SUBSECT. III. Concerning Physick. PHYSICK it self in the last place is to be considered; "for the Lord hath created medicines of the earth, and he that is wise will not abhorre them," Ecclus 38. 4. ver. 8. "of such doth the Apothecary make a confection, &c." Of these medicines there be divers and infinite kindes, Plants, Metals, Animals, &c. and those of severall natures, some good for one, hurtfull to another: some noxious in themselves, corrected by art, very wholesome and good, simples, mixt, &c. and therefore left to be managed by discreet and skillfull Physicians, and thence applied to man's use. To this purpose they have invented method, and severall rules of art, to put these remedies in order, for their particular ends. Physick (as Hippocrates defines it) is naught else but " addition and substraction;" and as it is required in all other diseases, so in this of melancholy it ought to be most accurate, it being (as Mercurialis acknowledgeth) so common an affection in these our times, and therefore fit to be understood. Severall prescripts and methods I find in severall men, some take upon them to cure all maladies with one Medicine, severally applyed, as that Panacea, Aurum potabile, so much controverted in these dayes, Herba solis, &c. Paracelsus reduceth all diseases to foure principal heads, to whom Severinus, Ravelascus, Leo Suavius, and others adhere and imitate: those are Leprosy, Gout, Dropsie, Falling-sickness. To which they reduce the rest; as to Leprosie, Ulcers, Itches, Furfures, Scabs, &c. To Gout, Stone, Cholick, Tooth-ach, Head-ach, &c. To Dropsie, Agues, Jaundies, Cacexia, &c. To the Falling-sicknesse, belong Palsy, Vertigo, Cramps, Convulsions, Incubus, Apoplexie, &c. "If any of these four principall be cured (saith Ravelascus) all the inferior are cured," and the same remedies commonly serve: but this is too generall, and by some contradicted: for this peculiar disease of Melancholy, of which I am now to speak, I find severall cures, severall methods and prescripts. They that intend the practick cure of Melancholy, saith Duretus in his notes to Hollerius, set down nine peculiar scopes or ends; Savanarola prescribes seven especiall Canons. Elianus Montaltus cap. 26. Faventinus in his Empyricks, Hercules de Saxoniâ, &c. have their severall injunctions and rules, all tending to one end. The ordinary is threefold, which I mean to folFuchsius cap. 2. lib. 1. In pract. med. hæc affectio nostris temporibus frequentissima, ergo maximè pertinet ad nos hujus curationem intelligere. aliquis horum morborum summus sanatur, sanantur omnes inferiores, + Si low, law. Aαintin, Pharmaceutica, and Chirurgica, Diet or Living, Apothecary, Chirurgery, which Wecker, Crato, Guianerius, &c. and most prescribe; of which I will insist, and -peak in their order. DIET; SECT. II. MEMB. I. SUBSECT. I. Dyet rectified in substance. IET, Axinn, Victus or Living, according to Fuchsius and others, comprehend those six non-naturall things, which I have before specified, are especiall causes, and being rectified, a sole or chief part of the cure. Johannes Arculanus cap. 16. in 9. Rhasis, accounts the rectifying of these six, a sufficient cure. Guianerius Tract. 15, cap. 9. calls them, propriam & primam curam, the principall cure: so doth Montanus, Crato, Mercurialis, Altomarus, &c. first to be tried, Lemnius instit. cap. 22. names them the hinges of our health, “no hope of recovery without them. Reinerus Solenander in his seventh consultation for a Spanish young Gentlewoman, that was so melancholy she abhorred all company, and would not sit at table with her familiar friends, prescribes this physick above the rest, no good to be done without it. Y Areteus, lib. 1. cap. 7. an old Physician, is of opinion, that this is enough of it self, if the party be not too far gone in sicknesse. Crato in a consultation of his for a noble patient, tells him plainly, that if his Highness will keep but a good diet, he will warrant him his former health. Montanus Consil. 27. for a Nobleman of France, admonisheth his Lordship to be most circumspect in his diet, or else all his other Physick will be to small purpose. The same injunction I find verbatim in J. Cæsar Claudinus, Respon 34. Scoltzii consil. 183. Trallianus cap. 16. lib. 1. Lalius à fonte Eugubinus often brags, that he hath done more cures in this kinde by rectification of Diet, then all other physick besides. So that in a word I may say to most ine a Instit. cap. 8. sect. 1. Victus nomine non tam cibus & potus, sed aër, exer. citatio, somnus, vigilia, & reliquæ res sex non-naturales continentur. 'Sufficit plerumq; regimen rerum sex non-naturalium. "Et in his potissima sani-, tas consistit. Nihil hic agendum sine exquisita vivendi ratione, &c. y Si recens malum sit ad pristinum habitum recuperandum, alia medela non est opus. * Consil. 99. lib. 2. si celsitudo tua, rectam victus rationem, &c. Domine, ut sis prudens ad victum, sine quo cætera remedia frustra adhibentur. Omnia remedia irrita & vana sine his. Novistis me plerosq; ita laborantes, victu potius quam medicamentis curasse. • Moneo lancholy lancholy men, as the Fox said to the Wesell, that could not get out of the garner, Macra cavum repetes, quem macra subisti, the six non-naturall things caused it, and they must cure it. Which howsoever I treat of, as proper to the Meridian of Melancholy, yet nevertheless, that which is here said with him in Tully, though writ especially for the good of his freinds at Tarentum and Sicily, yet it will generally serve most other diseases, and help them likewise, if it be observed. Of these six non-naturall things, the first is Diet, properly so called, which consists in meat and drink, in which we must consider Substance, Quantity, Quality, and that opposite to the precedent. In Substance, such meats are generally commended, which are "moist, easie of digestion, and not apt to engender winde, not fryed, nor rosted, but sod (saith Valescus, Altomarus, Piso, &c.) hot and moist, and of good nourishment ;" Crato Consil. 21. lib. 2. admits rost meat, if the burned and scorched superficies, the brown we call it, be pared of. Salvianus lib. 2. cap. 1. cries out oncold and dry meats; young flesh and tender is approved, as of Kid, Rabbits, Chickens, Veale, Mutton, Capons, Hens, Partridge, Phesant, Quailes, and all mountain birds, which are so familiar in some parts of Africa, and in Italy, and as † Dublinius reports, the common food of Boores and Clownes in Palestina. Galen takes exception at Mutton, but without question he means that rammy mutton, which is in Turkie, and Asia minor, which have those great fleshie tailes, of 48. pound weight, as Vertomannus witnesseth, navig. lib. 2 cap. 5. The lean of fat meat is best, and all manner of brothes, and pottage, with borage, lettuce, and such wholesome hearbs are excellent good, specially of a Cock boyled; all spoon meat. Arabians commend brains, but Laurentius c. 8. excepts against them, and so do many others; Egges are justified as a nutritive wholesome meat, Butter and Oyle may passe, but with some limitation; so ‡ Crato confines it, and "to some men sparingly at set times, or in sauce," and so sugar and hony are approved. All sharp and sowre sauces must be avoided, and spices, or at least seldome used; and so saffron sometimes in broth may be tolerated; but these things may be more freely used, as the temperature of the party is hot *1. de finibus Tarentinis & Siculis, Modo non multum clongentur. * Lib. 1. de melan. cap. 7. Calidus & humidus cibus concoctu facilis, flatus exortes, clixi non assi, neq; sibi frixi sint. • Si interna tantum pulpa devoretur, non superficies torrida ab igne. Bene nutrientes cibi, tenella ætas multum vale, carnes non virosæ, nec pingues. Hodoper, peregr. Hierosol. & Inimica stomacho. h Not fryed or buttered, but potched. Consil. 16. Non improbatur butyrum & oleum, si tamen plus quam par sit, non profundatur : sacchari & mellis usus, utiliter ad ciborum condimenta comprobatur. iMerCurialis consil. 88. acerba omnia evitentur. or or cold, or as he shall finde inconvenience by them. The thinnest, whitest, smallest wine is best, not thick, nor strong; and so of bear, the middling is fittest. Bread of good wheat, pure, well purged from the bran is preferred; Laurentius cap. 8. would have it kneaded with rain water, if it may be gotten. Water.] Pure, thin, light water by all means use, of good smell and taste, like to the ayr in sight, such as is soon hot, soon cold, and which Hippocrates so much approves, if at least it may be had. Rain water is purest, so that it fall not down in great drops, and be used forthwith, for it quickly putrefies. Next to it fountain water that riseth in the East, and runneth Eastward, from a quick running spring, from flinty, chalky, gravelly grounds: and the longer a river runneth, it is commonly the purest, though many springs do yeeld the best water at their fountains. The waters in hotter countries, as in Turkie, Persia, India, within the Tropicks, are frequently purer then ours in the North, more subtile, thin, and lighter, as our Merchants observe by four ounces in a pound, pleasanter to drink, as good as our Bear, and some of them as Choaspis in Persia, preferred by the Persian kings, before wine it self. "Clitorio quicunq; sitim de fonte levârit Vina fugit gaudetq; meris abstemius undis." Many rivers I deny not are muddy still, white, thick, like those in China, Nilus in Ægypt, Tibris at Rome, but after they be setled two or three dayes, defecate and clear, very commodious, usefull and good. Many make use of deep wels, as of old in the holy Land, lakes, cisterns, when they cannot be better provided; To fetch it in Carts or Gundilo's as in Venice, or Camels backs, as at Cairo in Egypt, † Radzivilius observed 8000. Camels daily there, employed about that business; Some keep it in Trunks, as in the East Indies, made four square with descending steps, and 'tis not amiss: For I would not have any one so nice as that Græcian Calis, sister to Nicephorus Emperour of Constantinople, and married to Dominitus Silvius Duke of Venice, that out of incredible wantonness, communi aqua uti nolebat, would use no Vulgar water; but she died tantà (saith mine author) fætidissimi puris copiá, of so fulsome a disease, that no water could wash her clean, § Plato would not have a traveller lodge in a city that is not governed by laws, or hath not a quick stream running by it; illud enim animum, hoc corrumpit valetudinem, one corrupts the body, the other the minde, But this is more then needs, too much *Ovid. Met. lib. 15. then permitted to marry, + Peregr. Hier. The Dukes of Venice were curiosity curiosity is naught, in time of necessity any water is allowed. Howsoever pure water is best, and which (as Pindarus holds) is better then gold; an especiall ornament it is, and "very commodious to a City (according to * Vegetius) when fresh springs are included within the wals," as at Corinth, in the midst of the town almost, there was arr altissima scatens fontibus, a goodly Mount full of fresh water-springs: "if nature afford them not, they must be had by art." It is a wonder to read of those stupend Aqueducts, and infinite cost hath been bestowed in Rome of old, Constantinople, Carthage, Alexandria, and such populous cities, to conveigh good and wholsome waters: read Frontinus, Lipsius de admir. Plinius lib. 3. cap. 11. Strabo in his Geogr. That Aqueduct of Claudius was most eminent, fetched upon arches 15. miles, every Arch 109 foot high they had 14. such other Aqueducts, besides lakes and cisterns, 700. as I take it; every house had private pipes and chanels to serve them for their use. Peter Gillius, in his accurate description of Constantinople, speaks of an old cistern which he went down to see, 336. foot long, 180. foot broad, built of marble, covered over with Arch-work, and sustained by 336. pillars, twelve foot asunder, and in 11. rowes, to contain sweet water. Infinite cost in chanels and cisterns, from Nilus to Alexandria, hath been formerly bestowed, to the admiration of these times; their cisterns so curiously cemented and composed, that a beholder would take them to be all of one stone: when the foundation is laid, and cistern made, their house is half built. That Segonian Aqueduct in Spain, is much wondred at in these dayes, upon three rows of pillars, one above another, conveying sweet water to every house : but each City almost is full of such Aqueducts. Amongst the rest he is eternally to be commended, that brought that new stream to the North side of London at his own charge: and Mr. Otho Nicholson, founder of our water-works and elegant Conduit in Oxford. So much have all times attributed to this Element, to be conveniently provided of it: Although Galen hath taken exceptions at such waters, which run through leaden pipes, ob cerussam quæ in iis generatur, for that unctuous ceruse, which causeth dysenteries and fluxes; † yet as Alsarius Crucius of Genna well answers, it is opposite to common experience, *Lib. 4. cap. 10. Magna urbis utilitas cum perennes fontes muris includuntur, quod si natura non præstat, effodiendi, &c. Opera gigantum dicit aliquis. De aquæduct. "Curtius Fons à quadragesimo lapide in urbem opere arquato perductus. Plin. 56. 15. Quæq; domus Romæ fistulas habebat & canales, &c. Lib. 2. ca. 20. Jod. à Meggen. cap. 15. pereg. Hier. Bellonius. Cypr. Echovius delit. Hisp. Aqua profluens inde in omnes ferè domos ducitur, in puie's quoq; æstivo tempore frigidissima conservatur. Sir Hugh Middle ton, Baronet. De quæsitis med. cent. fol. 354. |