whose best Divertisement and only Antidote against Melancholy is hard labour and constant working whose Food is most slender and simple are seldomest essayed and proved with these depravations But above all such as are Hysterick with whom we may justly reckon a great part of your delicate Women who spend the most of their time in Dressing and Decking and do languish and decay with idleness whose lazy and torpid Blood waxeth Acid and Tart after the same manner that standing Waters do corrupt do most certainly Communicate to their Infants such Dispositions to Diseases with their first life Being an ill Raven as the Proverb is an ill Egg. Amongst the rest of the Creatures the innate goodness of the Kind is most surely derived upon their young partly because of their simple Dyet and partly but more especially because the Male sacredly observing the Laws of Nature never copulateth with his Female when his instinct however informed inditeth her teeming But Man whose lofty Reason hath taught him to despise the Brutes almost more salacious than a Buck-Goat not knowing how to restrain and bridle his Lust importuneth his Mate from her first Conceiving until the hour of Birth Hence it is that strong and Healthy Men do so frequently beget weak and valetudinary Children This is the Reason why Old Men having overpassed by the benign favour and help of Nature the Stage and Period of their immoderate Embraces do beget of their Decayed and Barren Seed more plump and healthy Children than the strongest and most keen Youth Thus having considered the procatarctick cause of their Diseases which do mostly depend upon the condition of the Parents whilst they are begotten especially of the Mother in the time of her Big Belly We will now come nigher and inquire into the more immediate Causes of their Maladies which may be reduced to these four Articles 1. To their catching Cold. 2. To the too thick Milk of the Nurse 3. To their over soon eating Fleshes And 4. To the mad and imprudent fondness of Mothers and many Nurses who do often permit their Infants to sip up Wine and other strong and Spirituous Liquors And 1. Cold especially from the night Air to which they are most subject doth very often make way for these Fevers with which Infants are so frequently affected Sith that they come naked from the Womb not being cloathed by Nature as all other creatures are Reason or rather Nature destitute of her own help doth instantly suggest the necessity of wrapping them up into warm Cloaths Moreover the mutability of the Air and the continual vicissitudes of Heat and Cold do plainly advertise us how great our care should be in the warding off its Injuries For the more tender and delicate the Temperament and Constitution of any even of the most adult is the more are they subject unto impresses and inconveniences from the Air. But the strength and constitution of Infants are of all the most tender and infirm and unless there be great care taken for warm and convenient not fine splendid and sumptuous Cloaths especially for such as are descended of honest Parents they cannot long eschew these Diseases which are the ordinary attendants and consequents of night Air. Yea an exact care for convenient Apparel whatever some strong men may deny is so absolutely neessary for every age that ordinarily the most weak and valetudinary People for as much as I could ever observe do live longer than the most robust and strong Men which can be attributed to nothing else than the great care of the one and supine negligence of the other for convenient and warm Cloathing 2. The too thick Milk of the Nurse For if she be a lover of Wine or any other strong and spirituous Liquors her Milk is so warm'd and on a sudden inflamed that fire it self only passeth her Breasts for her sucking Infant but if she more wantonly entertain the untimely embraces of her Husband her monthly Visits are renewed by their Coppulating and so her Milk Corrupteth and groweth soure and the matter for the Milk being otherwise diverted the Milk it self doth gradually diminish and the lean Child for some time troubled with unconvenient Food is so often killed Lastly If she be hysterick h. e. of a more tender and delicate Constitution however Chaste and sober she may be yet her Milk doth degenerate and Naturally turneth thick In how great danger then are Sucking Infants upon how Inconstant and Slippery a plan doth the Health of these Innocent Children Sist It 's this and some other Causes which I shall just now recount that are the frequent occasions why we hear so often the sound of the Passing Bells of the Villages about London for some one Child that is undeservedly Atoning and Expiating the faults and mistakes of its Nurse and now ending itâ— scarce well begun Life having met with some unchast Intemperate or froward and dishonest Nurse But also from the foregoing Causes doth depend a remark which a Divine of very good Credit and intire Fame Rector of the Parish of Haies twelve miles from London did make when he told me with great Grief how his Parish which is very large and of great extent well Peopled and seated in a most pleasant and wholsom Air was upon his coming to that place filled with Sucking Infants yet in the space of one year he was assistant at the burying of them all if you do except two and his own only Son whom being yet very weak he did not unadvisedly commit unto my Care from his Birth Yea he was witness that same Year to the Interring of the same Number which had been twice supplyed in a City perhaps amongst the greatest in the World yet brought to an untimely end by the fault of the Mercenary Nurses Moreover the thickness of Milk whatever be its cause cannot but produce a great many inconveniences of sundry kinds being that the Bodies of Infants should of all be the most fluid and these smallest conduits which are ordained for transmitting of the Chyle should always be kept open and lastly being that this most unnatural thickness of Food is most opposite to that most fluid Constitution of Infants and doth give occasion to all kinds of Obstructions in the first Passages 3. To their over soon eating if not more properly devouring and swallowing down of fleshes For it 's most admirable that Mothers are not in a fear of killing their Infants with so disagreeing and improper Food whom though they love so excessively that they seem mad in that passion For who could seriously think that flesh so solid and compact a substance can be at all agreeable with these tender Infants who as yet have got no teeth at least not strong and firm enough for the chewing of fleshes What man of the least judgment can assert the Riot and excess of the most manly and robust Age any way convenient with one that is so tender and most simple and whose strength is
Acidity is the chief cause of all these Diseases wherewith this tender age is affected the whole Artifice of the Cure is hinged upon the defeating of the Acid. Truly there might a good deal of miâ—â— be raised before the Eyes of Novices that the truth might not be disclosed to the sedulous Inquirers But to be ingenuous and if it be lawful to speak truth and that we may not lose our Cost and Pains whatever things oâ— most immediately eliminate the Acid these are they that promote the Cure and whatever serve not that design do more or less torment and trouble thâ— tender Bodies of these Infants But the right management and traitment of the Acid is stayed 〈◊〉 on these two Views and Intentions First seâ—â—â— That the Acid may be made fit and prepared to be cast out of the Body 2. That the Acid thus prepared be eliminated with convenient and proper Medicaments The one without the other can never make a perfect Cure but when joyned are not only able to defeat Acute Diseases but do much allay the dispositions to Diseases of greater continuance The purging of Young Children in the heighth and vigour of Acute Diseases at first view doth seem most difficult and full of hazard But the certain advantage from the following method is Apology sufficient after Tryal It 's true the Purging of people of full age in continued Fevers did make a shew both of danger and boldness to Novices and th' unexperienced Notwithstanding its event and happy success is much approved and made out by the late trials of the most skilled Physicians But the incomparable and unparallelâ—â— Vanquisher of Fevers of all kinds the most famous Practitioner Mr. Sydenham was the first that did ever communicate the benefits and advantages of Purging even in Fevers themselves who designedly did expose in his Monitory Schedule that was Printed three years ago his Method for staving off and driving away that Epidemick Fever which so much rageth at this time And therefore he has merited so much by this as I think no Age so long as the art of Medicine shall flourish can pass by his Name in silence Who likewise did not doubt to detect with a sublime and Masculine Spirit the hurtful and deadly mischief of Diaphoreticks over-thwartly and perversly used not only in Forreign Countries but amongst our selves He hath inculcated before in his Works Printed long ago the great use of Purgatives for the Bastard Inflammation of the Lungs a Disease very rise and frequent amongst us and a great many more and in the Postscript added to the end of all his Works he did place the cure of that which he called the Winter Fever entirely in Purging Truly the ardent Affection of that Man now almost seventy and being most sickly and valetudinary for the publick good could not be hindred or interrupted by approaching Death why at length he should not Communicate his most compleat and exact Observations upon this matter in that golden Schedule But that Purging though it be not enroll'd amongst the secrets of Curing neither is accounted among the Wonders of Chymy is amongst the best helps that the fruitful inventions of Curious Men have at any time discovered I am induced to believe chiefly upon this account Because none can be in perfect health at least not abide therein for any time who hate not Evacuations by their belly once a day Which natural evacuation is no less necessary for the maintaining and the preservation of Health than our daily food for the nourishing of our Body For 〈◊〉 way of living doth but as much require that the best and most succulent part of our food be carried by the Lacteal Veins for nourishment to our Body as that the worst and grosser part which too long retain'd doth cast forth hurtful yea venemous scents be by Nature or Art cast out by the common Privy of the Body Truly Purging hath most justly acquired to it self that Reputation and Renown that in common discount it alone hath the very ample and honourable name of Physick It hath been my constant custom these last seven Years to enjoyn Purging in the Fevers of Children and the youngest Infants according to the prescript of that commended Method altho I did set it at nought for these People of full Age And neither can I express how much it did answer my expectation and design Wherefore when at first I did seriously read th' afore mentioned â—chedule I had as great joy and gladness of Spirit as if I had received some signal favour from God Therefore I was easily perswaded most succesfully to try that method of Purging of People of full Age who had found before the most desired event of it in the Feavers of young ones But the first Indication in the Cure of the Fevers of Infants is to prepare the Acid aright And it shall become most evident that Acids must of necessity be prepared before they can be purged off with advantage if we will but a little consider the nature of an Acid If viz. we shall reflect upon its great power of Coagulating and Posseting if as the general cause of Obstructions which do arise from it if the natural tendency of all Liquors if you do except the most Spirituous into an Acid if the great trouble that Physicians meet with in the Curing of these people whose Bodies do abound with Acidity and above all if we shall consider those Gripes which attend the purging of these Bodies that abound with Acidity without preparation I know that this saying Preparation of humours may be read amongst â— great many Authors And their design was that the ensuing Purgative might have the better event They did intend to attenuate gross humors mitigate hot ones to open the Obstructed Passages or to force these by Diaphoreticks through the Pores of the Skin But they mustered up against these I know not what great train of Syrups Simple distill'd Waters and a great many such trifles which were of no use for the designed preparing or altering of the Body And the time which should have been spent in subjugating the acute Disease was squander'd away in idleness and ignorance if not worse But I think this whatever preparation had its rise from that common but not throughly understood Aphorisme of Hippocrates § 1. N. 12. Things Concocted not Crude are to be medicated And I do believe that the continual wresting of this great Canon into Senses very strange and forreign to the purpose is the Cause why so many famous Physicians in the by-past Ages have so little dreamed of the benefit and advantage of purging in continued Fevers For indeed the first beginnings of Fevers and especially after the sick persons are confin'd to a warm Bed do very often give most evident signs of Crudity the assistant Physicians however happy Practitioners they be upon other occasions for the most part do instantly betake themselves to Diaphoreticks as their only refuge and they are as
Diseases hath been so ill thought of by very learned Physitians seement to me quietly and under thumb to be this because viz. they did drive as people speak the plough before the Oxen h.e. they did purge before blooding or at least having no thought of it where it was most requisite did rashly give some one of the strongest Purgatives Albeit that any notable Translation of the subject matter of the Fever â—nto the Lungs and Chin-coughs â—o advise Blood-letting for the youngest Infants yet it is most evident that it is not a Remedy naturally convenient for them neither is it more contradictory and unfitting for this most tender then decrepit Old Age. And therefore its help is not to be invoked for all the Diseases of Infants except in the Chin-coughs or any other Coughs that do attend and are concomitants of Fevers that do suddenly begin and unless for grievous contusions which do sometime occur For it is not supposible that Infants being nourished with thin and slender Food should be affected with a true Plethory however florid they be They do all abound with Humidity which is easily changed into a Praeternatural Acid the cause of all their Diseases Neither can I be made believe that blood-letting can alter and correct an humid Constitution especially when it hath already degenerated into Acidity There are some who through aâ— obstinate itch of contradicting oâ— blame and accuse the use of Blood-letting even for people of full Age. And these are the Through-followers and Disciples of peaceable Helmont that most trusty Friend of the Old Medicine these happy and fortunate Heirs to so great Secrets of which neither Physick or the Common-Wealth have been worthy It 's they viz. who have succeeded to a not common sort of Chymistry unknown to all skilled Physicians but which produceth wonderful Effects to these Philosophers by the fire All testaceous Medicaments do wonderfully dry and therefore are very proper for the curing of these Diseases which proceed from too much Humidity and for these Constitutions which so much abound with it But the Constitution of boys is most humid because it is of all the most delicate and soft But they are also somewhat adstringent which is lost by burning yet thereby do they assume a good deal of Acrimony and Hotness which are most evident in Quick-lime and a great many more Chymical Medicaments But they do also most power fully blunt and defeat Acidity which as naturally attendeth the corruption of Aqueous Humidity as Heat doth Fire Moreover testaceous Medicaments do not at all warm their tender bodies which consideration doth easily induce me top prefer them to all other in the cure of Infants Diseases But there are other things for which I recommend the use of Testaceous Medicaments for Children Their Stomach is endued with a devouring and insatiable sort of Ferment which delicate and liquid Food cannot still quiet for any time Being it must be blunted with Butter which swimmeth long upon the upper Orifice of the Stomach or be nourished with Panado or Pudding which are not easily cast out of the Ventricle And I have frequently observed sick children feeble and dull only because they were nourished with too thin and liquid Food Wherefore testaceous Medicaments are upon many Accounts very agreeable with the Nature and Constitution of Children neither doth doth that change or alteration made by them in the Stomach wear off so soon as that which is made by Liquid Medicines That I may say nothing of very many Fowls which when drooping by a Pica or depraved Appetite have been recovered by Sand cast amongst and swallowed down with their Food as the Poultrey-women do very well know By testaceous Medicines I do not only mean strictly those made of Shells but Coral also Corallin both the Bezoars and the like which are known to absorbe Acidity and are of the same nature although they be quite of another Origine These Medicaments have been much used by Physicians but their use as adjusted to Children's Constitutions was either altogether unknown or was of very small help and advantage For their too too spare Dose wag truly the cause why Physicians in the Watchings and Pains of Infants fled from these sure and safe Remedies unto Opiats which are by far the more dangerous if not hurtful and diametrically opposite to their Nature and Constitution And I cannot but relate how I was once mocked by a very famous Physician upon this account When viz. at my desire he was called for assisting in the cure of a Noble Child the Heir of very great Possessions who was ordinarily entrusted to my care and at that time was sick of a most dangerous Feaver and when he proposing a Narcotick instantly to be given unexpectedly found me refractory to his design You said he if so you be resolved do seem to practise after a way that 's obsolet and out of fashion to whom I replyed That I did not neither would I ever practise for Children as is now the custom Being I do as surely yea more certainly unless I be entirely deceived and at least more safely allay all their Gripes lessen their Watchings and asswage their Pains by the fore-going Medicaments than any can do however they esteem Narcoticks by these kind of Remedies given with the greatest hazard of their life I know no such mad admirers of Opiats that ever recommended their use for the weakest Constitutions though some even in this case have covertly tryed their strength Remembering perhaps the proverb that dead Men tell no Tales But being the Pulse of Infants is of all the most weak their Constitution naturally the most tender and their strength very infirm I cannot conceive why any should make choice of uncertain and dangerous Medicaments for the curing of Infants Diseases when safer yea the most safe may be as easily purchased This also I shall add that scarce any of their Maladies however tormenting did require the least tasting of Narcoticks properly so called ever since I had sufficient knowledge of the most anodyne yea so poriferous power for Infants of these testaceous Medicaments providing they be given in quantity sufficient for attaining the Design But as no Opiats are to be approved of for Infants Diseases so neither can I recommend any liberal use of these hot Medicaments however salutiferous and cordial they be in their Name For the word Cordial hath been curiously and with abundance of artifice contrived for the soothing of all the Gay-women for the taking of Country-women who very often dwell far from skilful Physicians for good Matrons who with so great honour use these Cordials for all Diseases in their Eleemosynary Practice and lastly for pleasing the ignorant upon all occasions For who could expect any evil by the taking of a Cordial Yet it may be a question amongst Learned Physicians whether of those who have ended their days by a natural Death more have truly died by Diseases or by these Cordials