Hermetical physick: or, The right way to preserve, and to restore health. By that famous and faithfull chymist, Henry Nollius. Englished by Henry Uaughan, Gent.

Hermetical physick: or, The right way to preserve, and to restore health. By that famous and faithfull chymist, Henry Nollius. Englished by Henry Uaughan, Gent.

Table of contents

Title page

THE TRANSLATOR To the ingenious READER.

HERMETICALL PHYSICK &c.

CHAP. I. Medicine or Physick is an Art, laying down in certain Rules or Precepts, the right way of preserving and restoring the health of Man-kind.

II.

III.

IV.

CHAP. 2. Of the preservation of Health.

I. Lead a pious and an holy life.

II. Follow after Sobriety.

III. Eat not greedily, and drink not immoderately.

IV. Let thy meat be simple and unarted.

V. Accustome not thy selfe suddainly to meats and drinks, which formerly thou hast not been used to feed upon, unlesse they be prescribed thee by some expert and learned Physician for thy healths sake.

VI. Use Antidotes frequently, to preserve thee from poysons, and private or accidental mischiefes.

VII.

VIII. Take Physick in the spring-time, and in the Autumne.

IX.

CHAP. 3. Of Diseases in Generall.

I.

II.

III.

IV.

V.

VI.

CHAP. 4. Of the Extrarious or conjoyned and apparent Cause of the Disease.

I.

II.

III.

IV.

V.

VI.

VII.

CHAP. 5. Of Tartar.

I.

II.

III.

IV.

V.

VI.

VII.

CHAP. 6. Of God, the first and supreme Cause of the Extrarious Cause.

I.

CHAP. 7. Of the excesse and the defect of necessaries, which is the second cause of the Extrarious cause.

CHAP. 7. Of Fire, the third Cause of the Extrarious Cause.

I.

II.

III.

CHAP. 8. Of Hereditary impurity, which is the fourth Cause of the Extrarious Cause.

I.

CHAP. 9. Of Imagination, the fifth Cause of the Extrarious Cause▪

I.

II.

III.

IV

V.

VI.

CHAP. 10. Of violent Illation, which is the sixth and last cause of the extrarious Cause.

I.

II.

CHAP. II. Of the cure of Diseases.

Section 1. What▪ and how manifold the Cure is.

I.

II.

III.

Section 2. How a Physician ought to be qualified.

I.

II.

III.

Section 3. Of Medicines, what their qualities should be, and how prepared.

I.

II.

III.

Section 4. Out of what things Medicines must be sought.

I.

Section 5. Why Medicines cannot alwayes restore sick Persons to their former health.

Section 6. How Medicines ought to be administred to the sick, and after what manner the Physician must behave himself in their administration, and generally in his practise.

I.

II.

III.

IV.

V.

VI.

VII.

VIII.

Section. 7. How the sick man should behave himself, while he is in a course of Physick.

I.

II.

III.

IV.

§

§

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HERMETICAL PHYSICK: OR, The right way to preserve, and to restore HEALTH.

BY That famous and faithfull Chymist, HENRY NOLLIƲS.

Englished by HENRY UAUGHAN, Gent.

LONDON. Printed for Humphrey Moseley, and are to be sold at his shop, at the Princes Armes in St. Pauls Church-Yard, 1655.

THE TRANSLATOR To the ingenious READER.

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IF any will be offended with this Hermeticall Theorie, I shall but smile at his [Page] frettings, and pitty his ignorance. Those are bad Spirits, that have the light; and such are all malicious despisers of true knowledge, who out of meere envie, scribble and rail at all endeavours; but such as submit to, and Deifie their rigid superstition, and twice sodden Colworts. For my owne part, I honour the truth where ever I find it, whether in an old, or a new Booke, in [Page] Galen, or in Paracelsus; and Antiquity, (where I find it gray with errors) shall have as little reverence from me, as Novelisme. Veritatem tempus manu-ducit. There is no reason (if they bind not their owne hands) but the discoveries of Survivers and Posterity, may and should be more perfect, then the superficiall searches, and first attempts▪ or aims rather of their predecessors. I wish [Page] we were all unbiassed and impartiall learners, not the implicite, groundlesse Proselyts of Authors and opinions, but the loyall friends and followers of truth. It would not then be impossible, but that we might in a short time attain to that perfection, which while it is envied in some, will never bee found in all. As men are killed by fighting, so truth is lost by disputing; for while we study the [Page] figments and subtilties of Sophisters, wee cannot search into the operations and virtues of nature. As many as wil consider this, it is not improbable, but they may do well. But despisers, and such as hate to be quietly instructed, must be punished with silence, lest by seeking their peace, we lose our owne.

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Plautus.

Qui mali sunt, habeant mala; qui boni, bona; bonos quòd oderint mali, sunt mali; malos, quod oderint boni, bonos esse oportet.

HERMETICALL PHYSICK &c.

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CHAP. I.
Medicine or Physick is an Art, laying down in certain Rules or Precepts, the right way of preserving and restoring the health of Man-kind.

THe word Medicine, hath a manifold sense. First, It is taken for some receipt or medicament. So the Philosophicall Stone is termed a Medicine. The [Page] Lord hath created Medicines out of the Earth, and the wise man will not abhor them. Secondly, It is taken for the habit, or profession of the Physitian, and then it signifies the faculty of curing existent in some learned and expert Professor. This habit or faculty is delineated, or methodically described and laid down in the Dogmaticall Books of Physicians, that others may learne and practise thereby. Thirdly, It is taken for, and signifies a Physicall System or Treatise, and in this latter sence it is to be understood in this place.

The Object of Medicine or Physick in this latter sence is, Man, not in general, but that man onely who desires to learn the Art of Physick, and is to be informed or instructed by this present Treatise: but the Object of Physick, as it is an habit in the mind of the Physician, is man in general, either for the preserving [Page] or the restoring of his health. The operation, use, and end of Physick, is health; as the work and end of Physical books, is a rightly principled and instructed Physitian; so far as instruction goes: It is termed Hermetical Physicke, because it is grounded upon Principles of true Philosophy, as the Physick of Hermes was. And for this very reason the true Philosophers applyed themselves wholly to the Hermetic science, that they might thereby lay a true foundation of Physick, for the Hermetic Phylosophy layes open the most private and abstruse closets of nature, it doth most exquisitely search and find out the natures of health and sickness, it provides most elaborate and effectuall Medicines, teacheth the just Dose of them, and surpasseth by many degrees the vulgar Philosophy, and that faculty which is grounded upon the principles of the common, [Page] supposititious knowledge, that is to say, it doth much exceed and out do the Galenical Physick. This appears most evidently, because the Hermetical Phisicians both can and frequently doe cure those diseases, which the Galenists adjudge to be incurable, as the Leprosie, the falling sickness, the Gout, &c. That the Principles of the Hermetists, are more certain then those of Galen, is sufficiently verified by their performances; besides, it is a truth which cannot be denyed, that the Certainty and proof of the principles of all Arts, can by no other meanes be known and tryed but by practise, as Paracelsus doth rightly urge In Praef [...]t. D fensionum, page 252. Now all the knowledge of the Hermetists, proceeds from a laborious manual disquisition and search into nature, but the Galenists insist wholly upon a bare received Theorie and prescribed Receits, giving all at [Page] adventure and will not be perswaded to inquire further then the mouth of their leader. I call not those Hermetists, who know onely to distil a little water from this or that Herb; nor those, who seeke to extract from other things by their sophistical operations a great treasure of Gold, which onely nature can supply us with: for the most ignorant amongst the people, may make a very useful Distiller, and the other attempt is most commonly the task of Sophisters and Impostors: but I call them Hermetists, who observe nature in her workes who imitate her, and use the same method that she doth, that out of nature, by the mediation of nature, and the assistance of their owne judgements, they may produce and bring to light such rare effectual medicines, as will safely, speedily, and pleasantly cure, and utterly expell the most deplorable diseases. These [Page] are the true Hermetists: As therefore I doe not approve of all those that would be called Hermetists, So neither doe I condemn all those, who diligently and conscientiously practise the Galenicall Physick: for some of them are precize and petulant, others are sober & modest: and these latter sort acknowledge the imperfection of their medicines, and therefore they endeavour and take delight to adome, inlarge, and accomplish their profession with the secrets of Hermetical Physick: but the other sort ascribe supreme perfection to that Ethnic, Antichristian writer, and his medicines, and will not for meer envy, or out of a childish depraved ignorance▪ looke upon the eminency of Hermetic Philosophy, nor inquire into the secrets of it, but seek rather by reprehending and carping those things they doe not understand, to magnifie their own way, and with peevish [Page] and virulent language, raile at the Hermetic professors. Now as I preferre the Hermetical science to the medicines of these men: so (their Errours being first laid aside,) I unite it with the Physick of the more sober Galenists, that theirs by consoclation with ours, may become perfect and irreprehensible:

This Joseph Quercetar, a most expert Physician, and a learned Philosopher, whom as my master in this science I worthily honour, (for I must confess, that by his instructions (God assisting me,) I benefited very much,) did most happily performe. And many learned men even in this Age design the same thing, especially the professors of Physick in Marburg, who by an express and memorable decree of the most illustrious and mighty Prince William Lantgrave of Hassia, proceed in that very course. And who then can justly blame me, for walking in the [Page] same path with such eminent men? I shall conclude, and give my judgement with learned Crollius (a man who for the advancement of the true Physick, was most worthy of a longer life) that whosoever desires to be eminent in the Art of Physick, (and none can be so, that will study onely the Placets of one man) must (above all things) be unbiassed and addicted to no Sect, nor aany one Author whatsoever, but passe through them all in pursuit of the sincere truth, and subscribe only unto that, being mindful ever to preserve the same freedome for himself, which Horace did.

Quo me cun (que) rapit tempestas, deferor hospe [...],

Nullius addictus jurare in verba Magistri.

Where-e'r my fancy calls, there I goe still,

Not sworne a slave to any Masters will.

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II.

Health is an incorrupt integrity, and soundnesse of the body preserved by, and depending upon the strength and virtue of the radical Balsame.

WHence followes this Consequence, that the more strong and virtual the Balsame is, so much the more vegetous and healthful is the body.

III.

The strength and virtue of the Balsame, depends upon the equal and mutual conspiration of the Hypostatical Principles, that by their even and peaceful consistency, the Balsame also may legitimately perform his functions, by which he may advantage and strengthen himself with the received aliment or food which is taken in, and may also (when separation is performed[Page]by the stomack,) cast out through his proper Emunctories what is not nutritive, and may further provide that the seeds of diseases (if any lurk in the flesh, or in the blood, in the disguise of that tincture,) break not out, and bring suddain destruction to the body, or else may cause that those [...]ll seeds may by the balsames strength and vigour, be cast out of the body as superfluous impurities, which cannot consist with the health of man.

IT is truth therefore which the most noble and learned Crollius speaks in his preface to his Basilica Chymica: In what body soever (saith he) the Hypostatical principles consist by union, that body may be judged to be truly sound.

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IV.

Medicine or Physick, treats either of the preservation, or of the restoration of health.

CHAP. 2.
Of the preservation of Health.

THat part of Physick which treates of the preserving of health, is an Art, which by certaine cautionary Rules, or Precepts, teacheth and prescribeth a certain way and meanes to defend and save people from diseases.

It is by the Graecians termed [...]: To effect what this Art promiseth, I give these following Precepts.

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I.
Lead a pious and an holy life.

FOr Piety (as the Apostle teacheth) is profitable for all things, having the promise of this present life, and of that which is to come. Now all piety consists in thi [...], that we love God with all our souls, and our Neighbours as our selves. Wonder not therefore, that so many in this age perish so suddainly and so soon. Impiety now bears the sway: true and unfeigned charity hath no place to abide in; Perjury, Treachery, Tyranny, Usury and Avarice, or (where these are not,) a vicious, lascivious, and loose life, are every where in request. The soul, which God made and ordained to be the nobler essence, and the mistress, is now the bond-woman, and the serviledrudge to the vile body. We daily see, that one Groom will serve to [Page] dresse and look to many Horses, one sheepheard will keep a thousand sheep, one Herdsman as many Kine or Oxen: but to dresse and feed one voluptuous body

There's need (betwixt his clothes, his bed and bord,)

Of all that Earth and Sea, and Air afford.

And I would to God that all these would suffice! A most unhappy truth was that of the Stoic, He is a servant to many, that serves but one body: for doe but imagine thy selfe placed in the Clouds, or neare the Starres, and from thence to looke down and observe our actions upon earth, thou shalt not see one man quiet, they runne all as busie as Ants over Sea and Land, through Citty and Country, by right and wrong, to become Lordly and rich.

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With restless cares they wast the night and day,

To compasse great Estates, and get the sway.

What wouldst thou say at such a sight as this? wouldst not thou cry out with Seneca, Oh the faith of God and men! how many persons doth one ambitious stomach imploy? If brutes and wild beasts devour or eat one another (unless they be compelled unto it by extream famine) we presently cry out, it is a prodigie: but what thing (I beseech thee) amongst mankind, is more frequent then such prodigies? The Satyrist askes the question,

—When ever did (I pray,)

One Lyon take anothers life away?

Or in what Forrest did a wild Bore by

The tusks of his owne fellow wounded, die?

Tygers with Tygers never have debate,

[Page] And Beares amongst themselves abstain from hate.

—Quando Leoni,

Fortior eripuit vitam leo? quo nomore unquam,

Expiravit Aper, &c.

But men, whom God adorned with rationall soules, kill one another, and those to whom nature, reason▪ and the faculty of speech, did (above any other creatures) commend love and unity, do by troopes (as it were for spectacle and ostentation,) murther and butcher themselves. Add to this, that (as Seneca saith) a Dogge will bite before he barks; stormes will threaten us before they dissolve upon our heads; buildings will crack before they fall, and smoke will give us warning that fire is at hand: but the destruction of man by man is suddain, and without the least notice: nay, the nearer it is, it is by so much the [Page] more diligently concealed. And what then is one man to another? who smiles, when he hates, salutes and embraceth, when he intends destruction, who under a serene smooth countenance hides poyson, violence and blood-shed▪ Certainly thou wilt erre, and erre grievously, if thou wilt trust to those faces, that meet thee civilly, and salute thee fairly: they have (indeed) the complexions of men, but the conditions of Devils. Nay, thou wilt meet with some, who (as the same Satyrist hath observed,)

Esteem it no point of revenge to kill,

Ʋnless they may drinke up the blood they spill;

Who do believe that hands, & hearts, and heads,

Are but a kind of moat, &c.

—Quorum non sufficit irae,

[Page] Occid [...]sse aliquem, sed pectora, brachia, vultus

Crediderint genus esse cibi, &c.

But thou wilt reply, that Salvages, Barbarians, and Canibals, may (perhaps) commit such villanies. Art thou no better acquainted with our Saints of Europe? that humane society and commerce, that godlinesse and sanctity, which we so much celebrate and commend our selves for, is nothing else but meere monopolizing, meere deceit, and a mutuall imposture. And amongst us Saints, who (in our owne opinion) are mighty righteous, tender-hearted and brotherly, there is nothing more usuall, then to have store of Anthropophagi, or Men-eaters: for the rich, and the great amongst us, not onely feed upon and live by the sweat, the slaughter, and the blood of the poor and opprest, but esteem them (of all others) their choicest dainties, [Page] for they are swallowed without much chewing, and there is none to deliver them: Insomuch that those sheepheards, who were said to flay their sheep, robbing them of their Wool their skins, and their flesh, and leaving them onely their bare bones, may be truly said to be more merciful then those men. So that man to man, is no more a God, but a Woolf and a Devil. Wonder not then (as I said before,) that so many amongst us dye so suddainly, and so soon for they had rather die sooner, yea and die for ever, then become sober▪ charitable▪ and truly pious.

II.
Follow after Sobriety.

FOr as drunkenness and immoderate feeding oppress and weaken the virtue of the radical balsame: so sobriety preserves from sickness [...], and diseases. Sober above most Kings [Page] was Massinissa the Numidiar, who standing alwaies, and at his Tentdoore, would in the open field eat his meat without sauce, being contented with dry bread, and military Commons. For which very reason he was so vegetous in old age, that at the years of fourscore and six, he begat a Sonne, and after ninety two, did in a pitched field over-throw the Carthaginians, who had broken their league made with him; in which battel he did not onely supply the place of an active, and expert Leader, but performed all the duties of a common Souldier. By the benefit of this virtue of temperance, did M. Valerius Corvinus live to be an hundred years old▪ and retain'd at that age a sound mind in a sound body. And Socrates continued all his life long in a perfect undisturbed health: yea, sobriety (if we should fall sick,) will restore us to health. There are some who think, that Caesar [Page] used no other remedy to cure his falling sicknesse, which tooke him first at Corduba in Spaine, so that by a meere spare dyet, hard labours, and tedious watchings, he escaped, and overcame that dangerous and most commonly fatall in disposition.

III.
Eat not greedily, and drink not immoderately.

NAture in Vegetables, doth not swallow down her nutriment, nor take it in ravenously, and all at a time. She doth all things leasurely, and by degrees, that her motion may be covenient and useful, or assisting to her Preservation. It is thy concernment to imitate Nature, and to do as she doth, when thou dost eat, and when thou dost drink. It is a most foul blemish upon the memory of Alexander, that after most of his Victories, he used to riot it with his [Page] Officers, inviting them to delicious and sumptuous feasts, in which he used alwaies to drink Prizes, and he that could tun in more then all the rest, was rewarded with a Talent: But this intemperate eating and drinking, did cast him into such a violent, suddaine disease, that within three dayes he dyed of it.

IV.
Let thy meat be simple and unarted.

FOr such victuals (saith the most industrious Pliny,) are the most wholesome and agreeable: Nature is but one, therefore she doth most delight in one kinde of meate and drink. Whence followes this consequence,

Thou shouldest never at one meal feed upon divers sorts of meats & drinks.

[Page] For they are of an Heterogeneous nature, and the fire of Nature, which is but one and the same cannot work equally upon them all, and prepare (legitimately) a nutriment for his own body, out of divers and differing cibations. Every thing the nearer it is to unitie, is by so much the more perfect and durable. There are infinite sorts of Trees which live very long, but they use all of them (without change) onely one kind of nutriment: But if it be so, that thou canst not abstaine from variety of meats, yet be sure (if possibly thou canst) that they have some agreement and correlation amongst themselves: For Contraries, (as Hippocrates affirmes) will move sedition and differences, while some of them are sooner, some latter digested and communicated to the body. Octavius Augustus, would never have above three dishes of meat to his supper: Imitate him, and use not too [Page] much indulgence towards thy selfe, so shalt thou live the longer and the better.

V.
Accustome not thy selfe suddainly to meats and drinks, which formerly thou hast not been used to feed upon, unlesse they be prescribed thee by some expert and learned Physician for thy healths sake.

FOr every Change is dangerous. Nature is simple and alwayes the same: Other manner of operation is simple too, and without change, and she delights altogether in constancy, and simple nutriments: but if thou dost change, she also will suffer the like change. We see daily, that those birds which are taken, and put into Cages, by changing their naturall dyet, fall into divers diseases, and dye frequently. A Lamb that is nourished with the milk [Page] of a Cow, seldome comes to any improvement, but most commonly dyes.

VI.
Use Antidotes frequently, to preserve thee from poysons, and private or accidental mischiefes.

LEst thou perish by venemous meats or drinks, or by the aire thou livest in, which may be poysoned as well as thy food. Mithridates by the frequent use of an Antidote, which from him is still called Mithridate, did so strengthen nature, that no poyson could hurt him: And when he tooke a venemous, deadly confection of purpose to kill himselfe, it could not so much as make him sick: So that being overthrown in battel by his Enemies, and not being able to poyson himselfe, he was forced to command his Armour-bearer to thrust him through, and so dyed. There be divers [Page] kinds of Antidotes. I shall onely mention the most effectuall. The first is Quercetanus, his confection of Juniper and Vipers, described by him in his private dispensatory, page 349. The second is his blessed Theriac: the third, his celestiall Theriac, called so by way of Eminency, and described both in the same Book. The fourth is (rollius his Theriac of Mummie, with another very soveraigne, one described by him in his Bafilica Chymica. Use these Antidotes according to the Philosophers prescriptions, and (God assisting) no poyson shall be able to hurt thee.

VII.

Fly contagious airs, and if the aire thou livest in, be infected, change thy habitation.

VIII.
Take Physick in the spring-time, [Page] and in the Autumne.

LEt us consider the nature of Serpents and Vipers: these in our stated seasons of Spring & Fall, cast off their old skins, and are clothed with new. That Medicine or course of Physick, which in all its circumstances answers to the great world, will work the more easily, the more prosperously, and will have the greatest effect. Seeing therefore that Trees, and all Roots, which in the Winter time seem dead, doe about the entrance of the Spring break forth and bud, putting on greenness, and a renew'd youthfulnesse and fresh vivacity as it were, therefore the wise Ancients did at the very same time (by observing them) take their purging and restorative Physick, and by that meanes (God cooperating with them) did mightily strengthen nature, and multiply their dayes upon earth. Such Physick [Page] as this, is the starre of man imprognated with the Physicall tincture. Others use onely the Philosophicall stone These glorious medicines (whomsoever God shall reveale them to,) may in their just Dose be taken once in every week to the singular comfort, and incredible improvement of nature: So the Philosophers tell me. The dose of the universall medicine, is the weight of one graine.

IX.

Vse not too freqnently, the permissions of Marriage.

MAn for procreations sake, should not abhorre the Concessions and Priviledges of lawfull love, but let him eschew all wantonnesse, and confine his desires to naturall▪ and legitimate, and that too within the bounds of Wedlock: But in this also there must be moderation. [Page] Solons Law was thrice in the moneth. Emission of seed weakens all bodies: This experience tells us, for men that are addicted to this intemperance, have the most nice and tender constitutions, easily offended, and seldome fruitfull▪ like Trees, which bearing too much in one year, yeeld nothing but leaves in the next. You are to understand from this Paragraph, that seed is two-fold, Radical, and Prolific. The Radical seed, is the innate balsame of the body, which if it be advantaged with perfect digestion, will yeeld effusion, and a balsame of the same nature as it selfe. In this balsame the body lives as in his proper seed. Hence Anonymus Leschus, Tract. 7. instructs us, that so long as there is seed in the body it lives; but the seed being consumed▪ the body dies. It is no wonder then, that so many have perished by the intemperance, [Page] whoIt was not long before the publishing of this peece, that I was told by a very noble Gentleman, that in his late travailes in France, he was acquainted with a young French Physician, who for a long time had beene suiter to a very handsome Lady, and having at length gained her consent, was married to her, but his Nuptial bed proved his Grave, for on the next morning he was found dead. It was the Gentlemans opinion, that this sad accident might be caused by an excessive joy, and for my part I subscribe to it; for a violent joy hath oftentimes done the worke of death: this comes to passe by an extreame attenuation, and diffusion of the animal spirits, which passing all into the exterior parts, leave the heart destitute, whence followes suffocation and death. Scaliger Exercit. 310. gives the reason of this violent effusion and dissipation of the Spirits: Quia similia maxime cuprint inter se uniri, ideo spiritus, veluti exire conantur ad objectum illud ex [...]ernum [...] atum ac jucundum, ut videlicet cum eo vniantur, Illud (que) sibi maxime simile reddant. If any will suspect, that together with this excessive joy, there was a concurrency of the other excess mentioned by my Author, I permit him his lib [...]rty, but certainly I thinke he will be deceived. going to bed in a vegetous, perfect health, were found dead next morning. If you excite a Tree to bear fruit by violent and unnatural means, or by artificiall, as by kindling fire under his branches in an unseasonable time, you will but kill the Tree, and manifest your own indiscretion.

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CHAP. 3.
Of Diseases in Generall.

HItherto we have spoken onely of that part of Physick, which teacheth us to preserve health; It remaines now, that we consider the other part, which treats of the restitution of health.

I.

That part of Physick which teacheth us the restoration of health, is an Art laying down in certaine precepts or rules, a sure & safe way to redeem or free sick persons from diseases. It is termed by th [...] Grecians [...].

II.

In this we are to consider, first, the disease, and all its circumstances: secondly, the cure of it.

[Page] For the true method consists in knowing, first the disease, and afterwards the cure. The Doctrine of diseases, is termed by the Grecians, [...].

III.

Disease or sicknesse, is a privation, or the loss of health.

IV.

Therefore; because health depends upon the strength and vigour of the radical balsame, sicknesse must needs proceed from the weaknesse and indisposition of it.

V.

But when the strength of the Balsame followes the conspiration of the Hypostatical principles, as his proper [...] [...]r inclinatior, then or in that cause the insirmity of the balsame proceeds from the ind [...]sposition of the principles.[Page]Whence followes this consequence.

THat those bodies, whose principles agree not amongst themselves, may be truly judged to be sickly and ill disposed.

VI.

Touching the disease, there are two things to be considered. First, The conjoyn'd and apparent cause of the disease, which we shall terme Extrarious. Secondly, the cause of that Extrarious or conjoyn'd cause.

CHAP. 4.
Of the Extrarious or conjoyned and apparent Cause of the Disease.

I.

The conjoyned' apparent cause of the [Page] disease, I termeExtrarious signifies such a substance, that is quite another thing, and of another disposition than ours is. by reason it is a Cause most remote from, and altogether a stranger to, our nature.

II.

This Extrarious Cause is twofold, Substantial and Accidental.

THe substantial is so termed, because it is the substantiall Essence, or matter of the disease. The other is termed accidental, by reason that the conjoyned cause signified by it, is an accident, not a substance.

III.

The substantial extrarious Cause, is either an impure tincture, or a Meteor.

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IV.

An impure tincture, is an impure spiritual nature, so exactly mixt with the most inward parts of our substance, that at the time of its commixtion, it doth not presently and manifestly hinder nor prejudice the functions of the Balsame, but remaining quiet and inoffensive at first, and for a time, doth afterwards by degrees, discover its enmity and force, and so infects the body.

TO this place must be referred; first, those impure seminal tinctures▪ by which the prolific seed is tainted, and the child that is borne of it, comes to be Hereditarily infected with the Diseases of his parents.

Secondly, the impurity of the body, that proceeds from the bloud, with which the child is fed and nourished [Page] in the wombe: from which last impurity, if the substance of the Childe were not vindicated, and free'd by frequent breakings out, by the Measels, and divers other extrusions, and petty and indispositions, besides the dayly discharge of it through the proper Emunctories of the body, it were not absurd to conclude, that his whole nature must needs be depraved and overcome by it. Purgations of this kind happen sometimes sooner, sometimes later, according to the strength of the Radicall balsame▪ which in some is slower, in others quicker and more vigorous; as we see it exemplified in our very fields, of which some are more barren, some more fruitfull, according to their scituation, and the aspect of the Sun-beames, shining directly and favourably upon some, upon others glancingly, and for a short time, which makes some places more forward, some more [Page] back-ward, and their productions, whether flowers, or Hey, or Corne, to differ accordingly, some being very good, some very bad.

V.

A Meteor is either volatile or coagulated, both kindes are Extrarious.

I Call it a Meteor, because I would have the Reader to inquire, how theI promise my English Reader, that (if God will blesse me with health, and his performing assistance) I will shortly communicate to him, (according to the Hermetic principles) a most accurate Treatise of Meteors, their Generation, Causes, qualities, peculiar Regions aud Forms: what spirits governe them, and what they signifie or fore-shew. Meteors of the greater world are generated, and by their Generation, to learn and find out the true Doctrine of the Microcosmical Meteors.

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VI.

The volatile Meteor, is commonly called an Exhalation, and that is either dry or moist.

THe dry Exhalation is termed a Fume, and the humid a Vapour: the fumid Exhalation, because it is a fume arising from a dry body or Principle, is hot, dry, light and subtile, alwayes tending upwards, and is near to a sulphureous fiery narure, which will easily inflame and kindle, and so is set on fire▪ and burns. Contrarily, a vapour is an humid flux, which if it be deprived by any exterior heat of its owne cold quality and so carried up into the Region of the Air, and there condensed by cold, is presently (because of [Page] its thin, Mercurial and aqueous nature,) forced to resume its former state, and is turned againe into the nature of water. For as we see in the greater world, that tho [...]e Vapors and Exhalations, which by the heat of the Sun, the influence of the Stars, and by their owne proper internall calidity, are excited and stirred up, doe afterwards afford matter for various, miraculous Meteors, and bodies imperfectly mixt both in the Region of the Air, and in the bowels of the Earth; and that those which are of a Mercurial, cold, moist, and watry nature, doe alwayes produce Clouds, Raine, Hail-stones, Snow, Frost and winds; but those which are sulphureous, hot and dry generate Coruscations, Lightnings, Firedrakes, Thunder-bolts, and other burning Meteors: so in the lesser world, that is in the body of man, the like, and the very same vapours and Exhalations, afford matter for [Page] the generation of many and different kinds of Meteors. Hence it is, that so many and such various sorts of Diseases afflict man-kind. Some of them being Mercurial, cold and moist; others sulphureous, hot and dry: Nor are they so in meer forme and accident, but in substance, that is to say, they are such in their essentiall virtue, and are generated as wel in the inferiour Region, the breast, the stomack, and the belly; as in the superiour, the head and the braine, which parts do exactly quadrate and correspond with the airy Region, and the subterraneous Concavities of the earth. See Quercetanus, Tetr. page 45. 46.

VII.

The Coagulated Meteor, is termed Tartar, of which we shall treat in the following Chapter.

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CHAP. 5.
Of Tartar.

I.

Tartaris an acrimonious, pricking and corroding, or an aluminous, acid and styptic mucilage, which is bred in the body, and being separated from its proper juyce, is by the supervenient spirit of Salt, according to the various inclination of nature, at a set time, and in those places which are most apt to receive it, collected together, and coagulated; or if that juyce be not separated from it, it putrifies: from whence come worms and other innumerable symptoms.

QUercetanus in his advice against the Joynt-gout, and the Stone, describes it thus. Salsugirous substances, because they have alwayes [Page] mixt in them some portion of earth (though the predominant part in them be Liquefactive,) are in the body of man termed Tartar; a most apt (in truth) and most significant terme, which was first given them from the Analogy, or similitude that was found betwixt the humours in mans body, yea betwixt his very blood and the substance of wine: which of all the fruits of vegetables, doth most abound with Tartar. I doe not meane by Tartar in this place that substance which is dissolved, and flowes in new Wines, while they are thick and turbid, which being afterwards separated, or (as the common phrase is) settled, doth as the grosser, earthy, and more impure part subside into a feculent substance, found alwaies in the bottome, and called Dregs. Neither doe I mean that Tartar onely, whose separation is performed by a long Tract of time, and sticks to the [Page] Dregs or Lees of old Wine-pipes. But I meane that Tartar also, which is in perpetual liquefaction and commixture with the most refined wines, and which gives them their tincture either red or any other. This true Tartar, either by Evaporation, or simple distillation, or a Balneum Maris, is easily discerned to be moderately hot, for the more liquid part of the humour (which was the Vehiculum, in which the Tartar in its dissolution was contained) being separated from it, the Tartar alone remaine in the bottom. This liquid humour, though of red wine, distills all bright and limpid, but the heavler red substance, which I call Tartar, stayes all behind: a solid substance, and the more you fetch out of the substantifical humour, it becomes by so much the more hard and the dryer. Nor is this Tartar onely in red, or white Wines, but in any other though decocted and also [Page] in the humours of mans body. Nor is it there onely in the Chylus, or nutriment, which answers in proportion to wine newly made (for from the Chylus, as from new win [...], divers impure and tartareous dregs are separated,) but also in the very blood, yea in the most pure, and after the very same manner, as we described it to be in wine. And as the Art of distilling (even that which is performed by the most gentle fire) discovers and manifests unto us this kind of Tartar: so nature also by her naturall fury both ranne and daily doth performe such separations of Tartar, by a consumption of the humoural parts of our bodies▪ out of which the Dogmatical Writers of Physick, suppose the stone to be generated. And it is wonderfull to consider, how many sorts of Diseases by the intervening of obstructions or [...]ppilations, arise out of this meere separation, particularly the [Page] joynt-gout, and the stone: which diseases according to the sentiment of these Dogmatists themselves, happen most frequently to those, who have the hottest Livers▪ and consequently the coldest stomacks: Who ingenerate much crudities and mucous matters, which for want of a through-digestion, may be compared to raw fruits, that failing of their due and perfect maturity, (which is performed by a contemperate heat that is all concocting and digesting,) remaine acid, bitter, sowre and green. These being mixt with, and in the whole Masse of blood, are there by the natural heate againe concocted, and a separation is made of the more crude and tartareous portion, which sticks afterwards to the inward parts, and causing divers obstructions, is at length forcibly carried into the joynts, where it stayes and lodgeth. For every part of the body of man doth [Page] naturally delight in, and attract to it, that which is most like to it selfe: the fleshie parts are nourished by that portion of the blood, which is most thinly moist, and mercuriall: the fat and marrowish parts, by that which is most oily, or sulphureous, but the joynts which are parts that be naturally glutinous and mucilaginous, love that portion which hath most likenesse and affinity with their nature; whence it comes to passe, that this Salsuginous and Tartareous matter is taken in by them. Now, when it happens that these parts in some bodyes, either for their weakness, or an innate hereditary disposition, or some such cause cannot by a proper and particular digestion, inoffensively digest, nor expell this crude and indigested Tartareous matter, then is this matter, being of a saltish, viscous nature coagulated in them, and the ligaments of the joynts come to be stuffed up [Page] and stiffened with it, whence proceed those acute intolerable paines which attend this Disease. And this is the true and genuine conjoyn'd cause of the paines and knottines of the Joynt-gout. The same cause is sometimes lesse acute, sometimes more, according to the nature and condition of the Tartar. For as we see that there is in the greater world, a great diversity of Salts, for the Earth yeelds first Salt-gemme, which answers in proportion to Sea-salt, that is onely saltish in tast; then Salt-nitre which is bitter in tast, and Salt-alum which is austere and Astringent: afterwards Salt of Vitriol, and Salt Armoniac which are acid and hot: and lastly▪ those corrosive sharp Salts which are termed Alkal [...], with others that are sweet and pleasant as Sugar: so in the lesser world, that is in the body of man, there is generated a Tartar or Salt, which being dissolved, causeth [Page] onely a saltish humour, which the Dogmatical Physicians term saltish phegme, in plaine termes, a salt water or humour. There is also generated, a nitrous or bitter Salt, which mixeth with the Urine, and causeth bitter Choler; and a vitriolated acid salt which predominates in acid phlegme and melancholy. In like manner there be also aluminous and austere kinds of Tartar, and other sorts which resemble the acrimonie of Salt, as it is manifestly seen by the various affections of contractures and astrictions of the sinews, and the many perilous troubles of acrimonious humours in Dysenteries and, divers Ulcers as well inward as outward, all which are caused by the many and different kindes of Salts, which are generated in the body. For why should not this be done by those things which are most like to doe it and most significant, and which do [Page] most properly and fully expresse the natures and diversities of Causes, having their derivation and appositenes from the very fountains of nature, who is the best Interpretress of her own concernments. These Salts (believe me) doe better expresse and discover unto us the essences and distinctions of Tartareous or saltish diseases, then those four humours which are commonly termed the Sanguine, the Phlegmatic, the Bilious, and the Melancholy, both because that these latter termes, signifie nothing unto us of the essence or matter of the Disease, and also because that those Dogmatists themselves, Hallucinate and stagger very much both in the formation or aptnesse, and in the application of their said termes.

II.

Tartar is two-fold, Adventitious and Innate.

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III.

Adventitious Tartar,proceeds from meat and drinke, and the Impressions of the Firmament.

EVery thing that we eat and drinke, hath in it a Mucilaginous, reddish and sandy Tartar, very noxious to the health of man. Nature receives nothing for her own use, but what is pure. The stomack, which is an instrument of the Archaeus of man, or an internall, innate Chymist, and implanted there by God, presently upon the reception of that which is chew'd and swallowed down separates the impure▪ Tartareous part from the pure nutriment: If the stomack be vigorous, especially in its faculty of separation, the pure portion passeth presently into all the members to nourish and preserve the body, and the impure goes forth into the [Page] Draught: if the stomack be weake, the impure portion is through the M [...]saraic veines conveyd to the Liver, where a second digestion or separation is made. Here the Liver separates againe the pure from the impure, the Rubie from the Chrystall, that is to say, the Red from the White: The Red is the nutriment of all the members the heart, the brain, &c. The white [...]or that which is no nutriment, is driven by the Liver to the Reyns and it is Urine, which is nothing else but Salt, which being exprest from the Mercuriall portions, by the violence of the separation, is forced to a dissolution: It is dissolved into water by the Liven & so cast forth. If the Liver, by reason of its debility, makes no perfect separation, it casts that Mucilaginous and Calculous impurity upon the Reyns, where for want of a [...]ight and through separation it is (according to the concurrency and Method [Page] of nature) by the mediation of the spirit of Salt coagulated into Sand, or Tartar, either Massie and Solid, or Mucilaginous. This Tartar therefore is the Excretion of meat and drinke, which is coagulated in all mens bodies by the spirit of Salt, unless the expulsive faculty by its owne peculiar vigour or virtue, can command it into the Excrements, and so cast it out by dejection.

IV.

There are four kinds of this AdventitiousTartar,which proceed originally from the four distinct fruits or Cibations which we receive from the four Elements.

THe first kind proceeds from the use of those things that grow out of the Earth, as from all sorts of Pulse, Grains, Fruits, Herbs and Roots, upon which we feed.

The second proceeds from those [Page] nutriments which we take out of the Element of Water, as from fish, shelfish, &c.

The third is from the flesh of Birds and beasts, &c.

The fourth comes from the Firmament, which the spirit of Wine, in respect of its subtilty, doth most resemble. This kind of Tartar is of a most forcible impression, while the Air being primarily infected with the vapours of the Earth, the water and the firmament doth afterwards annoy us: as wee frequently see in those acute and pernitious Astral Diseases, the Pleurisie, the Plague, the Prunella, &c.

V.

Tartar innate, is that which is cogenerated with man in his mothers wombe.

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VI.

Besides these impure Tinctures and Meteors, there is another substantial Extrarious cause, which cannot be reduced to a certa [...]ne kind.

TO this must be referred, those Insecta's or quick Creatures which sometimes (though rarely) are generated in the body, as Snakes, divers worms, &c.

Secondly, those things must be referred hither, which by inchantment and the mediation of evill spirits, are invisibly and insensibly conveyed into the bodies of men and Women.

Thirdly, We are to reduce to this Aphorisme or Canon all Splinters, Bullets, or other weapons, which being violently thrust or shot into the body, lie deeply in the flesh, or under the skin.

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VII.

We have now done with the Substantial Extrarious Cause. To the Accidental, I shall referre all disproportions of Limbs, Gibbosities, Luxations, Wounds, and fractures of bones.

CHAP. 6.
Of God, the first and supreme Cause of the Extrarious Cause.

HAving now done with the Extrarious or conjoyned and apparent cause of the disease. I shall consider the cause of that Extrarious Cause.

I.

This Cause I shall divide into six heads or branches. The first of which is God. 2. Excesse and defect of Necessaries. 3. Fire. 4. Hereditary[Page]impurity. 5. Imagination. 6. Ʋiolent Illation. Of these I shall treat in their order; and first of GOD.

MAn, because he is made in the Image of God, is bound also to live according to his Will. I mean his will revealed and laid down in the Ten Commandements, and the holy Scriptures, namely in those Bookes onely which were left unto us, and which (without scruple) we have received from the holy Prophets, and the Apostles of the Lord and Saviour: but when we transgresse and violate this Law and will of our maker, then doth God send upon us condigne punishments, amongst which Diseases are numbred in the very Booke of the Law. For thus saith the Lord: If ye shall despise my statutes, or if your soules abhor my judgements, so that ye will not do my Commandements, [Page] but that ye break my Covenants: I also will do this unto you, I will even appoint over your terrour, consumption and the burning ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of heart. I will also smite thee in the knees and the legges with a sore botch, that cannot be healed, from the sole of thy foot unto the top of the Head. I will make the Pestilence cleave unto thee, untill it hath consumed thee from off the Land which thou possessest. And in another place, The Lord shall smite thee with a Consumption, with a Feavour, and with an inflammation and extream burning, and with the Sword, and with Blasting, and with Mildew: and they shall pursue thee untill thou perish. And the Heaven that is over thy head, shall be brass, and the Earth that is under thee shal be Iron. The Lord shall make the Raine of thy Land powder and dust, from heaven shall it come down upon [Page] thee, untill thou be destroyed. Leviti [...]. Cap. 29. 16. Deuteron. 28. And in the new Testament, that everlasting and blessed Physitian, the Holy JESUS, who came not to destroy, but to save the world; after he had healed the impotent man, who had beene sick of his infirmity eight and thirty years he dismissed him not without this loving and gracious caution: Behold, thou art made whole sinne no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee. S. John Chap. 5. 14. and S. Paul also in his first Epistle to the Corinthians, rebuking that new and sinfull custome (which had crept then into that Church) of prophaning the Lords holy Supper, with their own intemperate feasts, objects to them, that sharp visitation by Diseases, which (for that very abuse) God had punished them with: For this cause (saith he) many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep: for [Page] some of them had beene punished with death. Thus is the just and allseeing God, the first and supreme cause of the Extrarious cause.

CHAP. 7.
Of the excesse and the defect of necessaries, which is the second cause of the Extrarious cause.

FXcess of Necessaries, is to be considered, first in Victuals, where the offence is threefold. 1. In superfluousness. 2. In vairety. 3. In our manner of receiving them. We offend in superfluousness, when that which is to nourish us is taken in too great a quantity: whence follow frequent and unwholsome evaporations and belchings, which so fill and oppresse the vessels and Organs of the spirits, that they are hindered in their functions; or the meat with its weight and quantity so indisposeth us, that [Page] the inordinate operation and digestion is retarded. Innumerable are the Diseases and molestations which proceed from this particular intemperance.

We offend in variety, when at one dinner or supper, we eate many and divers kinds of Meats and Drinkes, for these having a great dissimilitude and enmity amongst themselves, cause divers inconveniences by their various dissents and unequall digestion.

We offend in the manner of receiving, when we eate hastily, or swallow our meat before it be well chew'd and devour our Drinke like Whales, as those are accustomed who drink healths (as they term them) at Meales, taking off whole Bowles and Tankards [...], without so much as breathing time, and thinke the excess very fashionable & praiseworthy.

[Page] Another Excess in Necessaries, happens about taking of rest and watching: When the Animal spirits by too much sleep, are by degrees habitnated into a certaine dulness, so that they perform their functions sluggishly, remitting still something of their due vigour, until at length they lose all their activity, and are naturalized (as it were) into an incurable stupidity. Contrarywise by too much watching they are easily inflamed, so that oftentimes they cause Maniacal fits and phrensies, with divers others most desperate consequences.

A third excess of Necessaries, happens from cold and heat. Excess of heat happens, either when the body is over exercised, or when any other Extraneous heat hath too free an access to it, and the innate fire of nature is beyond measure excited thereby, so that inordinate exhalations [Page] are caused in the body, which produce an excessive and dangerous resolution and weakness of parts. Excess of cold happens either by a suddaine Refrigeration or cooling after Exercise, or when we expose our selves too much to cold weather, which hinders the evaporation of Excrementitious Exhalations by stopping the Pores, and beating them back into the body, where they lodge and remaine. Whence it comes to pass, that being of an Extrarious malignant disposition, they afford matter and foment for many and severall kinds of diseases.

A like excess to this, proceeds frequently from the hardness and thick Callousness of some peoples skins, by which fault (because little or no perspiration is performed) the secret, and the Ambient Aire of their bodies is intercepted, so that there [Page] is no liberty for inspiration or exspiration.

Defect of Necessaries is first, the want of meat and drink in their due time and proportion. This is either famine or thirst. Secondly The want of naturall rest, according to the Verse,

Quod caret alterna requ [...]e, durabile non est.

The strongest body, and the best

Cannot subsist, without due rest.

Thirdly, The want of Refrigeration or coolness of aire, which by its needfull community and permeation, allayes and tempers the inward heat of the heart.

Fourthly, and lastly, the want of due and requisite heat, by which the Excrementitious Exhalations of the body are vented forth, and the animall [Page] spirits incited to their peculiar functions.

CHAP. 7.
Of Fire, the third Cause of the Extrarious Cause.

BY Fire in this place, I understand not onely Kitchin-fire, or any other fire that burns, but also the celestiall fire of the Sun, and the Sun and the native implanted fire of all the parts of [...]ns body.

I.

Externall fire is the producent of Extrarious Causes by its separative power or faculty, by which it separates & extracts them from other bodies, & communicates them afterwards to our nature.

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II.

The Internal, innate fire, produceth Extrarious causes, when by digestion it separates the impure part, from that food or matter in which it first resided, whence our natural substance comes to be infected.

SO the naturall heat digests our meat, and by the assistance of the innnate Salt dissolves it, that man may retain or keep in his body, that which is agreeable to his nature, and joyne it to his essence: but that which is contrariant, he segregates from the other, and casts forth at his proper Emunctories. This Segregated matter, or Excrement, doth oftentimes mightily afflict the body, and that it doth two manner of waies. The first by being retained in the body, or for want of evacuation. The second, by a noysome f [...]tid Exhalation, and sent ascending from [Page] it to the nobler parts, when it is so retained. It offends by retention first, when it is carried (indeed) to the naturall Emunctories, or deijcient parts; but the weakness of the expulsive faculty is so great, that it cannot drive it out. Secondly, When it is left in the very stomack without farther Exclusion. Thirdly, when some subtil poyson, in and together with the nutritive portion or Chylus, doth convey and insinuate it self into the most inward parts of the body: which poyson was first taken in with meat and drink. It happens often (saith the most learned and expert Quercetanus) that when the naturall Balsame is tainted by some impurity proceeding from food or nutriment, it doth afterwards give way and occasion for many dangerous symptomes and diseases. This Paracelsus, the great Father and leader of the German Philosophers, in his Treatise of the Being, and naturn[Page]of poyson doth most learnedly expound. The Stars also doe frequently powre down into the Aire, and upon the Earth, certaine Astral Emunctions, and Arsenical vapours, with other noxious Excretions and Exudations. See his Treatise of the Being, and the power of the Stars over inferiour Bodies. Hence proceed Distraction, Phrensies, Plurisies, the Plague, and frequent, suddaine Dysenteries. Putrified things grow to be noysome and hurtfull, by the meanes of those corrosive Salts and fuliginous Exhalations, which partly by an externall, partly by their own internall heat, are excited out of them and dispersed. Moreover the Excrements of man, when they happen to be retained in the body, are subject to a Re-putrifaction, and frequently doe so, and Wormes are generated out of them: In this Case, the fuliginous, malignant spirits of that foul Masse, [Page] ascend to the braine, whence proceed suddaine madnesse, the Vertigo, the Falling-sickness, and divers other lamentable diseases. There are also certaine living Creatures, which (if they be applyed to man) will by their natnrall heat, suddainly indispose him, by emission of that which is most remote from, and inconsistent with his nature. Cantharides are so full of this virulency, that being onely externally applyed, they prove oftentimes pernicious. Bartholomew Montagnana reports, that a certain Citizen of Padua, applying them onely to one of his knees, did bleed at the Urinary passage, five quarts of blood. He affirms also, that the like inconvenience happened to another, who applyed them to his great Toe, to take off the Leprous scurfe of his Nayls. The Basilisk hath such a subtil and violent poyson in his eyes, that his very looks infect and kill. How hurtfull [Page] Minerals are, when elevated into Mercuriall vapours, may be read at large in Paracelsus his books, Von den Bergfrancfhe [...]ten.

III.

That Extrarious Causes, and divers indispositions, are introduced by common fire, none is ignorant.

ALchymists, Goldsmiths, and Colliers, can sufficiently prove this point, who are oftentimes so offended with vehement searching, Sulphureous, Arsenical and Mercurial smoaks, that they fall into desperate and most painfull Diseases. The smoake of Galbanum, and Hartshorne will induce the Lethargy.

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CHAP. 8.
Of Hereditary impurity, which is the fourth Cause of the Extrarious Cause.

I.

Hereditaryinfection, is a transplantation of extrarious Causes, performed by impressing a fixt tincture, springing from another fixt salt into the prol [...]fic seed, which Parents contribute to the Generation of Children.

SAlt alone and onely, is of all the three Principles fixt and f [...]e. Therefore those Diseases which proceed from the indisposition of the Salt, are radically fixt, and for the most part Hereditary, as the Leprosie, the Stone, the Joynt-gout, and the like. But those Diseases which spring from any infirmity of the fluxible [Page] and volatile principles, that is to say, from Mercury and Sulphur (as all manner of Cathars and Feavers do,) cannot so easily infect posterity: for these Diseases neither fix their seeds firmly, nor deeply, because they have not their tinctures so tenaciously imprest. The nature of this kind of fixed Salt or Sulphur, may be perfectly discern'd in the seeds and the roots of Plants: for if you take but some particles of them, and transplant them▪ those very peeces will take root and grow, and bear fruit: But neither the leaves, nor the flowers in which the volatile Mercury & Sulphur have their seat, will do so. Now the fixed Salt is alwaies conserved in the root, and in some pithy stalks & Siens or Graffes: but the fixed Sulphur is in the seed. And this is the reason that the transplantation of all Vegetals, is performed by these onely: but by the Mercuriall parts, which easily fade and [Page] wither, it cannot be done; nor by those parts, which have onely in them a volatile Sulphur, as the flowers, and the leaves of some Vegetables. See Quercetan, in his advice against the joynt-gout, and the stone.

Therefore (saith the same Quercetanus) whatever lodgeth in the body of the parents, that with a firm, spiritual, impure, and malignant tincture can affect or infect the radical Balsame, the vital seed, and the very root or fundamentall of humane nature: that same impurity (whatever it be) doth by an Hereditary transplantation pass into, and infect the Children. But if these impure seeds of Diseases, have not taken such a deep root, nor so far corrupted the radicall Balsame: or if by the helpe of nature, and her internall Balsame, there is a separation made of them; or if by the ministry of Art, and externall, specifical Balsames [Page] of Physick, they are effectually allayed and weakned, or are come to their proper terme and utmost duration, so that their virulency and force is quite spent and broken: in any of these Causes, Gouty and Leprous persons, doe not alwaies beget Gouty and Leprous Children. For by these means, the roots of Diseases, even the most fixt and malignant are eradicated, impure seeds are purified, and the morbid tincture by long traduction becomes quite extinct. This Eradication of hereditary Diseases, and Purification of diseased seed comes to passe by the benefit and assistance of good Seedplots, that is, by the excellent, wholesome temperament of the Matrix, in vegetous and healthy women: whence it happens, that the Fathers seed, though tainted with some morbific indisposition, is by the laudable vigour of the mothers radical Balsame amended, so that [Page] Arthritical and Calculous Fathers beget Children, which all their lifetime continue healthy and unattempted by such Diseases. Yea, they beget such Children▪ as are not obnoxious or liable to such indispositions▪ In like manner also it happens, that a vegetous, healthy Father, contributing good seed, may have a sickly, impure issue, troubled with hereditary infirmities, the Fathers seed attracting to it the malignant propriety of those Diseases which possessed the Mother. Thus good Corne, if it be cast into a bad soile, will degenerate into Tares, or yeeld a very bad and a thin Crop: but sow it againe in good ground, and it will recover its former goodnesse and perfection.

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CHAP. 9.
Of Imagination, the fifth Cause of the Extrarious Cause▪

I.

Imagination is a Star, excited in the firmament of man, by some externall Object.

II.

When the Imagination is inflamed, or at the height, then strange passions and defections follow.

III.

It is inflamed first, when it feigns some object to it selfe, and longs for it, but cannot enjoy it.

HEnce it comes to passe, that pregnant or breeding women (whose imagination is most vehement, because of the Starre of the [Page] Child, which upon some singular longing, doth most powerfully move them,) doe by the force of an inflamed or exalted imagination (when they faile to come by that Object they long for) impresse into the very child, the perfect forme or figure of it; yea, it oftentimes causeth miscarriage, and the death of the Child, as may be seen in this following History. A certaine woman great with child, seeing a Baker carrying Bread into the Oven with his Doublet off, longed for a peece of the Bakers shoulder, and when any other meat was offered unto her▪ or brought in to her sight, she would presently fall to vomit. Her Husband distrest betwixt love and pitty, offered such a large summe of money to the Baker, that he consented, & suffered her to bite off two morsels of his flesh, but being not able to endure the pain the third time, the woman presently fell in Labour, and was delivered of [Page] three boyes, whereof two were alive, and the third dead. Mizaldus in his first Century, relates it out of Langius. To this first Division, must be referred those unfortunate Aspirers, who affecting some great knowledge or science, and missing to attain to it, by reason of a blockish stupidity, or imbecillity of apprehension, come to be distracted and stark mad.

IV

Secondly, The Imagination comes tomes to be inflamed, when by some unexpected Object or Accident, a man or woman is suddainly frighted.

SUch Accidents prove oftentimes very pernicious. A causeless, imaginary fear in times of infection, hath cast many into the Plague, and the Plague hath beene their death. There lives at Gueilburg, a certaine Bakers wife, who being young with [Page] Child, went into the adjoyning Woods or Forrest, to gather sticks, and being very intent in gathering with her face towards the ground a Citizen of that place comming suddainly at her, did so fright her, that (not knowing well what to doe▪) she struck one hand into the other, and continued rubbing them together with a very strong compression for a good while. This woman was shortly after delivered of a Son with one hand onely, which Childe I my selfe saw, and taught there in the publick free-Schoole. In the like manner, some men that have been frighted by Phantasms, and spiritual Apparition in the night time, have instantly fallen into grievous diseases, and some have dyed. Others by the excesse and violence of the horrour had the hairs of their heads changed from the native colour, into a quite contrary, especially that part which they chanced to touch at the [Page] time they were so frighted. I my self have known two, who affirmed, that such a change did happen to them upon the like occasion: the one had halfe his Beard turned gray, the other had part of the haires of his head turned perfect white, the rest retaining still their first colour.

V.

Thirdly, The imagination is inflamed, when the stomack is offended by some object of sence.

SUch perturbations happen often, and men are frequently inclined to vomit, when they looke earnestly upon those Ejectments which another hath cast up.

VI.

Fourthly, The imaginationis in flamed, when any person imagines or fancies, that paine or trouble he is[Page]in, to be intolerable for him, and incurable.

HEnce it comes to passe, that men despairing of their health or redemption, contrive their owne death, and make themselves away.

CHAP. 10.
Of violent Illation, which is the sixth and last cause of the extrarious Cause.

VIolent Illation is performed two wayes, Corporally, and Spiritually.

I.

Corporally, when a man or woman is wounded, thrust, or shot, or fallen, or their bones broken.

II.

Spiritually, when by the meanes and [Page]ministry of evill spirits, a man or woman is either blinded, or maimed, or any extraneous visible matter, is invisibly and without manifest violence, conveyed into, and lodged in their bodies, or when they are by any other preternatural wayes and meanes set upon and af [...]licted.

THat such things may and have been done, we shall prove by the truth of this following relation. In the year of our Lord, 1539. there lived in the village of Fugesta, within the Bishoprick of E [...]steter, a certaine Husbandman, named Ulrich Neusesser▪ who was grievously pained in the Hypochondriacal Region, with most violent and sharp stitches; whose sury and persistance made him send for a Chirurgion, and (incision being made) there was found, and taken out of his side, an Iron Naile, which lay under the [Page] skin, without the least external symptome▪ or discoloration of the part. This, notwithstanding the pain ceased not but was dayly exasperated▪ and did more and more increase: whereupon this miserable man resolving with himselfe, that there could be no cure for him but death, snatched a knife out of the hand of his attendant, and did therewith cut his own own throat. Upon the third day after, when his body was to be drest for buriall, there were present, Eucherius, Rosenbader of Weisenburg▪ and John of Ettenstet▪ (a Town in the Dukedome of Bavaria,) both Chirurgions who in the presence of as many persons as came to the Funeral did cut up the Body, and in the fore part of his belly, betwixt the Cartilages and the Navill, towards the side-region there were found, and taken out, and seen by them all (a prodigious and wonderfull [...]ight [...]) a round and long [Page] peece of wood, foure knives of steel made partly with edges, and partly with teeth like a saw, and two peeces of sharp and rough Iron▪ each of them being more then a span in length, and underneath all these, a great lock of haire wrapt close together and made up in the forme of a Ball. Mizaldus in his sixth Century, relates this sad History out of Langius.

CHAP. II.
Of the cure of Diseases.

HItherto we have known the Diseases by his Causes: It remains now that we teach the Cure of it; and this we shall doe onely by certain genernall Rules or Precepts. But lest we should proceed without method, we shall divide this Chapter concerning the Cure, into seven Sections.

[Page] We shall teach, 1. What, and how manifold the Cure is. 2. How a Physician ought to be qualified. 3. Of what sort, kind or quality, the medicines or meanes of the Cure ought to be. 4. Out of what things those Remedies must be sought and taken. 5. Why Medicines sometimes cannot restore and introduce health. 6. How the Remedies or Medicaments ought to be administred. 7. How the sick man must carry or dispose of himselfe, while he is in a course of Physick.

Section 1.
What▪ and how manifold the Cure is.

I.

The cure of Diseases, is an operation by which a sick person is restored to his former health, and his sicknesse (what ever it be) quite expelled, [Page] and radically extirpated.

II.

The cure or healing of all Diseases, (that I may in this place make use of the most apposite, significant termes of Severinus,out of Crollius) is two fold.

1. Universal,which is an absolute Extirpation of every radical morbid impurity, whether hereditary, or from the sinister use of food, or by the force of externall impression.

THis universall Cure is performed by a naturall medicinall Balsame, consentaneous to the nature of man, which resolves, discusseth and consumes the Seminary tinctures of all impurities and diseases: but corroborates, confirms, and conserves the innate humane Balsame; for (as Paracelsus teacheth) so long [Page] as the radicall humour keepes in its due quantity and proportion, no Disease or indisposition can be perceived. And in this way of Cure, the pluralities, particularities, and orderly Rules of Symptoms and Prognosticks, have no place▪ for all Diseases (what ever they be) are universally & perfectly cured by this one universall medicine. It is not without reason then that Raymund Lull [...]e affirms, that this onely one, supreme, universall medicine (to which, and in which the virtues of all other particular and specificall medicines are reduced and included) may be safely administred unto all sick persons, without inquiring what Dis [...]ase they are sick of For wise nature, by an instinct from her selfe, hath given unto this her favourite medicine▪ the prerogative and power to cure, and absolutely to exterminate all naturall infirmities whatsoever; yea, and to rectifie and restore [Page] her own selfe when disordered and weakned. There be four chief kinds of Diseases which if once confirmed, or inveterate, can be expelled by no medicine, but the universall, namely the Falling-sicknesse, the Gout, the Dropsie, and the Leprosie. To these Paramount Diseases, all other inferiour sicknesses, as to their proper fountaines and originalls, have relation and affinity. This universall medicine, is a Jewel much to be wished for and worthy the looking after; but few are they whom God blesseth with his favourite-secret. Lullius adviseth all Physicians, that diligently and faithfully labour for to search and looke after it: because it is the infallible remedy against all infirmities, and the greatest and most proper restorative and comforter of the spirits in their functions: For in this medicine (as in their onely and proper subject) there is [...]all and universall [Page] collection and conjunction of all the operative, effectuall virtues of generall Physick, coacted and united together by a natural method, consent and design: which virtues are otherwise, (according to the ordinary course and dispensation of nature) confusedly dispersed and distributed amongst and through herAnimalls, Vegetals, and Minerals. three great Families; and he that hath such an Antidote against all bodily Diseases, hath the gift of God, which is an incorrupt, incomparable, and invaluable treasure in this life: What ever infirmity cannot be healed by this competent, natural medicine, we may boldly and safely conclude, that the finger of the great God of nature is in the Cause. But the paine (when we find it to proceed from his righteous hand,) is by much the more tolerable, and we ought to beare it patiently, and thankfully, until the [Page] Almighty Physician himselfe will be pleased to heal us, by those wayes and means which his divine and unerring wisdome shall judge the best.

III.

2. Next to the universall, is the particular cure, by which the roots of diseases, and the Seminal tinctures themselves, are not alwayes taken away; but the bitter fruits of them, the Symptoms, Paro [...]is [...]es; and paines, are oftentimes prevented, mitigated, and so supprest, that they cannot come to their exaltat [...] on, or the worst passe, as the common phrase is. By this Cure, the Physicall evacuation of Excrements is instituted, and some considerable succours are communicated to opprest nature by the friendly, consentaneous spirits of those medicines that are administred; which spirits can onely rightly know, and penetrate into[Page]the secret lodges and topicall residencies of the radicall mor [...]ifie impurity.

NOw, though this particular Cure performs no more, than we have told you in the definition of it, yet is it not therefore to be slighted, nor rejected; for it doth oftentimes in the most desperate diseases, doe the work of the universal, because the most mercifull God hath discovered unto us certain secret-natural universals,☞ of which some containe in them the nature of the whole Heaven, others of the whole Air, and some againe of the whole earth, by whose help most Diseases are easily known and cured. Moreover specifical, appropriate medicines, when they are rightly refined and spiritualized, will emulate the virtue of the universal, by consuming radical impurities & strengthning the virtue of the innate humane [Page] Balsame. Seeing then that we want the universal, it will be happy for us, if we may attaine to the anie knowledge of (at least) the particular, subordinate, specifical and individual kinds and means of cures.

Section 2.
How a Physician ought to be qualified.

I.

Every Physician that desires to cure sick persons well and happily, must be a sound Christian, and truly religious and holy.

FOr true and perfect medicines, and the knowledge of them, can no where be had, but from God, whom we can serve by no other means in this life, but onely by piety, and piety hath included in it fervent and incessant supplications unto [Page] God, hearty and frequent thanksgivings for his gracious and free benefits, with sincere and actuall love towards our Neighbours. God is so infinitely good and kind, that he doth dayly give, and offer both to the good and to the bad, all those things which are necessary both for their sustenance and their health: but that we use those gifts to the glory of God, and the good of our Neighbours, piety alone is the onely cause. Therefore, if thou desirest to select, and extract convenient and effectuall Medicines out of those Myriads of Creatures, which by the secret power of their Creator, dayly flow upon thee, & appear about thee, Fear God, and love thy Neighbour as thy selfe. This being done, I affirm it to thee, thou shalt find those things, which will fill thee with joy. Thou maist easily apprehend by what I say, that he is unworthily permitted to be a Physician, whose practise hath [Page] no other aim then Covetousness and Usury, and abuseth the gifts of God (I mean his medicinal favours and discoveries▪) to hoord up for himselfe the riches of this world. They are all impostors, and faithlesse Mountebanks, who professe Physick, and its great ornament Chymistry, out of such a sordid, uncharitable, and unjust design.

II.

He must be the servant, not the Master of nature, and according to the sentiment ofHippocratesand Calen,he must be a profound Philosopher, and expert, or well vers'd in the Art of healing.

HE must be throughly seen in Philosophy, because there be two sorts of Philosophers. The one (who are in truth but Philosophers by name,) after the common Doctrine of the Schooles, inquire onely into the Elementary qualities of sublunary [Page] bodies: but the other sort (who are the true Philosophers indeed) search into the most secret operations, proprieties, and performances of nature: her most private Closers, and Sanctuaries, are ever open unto these; whence it comes to passe, that they have a perfect experimentall knowledge by the light of Nature▪ and are indeed true Physicians: For the innate naturall faculty of all productions of the earth, is, by the Chymical dexterity of these latter sort of Philosophers, vindicated from the drossie adherencies of the matter, and united with the firmamentall virtue, or occult quality, which is caused and communicated to them, by the influence of the Stars. This Art of refining, and uniting inferiours to their superiours, makes a compleat and a successful Physician.

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III.

He must be an Alchymist skilfull in all spagirical operations, to separate the pure from the impure, the drossie and venemous parts of his medicinall Ingredients, from the usefull and sanative, and one that knowes exactly how to prepare, and when to administer Chymical medicines for the restoration of his Patients.

FOr as Gold is seven times purified, so a Physician ought to try and refine all his Physicall Materials by the ministry of fire, which separates the good from the bad. Also he ought to have in some things, a certain and confirmed knowledge acquired by long experience, and a diligent daily inspection into the works of nature; for true Philosophy is nothing else, but a Physicall practise or triall, communicating [Page] daily to industrious and learned operators, most usefull and various conclusions and medicines. And after all the coyl of Academical licenciated Doctors, he onely is the true Physician, created so by the light of Nature▪ to whom Nature her selfe hath taught and manifested her proper and genuine operations by Experience.

Section 3.
Of Medicines, what their qualities should be, and how prepared.

I.

Physicall Remedies or Medicines, should both expell the disease, and strengthen natu [...].

HEnce came that infallible Rule of Physicians, Contraries are cured by their Contraries. For Contraries, by the consent of all Philosophers, expell and drive out one another, [Page] therefore it is necessary, that those Medicines which take away the Disease, be repugnant and contrary to the Disease: and for the same reason▪ they must be auxiliaries and consentaneous to our nature. Upon which very consideration, that famous principle of the Hermetists is grounded: Every like is cured by its like. Therefore Medicines, as they respect, or look to the Hypostatical principles, ought also to have some correspondence with the nature of the disease, but in their Energie and effect, they must be adversant and quite opposite. Thus the stone which proceeds from Tartar, or coagulated Salt, is cured by Salt, but it must be Analyticalor resolvent salt. The Joynt-gout also which proceeds from Tartareous, sharp and corrosive Salts, is cured by lenitive and consolidating Salts. In like manner, sulphureous Diseases must be cured by their proper and specificall sulphurs: [Page] but to inflammatory sulphur that causeth Feavers, we must oppose acid, Vitriolated sulphur, which is a most effectuall cooler, and will coagulate and allay those incensed sulphureous spirits. Whence followes this Consequence.

That some Medicines may be corrosive, without any danger or prejudice.

But with this Caution, that they be so qualified, as not to work upon the innate, radical Balsame, but only upon that Extrarious malignant matter, which is the conjoyn'd and apparent cause of the Disease.

[Page]

II.

It is requisite, that of Medicines, some be Spagyrically prepared, and some otherwise.

FOr Chymical remedies must not be used at all times, nor in all Causes, but onely then, when our internal natural Alchymist is insufficient of himselfe to separate the pure from the impure, and perfectly to extract out of compound Medicines, that noble Essence in which the force and virtue, or spirit of the medicament, is chiefly resident: or when there is a necessity in fixed and rooted Diseases, to use minerall remedies, that confirmed and obstinate Maladies may be set upon, and brought under by such powerfull and active Medicines that will not be baffled. It is otherwise a foolish and needlesse imployment, to separate that by Chymistry, which nature her selfe [Page] will performe with more ease and dexterity. And Nature knowes better what is most convenient for her, then any Physician: for she makes use of her own proper fire, and Magnet, which attracts both from Physick and food, that which is congeneous, and most like to her selfe: whereas an Artist on the contrary, doth not at all times use the like fire, nor exactly in the same degree to perform his operations. For which cause, the true Hermetical Physicians, do not at all times administer Minerals; but most commonly when they exhibite Minerals, they make use also of Medicines extracted out of Vegetables, or to quicken the operation of these latter, they give a competent and safe quantity of the former.

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III.

All Medicines must be specificall and a [...]propriated to the Disease.

THat is to say, they must have in them by the gift of God, such a virtue, that is peculiarly proper, and designed (as it were) to remove those diseases against which they are administred. Whether they be universally so gifted, or particularly for some one sort of disease. That body, or subject in nature, which will be easily corrupted▪ cannot be medicinall for all diseases: and this is the reason, that out of such bodies, the true Philosophers extract onely specifical Antidotes, whose power or virtue is effectual onely against some particular kind of disease. That thou maist have some knowledge of those materials or ingredients which are requisite and proper to make such sp [...]cifical Medicaments, thou must [Page] diligently read the Bookes of the Hermetists, De signaturis rerum, That is to say, Of those impressions and Characters, which God hath communicated to, and marked (as I may say) all his Creatures with. These Bookes thou [...] must carefully peruse and all others which teach us the true and solid practise of Physick. But if it would please God to blesse thee with the universal Medicine, these studies, and all other cures whatsoever, might be safely pretermitted. This glorious universal Medicine (without all doubt) is to be extracted out of such a subject, whose innate Balsame preserves both it Selfe, and the Body in which it exists from all corruption. This body is so adequate, and temperated with such a just and even proportion of all the foure Elements, that the qualities of no one of them, can ever possibly corrupt it. If thou conceivest it may be bad in another [Page] kind of subject, thou dost but play the fool and deceive thy selfe. What ever Nature hath, that she can give us; what she hath not, she neither will, nor can afford. To the wise man one word is enough. I speake out of the true light of nature: My Studies also hitherto cannot find any other Fu [...]damental of an universal Medicine.

Section 4.
Out of what things Medicines must be sought.

I.

They must be sought. 1. Out of the Word of God. 2. Out of Nature: and in nature, out of Vegetals, Animals, and Minerals.

I In this search, we must first pray for Gods assistance; and in the next place, we must attend to the instructions [Page] of the wise Ancients. If thou couldst finde out such a thing as would purge and rectifie nature in the great world so effectually that ever after she would remaine sound and unimpaired, so that nothing of her Homogeneous essence and perfection, could be saved from her by any Extraneous fire, then (without doubt) both the way to, and the miraculous Energie of this onely true and undeceiving medicine were in thy hands.

Section 5.
Why Medicines cannot alwayes restore sick Persons to their former health.

O [...]waldus [...]roll [...]us, a cruly learned and expert Physician, in his Preface to his Basilica Chymica, doth most fully and judiciously handle this point. His words are these. It is observed sometimes, that [Page] sick persons by the most convenient and effectual Medicines, cannot be healed for some one or more of these eight subsequent reasons.

The first is, because their appointed time or terme of life is come, which by no humane wit or Medicine can be prolonged. For there is no remedy upon earth, by which our corruptible bodies can be freed from death, the decreed penalty, and the wages of our sinnes: But there is one thing, which (if we add holinesse to it,) will keep back and restrain corruption, renew youth, and lengthen our short life as heretofore in the Patriachs. Now though our life may be shortned andThe terme of life is moveable, not fixed: conditionall, not positive, as appears by that commandement, which S. Paul observed to be the first with a promise; and by many other reasons, which cannot be inserted in this place. prolonged; yet because of the punishment for sinne, we must by the immutable decree of the eternal Law, unavoydably [Page] die: for a conjunction of different Natures, and things (suppose a Spirit and a Body) must necessarily induce a dissolution, else we should state a Pythagorical Metempsuchosis, or a revertency in ages as Plato did. And in this Case the use of our universall and supreme Medicine, will prove as vaine and ineffectuall, as an old womans Recipe [...] because the Marriage of souls and bodyes, ordained by an inevitable necessity for divorcement and separation, can by no industry of Artists, nor Ayds of nature be rendred perpetuall; for the statute Lawes of the present things, and their great Lawgiver, are inviolable. It is impious therefore to seeke, and impossible to find out such a Medicine, that will carry us alive beyond those bounds, which the very Father of life will not have us to transpasse.

[Page] The second reason is, Because that sick persons are too too often brought to such a lamentable passe by the ignorance of unlearned Physicians, and their pernicious Recipe's, that the best and most virtual medicines can doe them no good, their bodies being utterly poysoned, and made immedicable by those fatal Tormentors and Executioners of mankind. In this desperate [...]ase (most commonly) is the Chymicall Physician called upon; but then would I have him to call to mind, that saying of Trophilus in Plutarch, which affirms that man onely to be the compleat Physician, [...]: and not to cast away (but of vaineglory,) their soveraigne and undeserved medicines, to [...]alve the credit of such detestable villaines, whose infamy is past cure: [...]: Let them beware also, that they suffer not their [Page] Medicaments to be mingled with the sluttish and venemous compositions of others, lest the ill consequence of such doings be laid to their charge, and the success or good event (if any comes to passe▪) be arrogated by, and ascribed unto those impudent and clamorous impostors; for such a perverse and execrable envy possesseth these Medicasters, that to disgrace those that are more learned and expert than themselves, and to keep up their owne decaying repute, they will (if they can have that opportunity) cast those Patients which are curable and towards recovery, into an incurable and hopelesse condition. Hence it comes to pass, that amongst the common sort of people, (who suffer most by them) they are publiquely saluted by the most apposite▪ Title of Profest Poysoners.

The third reason is, Because the Physician is called upon too late, [Page] when nature is quite mastred or orecome, and the disease hath got his full sway; otherwise if convenient or proper medines were seasonable, (that is to say, in a time of prevention, by resisting the beginnings and first attempts of diseases) administred, no doubt but (with Gods blessing and assent) the consequence and effect would be happinesse and health.

The fourth reason is, because the sick person will not punctually observe the Physicians prescriptions: for it happens too often, that Diseased people charge the Physician or his Medicines, with those ill events which by some omission or irregularity (contrary to that golden Law of the Locrenses in Ael [...]anu [...],) they have drawne upon themselves.

The fifth reason is, because the [Page] nature or peculiar propriety of some persons, are not inclinable or adapted to health, as we see some timber to be so tough and knotty, and out of a certaine natural defect, to degenerate into such an untowardnesse, that by no force or Art it can be cleft or wrought: And it happens very frequently, that the time chosen for healing, together with the indisposition of the Stars, oppose the Cure: for what ever Disease is unseasonably, that is to say, immaturely heal'd, the party will be ever after subject to a relapse, because it is the seasonablenesse or fulnesse of time, that (like harvest) gives a firme and a fixed health. A ripe Pear will fall off the Tree spontaneously, but if we seeke to have it off, while it is green, we must either bruise the tree by shaking it, or with more violence break off the bough. Therefore, if these considerations be neglected, especially in the Cure of Astral diseases, [Page] we shall but lose our labour, and come off with prejudice. Physicians also must religiously provide, that the remedies they give, prove not worse then the Disease, therefore let them never advise their Patients to any impious course, nor consent to doe those things, which by salving the sore, destroy the soule and the body too: let it be their chiefe care not to hurt, if they cannot help. By doing so, they will keep a good conscience, which is a continuall [...]east, but for a bad one there is no medicine.

The sixth reason is, because the disease is come to that pitch or confirmation, from whence there can be no regress by the Laws of nature, as in perfect, absolute, and confirmed bituminous, massie, sandy, and stony coagulations: for in such consummated Diseases, no medicines can availe: nor in a native deafnesse or blindness: [Page] for what nature her selfe hath once deprived us off, that cannot be restored by any Artists, no more then corporall disproportions and birthmaimes, or transpositions can be amended.

The seventh Cause or Reason is▪ the sordid, tenacious parcimonie of some rich Patients, which makes the Physician (for no Money is better disbursed, nor more honestly gotten) discontented and carelesse: sometimes also the diffidence, incredulity, and suspition of Patients, (though the Physician be never so faithful and diligent,) hinders the operation of the Medicine, and is a great impediment to the Physician himself.

The eighth and last reason is, the wisdome and the goodnesse of God, who (without further toleration) takes away the Patient, lest being recovered, he should commit more, [Page] and more heynous offences against his Maker, his Neighbour, and himself, to the utter misery and perdition of his soul. For every disease is an expiatory penance, and by this divine affliction, correction and rod of judgement is the patient called upon, and required to amend his life: or else by this fatherly visitation and imposition of the Crosse, which every child of God (in imitation of his blessed Sonne) must patiently bear, he is purposely exercised to be an example of piety, submission, and perfection unto others; for God doth oftentimes permit some particular persons to be afflicted with many and grievous Diseases, whom the cheerefulness and health of the flesh▪ with their dayly continuation in sins (if left without rebuke,) had cast at length into some desperate spirituall malady, to the manifest hazard of their eternal welfare: for health▪ without holinesse, and a penitent [Page] resentment of of our frequent infirmities, is no token of Gods mercy, but rather of damnation, and the portion of this life. Moreover, sinnes by weakning the forces and activities of the soule, make her impotent and unfit to govern the body; so that the principall part being sick and unapt to rule, the bodily faculties are profusely wasted and abused, and so death is hastned on, and with it a total and a finall destruction. At least by this yoke and bridle of sicknesse, as by a wholsome kind of purgatory, men will be retained in the ordinary offices of piety, and (though they be but few, who are effectually reclaimed or converted by it,) yet this detainment of their health (which i [...] still left to them, they had still abused,) will in some measure restrain and cut off from them, both the liberty and the power of sinning. Hitherto the most learned Crollius.

[Page] Thou wilt now (perhaps) object, that seeing all Diseases are not curable, it is consequently absurd, to terme any Medicine universal I answer, That is termed universall, not becaus it takes away all diseases at all times & in all Causes, for that it cannot do; but because it being but one, can expell and cure all those diseases, which by all other particular or specifical Medicines whatsoever can, or have been healed and eradicated; yea, and some diseases which by no appropriated particular medicine can be healed, as the Gout, the Falling sicknesse, the Dropsie, the Leprosie, &c. Therefore it is termed universal, because it hath in it real and effectually, all the manifest and occult virtues of all other specifical medicines & that eminently, or by way of transcendency, so that all other medicines are subordinate and accomptable unto this.

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Section 6.
How Medicines ought to be administred to the sick, and after what manner the Physician must behave himself in their administration, and generally in his practise.

I.

Every professor of Physick, when he is furnished with convenient, effectuall, and rightly prepared medicines, before he enters into practise, must be conversant with, and acquire the friendship of some learned and well experienced Physiciar, whose advise and assistance in his first attempts, he must make use of, not omitting his own observations.

FOr in the multitude of Counsellours there is safety, and a more [Page] exact judgement is given of the Patients present condition, and the wayes and meanes to restore him are better and surer laid. By this Course, that opprobrious German Proverb, which sticks too fast to some young Adventurers (Ein newer Arkt, Ein newer Kirch-hoff: A new Physician must have a new Church-yard,) would be easily refuted and quite abolished. This very Course (after serious and needful considerations) I did heretofore propose to my selfe, and to effect it throughly, I procured and entred into mutuall and friendly Covenants with a certaine Doctor of Physick, who was not unlearned: and that I might by this meanes proceed farther in my Chymical discoveries, I conversed with him by frequent Letters, and other more familiar wayes: And this I did, because I supposed him (at that time) to be a true Philososopher, but I could never receive one line from [Page] him, that was not wholly dictated by the spirit of pride and arrogancy. At length, when it fortuned, that (after a most loving invitation, I could not for very moving, and extraordinary reasons, attend upon him) he rail'd at me (though altogether innocent,) with most horrid imprecations, and virulent language, terming me an unsanctified villaine, and laboured by all meanes to vilifie my studies and person, that by such clamorous and publique discouragements, he might force me to desist, and give over my profession. But none of these things shall move me: for God will yet give me such friends, with whom I may freely deliberate, and advise about Physical operations, and the healing of the sick: too much knowledge is oftentimes foolishness. True Philosophers walk wholly in the plaine path of nature. What profits learning, where pride beares the sway, and [Page] blinds the owner? I have ever judged, the modest knowledge to be the most divine. It is true indeed, we are not all equalls: but let him that hath more of the light, walke in that shining path with modesty. I confesse indeed, and it is true, that he was my superiour by many degrees, but had he beene moved to this harsh dealing, by a meer conceit of his superiority in learning, perhaps he would not have cast me off so as he hath done. God resisteth the proud, and gives grace even to the humble. Yea, the most wise, and the blessed JESUS, did humble himselfe in the very forme of a servant, that he might familiarly live and converse with the most obscure and inferiour sort of people: and he was not ashamed, nor disdained to teach those poore spirits, not a sublunary, transient knowledge, but the glorious and permanent mysteries of the Kingdome of heaven. I love still the [Page] learning of so eminent a person because others whom I love, commend it unto me: But that great knowledge, which he abuseth to an injurious scorn and undervaluing of me, I heartily hate. God Almighty (it may be) for some secret respects, which his all discerning spirit onely knowes, would not suffer me to impart any longer, (as we were mutually bound) my private affaires unto him. Therefore from henceforth let him live to himselfe, onely I would have him understand by this which is published, that his vehement and bitter Letters made me very sad. But to returne to what we have proposed in the Contents of this Section; A Physician that would practise successfully, must

First and before all things find out the disease, and what the cause of it is.

For in vain wilt thou either seek or [Page] apply remedies, if the cause of the disease be not perfectly knowne unto thee: the beginning of the Cure, is a right knowledge of the Disease: but the disease cannot be known, without knowing the cause: For then are we confident, that we know the matter and effect, when we have discovered the cause or efficient of it.

II.

He must apply and appropriate his remedies to the root and originall apparent cause of the d [...]sease, and not otherwise.

III.

He must administer no Med [...]cine [...], whose forces or operative virtues in taking away the disease, he is not throughly acquainted with, unlesse he be well assured that they cannot indanger nor prejudice a person that is in health: by such trials he may safely and profitably [Page] discern what his Medicines can and what they cannot effect.

IV.

He must administer nothing that hath in it a manifest poyson, unlesse the venome be first wholly and actually separated or taken out.

V.

He must before the administration of his Medicines, remove all impediments that are likely to oppose or weaken their virtues; and this must be done either by himself, or by another,viz.by a Surgeon.

HE must let blood, take away all luxations, set broken bones, &c. And afterwards apply his Medicines inwardly or outwardly, or both wayes, as need requires.

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VI.

He must prescribe such a Dyet both of Meat and Drinke, as will be agreeable to his Patients present exigencie, and for the furtherance or assistance of nature, and the restoration of health.

VII.

He must carefully observe a just Dose in all his Medicines, with respect had to their operations, and to the strength of the Patient.

VIII.

He must never administer any of his Medicines, without sanctifying them in, and with the blessed name of JESUS CHRIST. Whatsoever ye doe (saith the Apostle of the Gentiles) in word or deed, doe all in the name of the Lord JESUS, giving thankes to God and the Father by him. Colos. 3. 17.

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Section. 7.
How the sick man should behave himself, while he is in a course of Physick.

I.

Let the sick person acknowledge, that he hath deserved, and drawn upon himselfe, the just anger of God by his frequent sinnes: and that it is by his righteous permission, that he is visited with sicknesse.

II.

Let him by an unfeigned penitence, and a godly sorrow reconcile himhimselfe unto God through the merits of his Saviour, putting on an holy resolution to become a new man; and afterwards let him draw near to the throne of Grace, and intreat God for mercy, and his healing assistance.

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III.

After reconciliation and invocation of the divine Aide, let him send for the Physician, and Physick being taken, let him not doubt of Gods mercy, and his own recovery.

THat is to say, let him certainly believe that there is communicated and infused (by the gift of God) into the medicine which he hath taken, such an innate vertue▪ as is effectual and proper to expell his Disease. If he doth this, the event will be answerable to his faith, and the Medicine will in all circumstances work successfully. A firm credulity, chearfull hope and true love and confidence towards the Physician, and the Medicine, (saith that great Philosopher Oswaldus Crollius,) conduce as much to the health of [Page] the Patient, yea sometimes more, then either the remedy▪ or the Physician. Naturall faith (I meane not the faith of Grace which is from Christ, but the imaginative [...]aith, which in the day that the first man was created, was then infused and planted in him by God the Father, and is still communicated to his posterity,) is so powerfull, that it can both expell and introduce Diseases: as it manifestly appeares in times of infection, when man by his owne private imagination, out of meere feare and horrour, generates a Basiliscum Coeli, which infects the Microcosmical Firmament by means of the Imaginants superstition according as the Patients faith assists, or resists. To the faithfull all things are possible, for faith ascertaines all those things which are uncertaine: God can by no meanes be reach'd and injoy'd of us, but onely by faith: [Page] whosoever therefore believes in God, he operates by the power of God, and to God all things are possible. But how this is performed, no humane wit can find out: This onely we can say, that [...]aith is an operation or work not of the Bel [...]ever but of him in whom he believes. Cogitations or thoughts, surpasse the operations of all Elements and Stars: for while we imagine and believe, such a thing shall come to passe, that faith brings the worke about, and without it is nothing done Our faith that it will be so, makes us imagine so: imagination excites a Star, that Star (by conjunction with Imagination) gives the effect or perfect operation. To believe that there is a medicine which can cure us, gives the spirit of Medicine: that spirit gives the knowledge of it and the Medicine being known, gives health. Hence it appeares, that a true Physician, whose operations are natural, [Page] is born of this faith, and the spirit (I meane this spirit of nature, or star of medicine,) furthers and assists him, according to his faith. It happens oftentimes, that an illiterate man performes those cures by this imaginative faith, which the best Physicians cannot doe with the most soveraigne medicines. Sometimes also, this bare perswasion or imaginative faith heales more and more effectually, then any virtue in the exhibited Medicine, as it was manifestly found of late years, in that famous Panacea, or All-heal of Amwaldus, and since his time, in that new medicinall spring, which broke out this present yeare in the Confines of Misnia and Bohemia, to which an incredible number of sick persons doe daily resort. No other cause can be rendred of these Magnalia, or rare Physical operations, then the firme and excessive affection of the Patient; for the power, which worketh [Page] thus, is in the Spirit of the receiver, when taking the medicine without any fear or hesitation, he is wholly possessed and inspired (as it were) with an actual desire and beliefe of health: for the rationall soule, when stirred up, and enkindled by a vehement imagination, overcomes nature, and by her own effectuall affections, renewes many things in her own body or mansion, causing either health or sicknesse, and that not onely in her own body, but Extraneously, or in other bodies. The efficacy of this naturall faith, manifested it selfe in that woman with the bloody Issue, and in the Centurion. Hitherto are the words of Crollius.

IV.

When the Patient is del [...]vered from his disease, and restored to his former health, let him heartily and solemnly give all the glory to the Supreme, All-mighty Physician: [Page] let him offer the sacrifice of Thankes-giving, and acknowledge the goodness and the tender mercies of the Lord. And let not the Physitian forget to performe his duty, by a thankeful and solemn acknowledgement of Gods gracious concessions, by choosing and enabling him to be his unworthy instrument to restore the sick. And this he must do, not onely because it is his duty, and a most deserved and obliged gratitude, but also out of a wise Christian caution, to avoid those judgements which are poured upon the negligent and ungratefull, by the most just jealousie of the irresistible and everlasting GOD; unto whom alone be rendred by Angels and Men, and by all his creatures, All Praise and Glory, and perpetual thanks in this the Temporall, and in the eternall Being. Amen.

FINIS.

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Information about this book

Title statement

Hermetical physick: or, The right way to preserve, and to restore health. By that famous and faithfull chymist, Henry Nollius. Englished by Henry Uaughan, Gent.

Nolle, Heinrich, fl. 1612-1619.

Edition statement

1655

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Text Creation Partnership,

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Date

2008-09 (EEBO-TCP Phase 1).

ID [DLPS]

A89713

ID [STC]

Wing N1222

ID [STC]

Thomason E1714_1

ID [STC]

ESTC R209619

ID [EEBO-CITATION]

99868485

ID [PROQUEST]

99868485

ID [VID]

170298

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(EEBO-TCP ; phase 1, no. A89713)

Transcribed from: (Early English Books Online ; image set 170298)

Images scanned from microfilm: (Thomason Tracts ; 213:E1714[1])

Source

— Hermetical physick: or, The right way to preserve, and to restore health. By that famous and faithfull chymist, Henry Nollius. Englished by Henry Uaughan, Gent., Nolle, Heinrich, fl. 1612-1619., Vaughan, Henry, gent,.

Extent

[8], 130 p.

Printed by Humphrey Moseley, and are to be sold at his shop, at the Princes Armes in St. Pauls Church-Yard,. London. :: 1655.. (Annotation on Thomason copy: "25 June".) (Reproduction of the original in the British Library.)

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