●oner than others, when it endues corporiety from a virulent Contagion, it gins to boil in the blood, which is the receptaculum vitae, the very seat of life, and red-sea wherein our Archaeus navigates, tacks to and fro for the safeguard of the Microcosm: when it espieth any enemies, especially of a poysonful property, it either lowreth its topsails in obedience thereto, or else it sets upon it with all its might and force; in which combat the one masters the other.  
The blood is the Scene, in which both the vital Archaeus, and morbid Entities act their parts vicissim, and if any corrupting Acidity enters its Confines, it becomes presently hostile thereto, either coagulating the same, whereby the Viscera become obstructed, and diseases thence arising; or putrefieth the same, causing it to contract a fracedinous odor, whence it affords a putredinous Aporrhoea, that gives the Materia substracta for a venenous Idea of fear to work upon, whence also from the one, acting upon the other, are begot all malignant Diseases, and especially the Disease I ●m now treating of, viz. the Pest.  
In which Disease, the putrefying ●erment is so great, that if any of ●he Archaeus his forts be safe, I mean, if any part of the blood be free from putrefaction, the Archaeus flieth thither, as to his safest Port, and there skulks awhile in ambush, ●till the malignity either overspreads the whole blood and Archaeus, or else that the Archaeus gains by retreating the more forces, whereby it makes more conquerable assaults upon the vital enemy.  
Hence it is, that if the blood be ●●t forth by opening a Vein, it ●roves mortal, both in this and all other malignant Diseases, because the most pure and untainted part of the blood, and where the Archaeus chief lodgeth (which is the Pillar of life) is thereby exhausted, and the putrefied part only les● which is become a mere Cadaver and hasteneth all the rest of the parts into a likeness with its sel● whence death inevitably. Where fore in all sorts of Fevers, the Physician should seriously consider and weigh, whether there may no● be somewhat of malignity in the Disease, whose Diagnosticks h● propounds to himself, as the rule 〈◊〉 proceeds by in the Therapeutic o● Curative part, lest he order a Phlebotomy where there is a degree o● malignity and virulency, that an●guis sub herbis in all infectious Fevers.  
Therefore not only in the Plagu● but also in the small Pox, camp-Feavers, spotted Fevers, putrid and other malignant Fevers, the letting of blood is most dangerous, if not presently mortal; for it takes away not only the weapon Nature has to contend with, but also her very Champion, the Archaeus, and ●aves her destitute of help to struggle with a potent enemy; therefore she must needs flag and fall before his fury.  
And indeed to tell you the sum ●f my thoughts, I must needs say, that bloodding is not only dangerous and mortal in malignant Feathers, but unnecessary in all other ●eavers; though, if any, the Pleu●sie may seem to plead a necessity, ●ut to whom? Only to the Gale●●sts, who know no better remedy through their poverty in Chemical preparations of noble Medicines: ●●ea, it is impertinent in most Chro●●ick Diseases, and also dangerous, where the Ferments or Digestions ●f the body are weak, the blood impoverished for want of due circulation (restagnating in the parts) and a through-want of illumination from the aura vitalis, or vital ●last. And lastly, where all the powers and faculties are at the declining hand, as in all linger wasting, and consumptive Disease where to let blood is to pump Nature of her very best Treasury.  
I must confess I have found 〈◊〉 experience, that some persons have found sensible good in some disease giving them a temporary ease, but if their disease be Fevers, they li●ger long before they come to the●● full strength, especially if blood w●● drawn, when Nature was brought to a low ebb, for than it cannot regain strength nothing near so soon, a● when without blooding, by a powerful Medicine, Nature is helpe● and returns to its strength. Als● I have found, that if Nature b● strong, and some exotic pains, o● some other slight Disease, that aris● from the too great repletion of the Veins, as sometimes Migraines, and Vertigo's, pains in the head, etc. which arise from the intumescence of the bloody vessels of those parts, or else from a pungent acidity either in the blood, latex, or aqua lymphatica, which may prick the Nervous and Membranous part of the Brain, I mean, the Pia-mater, where in defect of other Medicines (which may correct that spurious acidity, and transpire the superfluous lat ex which swelled the vessels:) blooding may be a little indulged, but not with too prodigal a hand. Also those whose sanguinious springsource is of a vegetating and strongly increasing property, may in some cases have a little indulgence herein, though with moderation.  
For if the spring of the fourth Digestion which is the Port to sanguification be veget, the water, I mean, blood, may be exhausted better and with less loss than where this spring is faint, therefore those who according to the common Dialect say, their Liver is strong, and begets great store of blood (taking for granted the common notion of sanguification in the Liver) may a great deal the better bear the loss of blood by Phlebotomy, and perhaps too, may find some present REMEDY for their MALADY, especially if they have been accustomed to be blooded in the like cases, because custom habituats the Archaeus to an expectation of the same again, and repeated actions become a second nature. But to return; but before I leave this subject, let me add one thing, and that is this, That by blooding, Nature oftentimes becomes so languid, that if a Disease follow after, she is not so able as with its wont strength to give a strong repulse to the invading enemy, which watches the slips and defects of Nature to trip her up at her weakest point, for hereby her weapon the blood, which is the seat of life, is surreptitiously taken from her.  
Now to the point in hand, The blood boiling in the vessels from a virulent ens impressed therein, ferments, and like an evil leaven (from which, as also from the working of Eiquor, hath the name Ferment had its original) works till it have moulded all the principal parts and humours of the body into its own likeness, in manner of a gangrenated Ulcer, which feeds upon all near it, and by its venomous Ferments, turns all, as far as it goes, into its own likeness of mortified flesh: For the blood has in this Disease got such a poysonful Ferment, or leaven in it, as that it ceaseth not inwardly to putrefy, till it either mortifies the whole, or a stop be put to its venomous progress.  
In this inward putrefaction of the blood, the outward parts are not long free from the Contagion, but breaks forth in one place or other, or all over, in its own characters, viz. Spots, Bubo's, swell, Sores, intolerable pains, etc. which are outward badges of the inward mortification; for no Ferment can rest till it either have a stop put thereto from some other more powerful supervening Ferment, or have overrun the whole, so that the outward is signed by the inward in respect of that concatenation of inward and outward parts.  
Now if this pestilent Ferment putrefying the blood, and in its making its issue forth, contracts and centres its self in one place, if within twenty four hours after the Contagion has not universally overspread the whole, whence death inevitably; than it is an argument that a stop is put to its spreading inward Gangrene, and the outward issue is a Magnet which attracts, or at least, by which other proper Magnets may attract the virulency and poison from the whole.  
But if the contagious Ferment acts furiously within, and that there is an obstipation or locking up of the Pores, (those little Portals through which sometimes the infectious odor is let in, as also sometimes let's forth the same poysonful Gasi) than it commonly kills, before any greatly manifest symptoms of the outward parts break forth, till after an expiring of the vital spirit, the virulent Ferment goes on to overspread the vegetative life in the last digestion, which it doth after death; and so, I say, the last digestion, viz. of the solid parts, becomes also infected and breaks forth, even after death, into spots, pustuls, and swell: for in these malignant Diseases where the venom first seizeth upon the vital parts or centre, and so spreads to the outward parts or circumference, the vegetative or growing life or property which lodgeth in the ultimat digestion, viz. of the solid parts, is the last that's wrought upon and slain, whose badges do betray the Serpent that lurked in the blood.  
The intolerable pains that happen in these outward swell, come from the anxiety of the vital and animal spirits, I mean, the Archaeus (for those divisions of spirits are but different vibrations of one and the same Archaeus) which is sadly oppressed with the close dogging of this virulent Ferment that has got footing in the Cottage of life: The Virulency in respect of its great corrupting property, has an acute acidity annexed thereto, which pricking the nervous and membranous parts of the body, especially of the part where the Contagion works to a head in the swollen place; somewhat like to the pricking pains of the Pleurisy (though more eminent in degree) which proceeds from a punging acidity in the blood, whereby it becomes (Nature abhorring its hostile enemy, & therefore where it hath strength thrusts it forth) hostile to the Archaeus, and is therefore extravasated out of the azugal Vein into the Plura, and there by reason of its acidity (which yet has not arrived to any virulency) which is hostile to the Veins and Membranous parts, lacerates, and, as it were, by pricking, tears the Membrain of the Plura, which is a most sensible part, thence comes those smart pains and stitches frequent in that kind of Fever.  
But in the Plague the corrupting acidity differs from others, in that it has a contagious Ferment adjoining to it, and what the acidity, causing pains and boilings in the blood, and what the virulency causing a gangrenating property through the whole; this Disease becomes determined into the most deadly enemy to the mortal life: And from the boiling of this venomous leaven in the blood proceeds those direful symptoms which accompany this Disease, as an inquenchable thirst, which would drink all before it, because of the fermental fire that centres in the bosom of the blood, which boils up continually in an anxious dark fire-source, darkens the vital beams which should be irradiated through the whole, and makes the lamp of life burn dimly.  
For this outward temporary life of ours, which at the best since the fall is caduce, is truly and really a vital lamp or a luminous ens, of a middle nature, between the immortal Soul, and the Elemental Body, and is (as the acute Helmont well calls it) pedissequa, or receptaculum animae immortalis, not only the Handmaid, but Cottage of the immortal Soul; or (if I might call it) the lowest Sphere to which the Soul is banished, since it fell from the upper Sphere of Paradise, where now its conversant amongst those Spinae & tribuli, those Briers and Thorns of Morbid Entities, or Diseases and passions which disturb the otherwise pure and serene oeconomy of the generous Soul, as it is born in the divine light.  
The lives of all Creatures (as Helmont saith) are entia luminosa & Dei dona, Beings of light, and gifts of God, implanted in every Creature for the governing the structure of the body, with both the signatures of the life and inward spirit, and also the stage wherein the Magia thereof produceth its wonders: this spark of fire or light which quickens every body, gives life, motion, sense, capability of accepting or eschewing what is either of a like nature, or what is of a different from its self, and gives all the concomitant products of life, is yet but a little in bulk, and yet puts an activity into great bodies, which otherwise would fall of their own weight, ruit & ipsa mole.  
This is that Plastic principle that shapes every thing in the Embryo, puts on the watery Element for an outward garment, and appears in most delicate forms, sporting itself (according to the appointment of God in Nature) in great variety, to the wonderment of the great Spectator, Man; who if he be born with eyes, cannot but admire the wisdom of the great Creator, who has placed a vegetative spark in every Plant, Praesentemque refert, quaelibet herba Deum. If these lights are darkened the Creature falls into disorder, deficiencies and weaknesses, if it be extinct, the body falls like a cadaverous bulk.  
That which I would aim at herein, is, That seeing the outward fragil life of man consists in a spark of light, which is a warming, nourishing, and enlightening lamp to the body, is therefore exposed to all those many dangers which may hazard not only the dim, dull, and obscure burning of the lamp of life, but also the extinction of the same, amongst those many puffs and blasts that hazard the extinguishing this vital flame, that malignant blast of the Pest, as also of other contagious fermental Diseases, doth the soon stifle the same, and that because such infective odours are very active and nimble, and therefore insinuate with their venom the more intimately, reaching to the very root of life.  
These pestilential Odours or Hogoo's surprise the vital flame of insected persons, not much unlike the malignant Mineral Arsenical sulphur which is found in Mines, that first darkens a Candle, and at length blows it out, which also they in effect do the same to the workers in the Mine, by sometimes stifling their vital flame, by the poysonful Arsenical vapour that comes out from the Caverns of the earth, where there is as well unwholesome, nay, poisonous breaths as well as healthful.  
Thus you see I have (as succinctly as I could) run through the description of the cause, essence, manner, and symptoms of this devouring Disease the Plague, together with some transient hints of other malignant Diseases; so that Ex ungue leonem, from one you may learn to measure another, and them all, in their own proportions and dimensions: you may espy (i● you observe) a secret concatenation or cementing together of the notions laid down, in order to the through discovery of this Monster, though I confess, much shorter than I might have done if I had time.  

The nature of a Zenexton.  
HAving thus determined the essence of this Disease, it's now time to discover, if we can, what may possibly concur to the assistance against it, as also what may conduce probably to its Cure. For the way to seek a right Remedy, is first, to be throughly satisfied of the Nature, Cause, and Essence of the Disease, which may make way for a due application of Antidotes and Specificks.  
That which is therefore incumbent upon every one, is, first, Every man to look well to his own ways, that he be found doing that which is wellpleasing to the Lord in all righteousness, to whom the blessing of health and long days belong jure divino.  
2. Then secondly, That as many as may, be of a cheerful, serene, and free spirit, for a well-grounded cheerfulness, that has no guilt lying heavy upon it, hic murus ahaeneus esto, nil conscire sibi, nec impallescere culpae: This is the great Wall of defence, to be conscious of nothing that is unrighteous; that spirit may (if any) be truly cheerful; and nothing doth keep the natual spirit in better frame than such a well-founded cheerfulness.  
For this keeps out all foreign and timorous Ideas which most-what hasten the infection in those dull and low-spirited people; inasmuch as Fear is the inlet unto the many Miseries and Calamities that the humane life is exposed to, it makes the Spirits dull and renders them like Wax, susceptable of every contagious impression in the Air; whence it is, that a confident Physician may almost (if not wholly sometimes) persuade a timorous spirited person into a disease, through a slavish indulgence to his passion of Fear.  
Whereas a cheerful, confident, and deboneir person, like a Champion conquers those beasts of fear that lie in the way, and blots out those timorous Ideas, whereby the fruits and effects thereof, viz. of being easily surprised with that which many times is most hurtful, are prevented: For cheerfulness doth not only hinder the entrance of fears, and of what fears produce, but also blots out those Ideas of too much carefulness and anxiousness in worldly affairs, which prove often the very bane of the outward life, producing both trouble, doubtful, and despairing thoughts, much to the prejudice of that person.  
And though we say, there is no fence against fear, yet surely a cheerful and pleasant spirit, being in counterpoint to that of fear, cannot but must be its Zenexton or Antidote, greatly preservative against that great Malady of Fear, which brings oftentimes direful effects upon the stage of humane life; but upon the entrance of a cheerful pleasant spirit, that of fear makes its exit, and so the Scene is altered and a new face put upon things: so that I should commend cheerfulness as one of the main hinges of Health, keeping out all Exotic Ideas that might disturb the Archaeus.  
3. The next thing in order to a Preservative, is Vinum ad hilaritatem, according to Hypocrates his advice, Sed non ad ebrietatem, To drink Wine moderately, to make the heart merry, as Solomon saith, which enlivens the Spirits, and puts the Vitals upon action, so as to stand Centinel against all other bad impressions from malignant Contagions; for this exalts the Spirits to that strain, as that they will not admit of any slavish passion (which often subjugates the whole to its tyranny) but banisheth all Exotic strange, fears, and other impressions, that would (if prevalent) make the life cumbersome to itself.  
The Spirits of Wine have different and something odd effects upon the Archaeus, for if moderately taken, they cause cheerfulness by strengthening the Digestions, meliorating the blood, fortifying the Balsam of life against all infectious breaths, and preventing the many enormous Ideas of fear, hatred, anxiousness, sorrow, and other perplexing thoughts, which often worm out the contents and comforts of life, if immoderately taken, than they subjugate the Archaeus to a stupidness, sottishness, and dulness, from its Narcotick virulency, captivating the same into obedience to its stupifying Idea, which works differently upon several Constitutions; some it besots and renders them as blocks, others it makes courageous ready to attempt any desperate design, witness the Spirits of Brandy in Hollanders Pates, make them fight like Bears, without fear of loss of life; some it puts into an angry waspish frame, ready to quarrel with every petty offending object; others it makes merry to a frantic madness, rendering them for a time in their discourse and gestures not unlike the Tenants of Bedlam.  
Again, Wine moderately taken, in such a quantity, I mean, as will actuate the Spirits into a brisk posture; to some, it brusheth off all those fears of want, and to themselves they appear like Princes, and then they scorn to be base, or to act in a sordid niggardly way, and think themselves no small fools: others it inspires with a poetical vein, and makes their lines run with Bacchus his feet; and in such Poetic furies, high and lofty strains have been warbled forth. And lastly, some are so alevated, that they are extraordinarily fore-sighted, insomuch as to speak Prophetically in some cases.  
Therefore the drinking of good wholesome well-spirited Liquor, may be as one assistance both against that Idea of fear wherewith the Archaeus is frighted, when it receives a pestilent odor, & against other melancholy solicitous thoughts which often drive the Spirits to a low ebb, and dwine away the body in a consumptive Tabes.  
4. The fourth thing in order to a Zenexton, Antidote, or Preservative, aught to be of a seasoning balsamic and preservative property, such as may absterse the sordes or impurities from every digestion, and preserve the Ferments clear from contagion, which commonly seizeth upon those bodies whose digestions are the most loosely performed and excrements more plentifully abound, there the Idea of fear doth most powerful work to superinduce a pestilent Ferment.  
The preventing therefore of which requires a certain purefying of the digestions and due separation of excremental sordes, which ought to be done not by Solutives and common Purgatives, because they rather vitiate the digestions, liquate or melt the Chile, Cruor, and Arterial blood; nay, sometimes even the solid parts themselves into a putrilaginous corrupt excrement, corrupting the whole, instead of duly separating the natural sordes of the digestions; therefore they as well as all other corrupting Purgers, which work indiscriminately upon the whole mass of humours, are herein to be eschewed.  
That therefore which will sweetly do the work, without any trouble, cumber, or fretting to the Spirits, aught to be of the nature of a Salt, and that too partly fixed, and partly volatile, that so it may pass the better through all the digestions, opening obstructions as it goeth along, correcting and mitigating Pontic Acidities (the causes of pains, stitches, and gripe) irritating the natural expulsive faculties, to let go at due seasons all excremental separations, abstersing the engendered putrefied matter, that has stayed longer then of right in the bowels, which is the beginning and cause of worms, and wormatick Fevers-  
And, this partly a Mineral Salt purged from its Hydropic and Scorbutic halituousness, & from its terrestrious ferulencies, and that by fire and water, which is to take away only that which lets or hinders it from becoming a noble Balsam, and, by yet further progress, according to the manuduction of the Art of Chemistry, may be brought to a noble fermentative Elixir, which may tinge the body from its feculent impurities, into a generous quintessence of health; to such a height may Salts be brought by the assistance of the Spagyric Art imitating of Nature.  
Now that which is truly of a preservative nature against infectious Diseases, ought itself to be highly depurated, and freed from its own inherent sordes, lest it be expected a thing should communicate that to another, it has not itself: but the culinary Salt is susceptable of a contagious odor, and therefore as such cannot be admitted as a Zenexton, though in it lurks a Virgin untouchable by any Exotic pestilent Ferment, and by a further graduating process may appear from it, as well as from other Mineral Salts, that Primum ens salium, or great solvent Liquor of Paracelsus and Helmont.  
I prepare therefore a Mineral Salt by separating from it its superfluous sordes, which is purged by Vulcan and Neptune, who not at once, nor a second time, is able sufficiently to be cleansed from its contracted feculency; inasmuch as all Mineral Salts in their coagulation, wrapped up together with themselves, much of a terrestrious impurity, as also an Embrionative Faetid sulphur close locked in their compaction; which Embrionative sulphur (the constitutive cause (together with the dissolved body of the Salt) of of sulphurous Wells, as of Knarsbrough, etc.) I have sometimes in working in those Salts made to appear to my own satisfaction.  
This prepared Salt being Specificated with a volatile Animal Salt, upon whose wings the volatile Sulphur of a Mineral is carried, which volatile Salt being purely saline, and therefore Cleansers of the Digestions, doth carry the fixed depurated Salt along with it, with a more facile current through the Digestions then otherwise, if not assisted by such a friendly co-natural Salt, by whose means the fixed becomes more acquainted, and enters more intimately into the Digestions; by the one the obstructions are opened, and the vital Balsam fortified according to the similitude of Nature; and by the other, the Digestions make their separations o● their impurities the better and with more ease, and every Excrement is hastened to its own proper Emunctory.  
Of which prepared Salt I have had some late instances of its efficacy in depurating the Digestions, abstersing the clogging sordes that cling to the Tunicles of the Ventricle and other bowels, of which I shall relate one or two, viz. Of a Child that was deemed to be consumptive, vomited most of what it took, and wasted away, in which I judged a corrupt sordes clogging the Digestions, from which, Worms causing the foresaid symptoms: Upon the taking of a few Doses of this prepared Salt, to which was added the third part of a Mineral proper in the case, together with a little Cordial acuated with vegetable fixed Salts; the vomiting presently left the Child, and it fell freshly to its wont food with a great deal of eagerness, and in a very little time became lively, active, and fleshy.  
A woman that had a great Cough, the oeconomy of the Stomach and Lungs so perverted, as that the Digestions were oppressed with an abundance of tough viscous humours, and she brought so weak, as her friends were glad to take away the tough Phlegm from her with a cloth, and every one that saw her judged her no otherwise then a dead woman: upon the taking of the foresaid Medicine, together with a few Doses of Sal martis, was, by the blessing of God, in a short time freed from those oppressing Symptoms: other instances I could give of bringing away Worms and Wormatick matter, but I hast.  
This Salt therefore seeing it thus mundifies the Digestions, and promotes due separation of excremental sordes, cannot but thereby be very effectual as a Preservative; inasmuch as it prevents or takes away those sordes, which by a further degree of degenerating, become the Materia substrata, fitted matter for infectious Ferments to work upon: And what this Salt may be further exalted to, I have several graduating Experiments in work, which in time I may possibly give an account of to the World. Therefore I would advise Physicians who make their own Medicines (which certainly must be the best and surest of ways, whereof I could give several reasons, but that I cannot now stand to insist further) I say, chief to set up good Preparations of Salts, for they contain in them the Key both for unlocking all manner of Obstructions (and Diseases thence) in the body, and highly graduated for unlocking the bodies of Minerals and Metals, whereby the noblest of Medicines are at hand.   

5ly. The Zenexton.  
THat which we assumed for our Title in this short Essay, comes now to view, It is an Appensum or Amulet, carried or hung upon the left breast, as Helmont ordereth, by the mediation of which all infectious Odours are kept off, it being tutelary to the Archaeus: Now there are of them in all the three Kingdoms of Nature, viz. in Vegetables, Animals, and Minerals, of which Animals and Minerals excel Vegetables; amongst Minerals, many precious Stones are richly fraught with tutelary Ideas of keeping off all Pestilent Infections: nay, and further, of attracting forth the virulency from an infected body; as for instance, what is said of the Sapphirus lazureus, or Hyacinthus citrinus, which being held for a quarter of an hour upon the painful part, so as the light from the Gem may smite upon the infected or broken-forth part, and upon it collect its Rays, the touched place will within one hour turn black, and is an infallible token (as it is said) of the Plague, but if the touched place grows not black, the suspected is free from the disease.  
Also red Amber (which as I said afore) applied to the Planetary Pulses, was the secret Zenexton the Spanish Chirurgeon used (as Helmont relates) for three years together: and amongst other Minerals, the Electrum minerale immaturum Paracelsi; which, as Helmont saith, hung about the neck, Abimmundo spiritu liberat, & probably may be a Zenexton, and free the Bearer from this unclean Spirit of the Pestilence. Amongst Vegetables, the Petasitis or larger Coltsfoot is accounted by the Germans an Anti-pestilential Plant; but to hasten to what I aim at.  
That we must inquire after such a Zenexton, as may have an adiquate cause of preventing timid Ideas, or correcting them being already impressed upon the Archaeus, which, as I said before, is the Proximate Agent (being determined from a Fermental venenum) to work upon excremental sordes, whence from one actuating the other, comes the Plague, or other malignant Diseases. Such a one, I say, it must be as has an Idea exalted so highly as to correct the enormous, irregular, and to its own hurt, too much inclining Ideas of the Archaeus.  
For nothing can correct those intimate and inherent Characters of the Archaeus, but such as stand in a counterpoint, and are more prevalent than the former, by warning out those preexistent morbid Ideas; as for instance, those venenal and madling Ideas which have inverted the Eutaxy of the Archaeus in mad people, cannot better be rooted forth than by the super-inducing of a more powerful Idea, which of all the Ideas, the Archaeus is impressed with, that of Fear seizeth the most deeply, and so rooteth out those who are more loosely implanted.  
Therefore such persons (though some kind of madnesses more than others) are curable most probably, (and not only so, but has been found experimentally) by almost drowning of them in water, keeping them so long under water, as that they but hardly escape with their lives; and so they lose those morbid venenal and madling Ideas, by the great Idea of Fear, which furprized the Archaeus, lest it should forthwith be destroyed, which makes it quit those former and more slightly impressed Characters.  
By which means the Archaeus sometimes gets quit of some Ideal Diseases, characterized in the very spirit of life; as the Gout sometimes cured by a sudden fright, as that instance of a Sow invited by the smell of a Pultiis, laid to a Gouty man's feet, she endeavouring to take her prey, threw him, and frighted him out of his Disease; as the learned and ingenious Esquire Boil in his experimental Philosophy, makes mention occasionally. So sometimes an Ague has been known cured by throwing the party upon the access of the Paroxysm into a deep water, whereby, as in the former, the Archaeus being impressed with a strong Idea of Fear, let's go all those inferior and looslier hanging Ideas, and so returns to its primitive simplicity: For the fewer Ideas, the Archaeus is amuz'd with, especially of those careful and perplexing ones, the more quiet, free, and calm it is from troubles and diseases.  
I remember to the confirmation of what I have said, a pretty Story out of Helmont, in his Demens Idea, where he mentioneth something remarkable that he was an eye-witness of, which was of an old man naked, and fastened with ropes in the Ship, and weights to his feet at the Stern, ask what that uncoth sight meant? One of the Mariners told him, he so bound was a Hydrophobus, being bitten of a mad Dog, and therefore fearful of the water, which that madness brings along with it: He stood to see the Experiment, they hoist up the man on height, and let him fall suddenly down (fastened in ropes that he could not be carried away) into the Sea, and kept him under water for the space of Miserere, which they repeated twice more for the space of Salutationis Angellicae, then rolled forth the water out of his body, he revived and was cured of his madness.  
Also of a Carpenter, who from some horrid Spectra's was struck mad, by chance broke his bands, and leaped into a Ditch, was drawn forth for a dead Carcase, but revived and lived eighteen years after, free from madness; of which manner of cure, he made several trials himself, and they were always cured; unless that some were drawn forth too soon through fear of death: other passages he hath that might further illustrate the present Theme, but that I hast.  
Now the same reason that salves these Difficulties, how these Ideal venenal Characters, which have real Malady, either of mind or body hanging upon them, are raised forth by the intervening of more powerful Ideas of another stamp, which centre so deeply into the Spirit (as above all that of Fear) as that it blots out all other pre-existent diseased Ideas. I say, the same reason (comparing efficient causes) gives us light to our present inquiry of a Zenexton, that may powerfully both blot out the conceived Ideas of Fear, and prevent the impressions of the same, which is the efficient of Pestilential Diseases.  
The ingenious and quicksighted Vanhelmont, saith, That there is an Ingenit or inbred Idea of hatred in a Toad against a man, which if it be exasperated by hanging them up in sight, becomes so highly exalted in its own venom as that it's able to root out another pre-existent Idea of Fear in the humane Archaeus, being first approximated by a mummial Ferment to act upon our Archaeus, wherein are impressed all kinds of Ideas, some having deeper rooting than others.  
The manner of preparing them he had from the famous Butler of Ireland, the same as had the highly graduated Stone of Salt, which cured most diseases by a sleight touching of the tip of the Tongue therewith, or by dipping it in Salet-oyl, a spoonful wherein it was but dipped, being poured into a bottle of more Oil, made it all become a Medicine for all or most outward diseases: who, as Helmont relates, cured some thousands of the Plague in London to his knowledge.  
He commanded Helmont to take a great Toad in an Afternoon in June, to hang him up near the fire-place, and to place a waxed Platter underneath, and after three days it vomited up Infects, viz. moving Flies, their wings shining with a green colour, which done, he told him, that now he had enough Mecine to cure 40000 infected with the Plague; he promised to show him the hinge of the matter, but being banished presently after, he did not, therefore Helmont was left to make Experiments of what he knew.  
He took therefore those rejected sordes, and together with the exsiccated Cadaver wrought them into Trochy's, which he used happily both for the preventing, as also the cure of the Plague: he order them to be old Toads, whose eyes abound with white Worms, and are almost wholly transformed into Worms; these he commands to be hung at the left breast, which both drive away contagion, and being bound to the infected place draws forth the poison.  
Now the ground of this Medicine he supposeth thus, viz. That the inbred Idea of hatred in the Toad, is by hanging in the sight of a man, so exasperated against the humane Archaeus, as that it becometh a stronger impression than that inbred Idea of Fear in us, and therefore being determined to act upon our Archaeus by the intervening of a mummial Ferment, roots out the pre-existent Idea of Fear, and the consequents, therefore all contagious Ferments.  
For, as the primitive cause of the Plague is a frightful Idea of terror in the Archaeus, which it may conceive in itself, though we know not thereof, as the Archaeus of him that is offended at the presence of such or such an object, though the person himself neither sees nor knows its presence; so the curative Idea must be such as may also reach the Archaeus, so that the peccant Idea may be blotted forth; just as in the foregoing instances I hinted.  
That is, that as the humane Archaeus is subjugated and brought under bondage by the foreign Ideas of some toxical Plants, and inveterate Ferments of Animals, as of Napellus and the Tarantula, at whose whistle it danceth, and is not at liberty to stand in its own calmness, without the assistance of some counter Idea, which in Nature one is always set against another. So likewise in this Disease, the efficient being Ideal, I mean, that of Fear, which suddenly catching hold of a contagious Ferment wandering in the Air, as some malignant blast, must find an Ideal Remedy, either of the Archaeus correcting itself from its former erroneous conceptions (whereby its harm was of its self) or else from another supervening Idea, implanted in some Vegetable, Animal, or Mineral, and that either natural or artificial; ours is artificial, but grounded upon the natural. For that the Toad has an odium against a man is natural, but that it should be heightened by such a way as hanging the Toad up in a man's sight, and then determining it to its proper end by the medium of a mummial Ferment, that is artificial.  
As to the discovering of the certainty, whether a person suspected have it, yea or nay, the same thing may be used, Ego semper in dubiis, (saith Helmont) bufone pulverato sum usus, pultisque forma in aquae simplicis tantillo, decocto; quod si mox inde dolor in eschera, anthrace & bubone, mitesceret, securè pestem adesse conjeci. And though Paracelsus saith, That they being applied to a pestilent Tumour or Plaguesore, swell with the poison they attract; yet Helmont saith, He never could observe them swell though he used them frequently, but that they drew forth the venomous degerat pestilent Matter, as a Topick thereto applied, he affirms.  
Now, though this kind of Creature seem a sordid thing, against which, we to them, as well as they to us, bear a secret odium, so that we look upon them commonly with a kind of horror, aversion, and detestation, yet even in this very Idea in them, being aggravated against us, is seated the chiefest cure; for ●eing exalted, and that gradually ●y a continued linger death, the ●ery Ideal odium is impressed upon the whole, and lives though the ●hing itself dies, and in the ashes ●ears the same internal character, as while it was yet alive.  
To the same purpose of cure doth Etzlerus in his Isogoge physicosmagi●medica tells us, Bufo exiccatus a●etoque maceratus, & pestilenti bu●oni impositus, venenum polentissime ●licit, & apostemata maturescere fa●it. And the ingenious Doctor Villis tells us of an ash-colored ●owder which a Courtier used with ●ood success to many, whose Dose was half a Dram, which caused plentiful sweat, and so freed from the virulency of the Disease, which Diaphoretic was these Animals purged by Salt, washed in good Wine, and calcined in a Pot to a Powder.  
By which we see, that in this desperate Disease, they may be taken inwardly, and, that not only without danger, but with good success. But however, I should rather approve of them as an outward Appensum and external Zenexton, than as an inward Medicine; for thus the Idea in which is the preserving virtue of the Archaeus, is more eminently apparent in mortifying those dull Ideas of Fear in low-spirited Archeus', and of dinting the virulency of the pestilent contagious Ferment.  
For outward application they are certainly the best by attracting the virulency out of the infected body. Imprimis fateor (saith Helmont) me bufones applicuisse bubonibus & escharis, tam in pectore, capite, mammillis, quam alibî, tam in viris, quàm mulieribus: ac ub que, non sine prompto juvamine & doloris mittigatione.  
But for an inward Medicine, I should highly approve of Hypocrates his Remedy, By which he cured the popular Pest of the Grecians, which a certain man desirous to ●now, besought his Eu-daemon or Tutelary Angel, what that was wherewith Hypocrates cured the Plague, ●e answered, That Hypocrates used Sulphur, Salt, and Pitch.  
Amongst all bodies, none resists poisonous Odours so much as Sulphur, whereupon probably Hippo●rates called it, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, quid divi●um, quod sulphur virus pestilens ●anaret. This by its embalming O●or keeps bodies from corrupting, and therefore used for preserving Wines from decaying by fracedi●ous Odours of Vessels, wherewith they are first fumed, and like a fire blots out every footstep of contagious Odours where ever it finds them.  
Vide (saith Helmont) In chataracta Gandavensi integram le●gionem Neapolitanam peste periisse ●erat autem cohors ibi Germanorum● quae pulvere pyrio sua tinxerat indu● sia: horum si qui perirent, id pr●dysenteria, non autem peste. So that their Shirts being dipped or rolled i● Gunpowder, became thereby preserved from the Plague: Now, that is made of Sulphur, Nitre, and dust of Charcoal, of which Sulphur is the chief Ingredient, though Nitre also is a sulphurous Salt wholly flamable like Sulphur itself.  
And therefore in a popular Pest, the shooting off of Guns often, is no small assistance against the infection's Myasm in the Air, and also the burning of Sulphur in houses, roots out the footsteps of the wandering Fracedo; like the fuming of Vessels therewith, for keeping Wines or other Liquors from fracedinous putrefying Odours. Hypocrates fumed all his Wine that he gave in the Plague after this manner, by burning a Match of Sulphur within the neck of a Glass-bottle, ●ill'd one third, corking up the Bottle close, and after shaking the Wine well about, and so reiterating until the Wine had at several times ●mbibb'd into itself a competeut quantity of the Balsamic Odour of the Sulphur, whereby it was both ●ept along time itself, as also was ●ble to communicate a Balsamic, ●easoning and preserving quality to the blood, so as a Pestilent Odour could scarcely find room.  
Thus Juices and other Liquors may after this manner be preserved a long time without Sugar, which generally added in such a quantity ●s to reduce them into Syrups, doth by their great clog dull the Ferment of the Stomach and other parts, and so cause an inclination to a Scorbatick habit: But this Su●phurus Gas being well incorporate in them, will preserve them without that additament.  
And as Fracedinous Odours and apt to seize upon Liquors, thereby inclining them to putrefaction an● corruption; so the Pestilent Odo● is as apt to take hold of the blood its Tartar (or Excrement of the fourth Digestion) and other humours of the body, if not seasoned by its own innate preserving Balsam exalted, which indeed if strong is a fire that keeps forth all infectious breaths; or else seasoned with a Mineral Sulphur, which both help to dint venomous impressions when contracted, as also to preserve against them.  
And though there be a Vitriolin● acidity in Sulphur (as by distilling the acid Oil or spirit is made manifest) which taken too much (by the immediate Organs of sense, the nostril's) become hostile to the ●erves and Membranous parts of ●he Brain, drying up the innate moisture thereof, by the more than ordinary exiccating quality of the sulphur, and causing the Nerves to ●ag from their natural tention; thence I have known a blindness appen to a friend of mine who was ●o careful in taking up her Nostrils that Acid, and therefore hostile liquour to the Nerves as she was Lan●ering her fine linen, which she was the more apt to do in respect of her ●ant of quick smell; these Fumes ●id so dry up the natural moisture ●f her Brain, and so mortified the optic Nerves from their present ●ork, as that flagging, they suffered ●e Pupil of the eyes to be extended ●nto that magnitude as we call a ●utta Serena, whereby she was wholly blind: but by the blessing of God, I ordered her (after other advice) somewhat of Volatile Spirits both inwardly, and also up her Nostrils, which did supper induce an irrigating moisture in the Pya-mater and Optic Nerves whereby the Nerves were again brought into their wont posture and the Pupil contracted, and sh● in a short time received her sight again by the great mercy of God To whom be Glory.  
That which I aimed at in the fore said instance, was, That though Sulphur may by the fume thereof taken too immediately into the se●citive Organs, prove hurtful t● Membranous parts or genus nervosum; yet when it is taken ln the medium of another thing, the Acidity is castigated, and the fume o● odor thereof is as a Balm or Condiment that runs aloug in the Digestions, leaving its Gas in every Stage as it posts from one part of the body to another. So much for Sulphur as considered in its Gas or embalming Odour.  
Now, as for Sulphur to be taken inwardly in its own substance, requires a previous preparation; therefore Hypocrates gives his, though a very slight one; because in his days Chemistry or the art of Anatomising things into their constituent principles, by a retrograde Analysis, was but in Embryo, and scarce got into swaddling Clouts, though considering the Genius of his time, he was one that had as great an insight into the Wonders of Nature, as any man, than his preparation was a levigating it with water upon a Marble, and then drying it, and though this way may not want its commendation in the effect, yet a better prepared one cannot, but must be more efficacious, in respect that all Minerals are but in a way of melioration.  
I have therefore a Sulphur by me, elevated from a few embalming Vegetables, whose virtues may not be a little contributory to the graduating of its preserving qualities, which I give in Fevers that has any thing of malignity, as a powerful Alexipharmick. And as his preparation of Sulphur was sleight, so his preparation of his Salt was but in the way to a further exaltation by depuration, etc. (which, let be spoken without any unhandsome reflection upon so noble a Physician.)  
For though he did thereby free his Salt from those peregrine halituous vapours, which orderly are inherent in common Sal marins, yet a terrestrious part was left therein, which might dull it in his seasoning property; so that both the terrestrious and Hydropic superfluities may be removed, its depuration must be higher, by taking away that which defiles it, and exposeth it even to the contamination of infectious Odours, which the pure part is free from.  
For seeing it must help to absterse those fracid Impurities in the stomach, got by the degenerating of the Ferment thereof, after invasion of the Pest, its self ought to be pure and clean. The Vehicle wherein these are to be taken, is a generous Wine, and that hot, lest given tepid, it should cause a nauseousness upon the stomach: With this he order infected persons to sweat much, given for three days together, and that twice a day, sweeting for four hours together, if they can bear it; and during the time of sweeting, they are to have no kind of drink; and after sweeting, they are to be fed with Cream of Barley, and for their drink pitched Wine, with a little of the aforesaid Powder.  
For a Topick or outward application, the leaves of Asarum Macerated in Vinegar, placed hot upon a Bubo to the soles of the Feet, and wrists of the hands, which after twelve hours (then stinking strongly) he order to be buried, which by a secret Magnatism attracts the virulent contagious matter out of the body, by those Emunctories whether Nature drives it. Also clothes dipped in Greek Wine, in which a little Sulphur is boiled therein, applied to great Bubo's.  
All which argues the Sagacity of the Noble Hypocrates, who so levelled his Medicines, as that they might directly hit the Mark aimed at; that whether we consider his inward or outward Remedies, or both, they all strike at the virulent contagious Ferment, and mortify the Pestilent vennum; and then Nature thrusts it forth of its own accord, either through many small portholes, the Pores, or the proper Pestilent Emunctories, the Plague-sores.  
There was another Arcanum, by which (as Helmont saith) Hypocrates got Divine Honours, and that was made of Viper's flesh, by cutting off their heads and tails, taking off their skins, which together with the guts and gall was rejected, only the heart and liver was reserved: the flesh with the foresaid bowels and bones were bruised together, and dried to a Powder, which Powder was sprinkled with dispumed Honey, and to the palliating of the secret. The Aroma of the Country was added, the reason of which Arcanum working so strangely, as by a poisonous creature to take away a poisonous Disease: I shall not now stand to show, only this in short, that every poysonful noxious creature has its Antidote placed also in it, by the appointment of the great Creator, who in his great work of the Creature, has placed the Enemy which appeared in the fall, and by it stands his healing Virtue the badge of his Presence (according to the capacity of the Creature) even in the same very Creature; and that as the Pestilent Infection is from a certain venom, so this venenous Creature (as is probable the like from other Sepents) contains a singular Antidote there against: but I forbear.  
As for the Diet of infected persons, it should be that which is light and easy of digestion, and but very sparingly taken, for as in every Fever, so especially in the Plague, the Digestions are defective, and therefore apt to corrupt the body the more food is taken, according to Hypocrates his own Aphoaism, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unclean bodies, by how much the more they are nourished, so much they are the more hurt or corrupted.  
Helmont commends the Potion of Hypocrates, to which he adds Ginger, and the Blackberries of the Ivy; concerning which last, I remember what the most ingenious boil saith in one place of his experimental Philosophy, that he had an Arcanum communicated to him, from a person that had cured many of the Plague in Ireland, which was the same aforesaid, viz. a good Dose of the Powder of fully ripe Ivy-berries; to which in the same Disease, the juice of Horse-dung was a Succedaneum, both which used to work plentifully by sweat: and Helmont saith concerning his, that they are Diaphoretic and grateful to the Stomach.  
So that Diaphoreticks is most proper in this case, and not Solutives, Phlebotomy, nor swimming, because the first liquates the blood into a Putrilage, a second robs Nature of its sanguinary Treasure, and the third shuts up the Wolf in the Stable, by locking up the Pores, keeps the virulent Ferment within, which therefore works the more powerfully in its infecting the inward Vitals.  
Thus I have run through the descriptiou of this direful Disease, with its Symptoms, Zenextons, and Cures, which I confess is short and it may be defective, which yet is pardonable, because huddled up in haste, in respect of the urgency of the Season, that seems to threaten no less than an Epidemical Disaster, which God in his mercy avert [or accomplish his own work thereby, which no doubt will redound to the good of his Chosen.]  
And though naturally few Nations there are but one of three Judgements of Famine, Sword, or Pestilence, reach them once in twenty years' space, and that, I say, grounded naturally, because where there is no one of these in any Nation or Country, the Natives increase so fast, and multiply in such multitudes, that unless they were swept away, they would even overrun one another, and, as it were, devour one another, or prey upon each others Possessions, so as to become burdensome to the Earth; therefore a Besom of wrath comes once in 10. 12. 15. or 20 years and sweeps away multitudes.  
As to the foregoing Remedies against the Plague, the Zenexton and Hypocrates his Alexipharmick, I look upon as the most eminent which I have partly ready by me, together with other assisting Medicines, and the rest scarce yet finished, but will be in a very short time, even in a few days: Other Medicines also proper in other cases I have by me, having a Spagyrical Apparatus medicinalis, which I have not now time to speak of.  
June, 26. 1665. From my Elaboratory at York.  
FINIS.