are most vigorous and active for in the beginnings of Animals the Ferments are very languid especially I say in the Matrix and therefore the Transmutations they make are but very slender and tennious whence is the facil reduction of the minute Embryo into its first Spermatick Juyce or Elementary Liquor In Children the Ferments grow stronger but yet is very weak whence is their aptness to breed worms which proceed from a debilitude of the embalming Ferments as Children grow up in years the Ferments grow more strong and therefore they require stronger meat and the Transmutations of the Ferments are more vigorous whence the bones and flesh of young Men become more solid and firm and that increaseth till the body come to its full stature so that it is the vigour of the Ferments that gives flower and strength to the body and their defects give being to Diseases make the Spirits flag the sinews shrink and the flesh wast away by a lingring Tabes and that too oftentimes in the very spring of Youth even many times whilst we are upon the Meridian of our days occasionally from the assaults of many Diseases When we are once arrived to the Zenith of our Years that the florid strength of our bodies are demonstrable Indexes of the agil vigour of our Ferments and vital Functions we stay not long here but then begin to decline and to go down the hill our strength begins gradually to be impaired and that because our Ferments and Vital Powers when once mounted to their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are labil and in continual Flux for so all mortal powers are they begin grow come to their full state decline and come to a Period either by a further transmutation or reduction into the first Hyle or primitive Chaos therefore they spontaneously decay and with them the Fabrick of the solid parts of the body so that old Men that live out the full number of days do but spin forth a longer consumptive thread than others they wear away with an insensible Tabes having their succulent parts dried up by the exiccating Blass of the Air and that through the deficiencies of the vital Ferments And thus Old Age performs that at the long run which a lingring Disease whose Seminals are deeply seated in any principal part as stomach lungs liver veins c. vitiating the Ferment thereof doth in a less time as perhaps in a year half a year three months or less viz. wear away the body by a continual wasting or Consumption until the parts are reduced to a Skeleton which being after entombed in the earth doth as all other bodies by the fracedinous odour thereof Fatiscere in succum suum primitivum legesque aquae subire turns into a sort of Leffas and that by a further reduction is nothing else but water not to say what a great quantity of effluvia or vapours which for the most part are materially water pass continually through the pores of our bodies perhaps if duly computed not much less than the one half of the weight of the food we take in and yet is nothing but water circulated in our bodies through various Fermentations and at length reduced to its primitive simplicity Thus we begin we grow we come to our full stature from the operation of Seed and Ferments upon water whose degrees of vigour upon the material stage thereof gives the various Stadiums of Life Then we bend to Diseases we decline we die when the vital Powers and formal Ferments march off the stage and have their exit into their primitive Hyle and the body then ultimately reducible into water by the Fracedo of the Grave Hence I conclude all bodies in the Mundane System whether Vegetable Animal or Mineral from water as the material Element and by Seed as the efficient Agent have not only the Beginning But THE END AN APPENDIX Concerning the ORIGINAL of SPRINGS 1. IT is not the least part of Dr. Wittie's Book to Discourse of the Original of Springs and therein to assert their original to be from Rain and Snow-water from the confluence of which two he supposeth all Springs to flow and that after this manner viz. the Snow and Rain falling from the Clouds in great abundance upon the Earth do by moistening the Superficies cause it to bring forth Vegetables which we grant viz. That the moisture exhal'd from the Sea and Earth carryed up into the Clouds becomes impregnated with an influential Nitrous Salt or Sal Hermeticum floting to and again in the Atmosphere And circulated or cohobated upon its Caput mortuum the Earth gives fertility to the ground and makes it apt to bring forth Vegetables 2. The remaining part saith he except what suddenly runs into Rivers sinks down by secret passages into the earth with which the Superficies doth abound and in rocky ground it runs through the clefts and by them is conveyed to the Subterraneal Chanels more or less deep in the earth where it is concocted by the earth and moves as blood in the veins c. We shall indeed admit thus far of what he saith viz. That Rain and Snow-water are the proximate cause of all Land-Springs and sudden Flouds silling the Porosities and Chanels of the Superficies of the Earth the remaining part restagnates till it find declive Currents out of Brooks and Ditches into other Rivulets and those again by further passages swell into Rivers and thereby cause inundations of low grounds till those Rivers empty themselves by other intermediate ones into the Sea it self But that the same should be the cause of the Fontes perennes viz. of Living Springs I altogether deny as shall afterwards be evinc'd more clearly 3. This Water saith he at length in its passage through the veins of the Earth finds vent and runs forth which place of eruption we call a Spring or Fountain And this springing forth or eruption of the water I conceive saith he to be made from its own natural inclination and tendency towards its proper place assigned to it by the Creator which is the convex part of the earth it not resting till it meets with its natural correspondent the Air under which it must needs lie because of its greater gravity as above the Earth by reason of its levity And this I think saith he to be the natural reason of its ebullition out of the Earth 4. Here the Doctor hath at once conceiv'd and brought forth the causes as he supposeth of all manner of Springs and their manner of issuing out of the Earth viz. from rain and snow-Snow-Water and their tendency in the Channels of the Earth to their proper place the convex part thereof For he having numbred three general Opinions concerning the Original of Springs viz. first by percolation of the Sea secondly by transmutation of Earth or Air into Water within the Bowels of the Earth Or lastly by Rain or Snow with the last of which he closeth As for the second viz. the Opinion of the
earth to imbibe Rain-water as a sponge where it meeting with capillary veins as I may call them or small pores not clefts or crevises which are scarce to be found but amongst Rocks and Rocky Soyls sinks down by degrees into larger veins and those into Subterraneal Chanels where it makes Land-Springs which supply many Draw-wells yea and many of them run into Rivers too which help to keep Rivers high in Winter time above the ordinary pitch they are found to be upon droughts 29. The next difficulty that springs up which indeed is the most considerable is If Rain-water sink much deeper than ten foot into the caverns of the earth as he supposeth Then what shall fetch it up again to make it supply Springs that are upon Hills or high Heaths nay upon the very level of Plains themselves For it must be a retrograde motion of the same water which before descended into such low caverns of the earth Facilis descensus Averni Sed revocare gradum superasque ascendere ad auras Hic labor hoc opus 30. The next Objection he brings out of Seneca and his solution evince no more than what we grant viz. That there may be additional Land-Springs and that amongst Rocks which receive their supply from Rain and Snow-water which upon droughts are dryed up and therefore are not Quick-Springs whose Original I shall shortly hint to be otherwise besides he acknowledgeth that in solid Clay Soyls it is very rare to find any eruption of water because such are sad earth and have few or no caverns or chanels in them but our Springs Saith he break out ordinarily in rocky and gravelly ground especially the best and most lasting Springs such as we call Fontes perennes which indeed is most certainly true for they are not found but as accompanyed with a boyling gravel or sand called by Helmont Quellem or Sabulum Bulliens which makes nothing at all towards the proving his Assertion 31. The last Objection he brings out of Seneca is That in the dryest Soyl where they dig Pits two or three hundred foot deep there is often found great plenty of water which he calls living-Living-water as not coming from the Clouds Dr. Wittie's Solution of which Objection is thus From whence then should it come from the Sea Perhaps saith he the Sea is as many Miles from that water as the Superficies of the earth is feet from it Suppose it were say I What might hinder but that water might be carryed from the Sea by Subterraneal Chanels at far greater distances than so If Seas communicate with each other as we shall shortly endevour to prove it must be by Subterraneal Chanels many of which must be of far greater length 32. Perhaps it may come saith the Doctor from the Transmutation of Aer into Water for such a Transmutation I cannot saith he deny so that in short to me it seems as if he hovered between two whether to ascribe the Original of Spring-water to the Transmutation of Air into Water or to Snow and Rain-water Only he saith indeed It 's most probable to come from Rain so that That at the hardest and at the long run carries it yet that of the Transmutation of Air into water is not without its peradventure and that he thinks very well confirm'd too by an instance he brings in which is We see saith he Churches become wet before Rain falls from this cause Why What is the cause viz the transmutation of Air into Water and truely I am apt to believe that in moyst weather as sure as the Air is transmuted into water which moystens the Stone-Walls of buildings so sure is Air in the Bowels of the Earth transmuted into Water yea and so sure is the Original of Fountains from Rain and Snow Water 33. I wonder the Doctor 's Philosophy in his second Edition should not come forth more maturate then to adhere to this old and long since exploded transmutability of Elements which has no true solide Basis to be grounded upon For if the watryness we find in moyst weather upon stones of Walls and Floors of Buildings be from the transmutability of Air into Water and that he informs us before that reasons tells us that more then ten parts of Air will not serve for the making one of Water I think saith he twenty would be too little if so many parts I say of Air be too little to make one of water and yet so much water is made according to his own supposition as serves to moysten Stone-Walls and Floors in moyst weather before rain then what must supply the place and fall into the rear of so much transmuted Air The water thence made is but as onetoten or twenty which therefore cannot supply the necessary vacancy because one cannot make up nine much less nineteen Wherefore a horrible vacancy would if this Doctrine were true long ere this have surprised the body of Air. 34. Yea and suppose we should with him admit of the possibility of the transmutation of Air into Water in the bowels of the Earth for the furnishing of Springs for such Transmutation saith he I cannot deny and keep our proportion of twenty to one What a vast Vacuum long ere this had the Mundane Systeme groan'd under Which would have impos'd one of these two grand absurdities thereon viz. either the circulation of bodies one upon another requisite for the maintaining the unity and intirenes of the World would be intercepted by the great contiguous Vacuums which must follow wanting other bodies so to tear themselves in pieces as to supply the place of the deficient Air or else those who live in the last Ages or the longest might have cause to fear least the same mishap might fall to their lot as happens to those poor Animals that get into Squire Boyl's Air-pump viz. to dye of Spasmes and Convulsions through the thinness of the Air which would be so interspersed with contiguous Vacuums made wider yet by the frequent transmutation of Air into Water as that we should not be able to live therein or lastly we should constantly be expos'd to the same injury that those are who travail over the Mountains call'd Andes in America where the Air is so thin and rarified as they travayl not without danger of being stifled for want of Air and therefore usually they carry Sponges moystened with Water for the condensing the Air or the vapours therein which Air is so dispos'd there to Inflammations as that Travellers as the Ingenious Kircherus observes seeme to belch forth flames and being all in a sweat appear as if incircl'ed with Fire 35. I must needs indeed grant that the Air hath its Vacuolums or little Interstices its texture being like a net or spong by which it becomes the more capable of being as a vehicle for transmitting rarifyed Water and other vapours of the Atmosphere becoming thereby the better Subservient to the performing the great circulation of water from the Sea and
Earth up to the Clouds and from thence down again to the Earth but that the moysture in the Air should be reputed Air transmuted into Water viz That which falls upon stone-walls in moyst seasons is so absurd as it 's enough to confute it to name it So that we may conclude that the moysture in the Air which settles it self upon the Walls and floors of Stone-buildings neither is nor ever was Air and that the transmutability of Air into Water in the bowels of the Earth is impossible and lastly that Springs viz. the fontes perennes have not their Original from Rain and Snow 36. Thus I have run through the most considerable things which the Doctor offers in order to the confirming his opinion of Rain and Snow Water to be the Original of Quick-springs and all along I think have probably if not demonstratively overturn'd his Opinion together with the grounds arguments and reasons thereof I might I confess multiply more words in prosecuting at large his whole discourse but studying brevity I have couch'd all he hath to say that is any way pertinent to his purpose saving the story he relates out of Dr. Heylin concerning the Island of Cyprus in the Mediterranean Sea which without reflection on that worthy Author who as well as other Historians may probably take many things upon trust which I say as to the verity of matter of fact I should very much scruple viz. That a drought should continue so long as thirty six years so as all the Springs Torrents or Rivers were dried up and that in the dayes of Constantine the Great It 's very probable he had it by Tradition which many times to wing Fame makes large plumes That an Island so near the Mediterranean Sea should want rain for 36 years together would certainly put an ordinary credulity upon the Tenter-hooks and stretch a Thomas beyond his ordinary pitch for of all places Islands are the most frequented with Showers And that it should be done designedly by God upon a miraculous divine account I do not well understand because that has its ends and aims for the punishing the Natives where judgements are brought forth which done they frequently cease but here according to the story they were forc'd to forsake the Island and to seek for new habitations so that probably it may pass for a drought in Utopia 37. And lastly the two Rarities he mentions that are to be found upon the Castle-Hill in Scarborough viz. the deep Well which reacheth to the bottom of the rock which hath no water and the spring-Well which is within half a yard of the edge of the rock towards the Sea which never wants water which he saith doth somewhat illustrate the point in hand The first of which seems to me onely to be a Well digg'd within whose compass no Chanels have happened and therefore it is dry for so narrow a compass as a Well is may sometimes happen to miss of subterraneal Chanels And as for the other which is so neer the edge of the Rock towards the Sea which never wants Water I look upon it as supply'd from the same cause that other digg'd restagnant Wells are viz. from Land-springs which are feed from Rain or Snow-Water which yet makes nothing in reality towards the confirming his Thesis for it is no current Spring to the best of my remembrance which yet suppose it were it will not be uneasy to conceive the manner and way of its supply when I have propounded what I have to say in order to the establishing a new Thesis which will be positive to the point in hand 38. And that is as I hinted before from a circulation of Water in the Terraqueous Globe by the mediation of Subterraneal Channels along the Sabulum bulliens from Sea to Sea yea and from the Sea to the Heads of Springs and from them into Rivulets and those into Rivers and thence into the Ocean and so circulates round which also includes an other circle of Rain and Snow which first arising by exhalation from the Sea and Earth is carryed down again upon the Earth and Sea joyning Issue with rivulets from Springs swell Rivers which again discharge themselves into the Sea 39. So that a Circulation of water is as justly requisite according to the order and appointment of the primitive Cause for the upholding the Symmetry of parts and intirenes of the whole terraqueous Globe as the Cirulation of blood is necessary for the preservation of life and vital functions in the Microcosme or body of man The earth can no more produce Vegetables or Minerals without this connatural circulation of water replenish'd with Celestial influences than the blood in the body of man can produce Vital or Animal Spirits requisite for absolving the functions of life without its inbred circulation which concatenation of parts in the circulation thereof gave cause to some Philosophers of old to call the world a great Animal either because that animarum omnia plena viz. that the Seeds of all things are at hand and at the beck of the primitive Fiat alwayes at work or because of the great Symmetry of parts or coordinate circulations of the constituent Particles of the World whose proportions were so exact and actions upon each other in the circle of nature so uniform as if actuated by some Panspermion or universal operative Spirit Spiritus intus alit totumque infusa per orbem mens agitat molem 40. Not to say how Analogous the Sea and Hydrophylacia those great Cisterns of Water and Springs of the Deep that in Noah's Food joyn'd Issue with the Cataracts of Haven for drowning the World are to the heart of the Microcosme nor how Analogous the Channels of the Quellem or Sabulum bulliens which cary the Waters into the uttermost circle of the Earth for the supply of Mineral Glebes Minerals themselves and Vegetables upon the Green Carpet thereof are to the Arteries in the body of man by which the blood circulates from the Heart for the nourishment of the whole nor yet to determine the analogy of these circulating Waters further drawn up by Solar exhalations which clime up the slender Threds of Aereal Syphons into the Capitol of the Air to be impregnate there with Coelestial influences or Animal spirits if I may so call them which cohobated upon their own body promote vegetation yea and animation too by becoming that cibus occultus in aere of which the Cosmopolite and other Hermetical Philosophers discourse at large I say not to determine the Analogy of these Waters replenish'd in their circuit with Heavenly influences with those Animal spirits in the little World Man which in the Head receive a determination for obsolving the functions of sense and motion 41. Nor lastly to determine thoroughly the Analogy of water whilst circulating in the bowels of the Earth along the Channels of the Sabulum to the blood whilst circulating in the Veins and Arâ—â—ries of the humane body though
the Sea is found at sometimes great plenty of Naphtha and Bitumen which comes from the Bituminous Sea call'd Mortuum from its Lentor or toughness it 's call'd also Mare Asphalticum from Bitumen of which it has great plenty whose shores have great store of Bituminous Pits Into this Sea Jordan runs which having no other way to emptie it self but by these Subterraneal Chanels carries along with it its Bituminous offspring into the Red-Sea and that by a Chanel of 62 Leagues for so far is the Asphaltick from the Red-Sea The same happens to all Seas Lakes and great Rivers which receive others into themselves but let none forth by visible arms and therfore do it by Subterraneal passages 49. Other Lakes there are whose Superficies lies level with that of the Hydrophylacia and therefore are as Springs of the deep kept for a reserve for the furnishing upon occasion the grand Circulation Many other Rivers besides what are named do hide their Chanels in the Earth for many miles together and appear again as the Rhine in Germany Padus in the Alps but especially Guadiana of old call'd Anas a River in Spain which runs under ground in a subterraneal Chanel for 32 Miles together and breaks up again which gave occasion to the Spaniards to boast of their great Bridge which will feed so many thousand Sheep also the River Rye in Yorkshire as Dr. Wittie acknowledgeth runs under ground a quarter of a Mile and then appears again 50. And as by this Circulation of Water all Inland Seas Lakes c. communicate by Subterraneal Chanels or by visible arms one with another and at length with the common Ocean it self So by the mediation of the same hidden pipes conveyed along the Sabulum the Water circulates from the Seas and Hydrophylacia unto the Spring-heads which breaks forth at great distances either in Levels Valleys Hills or Mountains 51. Now to determine the cause of the Waters rising above the Level of the Superficies of the Sea up into the tops of Hills and Mountains a motion seemingly and indeeed really according to the Hydrostatick Laws of water considered as Extravasated contrary to the nature of the weight of Water will be here very considerable being the main thing objected against the Hypothesis of Springs taking their Original from the Sea To the better understanding of which we shall propound 52. First that this Thesis supposeth and has hitherto partly proved a Circulation of Waters or a running round from the Ocean into In-land Seas and Lakes and those into each other and back again into the Ocean but whilst running into each other they also run along other Subterraneal Chanels at great distances under the Earth until they break up into Springs Fountains and Rivers and those often as I said above the Level of the Sea Now in every Circulation or Circle there is strictly neither beginning nor end because round as a wheel or ring so that wherever you determine a beginning in a Circle there also is the end 53. But that we may be the more demonstrative I shall for better apprehension determine a beginning of this Circulation and that shall be from the Sea and from the efficient cause moving the Seas which will be the last again in the Circle and this we suppose to be the Winds Storms and pressure of the Atmosphere upon the surface of the Seas together with the influence and Ellipsis of the Moon which probably gives being to the Flux and Reflux of the Sea by causing a depression of the waters at two opposite places in the Terraqueous Globe and an accumulation of the Seas answerable thereto in the two other Quadrants of the Globous Circle which swelling of the Sea is always opposite each Tumor possessing a whole Quadrant of the vast Ocean these Tumors rowl about the earthy Globe in Twenty four hours thereby agitating the whole bulk of the Seas and driving up the waters by the Subterraneal Chanels into the Hydrophylâ—cia and from thence by Hydragogal Syphons up Hills Mountains and high Heaths to the heads of Springs and Fountains 54. That there is besides the weight of Clouds Storms Winds c. a pressure of Water by Air is evident in common Hydrostatick Experiments for if you put down a glass Tube into a vessel of water you will find the water in the Tube to be above the level of the water in the vessel and that for no other cause than that the pressure of the Air upon the surface of the water in the vessel is stronger than the resistance of that Ayr that is pent up in the Tube and that it is so is evident because if you stop up the upper end of the Tube with your thumb or the like you will find that the Ayr in the Tube not having the liberty of recoyling becomes strong and presseth so much upon the water as that it raiseth up the water in the vessel to such a height proportionable to the compass of the Tube which I have thus tryed by taking a pint-white-Viol fill'd with water to about a fingers breadth of the mouth into which I let down a glass Tube stopping the upper end closely with my thumb the Ayr in the Tube would so press upon the water as that the glass would in a manner be quite full but upon removing my thumb the water would immediately run up the Tube two or three fingers breadth above the level of the water in the Viol and bubble up to and again till it settled a little above the surface of the water in the Viol and that still because water follows the strongest impulse of Ayr which while the Tube is closely stop'd bears down the water and raiseth it on the surface thereof whereas when the Ayr in the Tube has liberty again then the water being pressed by the Ayr upon the Superficies thereof mounts up speedily above the level of the water in the Viol. 55. So in like manner we see in a Weather-glass which is suppose a Globe or Egg-glass inverted into a vessel of water which if you do without altering the tone of the Ayr in the glass the water riseth very little within the Tube and that because of the resistance that is made by the unaltered Ayr in the glass but if you heat the glass and thereby thin the Ayr you will find the water to ascend gradually to a considerable height above the level of the water in the vessel which suppose to be done in the foresaid pint-Viol and you shall see the water five or six fingers breadth above the surface of the water in the Viol which when cool set it before the fire or expose it to the heat of the Sun so the heat be proportionable and you will find it descend as fast as it ascended before 56. Which argues That Ayr when altered by heat gives a different and that a less pressure upon the body of water than when it is in its natural texture and therefore upon the
Alkahest of Paracelsus and Helmont that primum ens salium their grand Solvent doth as Helmont saith dissolve all sorts of concretes whatever into their primitive juyces These Salts or Spirits out of which common Menstruums are made are either acid and those either naturally so as the Essurine acidity which is to be found in Allom and Vitriol Stones also in the sowr juyces of Herbs and Fruits amongst which that from Grains or Wines is most eminent or are so made from Mineral Salts by force of fire as spirit of Vitriol spirit of Nitre Salt c. 15. Or secondly from Alkalizate Salt and those either fixed as Salt of Tartar Wormwood Broom or any other vegetable fixed Salt or volatile as spirit of Urine Blood Harts-horn or the like volatile spirit from any vegetable as Sage Wormwood and the like the Alkalizate Salts are used to dissolve in water for the extraction of Brasil Sena c. and the volatile spirits mixed with a vinous spirit helps to procure a stronger solution and tincture of Mirrh Aloes and Saffron than spirit of Wine alone would for the making Elixir Preprietatis 16. Or lastly Menstruums are made from vinous spirits which is the frequent Menstruum for extracting the subtil sulphurious Medicinal parts of many vegetables though I have seen and made a fourth sort of Salt in order to a Menstruum which was an artificial one made by the fire which indeed is a kind of result from the three former Salts or Menstruums and being dissolv'd in water or spirit of Wine makes no ebullition with either alkalizate solutions or acid spirits 17. Now whatever it is that one of the two first dissolves the other being added precipitates if any solution or extraction be made with alkalizate Salts or volatile Spirits upon the mixing a little acid spirits of Vitriol Allom Nitre or the like a precipitation is presently made of the dissolv'd body as for instance in the preparation of the Magistery of Chochineel or other vegetables as the primary Ingredient for the confection of Alkermes which is made by a decoction of the Berries in water acuated with Oyl of Tartar when by this means by itterated affusions of more of the same Menstruum all the tincture is got upon which filtred pour the solution of crude Allom which is alone as if so much spirit of Vitriol answerable was poured on and what the lixivial Salts had dissolv'd the acid precipitates which being washt both from the taste of Oyl of Tartar and Allom is the Magistery of Kermes 18. Where take notice that the ingenious Zuelfer saith That in the preparation of this Lacca Florentina as he calls it he hath got almost double the quantity thereof respect of the Berries he first took in hand that which made up the bulk was an addition from the Menstruum and precipitating Salts 19. So likewise in the solution of Minerals or Metals as for instance in a filtred solution of Vitriol made in fair water into which if Oyl of Tartar be dropped there is presently as I said before a separation and precipitation of the Metalline parts of Copper or Iron according as the Vitriol was made and with the Colcotarine parts there doth also fall some of the very salts both of the Menstruum viz. acid salts for whose sake it is the Metalline parts appear under a form of a Liquor and also of the alkalizate salts in as much as to make the Colcotar appear single and solitary there is need of a dulcification by warm water which being filtred and evaporated gives a sediment or neutral salt of the same nature with that which is left after the evaporation of the Liquor out of which the Metalline parts were separated viz. a Tartarum Vitriolatum 20. By which it is evident that when a Mineral body is dissolv'd by an Essurine acid salt acuating a quantity of water wherein the solution is made fretting upon and subtillizing all the otherwise grosser parts of a Mineral in minima grinding them as I may say into the minutest particles that then if some of the contrary sort of salt viz. fixt or volatile alkalies be poured on the salts immediately close with one another but being of different textures of parts and thence apt to make different sorts of Menstruums and so of a contrary nature one to another fret themselves into other shapes in which fretting they cause an heat and sensible or insensible ebullition according to the intenseness or remisness of these hostile salts in the Duel they thrust forth the already dissolved Mineral or Metalline body which loosening the salts that dissolv'd them fall headlong to the bottom whilst the salts have turn'd themselves into a neutrum quid and part are faller together with the precipitated body 21. So that the salt of Tartar immediately reacheth the acid salts of the Menstruum that hath dissolv'd any Mineral body and thereby precipitates and lets fall to the bottom the dissolv'd body and part of it with some of the acid salts are carryed along with them which appears because the water wherein the Mineral precipititate body is dulcified upon evaportion gives as I said before the same things as is made from the combining of the two salts in the superstagnant water viz. a Tartarum Vitriolatum 22. Hence it is that Oyl of Tartar being dropt into the Spaw water makes a whitish coagulum or separation because of the solution of the Minera of Iron which is dissolv'd in the Essurine acidity either as it passeth through Allom stones or other proper matrixes in the bowels of the Earth wherever its sound as to its simple primitive elemental acidity it 's all one and therefore by some called the primum ens of all natural Minerals solutions Spaw waters and salts 23. For this Mineral acidity is the very solvent in the water which pervading a Minera of Iron makes a slight solution of it and being equally contempered together makes up the body of the Spaw upon which if spirit of Vitriol or any other acid Liquor be poured it makes no alteration in the water because of similariness of parts between the acid spirit of Vitriol and the acid solvent in the water no more than fair water mixed with fair water or spirit of wine mixed with spirit of wine but fixt and volatile alkalies being of a contrary temper precipitate whatever Mineral solutions the other hath made for an ingenious Friend of mine took a good quantity of the Spaw water upon which he poured some lixivium of Tartar which caused a great curdling separation of a white matter by standing a while a white sediment fell to the bottom which when the water was poured off and the rest dryed to a powder became a white and almost insipid calx by which it was evident that both the salts viz. the acid salt of the Spaw and the lixivial salt became dissolv'd together in the restagnant water and only let the aluminous calx which the acidity of the
like the water of the Spaw it self or the solution of Allom which with addition of Spirit of Vitriol or aqua fortis becomes clear and with Oyl of Tartar becomes white which may be again restored to its pristine Clarity by adding Spirit of Vitriol or aqua fortis c. 4. The fame Solution having some drops of Spirit of Harts-horn mixed therewith gives a white separation and with Spirit of Salt becomes clear again answerable in every particular to the Spaw water it self 5. Some of this clear Solution I distill'd in a Glass retort until what remained was a bright styriate floscule increasing the fire somewhat more it came to be a dry white Salt of a stiptick allumenous taste 6. The water which was distill'd off from this Salt being saved in a glass Receiver whose joints was close stopped would not give any alteration of colour either with solution of Gauls or with lixivium of Tartar which argued that no heterogeneous volatile parts of the same nature with the Salts came over the helm 7. All which put together evince no less than a parity or likeness of Principles between that Mineral earth and the Spaw water for from a parity of Principles in an homogeneal process results a likeness of products so that the Spaw is nothing else but this Essurine acid Salt in its Mineral earth in toro suo Metallico being an allumenish terrestrial Globe dissolv'd in the current Spring of water 8. For the specifical difference of all Mineral Salts depend upon these three viz. a Sulphurious acid essurine spirit water and a Mineral Glebe from the various solutions and mixtures of which arise the variety of Mineral Salts in the bowels of the earth 9. Water impregnate with this acid sulphurious spirit diffus'd thorough the occult Meanders of the terraqueous Globe according to the nature of the Mineral Glebe it meets withal it becomes coagulated into such and such a salt for if this acidulated water find a salsuginous Glebe it becomes coagulated according to the property of that Glebe together with its connate salt in a sal marine which with greater dashes of water passing thorough the subterraneal channels becomes dissolv'd and carryed into the Ocean thence the saltness of the Sea which hath its Minera from fossile salt from which also some Springs are fatturate as the Sulphur Well at Knarsbrough c. 10. If the suphurious acidulate water meet with Nitrous Veins it coagulates into Nitre which being by other current streams of water dissolv'd very probably become the original of intensely cold springs viz. such as Magnus Well Cockroft Well c. which though to touch extremely cold yet by an intrinsick sulphurious warming property doth so notably open the pores of such as are bathed therein as that it resolves the congealed blood and latex settled about the joints and outward parts of the body thence becoming the cause of Pains Aches Stiffness Numbness and Lameness of the joints which by the penetrating opening virtue of those Nitrous springs are resolv'd and thence a redintegration of the glyssent ferments of the blood and humours which give warmth and motion to all the parts again 11. If the aforesaid essurine water find a Mineral Iron bed it becomes determin'd thereby either into a Vitriol or becomes the original of most acid Spaws called Fontes aciduli sharp springs such as Tunbridge Epsom Knarsbrough c. amongst which this of Scarbrough is not the least 12. The sweet Spaw of Knarsbrough is but languid of Mineral principles having but a very slight touch of the Minera of Iron and hath the essurine acidity but in a very remiss degree thence it is that great quantities must be gulped down before any sensible operation by purgation 13. As the Minera of Iron terminates the sulphurious acidity into vitrioline sharp springs so in like manner the Minera or primum ens of Copper coagulates this essurine salt into a cuprous Vitriol and that either fossile to be digged out of Mines or iâ— further dissolv'd in a water spring which by exhaling the moisture by the Sun or by boyling it up over a fire it shoots into Vitriol Or lastly this acidity is coagulated in Mineral cuprous stones which being expos'd to the air become resolv'd by the falling of Rain water thereon which after filtration and boyling up shoot in great troughs into common Vitriol 14. But if this essurine sulphurious water find an allumenish Glebe or Rock it becomes thereby coagulated into natural Allom receiving a specifical difference from that particular Mineral Glebe whereby it becomes different from the other coagulations of the same Mineral acidity which by further dissolution in the current of a water spring give being to this of Scarbrough and other the like Spaws SECT 5. 1. NOw whence the great variety of Mineral glebes should proceed is a Philosophical query worthy our most choice consideration especially seeing that from the multiplicity hereof the sulphurious acid spirit becomes determined to this or that particular specifical salt of sal marine Nitre Vitriol and Allom. 2. For in these the Metals are in solutis principiis in their primitive juyces their Mercuries though volatile crude and undigested yet are spermatical and as such are the radical moisture of Metals not to say the Mercury of Philosophers these are apt to be coagulated and maturated into Metals by the embryonate Sulphurs which lurk in intimis Thalamis glebarum metallicarum which according to the purity or impurity of the terrestrial Matrix and degrees of the graduation of the Sulphurs are determined and specificated in imperfect and perfect Metals to the completing the septenary of the Metallick order besides their middle Minerals which are in the Road to Metalization 3. That all Metals and Minerals have their innate seeds shut up in themselves we shall not need to spend time to confirm in auro semina sunt auri quamvis abstrusas recedunt longius seeing that their spermatick principles become prolifick suo more whose seed operating in a volatile crude Mercury and an embrionate Sulphur become deducible after the manner of a natural genesis unto their state of maturation accord to the process of their concretes in the Vegetable kingdom 4. We may therefore consider that as God the original Founder of all beings hath implanted in the superficies of the earth that great variety of vegetable seeds whence the diversity of Plants not only sprung up at first but by their seminal beginings or somewhat analogous thereto have continued to propagate themselves in their species 5. Every Vegetable at its proper season by the instigation of the heavenly influences having its seminals set at work in which it hath its own specifick faber or if I may so call it Archeus which by its innate plastick power begins to hew forth it self a body out of the elementary principle of water shaping it self in stalk branches leaves flowers seeds and fruits according to the platform laid in the seminal beginings
but specificks will doe such I mean as hath power not only of correcting and preventing the enormous flatus but also of abstersing the subtle cadaverous sordes reposed in the inward chanels of the animal spirits by inclining them to a transpiration sweetning also the concomitant spurious acidities which is particularly done by some noble vitriolin Arcana's The Elixir Propâ—ietatis and volatile tincture of Coral of Paracelsus and Helmont per spiritum sanguinis per lac perlarum per appensa c. 9. The same circulated cadaverous recrement sometimes settles upon the spongy parenchyme of the Lungs at which borret Archcus flatum suffocativum extimulat which suddainly obstructs the porosities thereof and causeth an Asthma which often intercepting the air hinders the ventilation of the vital fire in the Heart if prevalent suddainly puts out lifes taper 10. This is not curable by the Spaw being too languid in its virtue to reach the Lungs especially when it is come on to the ripeness of an Asthma is curable by the former specificks and that because an Asthma Epilepsie Apoplexie and Palsie are identical in their material and efficient causes viz. The same circulated anodynous cadaverous recrement settling in different places cause the foresaid Diseases in the brain the Epilepsie in the membranous and nervous parts the Apoplexie and Palsie If it only vitiate the organs of motion salvo sensu then it 's the Palfie but if both motion and sense be deprav'd and that with a vibration upon one side or through the whole body then it is surely an Apoplexie 11. But if by a transmigration of this peccant matter it become coagulated in the Lungs then an Asthma of which as also of the other syncritical Diseases I may say as formerly hath been of the Quartain That they are ludibria Medicorum and therefore to be found only in the Catalogue of Incurables And what 's the matter Nothing but we want well prepared Medicines which either our idleness or our ignorance or both will not suffer us to attain to 12. These Disease being congenial in their causes are the same in their Cures therefore none of them curable by the solitary assistance of the Spaws but by the power of abstersive and restorative Arcana's such as the aforesaid remedies and the like 13. It is true Dr. Wittie brings in two instances of the virtue of the water in the Palsie but if you observe The Disease in both Patients was at the declining hand and probably nature by degrees might have wrought it forth without the help of the waters It 's very probable the change of air and the exercise of the body by riding might contribute as much to the Patients assistance as the water Besides it may be The paroxysm of this Disease might be hastened by the exorbitancy of the stomach and foulness thereof which being rectified by the abstersive property of the Spaw might be alleviated thereby 14. He gives one and but one instance of help in the Epilepsie by the water He tells us of an excellent success he had seen in that one that was Epileptick but how or after what manner it appeared we must not know though he doth indeed ingenuously confess if the Diseases of the Palsie Epilepsie Vertigo be idiopathick be radically in the head or otherwise though the malady arise from sympathy if it be in the begining of the paroxysm or in its state the morbid humour being fixed in such cases he acknowledgeth the improperness of the water 15. Where by the way take notice that those three Diseases have not always the head for their principal seat for though in the Epilepsie and Virtigo in the one there be a vellication of the membranous and perhaps nervous parts of the brain and in the other a consternation of the animal spirits lodg'd there and that either by a deuteropathy being disturb'd from other parts or by an idiopathy in the very membranous and nervous parts themselves yet notwithstanding the Palsie hath not its original seat in the head but in the genus nervosum and the inhabitants thereof viz. the animal spirits and therefore may be and is in other parts of the body salvo capitis regimine For it is the catastrophe of these spirits that gives being to the paroxysm of these Diseases viz. of the Epilepsie and Palsie c. and when ever they are found smitten with a flatus arising from the antipathy of the putredinous cadaverous recrement and the aura vitalis there to be sure is the Disease in what part soever of the body it is found To confirm which viz. that the head is not the chief seat of the Palsie I shall bring in a considerable instance of a paralytick Patient to whom I had the hap to be called after seven or eight other Physicians and pretenders to Physick had been consulted he lives in Fernedale belonging to the Duke of Buckingham This Patient had lingred most part of two years under his Distemper the occasional cause whereof was as far as I could learn either from the damp of the earth being imployed to over-see and sometimes did work in an Hough as the Country-People call it of Blacomoore for some suppos'd Mine of Plute some treasure deeply lodg'd in the earth but found none or else by going into the water in the Summer time to Fish either of which might occasionally give being to his Disease He was gradually taken of all his joynts and sometimes had neither sense nor motion in most parts of his body but most frequently if not altogether had little or no sense especially from the lower parts of his body downward insomuch as if any weight lay heavy on those parts or any great heat from the fire scorched them he was not sensible nor at all complain'd He could mostwhat move all his joynts as he sate or laid and that pretty nimbly but when he came to stand his knees shaked under him his legs bended and he glad to be held up from falling in ones arms His hands and arms he could move very well but when he came to take up any meat to put in his mouth he always either left it or let it fall so was helped by another both for his meat and drink taking Yet all this while salvoregimine capitis had all his senses in his head for saving a glimmering of his eyes whereby he could not read distinctly which might very probably be from the weakness of the optick nerves together with some alteration of the texture of the vitreous and cristaline humors thereof I say excepting this weakness in his eyes he had his memory as perfect as ever could cast Account as well as before had his hearing taste and smelling in good order could eat his meat pretty well without the least trembling or shaking of his head The Physicians he had consulted had ordered him Vomits and Purges in great plenty Unguents not a few and Baths too many for he was alway the worse after
remained a pale-coloured Sediment much the same with that which remains after the distillation of the Scarborough Spaw viz. an Esfurine alumenish Salt which passing thorough or by some Mineral Bed of Iron licks upon it carries some small touches thereof and also passing by some Stones in its current raiseth some small portion thereof which being wrought off by the Essurine Salt it hides it with it self in the pores of the water which is that as remains after the Salt is washt from this Sediment either simply or after calcination which hath no taste nor after the separation of the Salt is dissolvable 4. To enumerate the virtues thereof were but to repeat what I have said already concerning the Scarborough Spaw and therefore shall wave it and wish a stronger Spring with a better current were endevoured thereabout for the good of that part of the Country in respect it hath but a faint Spring and would easily be dreyned if many should drink thereat This water is as deeply saturate with Mineral Principles and as throughly impregnate with Essurine Alumenish Salt as the other of Scarborough only by reason of the restagnation of the water about the mouth of the Spring is somewhat more sluggish and unapt to give its virtue All which may be mended to the great improvement thereof if a new Spring were found out The Sweet Spaw at Knarsborough 1. I Shall not speak much of this water because the ingenuous Dr. French hath writ thereof at large only shall in short say That this water hath but a small portion of an Essurine Acidity which hath a little preyed upon the Minera of Iron got a sleight touch therefrom and therein is as a Vitriol of the Minera of Iron 2. For if Gauls be put therein it turns purple and in the conclusion Inky upon which if Oyl of Vitriol be dropt it becomes clear again and by Oyl of Tartar muddied and cleared again with Oyl of Vitriol Aqua fortis c. But if you pour Oyl of Tartar on some of the fresh water it gives a white milky separation which with Oyl of Vitriol becomes after â—bullition clear again upon which if Oyl of Tartar Spirit of Harts-horn or any volatile Saline Spirit be again poured it causeth the same white Coagulum reducible to a clarity by fresh addition of the foresaid Oyl of Vitriol Aqua fortis or the like 3. All which demonstrate That Vitrioline Solutions may undergo the same alterations by the effusion of various Liquors as Alumenish Solutions will do and that in effect as I at large shewed in the former Discourse are but the same Mineral Essurine Salt under various disguises from Mineral Beds where they become specificated into this or the other Salt from the touching upon various Mineral Glebes 4. So that in effect all Mineral Springs whether vitrioline or aluminous are the same only some waters are more strongly saturated with Mineral Salts than others in order to which we find that the Scarborough and Malton water are better fraught and more richly laden with its Minerals than this of Knarsborough which is a more poor lean water thin of Minerals and therefore greater quantities must be drunke 5. I confess I like the Air of that place much better being upon an high heathy Common than that of Scarborough especially for weak and tender bodies and in the Cure of Chronical Diseases the choiceness of the Air is of no small value nay indeed oftentimes instar omnium above all the rest For the change of the Air and the aptness and goodness thereof doth often volatize the sluggish ferment of the blood which in long continued Chronical Diseases as the Scurvy Dropsie Asthma Consumption Cachexia's c. is become flat feculent and restagnant in the vessels through the depravation of the ferment thereof which causeth the lamp of Life only to glow in the coal or Caput mort of the blood whence they commonly who are afflicted with thoses Diseases go heavily and sadly 6. Whereas when the ferment of the blood becomes restored to which change of Air doth not a little contribute that it separates the feculencies volatizeth the mass and gives wings to that which should transpire then the blood begins to circulate freely the Diseases become Cured and the lamp of Life burns with a bright flame I say the change of Air helping to volatize the blood renders it more capable of receiving some assistance by other Remedies whether the Spaw water or other Specificks 7. That this Spaw is Vitrioline and that only is demonstrable by matter of fact viz. Take a Dram of Vitriol of Iron otherwise called Salt of Steel which dissolve in a pint of Spring water of which two or three spoonfuls mixed with a glass of fresh Spring water gives the exact taste of that Spaw 8. I should advise the Drinkers of that Spaw in order to make the waters more effectual in less quantities to take Salt of Steel dissolv'd therein frequently which I am confident would add abundantly to its virtue and make it more readily answer their expectations For thereby first they need not drink such large quantities which often overchargeth the digestions stretcheth the Hypochonders and burdens nature to the prejudice of the expected future good whereas a lesser quantity acuated with an artificial Vitriol or Salt of Steel will make its way the more readily open obstructions more powerfully constringe the loose flagging membranous parts more easily and answer all indications more generally 9. Besides all which the Crocus of the Steel in that Vitriol when taken into the Stomach c. would precipitate upon which the excrementitious Salt or Tartarous recrement the great obstructer in many Diseases would be coagulated and by the peristaltick motion of the Intestines would be carryed off by siedge giving blackness to the excrements thereby sweetning the blood and hurnours 10. And therefore it is that those Mineral Springs which are the most impregnate with a natural Vitriol of Iron are not only reputed but found to be the most successful in Cures witness the two German Spaws Pawhont and Sanvenir or Savern in which though Dr. Heere 's saith That by distillation he found Rubrick Oker and a little Vitriol I mean in the Pawhom yet if we shall credit Helmont he speaks thus Distillari aliquando seriò Savenirium Pawhonteum sanè non tantum Mineralium catalogum imò nil quicquam in iis offendi prâ—â—â—â— aquam Fontanam Vitriolum ferri ab aliis aute me scriptorilue neglectum Now whether of these two is to be credited I rather think that Hen. ab Heer 's might be mistaken calling that Oker which is nothing but a sediment of the Mineral Earth of Iron dissolved by the Essurine acidity which we see is separable from Vitriol it self by a bare solution thereof in Spring or common water in the form of a yellow powder which he might easily mistake for Oker As for Rubrick I suppose it is nothing else but
their bodily Compage nor by pounding Vegetables to make Conserves thereof with the addition of Sugar nor the like addition of Sugar to the juyces thereof to make Syrups nor the additions of several Species together with Sugar and Honey for Lohochs and Electuaries I say None of these do suffer any considerable separation of the pure from the impure but the Sanguis cruor stercus of Vegetables the good and bad are all jumbled together and therefore Noble Helmont saith in his Pharmacopoeia Error Scholarum fuit succos Herbarum cum suo Parenchymate Fermento prius non subigere antequam optimarum partium selectio sit possibilis Who observing the frequent Preparations of Vegetables into Syrups Conserves and the like without any separation of parts tells us That the error thereof is for want of the knowledge of Fermentations and thereby of due separations of the pure from the impure and therefore also he saith in another place to the same purpose Discant Tyrenes sanguinem à cruore parenchymate plantarum distinguere separare si quicquam laude dignum egisse per simplicia meditentur so that unless there be some peculiar separations of earthly feculencies and other impurities which must be done by previous Fermentations in the Preparations of Vegetables we can scarce reap the Essential virtues thereof Now in Syrups Conserves Electuaries c. there are made no previous Fermentations or putrefactions and so consequently no separations of pure from impure Absque reseratione clausarum virium five vitae radice ac participatione emendatione defectuum cruditatum excrementorum potestatum violentarum Indeed Syrups and Conserves do by keeping work and ferment as we see that Syrups whilst working being close shut up in glass-bottles frequently break them though never so strong Conserves especially if made with powder'd Sugar and kept one or two years not with Loaf-Sugar which is commonly boyl'd up with a Lixivium of Calx vive do Ferment whereby the Compage of the Vegetable becomes opened out of which by a slight artifice I sometimes prepare a curious Spirit as of Roses or Rosemary Flowers which retains the taste and virtue of the Species whence they were extracted 4. Chymical Remedies are frequently more effectual in their operation than the Galenical By Chymical Medicines I do not mean such as every ordinary bragging Chymist exposeth to Sale who themselves are through their vain empty boasts no otherwise than a reproach to the noble Art of Chymistry and their Preparations spurious in comparison to the genuine products of the Spagyrical Art but such I call Chymical Medicines whose efficacy I am treating of as are made by a skilful Artist who by continued experience knows how to correct things corrigible and how by every succeeding Preparation to further inrich his Medicines with more noble virtues by making exquisite depurations and gradual seperations These will therefore more readily penetrate in intimos naturae thalamos into the more inward recesses of the Digestions and Fabrick of the vital and animal Spirits and thereby become more capable of rectifying the enormities of those nimble Agents who sit at the stern of the Digestions and govern the vital and animal functions much more than those clogging Medicines of Syrups Conserves Electuaries Lohochs Potions c. Which commonly are either rejected as nauseating to the Digestions or carryed off by seidge as cumbersom by reason of the unseparated Heterogeneities or else stuff and clog the vessels causing obstructions and thence enormous Flatulencies Concerning the constitutive Principles of all Coneretes whether Vegitable Animal or Mineral BEsides all which the Preparation of Chymical Medicines gives a diligent Searcher much insight into the Principles of Natural Philosophy which first insinuated the Tria prima of the Philosophers viz. Sal Sulphur Mercurius to be Principles of all things and that because they found in the Analysis of Bodies by the fire that they were reducible to some or all of those three for in reduction of Metals and Minerals to their first Principles as they suppos'd they found by this Art that they were separable into a Sulphur or Oyl which was the Hematina Metallorum retaining the true tincture of the Metal and into a Mercury which in the Mineral Kingdom is current Quicksilver and the key to this separation they found to be in a Mineral Salt which also needed reduction by Art to its primitive simplicity and graduation to its greatest activity They find also that Vegetables and Animals were by the Pyrotecnical Art separable into a Sulphur viz. into an Oyl or in Vegetables by Fermentation into a vinous Spirit which is the same thing with an Essential Oyl saving the different determination it receives from Fermentation also into a Salt and that either fixt or volatile for in the Concrete they are the same owing their difference to no other than to the force of fire and lastly into a Mercury which is their Phlegm or watery parts separable by fire or otherwise by the exiccating Blass of the Air. Now some of our modern Chymical Philosophers as the ingenious Dr. Willis multiply these three into five Principles which in effect are but the three first still the five which he reckons Bodies are most-what separable into rare Spirit Oyl Salt Water and Earth if by Spirit he means the vinous got by Fermentation What difference is there for both are Sulphurs both take flame and burn alike only the one is made by Fermentation the other not and being they have both the same Essential properties of Flamability What should hinder them from being Sulphurs But if he mean by Spirit the volatile saline Spirit which is not combustible This volatile Spirit by frequent rectification may be brought into the form of a volatile Salt whose Vehicle was water Phlegm or Mercury but the body of volatile Salt is Salt and therefore should not be accounted as another Principle As for that Principle which he calls Earth if a Concrete may be volatiz'd and brought over the helm without any resident Caput mort as the Chymical Adepti can perform Then I pray what becomes of his fixt Principles he calls Earth So that in the conclusion we shall find his five to be reducible into the first three These three Principles of Sal Sulphur and Mercury into which many Concretes are reducible by the Analysis of the fire are again reducible into two and those are Aqua Semen Water and Seed which are the primitive constituent Principles of all Bodies in the Mundane Systeme to which two the Sal Sulphur and Mercury are but posteriour products or offsprings of that double Original Yea whatever parts or supposed simple Principles any sort of Bodies are reducible into they are but the sequels or after-products variously extorted by force of fire of those two real Principles Water and Seed Water we suppose and perhaps may prove to be the first matter of all visible Bodies It is the true subject matter of all
Concretes which we thus prove viz. That is the first material Principle of all Bodies into which they are ultimately by a natural or artificial Analysis reducible but all Bodies are ultimately by a natural or artificial Analysis reducible into Water Ergo Water is the first material Principle of all Bodies The Major is plain and granted on all hands for the Aristotelians who plac'd the Principles of all things to be in the quaternary of Elements did it because they suppos'd but could not prove that all Bodies were reducible into those four Elements viz. of Fire Air Water and Farth so in like manner the Hermetical Philosophers in their weaving all Concretes out of their Tria prima of Sal Sulphur and Mercury did suppose them to be the first Principles because many Bodies by the artifice of the fire were reducible into some what analogous thereto And so those who encrease those three into five Principles do it because some Concretes are resolvable by fire into those five distinguishable parts which indeed are rather new products of the fire than genuine resolutions into their first Principles The Minor thereof rests to be proved viz. That all Bodies are ultimately reducible into Water by Art or Nature That it may be done by Art I shall demonstrate from an infallible Experiment of the most profound Chymical Philosopher Van Helmont who in his Tractate Entituled Elementa saith thus Nostra Mechanica mihi patefecit omne corpus puta saxum Lapidem Gemmam Silicem Arenam Marcasitam c. transmutari in Salem actualem aequi ponderantem suo corpori unde factus est quòd iste Sal aliquoties cohobatus cum Sale circulato Paracelsi suam omnino fixitatem amittat tandem transmutetur in liquorem qui etiam tandem in aquam insipidam transit quòd ista aqua aequiponderet Sali suo unde manavit viz. That by his liquor Alkahest for so I understand his words Mechanica nostra every Body whether Stones Gems Flints Sand Marcasites Earth Brick Glass Calx Sulphur c. might be transmuted into an actual Salt of the same weight with the body it was derived from or was made from and that Salt being cohobated sometimes with Paracelsus his Sal cironlatum would lose all its fixity and be transmuted into a liquor which at length would be turned into an insipid water of equal weight with the Salt whence it came He saith further Plantam carnes ossa pisces quicquid similium est novi redigere in mera sua Tria unde postmodum aquam insipidam confeci motallum autem preptor sui seminis anaticam commistionem et arena quellem difficilimè in salem reducuntur vix by the same grand Solvent liquor he knew how to reduce any plant Flesh Bones Fish and the like into their three first Principles which also were further reducible yea actually by him reduc'd into an insipid water but the reduction of a Metal was difficult by reason of the equal mixture of its Seed and so also of the reduction of Sand. Further he saith Terrae originalis sive arma tam arti quâm naturae resistat nec queat ullis adminiculis a primaeva sui constantiâ recedere unico duntaxat Grheunae drtificialis igni excepto quo arena sal fit ac tandem aqua quia vim habet agendi super sublunaria quaevis absque reactione viz that the original Earth or Sand arena Quellem resists both art and nature as to its reduction nor can it by any means recede from it Primitive constancy unless by the onely artificial fire of the Alkahest call'd by the name of Gehenna by which Sand is made Salt and at length converted into water because this solvent hath power to act upon all sublunary bodies and that without any reaction of bodies upon it By all which we may see that all bodies whatsoever are by art so transmutable as that at length they may be reduced into their simple Element of water which if it were not their first material Pricipic they could not ultimately be resolv'd thereinto for both Vegetables Animals and Minerals are by the natural Analysis of the alkahest at last reducible into common water Concerning Vegetables he saith novi aquam cujus medio omnia vegetabilia in succum distillabilem sine ullâ sui in fundo vitri residentia commutantur qui succus adjuncto alkali totus in aquam transit insipidam This is perform'd by the same Solvent liquor as the other was so that Vegetables by the powerful operation of this liquor are changed into a distillable Juyce which will pass over the helm without any Faeces or Caput mort left behind which distilled Juyce being re-distilled from Alkalies becomes totally reduced into a simple Elemental water As to Animals he saith he reduc'd Flesh Bones Fish and the like into an insipid water and as to Minerals or Metals the same is done though with more difficulty Paracelsus tells us that his Circulatum majus which he also calls acetum acerrimum metallicum primum ens liquidum Mercurii if digested upon any of the Metals doth reduce them to any oyl or supernatant fat tinctured according to the property of the Metal by which Metals are deducable into a magistery Now Helmont saith Olea pinguedines per ignem separata adjecto pauco sale Alkali saponis naturam assumunt atque in aquam elementalem abeant viz. That oyls or fats separated by fire by the addition of a little Alkali becomes Saponary and afterwards passeth into a simple Elemental water So that whether minerals and metals be by the grand liquor resolvable into a salt or into an oyl they are either way at length reducible into a water He tells us that the most rectified spirit of wine which is totus cremabilis by the intimate touch of salt of Tartar may be transmuted into an incombustible salt to the quantity of the sixteenth part of the whole the rest viz. 15 parts becomes a simple Elementary water and further that every distilled Oyl is changeable into a salt Deposito semine pinguedinis and that salt per adjuncta is convertible into water Carboquercus inquit Helmontius aquâ quadam tepore balnei spatio tridui versus est in duos liquores diaphanos fundo colore varios Quibus distillatis nil faecum remansit at ambo aequiponderabant massae carbonis liquor dissolvens manet in fundo paris ponderis sibi virium by which the excellency of the Menstruum and the reducibility of Compound bodyes in to clear liquors and those again by other additions into simple water is evident viz. that a charr'd coale of Oak should by being digested with this solvent in the heat of a Balneum for the space of three dayes be turned into two diaphanous clear liquors distinguishable in colour and consistence which being distill'd should leave no Faeces behind but should be equal in weight to the Coal it self I say this is very remarkable towards
as well as that of Antimony c. they call fires because they have a power of maturating and digesting the Mercurial Crudities into a penetrative tinging Elixir Thus we see that neither the Ternary of Principles of Hermetical Philosophers nor the quaternary of the Peripateticks nor yet quinary of the Modern Philosophers are sufficient to be accounted real radical Principles into which all Concretes should ultimately be reducible because they themselves are yet remigrable into a more simple Element and therefore ipso facto forfeit the Prerogative of primary Principles The very hinge of the matter now is Whâ—â—â—â—â— we believe the truth of Helmont's Experiments or no. As for my own particular I do not pretend the possession of that great Liquor though I have several Preparations I hope in the way towards it but methinks I cannot suspect the veracity of so Noble and Grave a Philosopher in matter of fact as to the Experiments he hath made by that Solvent though I should never live to enjoy it I cannot but think it dissonant to reason that he who wrought Thirty Years with his own hands in Chymical Experiments that he might not take things upon trust nor Jurare in verba Magistri should whil'st on the verge of the Grave in his old Age leave figments and palpable Lies in matter of fact to the World Besides he seems to be consistent with himself in matter of Experiments in which he is abundantly more plentiful than ever Paracelsus was though he also had the knowledge of that Liquor from some of the Arabian Philosophers but I am apt to believe he did not know half the extent of its use Geber and others of the Arabian Philosophers so also Lully was possessors of this secret Menstruum as may be seen in his Theorica where he tells us that he coagulated Quicksilver into a fixt Powder Et nemo scivit modum salvá Regiâ Majestate Also a Countryman of our own an Anonymus who if yet living hath it It 's not many years since he was in England some of whose Manuscripts I have by me who certainly gives more light to the Writings of another of our Country-men viz. Riply also to Count Trevisan and other Hermetical Philosophers than ever yet was done The greatest light Helmont gives in order to the Faâ—â—ick of this Liquor is as followeth viz. Chymia 〈…〉 â—ando sollicitae est corpori quod tantae puritatis â—â—â—iphoniâ colluderet nobiscum ut â corrumpente nequiret dissipari tandem stupefactaest religio reperto latice qui ad minimas reductus atomos naturae possibiles coelebs omnis fermenti connubia spernit Desperata est ejus transmutatio digniue se corpus non reperiens cui nuberet Sed labor Sophiae anomalum in naturâ fecit quod absque fermento commiscibili à se diverso surrexit Serpens seipsum iste momordit à veneno revixit ac mori deinceps nescit Of which he saith Unus idem Liquor Alkahest omnia totius universi corpora tangibilia perfectè reducit in vitam eorundem primam absque ulla sui mutatione aut virium diminutione Mundat etiam nauram virtute sui ignis Nam ut ignis omnes perimit insectas ita Alkahest consumit Morbos c. Now as by the highest Preparation in the Chymical Art Concretes become reducible into water so likewise we see in a natural circulation out of one shape into another that water is found most what to be the last For all Vegetables are distillable into a great proportion of water also all juyces of Vegetables are by Fermentation brought into potable Liquors and those again into Vinegar and that into a vapid Liquor which at length is nothing but simple water The Vine we see which is the noblest of Vegetables according to the nature of its Seed specificates the water or Succus leffas Terrae into its own shape attracting like a Syphon the Elementary Water in great plenty out of the Earth into its leaves and clusters This innate Seed which makes the difference of water coagulated in this Vegetable from that coagulated in other Vegetables by the concurrence of the influence of the Sun and Season of the Year begets a Salt and a Sulphur these mutually acting upon each other in the Mercurial part beget a Fermentation in which Fermentation there happens a separation and rejection of a feculent part to the sides of the vessels which is called Tartar from which Tartar by force of fire is separable a Sulphur Salt Mercury Spirit and feculent Earth all which are not really pre-existent in the Tartar but are new products by the fire whereof the Salt and Empyreumatick Sulphur digested together do by Distillation give a water and the Spirit at length degenerate into water Now by Fermentation and while the feculent Tartar is separating the Sulphur by working upon the Salt become united and so graduated as they both combine in the Fabrick of a vinous combustible Spirit which is promoted by a secret Fermentation after the actual working is over which is nothing else but a more firm and closely riveted union of the Sulphur and Salt maturating the Mercurial part into a generous Wine This Wine either distill'd is the most part of it left as an insipid Phlegm or water yea and the very flammable vinous Spirit is by the touch of Salt of Tartar in Fifteen or Sixteen parts thereof according to Helmont reducible into simple water or if the Salt thereof become too much exalted by letting go its Sulphur then it degenerates into Vinegar which Vinegar if dulcified by making Saccharum Saturni or the Sal Sennerti is totally reducible into an insipid water The like happens in all Vegetables for Water is the material Principle of Vegetables and therefore they ultimately resolvable thereinto That Water is the material Principle of Vegetables is apparent both because without water whether distilled down upon the earth in the circulation thereof in Dews or Rain or by the overflowing of Rivers upon the grounds whence the fertility of Aegypt from Nilus his overflowing the banks or by any other sort of watering grounds because I say without water from some of the foresaid ways neither do Plants take nor increase nor is any Vegetation perform'd also because in water many Vegetables grow shoot forth roots and spread very largely witness Mint and several other Plants whose tops being only nipt off and put into a glass-viol full of water they begin in a few days as I have seen to shoot forth spriggy roots and from thence to grow up to a great height even as if they were actually planted or set in earth whose growth and increase is from nothing else but simple water So also many Vegetables as I said grow in water and have no roots at all fastened in the earth To confirm which further that remarkable Experiment of Helmont is very considerable viz. He planted the Trunk of a Willow Tree of five pound weight in Two hundred pound
a Beast these again by a putrid solution of the Compage are transmuted into Worms Flies and other Insects which often retain some shape of the Animal whence they proceed and that which even now was in the shape of a Beast as Beef Mutton c. is forthwith by the Ferment of an humane stomach transmuted into Man's Blood Flesh c. and these again degenerate into Worms or other Insects in Fevers and being let out of their vessels they undergo any other Analytical putrefaction they become animated in strange different shapes all which is but Water â—orâ—eus-like under various disguises transmuted by Seed and Ferments out of one shape into another according to the great round of Circulations And all as they have their beginning and subsistence so are also reducible into Water Yea further as Vegetables and Animals have their original from and are reducible in water so also Minerals and Metals And though this is not so demonstrable as the former because we have not that occasion usually to converse with the Subterraneal Products as with Vegetables and Animals yet I find to this purpose what the Learned Squire Boyle cites out of a French Author Monsieur De Rochas who as a Chymist speaking what he could perform by water Having saith he discerned such great wonders by the natural operation of water I would know what may be done with it by Art imitating Nature wherefore I took water which I well knew not to be compounded nor mixed with any other thing than the Spirit of Life and with an heat artificial continual and proportionate I prepared and disposed it by graduations of coagulation congelation and fixation until it was turn'd into earth which earth produced Animals Vegetables and Minerals the Animals did move of themselves eat c. and by the true Anatomy I made of them I found they were compos'd of much Sulphur little Mercury and less Salt The Minerals began to grow and encrease by converting into their own Nature one part of the earth they were solid and heavy and by this truly demonstrative Science namely Chymistry I found they were composed of much Salt little Sulphur and less Mercury By which Experiment according to the relation of the Author Minerals were generated out of water which I suppose was done by some Mineral Seeds or the Analysis of some Mineral Concretes into their secondary Principles which by due digestions assum'd Water for their bodies For Mineral Seeds in their due Matrixes concenter water more or less according to the nature of the Seed and fitness of the place and accordingly give more or less pondus as the purity of the Seed and disposition of the place is whence are lighter and heavier Minerals and Metals Also Metals are reducible into water witness what the foresaid Author saith That by a certain artificial way of handling Mercury without any addition may be separated therefrom a fourth or fifth part of water or clear liquor which for ought I have heard or seen saith he is not reducible into Mercury again and so is more then a disguise That Mercury or rather Quicksilver should in its weight to the like bulk of Water be as fourteen to one is from the Seed of the Quicksilver concentring the body of water according to that proportion towards whose reduction two credible Persons told the foresaid Ingenuous Author That after as he saith many trials which they made to reduce Mercury into Water in order to Philosophical work they did once by divers Cohobations reduce a pound of Mercury into almost a pound of water and this without the addition of any other thing but onely by pressing the Quicksilver by a skilful managed Fire in purposely-contriv'd vessels To the like purpose Isaac Holland and some others speak of separating a water from Quicksilver which they call Aqua Nubis quâ tanquam Hydrops Mercurius turget Not to mention the experiment of increasing the bulk of a stone by the single addition of fountain-water till it swell to the bigness and figure of the glass it 's put into for we see that water needs no more then a petrefying Seed to compress it self or other things it meets with whether Vegetables or the like into a stony concretion as for instance the petrefying well at Knarsborough which hath in continuance of time wrought the earth and grass thereabouts into a rocky Compages with petrefied Isicles hanging down where the very Streams of water as they run along are actually congealed into stones which I say can be from nothing els save a petrefying Seed connatural to that sort of water This Succus lapidificus may haue its Seminals I say from a petrefying Nitre according to the experiment of the learned Kircher Si saxum inquit quodcunque in tennissimum pollinem resolveris et aquâ perfectè commixtum permanicam Hippocratis colaveris illa nil prorsus saxcum sed praeter arenaceum solummodo sedimentum nil relinquet si verò Nitrum vel Tartarum aquae perfectè commixtum addideris illa quaecunque tetigerunt intra subjectam concham posita sive frondes similiaque post exiguum temporis curriculum aeri exposita vel in Saxum ejusdem generis conversum si non totum saltem cortice Saxeo vestient So that the petrefying Seed whether in Water or in Nitre or in the Stone it self is in effect all one So that understanding the nature of a petrefying Seed and the extent of subterraneall Channels from the Sea at great distances upon the Land we need not wonder that some fish is digged up in some places petrified several of which was to be seen amongst John Tradescan's Rarityes That there are Subterraneal Channels not onely from one sea to another but from the seas at very great distances upon the land the Ingenuous Kircher doth fully demonstrate The first by a Dolphin which was taken in the Red Sea which by the command of the Bassa of the place was put into the water again cum laminis in bronchia insertis with these words in Arabick Characters ingraven Amed Abdalla Bassa Sues tibi vitam unà cum hoc munere donavit anno Hegira 720 which Dolphin was the very same year taken in the Mediterranean Sea prope Damiatam which could not possibly be that the Dolohin should swim that vast compass round Affrica and take in at the Streits and so up to the furthest part of the Mediterranean Sea whereas from the Mare rubrum to Damiata is but a small neck of land little above 30 Miles and therefore must pass along those subterraneal channels whereby one Sea communicates with another As there are Subterraneal passages from one sea to another so as I said from the seas to great distances upon the land whence all Fountains Springs and Rivers have their Original and return again into the sea contrary to the opinion of Dr. Wittie In which Subterraneal currents the things carryed along with the water whether fish or the like may when they
transmutation of Earth into Water for the supply of Springs it 's so absurd that its enough to name it although the Dr. is too credulous in telling us he can easily believe That the thinner part of the Earth may be turned into Water as also the grosser parts of Water into Earth So the thinner and more subtile parts of Water into Air and the grosser parts of Air into Water arguing a Transmutability of the Quaternary of Elements amongst themselves which I wish he could make me believe too by any ocular demonstration 5. As for that Transmutation of Air into Water for the supposed supply of Springs it 's Aristotle's opinion and Dr. Wittie denying this Thesis yet saith that reason tells us that more then ten parts of Air will not serve for the making but of one part of Water I think saith he by Parenthesis twenty would be to little But if I should be heard to speak in this case it should be Paradoxical and that thus viz. that five parts of Air would be too much and five thousand parts thereof would be too little for the making one part of Water 6. I shall therefore first endeavour to impugne his Thesis of Snow and rain-Rain-Water to be the Original of all Springs by being Negative therein Next to which I shall assume a positive Thesis from the Circulation of Water in the Terraqueous Globe by the mediation of Subterraneal Chanels from Sea to Sea yea and from the Sea to the Heads of Springs from them into Rivulets and those again into Rivers and those into the Ocean and so circulate round 7. First therefore that Snow and Rain-Water should give Original to living Springs as we call them cannot be because then upon deficiency of Snow and rain-Rain-Water as usually happens in long droughts these Springs would certainly fail But we find the contrary viz. that in long continued droughts when all Land-Springs are thereby dried that yet the true Quick Springs are as fluent as ever Ergo they are not fed by Snow or Rain-Water I cannot indeed deny but that Quick-springs are not without their additional supplies from Land-Springs which are fed by Snow or Rain-Water and thereupon may in long droughts having those auxiliaries drawn off become less able to manage that strong current they had before yet doth it not therefore follow but that these Springs when solitary fetch their Original deeper then Rain Water can sink 8. Yea suppose we should grant that some few of these Quick-Springs should for the generality of them do not prove deficient through long continued droughts yet this may very probably happen upon a double account First because the Quick-Spring it self may be lengthened by the additional supply of a Land-spring being suppose but an arme of that larger Channel which is carried under ground at a greater distance to another Spring of a more strong current and therefore a drought taking away its Auxiliaries may thereby break off an arm and make it run in its strong single Channel along the Sabulum bulliens to an other Spring-head where it glides currently away 9. The next reason why some few Quick-Springs as I said may in long droughts prove dry'd up is because the Superficies of the earth is so exhausted of that Natural moysture which should supple it for Vegetation and the like as that it imbibes it into its self like a Spung and the Spring spends its stock to moysten the thirsty earth about it and so proves deficient in its current But when the earth becomes again satiated by irrigating showers then that which before was diverted to moysten the Earth finds its Channel again and runs as fluently as ever 10. The second reason why Springs have not their Original from Snow and Rain-Water is because we find Springs break forth upon the tops of Hills or Mountains which flow even in the greatest droughts Now if Rain-Water should at that season onely supply them then of necessity upon want of Rain and continuance of long droughts these must be dryed up yea and that very speedily too because they want a supply from their essential constituent Cause which according to his Thesis is Snow or Rain-water But by experience we find the contrary viz that Quick-Springs even in long droughts do keep their current therefore Snow and Rain-Water are not the constituent or efficient Cause of Quick-Springs 11. The third reason that makes me scruple the Veracity of this Hypothesis is because neither the Dr. nor the rest of the Assertors thereof have duly assign'd the manner or Method the Pipes Channels or Conduits how Springs having their Original from Snow or Rain should ascend and mount the tops of Hills and spring forth in the uppermost parts of high Heaths And why upon the truth of the assertion they should not rather alwayes be thrust down into Vallies and confin'd to low declive places as being more proper for the heavy body of Water according to their own supposition of its being next in weight to Earth to descend then contrary as they say to the nature thereof to ascend To make Water climb a Hill forcing it volens nolens up the inside when all the contrivance they have cannot do the same upon the outside thereof Methinks they should have indeavoured to have extricated themselves and the world from these suspicious doubts before they had impos'd their Thesis 12. For by this supposition a great part of Rain-Water falling for the supply of Springs sinks down by secret passages into the Earth What then must force this Water contrary to its natural inclination up the bank to make it spring forth out of the tops of Hills and high places Surely the contrivers of this Hypothesis had not their eyes every way did not cast about to salve all the incident Phaenomena of this Doctrine All the reason I find Dr. Wittie gives for its Ebullition out of the Earth is a tendency towards its proper place which is the convex part of the Earth By which it should seem that the Water while in the Bowels of the Earth is out of its place and therefore must by a certain force ab extra as to its self be reduc'd to its natural place What this should be that may make the Water recoyle or drive upward contrary to it own Nature the Doctor would have done well to have assign'd For no body can be suppos'd to have a natural tendency in that where a force is impos'd but here is a natural tendency to the proper place viz. the convex part of the Earth and yet this is carryed upwards a contrary motion to that that is proper to water so that in good earnest it implyes no less then a tacit contradiction 13. For he expresly saith That the Springing forth or Eruption of the Water is not made by any forcible agitation compulsion or violence that is put upon it ab extra within the Earth c. but from its own natural inclination and tendency towards its
I confess to illustrate this Point will not a little conduce to the solving some Phaenomina incident to our Thesis 42. And first we see that blood whilst circulating in its proper vessels knows no such difference as either going up or down For it to ascend the Aorta and from thence up into other Arteries which are carried into the Head and Arms is the same as to descend by other Vessels into the lower parts The nourishment the blood gives in the habit of the body whether carried upwards or downwards is the same yea it ascends with as quick a motion as it descends and that because it 's carried in its own proper vessels and mov'd by the Systole of the heart whose vibration to parts whether upwards or downwards is equal 43. Now in like manner Water whilst circulating from Seas and the Hydrophylacia and carried in its proper Subterraneal Channels along the Quellem is in its proper place and becomes the Mother of Mineral Earths Minerals Metals Stones and Marcasites and so long knows neither up nor down and can as easily whilst in these Channels climb up the tops of Hills and Mountains and there make Springs as break forth in Valleys and in the Level of Plains yea it can as well mount the tops of Hills and high Heaths as the blood in the Arteries can ascend into the head and all by the natural circulation of Water set on work by the Original Fiat for the upholding the functions of the Terraqueous Globe where if such a thing be in rerum naturá you may view the Perpetual motion 44. Now that the Quellem or Sabulum bulliens is the proper Conduit and Subterraneal Channel for water to circulate in whilst in the bowels of the Earth is hereby apparent That a true Quick-Spring never breaks forth but this sand also appears yea where ever any dig in the Earth for the said Springs they are not found but at the bottom or verge of the Fundus of Mineral Earth Clay or marly ground where sand is alwayes seen to break up with the living Spring which frequently breaks forth under the Channels and banks of Rivers whence it is that plenty of sand is wrought up in Rivers also in Plains Valleys Heaths Hills and Mountains or in any places thereof digg'd for Springs are found as I said store of this Sand. 45. And that there are Subterraneal Channels by which Sea 's at great distance communicate with each other will appear first if we consider the Ocean which is the whole bulk of waters that compass the Globe of earth is but one which receives different names according to various Regions it washeth as Oceanus Atlanitcus Germanicus Deucalidonius Septentrionalis Tartaricus Aethiopicus Mare Arabicum Mar di India Mar Del Nort Mar Del Zur or Mare Pacificum Archipelagus c. And there is no In-land Sea which receive Rivers and let none forth visibly but they communicate with the Ocean Thus the Mediterranean Sea is joyn'd to the Atlantick Ocean per Fretum Herculeum and to the Red-Sea by occult Subterraneal Channels as the Story related by Kircherus of the Dolphin first taken in the Red and soon after in the Mediterranean Sea So the Caspian by the mediation of Subterraneal Channels is annexed to the Euxine or black-Sea and this to the Aegean and that to the Mediterranean Thus these great Seas in Asia communicate with each other according to the mind of Scaliger Wendeline and Kircherus So the Baltick communicates with the German and Deucalidonian Seas by the two Arms Bosnicum and Finicum per Fretum Cymbricum 46. In like manner the Asphaltick Sea or Mare Mortuum in Palestine communicates with the Red-Sea by the same Subterraneal Channels and thereby are conveyed into the Ocean So the Lake Zaire in Aethiopia by the same manner empties it self into the Aethiopian Ocean And that great River in Aethiopia call'd Fluvius Niger flowing from the Lake of Nilus and being shut up by a Chain of Mountains in the Kingdom of Nubia where privately breaking forth of the Western part of the Mountains empties it self by Subterraneal Meanders where meeting with several other Rivers increase them and at length is carried into the Atlantick Ocean After the same manner the River Tigris in Mesopotamia being carried through the Lake Arethusa meets with resisting Caucasus thrusts down its head into a large den and after a great space of ground peeps up again where scarce passing the Lake Thospis but it is begirt again with other Mountains and hides it self again in Subterraneal Chanels and breaks forth 24 Miles on the other side of the Mountains then continues to flow and neer Babylon is let into Euphrates 47. Now I say that these In-land Seas Lakes and great Rivers do communicate with each other and at length are carried into the main Ocean and that this is done by Subterraneal Channels will be apparent as followeth First that the Caspian hath intercourse with the Euxine or black Sea by such passages is evident because it receives into its bosome a constant flux of great Rivers and lets none forth visibly by any arme into the Sea and and yet notwithstanding is not at all increased and Kircher guesseth that before the deluge it might be contiguous with the Ocean overrunning all the Sandy Desarts of Tartaria and afterwards was broke off by the Chain of the Mountains of Caucasus This is onely conjectural but however it appears as if it were a Lake shut up on all hands having Rivers let into it but none let forth and yet shews no footstep of inundation and therefore must of necessity have communication with other Seas by private Chanels The same is also further confirm'd by observation That has been made upon that Sea as Kircher reports by Paradia Persa in Geograph viz. that when ever the Eastern Winds have rul'd strongly over the Caspian at the same time in the Euxine Sea the boylings has been observ'd greater then wonted with a great agitation of the whole Sea And on the contrary when the Western Winds blew strongly upon the Euxine the like perturbations have been seen in the Caspian Sea and when the Caspian hath by the agitation of winds emptied it self into the Euxine it is again replenished by the like secret passages from the Persian Sea which is done by a kind of Charybdis or Vortex along the shore of the Sinus Persicus whereby the Sea seems to be sometimes drunk up with a notable decrease which by a fresh flowing of the Sea the Vortex is hid again So that the Caspian by Subterraneal Chanels receives a supply from the Persian Sea and by the like Chanels communicates with the Euxine Sea 48. That the Asphaltick or Mare Mortuum communicates by the same hidden passages with the Red-Sea is evident because upon the coasts of the Red-Sea which looks towards the Desarts of Arabia at the noted place call'd Eltor as the inquisitive Kircher relates where not far from the shore from the bowels of
attenuating of Ayr by heat in an inverted oval glass the water seems to be drawn up by a kind of Suction as some would have it or to prevent a Vacuum as others think but most probably if not demonstratively it ascends gradually and sensibly for this cause viz That when the Ayr in the glass which before by heat was attenuated is either by cold reduced into its pristine form or having as so thinn'd but a languid pressure is therefore by a more strong Elastick force of Ayr upon the surface of the water forc'd up till it come to such a height as the pressure of Ayr within and that without the glass are brought to an Aequilibrium or equal poysure I mean till the springy power of the Ayr within and without the glass be of an equal force and there it stands till the springy power of the Ayr within the glass by heat becomes dilated and then it forceth down the water in the Tube and makes the water in the Viol rise higher proportionable to the degree of the attenuation of the Ayr. 57. That the Ayr receives a considerable alteration by heat is further confirm'd by the experiment of inverting a glass Cucurbit over a Candle fastened with tallow upon the bottom of a glass or earthen Bason wherein water is first poured to the height of two or three fingers breadths where the heat of the Candle doth so weaken the spring of the Ayr within the Glass that it wanting the help of the circulating Ayr always requisite to the perpetuating the motion of bodyes which is intercepted by the body of water that in stead thereof the Water it self circulates being forc'd thereto by the spring of the Air that presseth upon it from without and therefore it riseth up to a great height of the glass-body as I have sometime seen upon tryal thereof and puts out the Candle which Experiment seems somewhat to contradict the former of a Weather-glass though in reality it doth not for although there heat makes it descend but here it makes it ascend yet if we consider that in that of the Weather-glass the Air in it is first thinn'd by heat before the glass be put into water and therefore when it 's condensed by cold it draws up the water or rather the water is forced by the outward Spring of the Air and follows it to an Aequilibrium but in this last Experiment the glass is inverted into water without any previous alteration of the Air therein which being to supply the motion of a body viz. the burning of the Candle doth it for a while but wanting a fresh supply from other Air without to promote the Circulation thereof always necessary for the motion of bodies the want thereof makes the strong spring of the Air upon the surface of the water to force up the water it self into the glass-body From which Experiments result these following Corollaries viz. First That a Circulation of Air is requisite for the motion of all bodies the Candle in the glass we see extinguisheth for want thereof by forcing up the water in lieu of Air. Secondly That Air may be attenuated by the heat of the Sun whereby the same portion of Air may be made to extend it self over a larger space witness the heating the glass in the first of the two last Experiments Thirdly That this Air thus attenuated and extended by the heat of the Sun is the reason why culinary fire dies or goes out when the Beams of the Sun are cast upon it because they thin the Air and the Air is the natural Bellows of Fire which Fire burns according to the intenseness or remisness of the Air. Fourthly That the Air thus thinn'd makes way for water to ascend up the small veins thereof which are like so many slender Syphons by which it mounts from Earth Waters and Seas up into the Clouds for the supply of Rain and Snow which Syphons in droughty hot weather are mostwhat at work carrying it upward whereas in moist weather the water descends by the same Syphons and moisten the Ground with Dew and Walls or Floors of Stone-buildings in wet Seasons so that the reputed Exhalations of moisture by the Sun for the supply of Rain is no other than this gradual steaming up of slender Syphons whereby water mounts insensibly the uppermost part of the Atmosphere Fifthly That in great heat of weather many Diseases happen through the thinness of the Air for the Air in the Lungs is the Bellows of the vital Fire in the Heart which if it become attenuated either through a general heat in the Air whence ariseth frequently some Epidemical Disease or through the obstructions of the Lungs themselves whereby the Air for want of foundness of Organs becomes thinn'd before it come to volatize the Blood in its current from the right to the left Ventricle of the Heart causeth Faintings Lassitudes Candialgia's Asthma's Deliquiums and in Women Swoonings Palpitations rousing up the Spleen and Mother c. yea in fine makes the Lamp of Life burn dark and dimly whereas the Air by cold being reduc'd to its pristine form and the Lungs freed from obstructions quickens the vital Ferment sharpens the appetite makes the vital Fire burn clearly and makes evident that the Ferments of the several Digestions are vital for in cold weather we find our appetites more acuated our Ferments more vigorous and the Digestions more powerful But I will not though I might here further enlarge to shew how the Air in a due order contributes to the invigorating the Ferments and how much it conduceth in the change thereof towards the curing Diseases But I proceed Sixthly And which chiefly concerns our present purpose assert That the heat of the Sun contributes by thinning the Air towards the circulation of water from Seas to Springs and from water upon the earth to Clouds For the Sun whilst he is suppose in the Northern Signs especially towards the Tropick of Cancer casts his rays pretty powerfully upon those Places which are within the oblique position of the Sphere though not perpendicularly as it happens to those Places situated under the right position of the Sphere where the Aequator cuts the Horizon at right Angles whilst he is I say in the Northern Signs by his heat he thins the Air of those Regions especially as those Places fall under the Meridians as some Places must alwaies do the Sun in his supposed Diurnal Circuit making Twenty four Meridians the Air under these Meridians especially in those places where the Sun is or inclines to be Vertical being attenuated makes the Air circulate the more strongly towards the other Quadrants of the Terraqueous Globe causing there a stronger pressure upon the Surface of the Seas and this must be constantly done because the Sun really or apparently is alwayes in motion about the Earth who in his Circuit thins the Air of those Places which lie most directly under his Beams and so makes the Air as
I may say split it self I mean as to its uniform texture towards the Poles where it causeth a constant pressure upon the Northern and Atlantick Ocean and upon the Mare del Zur or Pacificum towards the South as also driving the Clouds whilst he is Northern into the South side of the Aequator enough almost alone to give Being to Springs by forcing the water along the Subterraneal Chanels up at great distances upon the Continents Seventhly That Air attenuated in one place of the Atmosphere is as much condensed in an other part thereof and what it is deficient of force in that thinn'd part so much more it is of force in the other so as to give a proportionable pressure answerable to the weakness of its Spring elsewhere 58. Now the natural pressure of Water by Air and of the upper parts of water upon those below is by perpendicular lines and that by Vorticles as Archimedes and after him Des Cartes and Kircher demonstrate Natural I said because accidentally by Winds or Storms the motion may be oblique so that supposing the Seas to be at their bottom perforated in many places with Subterraneal Chanels and secret Vortices the surface of the Sea being press'd with Winds Clouds and Storms the circulated and condensed Air which recoyls from the other thinner part of the Atmosphere where the Sun-Beams have attenuated it together with the oblique motion of the Flux and Re-flux of the Sea begins the motion towards the grand Circulation 59. For the Superficies of the Ocean being press'd by the foresaid weight sends down its water by Subterraneal Chanels into the Hydrophylacia or common Cisterns of water which are the Springs of the Deep where it not only comes to a level with the surface of the Sea keeping a Horizontal Parallel therewith which any water will do in a Syphon or duplicated Tube though unassisted by any considerable pressure of the Air but also by the force of the pressure upon the surface of the Sea it is easily carried up above the level thereof into Hills Mountains and high Heaths which breaking forth give Being to Springs and Fountains which run into many Rivulets and from those into larger Rivers especially joyning issue with Rain and snow-Snow-water and from Rivers are again carried into the Seas 60. That this is a Circulation whereby water is carried in a round is apparent because the Seas being pressed by the foresaid natural Causes are carried by Subterraneal Chanels along the Sabulum bulliens breaks forth at Spring-heads in Valleys Hills or Mountains runs along into Rivulets which with showers moisten the earth and then carried up again by Aereal Syphons in droughty Seasons into the Clouds makes the Atmosphere ponderous which together with Winds out of Subterraneal Caverns and the strong Spring of the Air recoyling from the rest attenuated by the heat of the Sun together with the Current of all Rivers into the Sea All these I say joyntly together conspire the pressure of the Seas again into the heads of Springs and so still more on in a circular motion and that in order to the supplying the grand Concerns of the Terraqueous Globe both for Mineral and Vegetable productions 61. That the Air doth press is evident in Pneumatick Engines as that of the Wine-Coopers Bellows which will by the meer pressure upon the surface of Wine from Air force forth the Liquor into other vessels the same happens in Pumps which by forcing forth Air carry up the water as also if a pair of Bellows be so contriv'd as to be plac'd over a vessel of water closed up on all sides with two Pipes going to the bottom of the vessel so ordered as whilst the one Bellows is drawn up the other falls down with its flap which pressing upon the surface of the water makes it yield which finding no other way will mount up suppose two Pipes which are carried into a Cistern at a competent distance above the vessel which again being let forth by an other Pipe at the opposite side falls into a chanel which carries it upon a Water-wheel and gives motion suppose thereto the Axis of which turns about a square handle to which is fastened the handle or pole of the Bellows poys'd upon a leaver plac'd equally betwixt the two Bellows so that as the water runs out of the Cistern it turns about the wheel and that moves the Bellows which pressing the water in the vessel forceth it up again into the Cistern and so in a round whereas if it could so be contriv'd that this water which moves the wheel about should by an other chanel be conveyed into the top of the water-vessel it might give a good probability of finding out at least fairly hinting a Perpetual Motion A Type of which may be seen in Kircherus his Mundus Subterraneus 62. So in like manner the surface of the Seas being press'd by the foresaid causes which joyntly together conspire its pressure as the bellows doth the water in the Vessel they force it up along Pipes or Subterraneal Chanels to the Head of Springs and Fountains Which Pipes by how much the more they are oblique in their windings by so much the more easily the Water is carried up to the tops of Hills and high Grounds 63. And as the Air by its own innate Spring doth press so sometimes it becomes more weighty by having the burden of Clouds lying and pressing upon it which also contributes to the former pressure upon the surface of the Sea For we see that when the Clouds are about to discharge themselves in Showers and that in large drops that they so compress the texture of the Air as they cause a Wind commonly to go before each Shower which is nothing else but a Latio Aeris or Motion of the Air from the pressure of the Clouds and the greatness of the drops which compress the Air and bear it down till it hath made its thorough passage to the Earth whereas when the Rain comes down in small drops and thin threds it passeth gently through the Vehicle and Colander of the Air without any considerable pressure thereof â—â—g i. pag 320 Fig ii pag 321 65. So in like manner the Air in the Atmosphere preffeth by its Spring set on work by the foresaid causes upon the Surface of the Sea which lyes in Right-Lines with the Hydrophylacia according to the Line F G which may represent the level-surface both of the Sea and springs of the deep Which being press'd at G towards I raiseth up the Water from F towards C which represents high Hills and Mountains where Springs break forth either at C or E. Hence we see that as the Spring of the Air is invigorated or weakned so its pressure upon water is more or less 66. The second Figure See the 2 Figure of the Scheme is the same save the Oval which it wants having instead thereof a small Concha where the Air from without has a free pressure
and that part of the Tube to be larger and the other part revers'd to be much smaller which suppose to be fill'd with Water at A where by the Solitary pressure of the Air contain'd within the cavity of the Tabe made by the Palm of the Hand laid thereon forceth the Water which is in the Pipe A B C. with a great sure from F to C and that too a great Height above C in the same manner the Air in the Atmosphere being pressed with Winds Storms Clouds and condensation thereof and the like causes aforesaid forceth upon the surface of the Sea which with the Hydrophylacia are alwayes at an Aequilibrium according to the Line F G beyond the Aequilibrium F G into the Concha's of Mountains E K C which are much higher then the Mathematical Circle of Water I mean then that circle of Water from which all Lines drawn to the Centre are equal So that supposing a constant pressure upon A or G which is certainly done at all times by some or all of the foresaid causes the Water must as constantly be press'd from F to K and C and there as certainly make Springs to break forth for from the same causes alwaies at work the same effects are alwaies produc'd 67. Hence the great difficulty may easily be resolv'd why Springs are sometimes found upon the tops of the highest Mountains and that because the bulk of Waters to be carried above the Aequilibrium F. G. is in a manner insensible in comparison of the great weight and pressure of the Water in the Ocean and that thus as the ingenious Kircher computes that the Semidiameter of the Earth is 3600 Miles of which 60 answer to every Degree of the Aequater which Semidiameter is computed from the Superficies of the Sea where the lines as I said from any part thereof to the Center are equal and seeing that the Basis of Mountains are level with the Mathematical globous earth so that the tops of these Mountains must be very protuberant Therefore it onely remains to be demonstrated how much higher the Sea ought to mount be yond its Aequilibrium F G or Periphery of its globous circle to make Springs break forth on Mountains 62. Fig iii. pag 323 68. To which purpose suppose the line See the 3 Figure in the Scheme A B to be the Semidiameter of the Earth 3600 Miles long which terminates in the line D E which cuts the Superficies of the Terraqueous Globe in the point B. Now suppose the height of the tallest Mountain to be C which added to the Semidiameter of the Earth A B will produce the line A C which expresseth the top of the highest Mountain Therefore as A B is to B C so is the Semidiameter of the Earth to the highest Mountain so is 3600 to 30 with which computing the immensness of the surface of the Ocean pressed on all hands with the foresaid causes makes it very easie to apprehend how readily Water may be carried from the Seas and Hydrophylcacia to the heads of Springs in the highest Mountains 69. For the proportion betwixt the Semidiameter of the Earth 3600 together with the vastness of the immense Ocean forc'd by the Spring of the Atmosphere to the Line B C viz. the top of the highest Mountain 30 is in a manner insensible and the more insensible by how much Hills or Mountains are less in height then 30 Miles insomuch that as the learned Kircher observes the Picke of Teneriff Olympus in Asia Aetna in Sicilia Caucasus in Asia Otho in Macedonia would as to their proportion with the vast Ocean disappear whence he concludes Unde infero inquit Kircherus Oceani aquas sive fluxa refluxuque sive tempestatibus ventorumque vi sive nubium descensu pressas nullo negotio etiam in altissimos vertices montium ejaculari posse 70. And as this pressure of the Sea by the said causes is constant and as constantly keeps Springs and Fountains in flowing upon Mountains and remore places upon Continents so also thereby the Hydrophylacia are alwayes kept fill'd from whence as from a Store-house the Alps comprehended by France Germany and Italy pour forth so many Torrents and Rivers which by a perpetual current never have ceased nor never will as long as the Wheels and Springs of Nature are kept at work by the Great Master Mechanick of the world cease to flow from which Springs of the deep Danubius Rhenus Mosella Mosa Rhodanus Arar Padus Ticinus together with other smaller Rivers have their supply 71. Besides Some Springs seeme to emulate the Flux and Reflux of the Sea as that which Pliny tells us of in the Gades which observes the motion of the Sea in ebbing and flowing and perhaps that in the Peake of Derby-shire may be from the same cause which ebs and flows every 12 hours And how Dr. Wittie comes to be sure that this last together with the Spring at Giggleswick in York-shire hath no correspondence with the Sea he might have done well to have inform'd us that we might have been as sure as he 72. As for the Spring at Gliggleswick which ebs and flows many times a-day we may perhaps not unaptly attain to some Foot-steps of the knowledge thereof if we remind what I have already delivered above viz. that if a glass Tube stop'd close at the one end with ones Thumb and the other end let down into a Vial or other vessel full of Water as soon as ever the air gets liberty by removing the thumb the Spring of air from without presseth up the Water 2 or 3 Finger breadths above the Level of the Water and bubbles up to and again for a while then settles to its ordinary pitch which is an exact resemblance of the Spring at Giggleswick and such like 73 For in these Springs the Air is so pent up by the streightness of the Chanels near the Spring-head and by the denseness of some interposing Glebe of earth which may and doth probably for a time very much though not totally intercepts the motion of the Air which hinders the Spring from flowing alwayes to high as if the Air had liberty it would therefore it onely flows at that time when the pressure of the Water forceth it through the dense Earth and gives thereby liberty for the Air which before was pent up for we see in all Hydrostatick Experiments that water follows Air as well as Air circulates after Water and that Water alwayes obeys the more strong impulse of Air though it be to ascend to a great height 74. Now having run through all the causes and demonstrated the reasons of those causes which promote the grand Circulation of Water it is now time to consider the final End Aim and Intention of the first Mover in Nature who sets all these Wheels and Springs a going in the great Clock-work of the World and who orders all things in Time Weight and Measure and that to the end that one part and Wheel
the same cause it 's very probable that the fertility of Aegypt is promoted by the overflowing of Nilus for Rain-Water doth contain of this Salt which as I said before being carryed over the Country by Winds are not let down save what moysture drills down by the Syphons of the Air till the clouds come to the Mountains of Aethiopia where being let forth in great abundance they wash down along with them a Nitrous Salt from the Earth of the Mountains which still adds to the fertility of the ground and that the Air at that time hath plenty of this Nitre in it is found because if a turfe be digg'd up from the ground as they usually do to know the height of the floud and weigh'd they do find it to increase considerably as the Water doth in height with a moysture which is impregnate with a Nitrous Salt For the Earth of that Country is very Magnetical and therefore is fertile without showers falling immediately thereon and in lieu thereof hath plenty of dews which commonly has the greatest quantity of the fructifying Salt in them and the flowing of Nilus which River is strongly impregnated with this Nitrous Salt from which much Nitre is made and brought into these Northern parts 87. Yea all the great difference of natural Soyls for some far exceed others in fruitfulness seems to depend upom this very hing viz. that some are naturally more replete with or at least are more magnetical of the Nitrous Salt then others 88. Thus we see that it 's a Nitrous Salt that both fertilizeth Earth as also maketh River-Water serviceable for the foresaid uses for as it distinguisheth Earths as to their fruitfulness so likewise it makes the difference betwixt River and Spring-Water and that it doth so I am confirm'd by an experiment I tryed for my better information therein viz. I took of a Well-Water in my own ground which is supply'd by a true Quick-Spring though it never runs over because in our greatest droughts it is never nere dry I took I say a gallon or more of this Water which alone never bears Soap in which I caus'd two dragmes of Nitre to be put over night which heated the next morning I ordered the Maid to put some of the usual Soap thereto and to wash me some linnen therein which she did and it made a very good Lather as they call it and was as fit for the purpose and perhaps better then if she had taken so much River-Water The like I suppose spring-Spring-Water would do if it were suffered to run through a Tub fill'd with Earth especially if that Earth hath not been too much exhausted of its Nitre by previous Vegetation 89. So that we see that Water in its great Circulation with its included circle of Rain doth in its passage through or over such Earths pregnant with this Nitrous Salt become so much salturate therewith as to make River-Water useful for the foresaid purposes towards which as also to Vegetation Rain-Water doth not a little contribute by carrying along with it the influence of this Acreal Salt for it will bear Soap and Yeast and I suppose Bleach as well if not better then River-Water not here to say how much dew especially May-dew is replenish'd with this volatile Nitrous Salt which contributes not a little to the Vegetation of the fruits of the Earth nor to say what key to a Philosophick Menstruum is hereby hinted concerning which consult Sendivogius and the Tractate de sale Philosophorum Tilemannus his Appendix and other Hermetical Philosophers 90. Now to conclude as Water in the grand Circulation in the Bowels of the Earth meets with different Salts and Mineral Earths it becomes the subject matter wherein these work upon each other and make Mineral or hot Springs and that from a nitrous or volatile Hermetick Salt floating as well in the Air of the Caverns as above the Earth which being condensed upon a proper Magnetick or Virgin-Earth which the Water in its passage runs thorough dissolves the Salt and after meeting with a Mineral Earth of Sulphur or Sulphure vive makes an ebullition therewith and not being carryed far breaks forth in a hot Spring witness the experiment of Monsieur de Rochas in his Tractate De Aquis Sulphureis which I find plac'd at the latter end of the Sixth Volum of the Theatrum Chymicum who tells us that finding a hot Spring near that Mountain whence the River Padus in the Alps takes its Original and desirous to search out the cause thereof digg'd along its Chanel with Laborers for 15 days together who found as they came nearer to the source the hotter was the current and that too though the Mountain was covered with Snow But first he evaporated 40 Ounces of the Hot Spring-Water and 5 was left of a slimy matter which being further examin'd gave three Ounces of a Sweet and fusil Salt the rest was a slimy fat matter which by Fire shewes it self to be of a Sulphureous Nature after digging as aforesaid he found the Original of the hot Spring by observing a very great ebullition with much froth who to search yet further digg'd on for three hours along the Chanel of the same Spring and found the Water beyond it to be very cold which was the Current of the same Spring and had lost both it's tast and heat wherefore he took a part of that hot Earth which seem'd to give heat to that Spring and also some of the Water in the very source tryed them both found the Earth to be a pure simple Minera of Sulphur and found the water to be impregnated with a Salt which he calls for want of an other name Sal Hermeticum by which it was manifest that the spirit or salt contained in that water by penetrating the substance of that sulphureous earth was the cause of the great Ebullition which is the same as in pouring Water upon calx vive or in making Tartaruns vitriolatum But to be further satisfied he ordered the Labourers to dig 12 days longer and found the current to be clear and sweet like ordinary Fountain-Water but the Earth to be Salt in tast with which the current of water was impregnated and therefore he examin'd the Earth by infusing it in Rain-Water decauting off the clear as it was settled the one half whereof he boyled up in a Copper Vessel the other part he distill'd in a Glass Alembick to try whether way would yield the more Salt and found much less both as to quantity and quality in that done in the Copper-Vessel than in that distill'd in the Glass-body Then he infus'd this Earth again in the same Rain-Water and found a Salt of the same nature as before but less in quantity which extraction he repeated a third time but found no Salt at the last The earth therefore he expos'd to the Air and found after a time it was impregnated with the same Salt which Salt being separated and the Earth become
of Brass Copper I suppose he means for Brass is an artificial Metal from Copper by the addition of lapis calaminaris The third sort he saith is found in Liguria somewhat black by which Iron may be turned into Brass or Copper called Colcotar where by the way take notice that the Mineral Salt being separated from the Vitriol either of Mars or Venus the remaining crocus or calx of both may be and is called by the name of Colcotar the one being a red colour viz. that of the Vitriol of Iron the other a yellow colour like Occar viz. that of the Vitriol of Venus when both their Mineral Salts are separated by an artificial menstruum known to us and that without any force or violence of fire both of which sorts I have by me 2. To me all natural Vitriols seem to be reducible indeed to three viz. to that of Iron Copper and Vitriolum album that of Copper admits of great variety according to the degrees of plenty and purity of the Essurine Salt which is Sulphuris embrionati partus innaturus an unripe birth of a Sulphur in fieri being far removed as Helmont saith from a Metallick nature and nearer to the primum ens which indeed gives the medicinal virtue to Vitriols I say according as Mineral Vitriols or Metallick Solutions are enriched more or less with this Essurine Salt propria sponte illi innatum so are they reckoned to be better or worse as to Medicinal use The best of which are accounted the Cyprian Hungarian or Goslarick or Dane Vitriol being pretty well saturate with plenty of this Essurine acidity 4. Natural Vitriols I said because many artificial sorts may be made among which Roman Vitriol and viride eris may be numbred which last being cristaliz'd by Solution Filtration and Evaporation may be brought to fine Cristals by the addition of Allom c. which may much resemble the Roman Vitriol SECT 3. FIrst He is pleased to reckon up four ways whereby Water may imbibe the nature and virtue of a Mineral or Metal 1. By receiving its Vapour his instance is Water standing somewhile in a brass or iron Kettle will taste of the brass or iron to which I say viz. That no metallick body as such doth or can give a Vapour to a simple elementary Water as long as the Water is homogeneal in its parts Minerals indeed being Metals in solutis principiis may whilst such give an dour for so I had rather and think more properly call it than a Vapour to Elementary Water as for instance Antimony and its Preparations viz. either the crocus metallorum or reguline part can give an emitick property to Water or Wine So natural Vitriols which are but their Metals in fieri or in primo ente reserato can communicate the like emetick odour though indeed there is some small Solution in Water 2. But take the complete perfect Metals of these Minerals and we shall find them such compact bodies as they have no Vapours nay scarce any odour to any simple Elementary Water for instance take Lead which is the Metal of its Mineral Antimony being the complete Metalline Body of that Mineral boyl Water ad aevum in it so as it be simple Water and hath not undergone the least degree of putrefaction for then begins an analytical resolution set a work from a spurious acidity and you shall find the Water to have contracted no saturnine impression at all but if the least acioity either from the Air or admixture of any acid liquor whatever impregnate this Water it shall make a Solution of the Metal and turn it self sweet more or less according to the degree of the sharpness of that acidity till at last it come to a Saccharum Saturm or Sugar of Lead After the same manner the perfect Metals perfect I mean in specie of Iron or Copper being by frequent fusions brought to their highest degree of Metallin compaction do no longer give any solution of parts odour or vapour to simple Water as they did whilst in principiis solutis viz. in their Minerals or Vitriols the which daily experience evinceth Do we not frequently boyl our Water for Broth and most of our potable Liquors in Iron Copper or Brass Vessels and that without the least taste of any of the Metals which Metalline Vessels as such may though made of Silver or Gold give no more vertue sapour or vapour than the Metals of Glass would do to the same Liquors boyled therein if any taste happens it is from some adust soods burnt to the bottom or sides of the Vessel or the like sluttish uncleanness 3. In vain therefore are all our decoctions of Silver or Gold in Water Milk or Broth the Cordial help thence expected as frivolous for all compact Metalline bodies must have proper and peculiar Menstruums to unlock them if any medicinal Arcanum be thence expected 4. The Doctor tells us That by this way of vapour the Sc rbrough Spaw partakes of Vitriol and of Iron That Vitriol may dissolve in simple Water we have before granted but that it should give a vapour to the Water I understand not To make a Body resolve it self into vapours or minute parts of the like nature with the whole is required as I apprehend either an intrinsick or extrinsick heat or fire which or these two the Vitriol of Spaw water hath the Doctor would have done well to have assign'd If he intend an intrinsick Ubi iste focus ille vulcanus ubi what Rule acts it by that it should so constantly and strongly resolve the Vitriol into minute vaporous parts which according to the nature of a vapour should take wings and quickly flie from this Fountain and yet the Carkass of Vitriol to remain for he saith nothing to the contrary but that it is actually and substantially Vitriol still if so then the vapour is Vitriol and the Vitriol a meer vapour for the way and means by which he makes the Water partake of Vitriol is by its vapour and yet this vapour is Vitriol being one of his assigned principles What to make of this or how to make it hang together really I cannot tell 5. If he understand an extrinsick heat it must surely be from the Sun which it must either resolve the Vitriol into a vapour where the spring appears subâ—dio or if its heat penetrate the Superficies of the Earth he must assign how deep its Rayes pierceth and that the Vitriol must of necessity be wrought upon at such a depth within ground which he may do well for satisfaction and strengthning his principles lest they run to ruine assign its place and manner of conversion into vapour otherwise one of his props will of necessity fall under him 6. As Vitriol how true judge so Iron he saith gives it self by a vapour to the Water which that it doth not as a compact body of that Metal we have already sufficiently asserted inasmuch as Iron being a solid body is not
at all apt to vapour and if it should whether or no that were yet Iron which according to his Thesis must of necessity be because a constitutive principle so that consequently Iron before it become an Ingredient of the Spaw must be resolv'd into a vapour but by what Agent I wish the Doctor would signifie And when it is a vapour how comes it to reassume a body which it must do to make it a real principle and what is it that bears up the body of the Iron in the Water that it falls not like other Iron or a Calx to the bottom What makes the difference betwixt it and a Crocus which if put into Spring water sinks to the bottom like Sand and gains no solution These things he ought to have been clear in before he imposed that upon the World as an Ingredient of this Mineral Water 7. But to make up the matter he tells us That not only by Vapour those two bodies Vitriol and Iron become principles but also something of the concrete juyces and substance of them both are given to the Water Here the Doctor would almost make us believe That he was inclinable to Philosophise for he is got as far as the concrete juyces viz. the Metals in principiis solutis or in fieri which indeed whil'st such are communicable to any current vein of Water which glide along the Surface or pervades the more soft body of the Mineral at leastwise to a current of Water that hath but got the least actuation from an Essurine Salt but that he spoils all again by bringing in Vitriol and Iron as two distinct things which as we shewed before are but one in any subterraneal Mineral solution 8. Had the Doctor spoken of the Minera of Iron and so to have been in its concrete juyce and omitted that of Vitriol or had he spoke of Vitriol as the Minera of Iron and so have understood of its concrete juyce rejecting the body of Iron as impertinent we should then have thought he had Philosophis'd in good earnest as having thence some permanent principles from whence he might have rais'd a noble Structure of Theory 9. From the vapours of Vitriol he saith the Waters hath its inky smell and acid taste and here methinks his vapours flies at random it 's a thousand to one but they may in a little time quit their paces from this Well and leave it to be possest by some other more natural Native I cannot pass the Notion without a smile But to be serious First What is it that gives an inky smell or rather makes-Ink Is it not a solution of Vitriol precipitated or made opacous by the addition of Galls whose stipticity makes the diaphaneous texture of the Particles in the vitrioline solution desert their former posture and muster in a confus'd opacous manner filling those interstices with solid Particles which before were kept transparent by the fluid parts of Water equally contempered and not a vapour from the Vitriol lince there wants an heat in either Agent which might procure a vapour 10. From the concrete juyces of Vitriol Iron and Allom saith the Doctor I think it hath its azure sky colour by which it seems as if precarious Philosophy were in fashion with the Doctor for in many places of his Book you will find his Assertions and Solutions of Phenomena's if I may so call them to be meerly precarious I think and all for want of a good apparatus of Chymical or other sorts of Experiments the want of which doth ever and anon make him inter multa vacillare as not having Ariadnes clew of Experiments to guide and extricate himself from Labyrinths he is ever and anon falling foul upon those two Rocks of Vitriol and Iron and I wish he suffer not Shipwrack upon them and in the conclusion lose them too 11. That it wants not the substance of Iron is he saith apparent in that after it hath been boyled and put into Oken Vessels for some while there appears a reddish Sand inclining to yellow which he saith is nothing else but Mater ferri or Rubrick 12. If so then what becomes of his other grand principle Vitriol for every Vitriol hath a Colcotur or Terra Metallica in it which may be made either yellow red or purple according to the several ways of separating its connate vitrioline Salt as I have before hinted how will he distinguish between the Colcotar of his assigned Vitriol and this Mater ferri being according to his Assertion both distinct Ingredients surely all the Art he hath can scarce hinder but they will coincide and forfeit their marks of distinction and so we may further Query how came the Doctor to know that both Vitriol and Iron were Ingredients seeing the badges of distinction clash but surely he took them in pitying to separate Kinsmen SECT 4. 1. THe second way whereby water may imbibe the nature and virtue of a Mineral or Metal is he said when some of their juyce is dissolv'd in the Water and that is while the Minerals are but young in fieri or in solutis principiis Here indeed the Doctor hath spoke like a Philosopher and hath hit the nail exactly on the head for this is the most probable way of all for Minerals or Metals whilst in succo primitivo in ente primo solubili to communicate themselves and virtues to current streams of subterraneal Channels of Water they are only then fit to propagate themselves for Medicinal help in Springs that thence become and are truly called Mineral Waters 2. Nay if the Metals themselves should be forc'd to open their treasures for Medical Arcana's for the health of Man with which they are doubtless nobly inriched it must be by a reduction of them by some powerful Menstruums into their prima entia into their first liquid principles and juyces whereby they would notably penetrate our very constitutions and therewith quadam Symphonia colludere abstergendo penetrando ac illum inando Archeum vitalem ex morbis tum acutis tum cronicis solvendo But not nobis liceat esse tam dissert os 3. The third way he saith is by corrosion of the substances of the Minerals mentioned by Gallen and this is performed by the help of the concrete juyces which corrode and extract Mineral Substances here we find a Galenical way of solution of Minerals in Waters and so indeed it seems for as it s out of their road to discourse of these Mineral solutions so their notions must be confus'd because not grounded on true chymical experiments which they are not at leisure to take notice of 4. For you see the Doctor saith that these concrete juyces corrode and extract Mineral Substances which tacitly involves no less than a contradiction in as much as these concrete juyces are Minerals in fieri or as he saith in principiis solutis and yet he would have those Minerals to corrode and extract Minerals the same body extract the same body In
probably may become occult yea at length be reckoned amongst non entia 35. He tells us what Dioscordes will have Iron to do viz. to loose the belly especially commending the flower or filings of Brass to that purpose this is like the rest incongruous for I believe neither Dioscordes nor himself ever gave the flower or filing of Brass if they did at least never to have had ground-work of observing a solutive property therefrom for if I mistake not should the Doctor give filings of Copper to any Patient of his he would find that by that time the filings had got into the stomach and had become fret upon by the acid ferment thereof it would presently become desperately emetick being by that time become as violent a Vomiter as if so much viride aris or common Vitriol had been taken 36. Now Iron saith he being joyned with Vitriol in this water partakes of the nature of Brass and is therefore the more purging and opening from which conjunction I think it is that most of our Vitrioline Waters in England do loosen the belly which if it be true that Iron joyned with Vitriol in this water partakes of the nature of Brass then must it of necessity as I said before prove constantly emetick which the Doctors long experience witnesseth to the contrary what difference of operation would it have from so much viride aeris or common Vitriol dissolv'd in a large quantity of water seeing that both of them are made from the body of Copper or Brass fretted by the acidity of Vineger or other acid alumenous liquor so that the water wherein this nature of Brass is becoming wrought upon by the acid ferment of the stomach would certainly become as powerfully emetick as the other and then this Spring would lose its good report 37. We have already sufficiently ravell'd into the nature of both Vitriol and Iron throughly discovering their inconsistency in a Water-spring which we are loth again to repeat therefore what we have already said to that point being premiz'd his Thesis of the reason of Purgation of these Vitrioline Waters will naturally and of its own accord fall in as much as any sort of Vitriol made out of Copper or Brass is as I said before dangerously emetick and not fit for an honest Physician to prescribe SECT 7. 1. ALlom is another principle of which according to Gallen he reckons up three sorts all of which are of gross parts and very stiptick abstersive heating and something corrosive c. as say Gallen Oribasius Aetius Serapio Fernelius c. 2. Which of these sorts it is that is the Ingredient of this Water the Doctor had done well to have put the World out of doubt for otherwise he leaves us in as great a Mist nay greater than he found us for the describing the virtues thereof he seems to mean no other than that artificial factitious Allom used by Dyers and Chyrurgeons which as such is a Mineral compound Salt which no doubt if the Water have any such Ingredient must be a simple Mineral Salt centred in the bowels of the Mineral Stone of Allom without any superadditionary additaments of Urine Salt of Kelp c. 3. Nitre another Ingredient is he saith of two sorts natural and artificial the natural tends to a reddish colour as saith Serapio Gallen saith there is also a white sort so that unless Serapio or Gallen tell us the kinds of Nitre we shall have little account thereof from Dr. WITTIE of which white fort he saith it is plain that this of ours is I suppose he means the white natural sort and yet goes on without distinction describing the virtues of the artificial sort saying it is wont to be mixed in Medicines when we would attenuate and deterge it 's added he saith to Cerats and Plaisters in Distempers of the Nerves 4. By all which it should seem indeed by his discourse as if this artificial kind of Nitre used in Shops were the Nitrous Ingredient of the Water and then we should consult where those Salt-petermongers are those subterraneal nimble sons of Vulcan who must furnish this Spring with this artificial sort of Salt-peter and further query whether if the Troglodites knew the use of Sulphur and Dust of Charcole they might not envying Mortals this happiness unfortunately and to the great loss of the Doctor blow up this Spring 5. Salt is the fifth and last Principle or Ingredient of the Spaw perhaps because it is so neer the Salt Water of the Sea and indeed looking a little further I find he saith he thinks it receives the Salt from the Sea but how demonstrable I know not for if any such Marine Salt was in this Spring it would certainly upon distillation or evaporation be left in the sediment and then would as evidently be demonstrable by the taste as we see the Sulphur Well of Knarsbrough having a body of Salt in it upon evaporation leaves it all behind in the bottom of the vessel so here a little proportion of Sea Salt would make the sediment sufficiently brackish and that distinguishable enough if it were there 6. But we find not the least foot-step of any such Salt left after the evaporation or distillation of the water neither is any separable by any known art of separation of Mineral Salts for after the sediment of the Spaw is further calcined by the force of fire and another separation is made by solution filtration and evaporation yet is the separated Salt so far remov'd from any such brackish taste as that it is quite of another perceptible taste so that the presence of such a Marine Salt is no otherwise than meerly imaginary and therefore to be taken up by praecarious Philosophers 7. Thus you see I have run through his five Principles or Ingredients of the Spaw found him tripping at every turn and very much inconsistent with himself for notwithstanding the latitude of his assumed Principles wherein he might have had scope enough to have sported himself inter thaumata Dei amongst the Wonders of God in the Mineral Kingdom yet we find him ever and anon so and so narrowly pent up as if he had not room to turn him so streight lac'd is the Aristoletick and Gallenical Philosophy in the whole triplicity of Nature Pars Secunda SECT 1. IT is now high-time after the unhinging of Dr. WITTIES Principles to come to make a serious scrutiny into the real Principles of this Spaw and though I have made Animadversions upon all his five Ingredients shewing the inconsonancy and inconsistency of them as he hath laid them down yet without any intention or thought of denying them all but to hold to those which we might find demonstrable by experiment 2. For which intention I went purposely to Scarbrough and took along with me several Liquors and Spirits by which I thought I might best essay the native Ingredients of the water I took also along with me a solution of the five Ingredients
according to the Doctors supposition each of them being in several glasses viz. a solution of Nitre Allom Vitriol of Copper Vitriol of Iron and common Salt and desired him for the evincing the truth of his Principles that he would please to mix these in such a proportion in a glass of fresh water as might resemble the taste of the Spaw water and would equally with it answer the same coagulations and solutions 3. So when we came to the Well I desired an essay might be made of the mixture of those five solutions in fresh water to try if we could imitate the Spaw thereby he told the company that I expected from those Minerals which had undergone the fire to see the same as from those which had not passed the fire I answer'd they were naked and bare solutions of the Mineral Ingredients made without any stress of fire and therefore might well be taken to make experiment withall when he seemingly refus'd it I called for a porrenger of fresh water and put some of each of these solutions in tasting it after each distinct Ingredient was put in 4. The Vitriol of Iron made it taste very like the sweet Spaw at Knarsbrough a little of the solution of Nitre and Salt did not much alter the taste thereof to which a solution of Mineral Allom was added which did not yet bring it any thing near the taste of that Spaw comparing them both together nor did the addition of Vitriol mend the matter upon this mixture we poured the solution of Gauls which presently upon the account of the solution of Allom and Vitriol became thick and muddy like ink and became clear from the same reason with the addition of some drops of the spirit of Vitriol not that the solution of Nitre or Salt contributed any thing to this attrimentous curdling nor yet was alone from the solution of Vitriol but also from the solution of Allom which as to changing colours by the addition of Gauls or solution thereof doth equally answer the solution of Vitriol 5. But to come a little closer to the matter I took a little Spaw water in one porrenger and a little solution of the Calx of Allom in another upon both of which I poured the solution of Gauls made in fair water and filtred and forthwith both waters viz. the Spaw water and the water of Allom became coloured alike of a deep purple and from thence having a little more of solution of Gauls added became blackish and opacous almost like Ink by which I demonstrated to the Doctor what he would not otherwise believe had not his eyes convinced him viz. that a purple colour and from thence a dark opacity like lnk might he made from another liquor than Vitriol or Iron to which he solely ascribes the changing of colours by a Gaul put thereinto making that one of his demonstrations why Iron is an Ingredient in the Spaw which by an occuler testimony I convinced him that the changing of colour by a Gaul was not any sufficient evidence that Iron Vitriol must needs be an Ingredient thereof because the bare solution of the Calx of Allom having nothing of Iron or Vitriol in it doth give exactly the same alteration of colour 6. The strength of his Argument for Iron and Vitriol being plac'd in this viz. that the sediment which falls to the bottom upon the alteration with Gauls which in his book I take saith he to be the Iron Mineral with a little touch of the Vitriol which certainly had been much more proper if he had spoke of the Minera of Iron and left out Vitriol or of the Vitriol of Iron and so discoursed only of one for that both should be there we have in the first part denyed and held inconsistent nor is this variation of colour by Gauls a sufficient argument of the presence of the Minera of Iron though I do not deny it to be an Ingredient seeing a solution of the calcin'd stone of Allom will do the same 7. But to proceed upon both these coloured Liquors viz. of the Spaw and of the solution of Allom by the solution of Gauls I poured a little spirit of Vitriol and presently by degrees both of them became alike clear again the spirit of Vitriol working upon and dissolving all those scattered loose confus'd atoms which the Gaul shiver'd the waters into till they had all become dissolv'd again in the body of water and became as clear as at first 8. From whence I inferr'd a further similitude of parts between the Spaw water and the solution of Allom being alike in their precipitation and in their reduction to clear Liquors again 9. To these cleer solutions I poured some drops of Oleum Tartari per deliquium which caused them both to become alike coloured as deep almost as Ink for this Oyl of Tartar precipitates what ever acid spirits such as spirit of Vitriol of Salt c. dissolve and bring clear solutions into confus'd postures by which it appears that Mineral Bodies or Salts may by the force of acid Menstruums be resolv'd into clear Liquors which Bodies are not therefore converted into the nature of the Menstruum and become the same with it as Dr. Wittie would have Metals that are dissolv'd in Aqua fortis to be converted into the nature of the Aqua fortis whereas lixivial Salts evince the contrary for either a fixt or volatile Alkali will presently precipitate and make it fall to the bottom whatever acid corrosive Liquors have dissolv'd by which the Metal he thought lost would once more become the object of his Opticks 10. Then upon these Muddy Inky Liquors I poured some more spirit of Vitriol and clear'd them both again upon which clear Liquors I poured some volatile spirit of Harts-horn which as the Oyl of Tartar made them both become confus'd and Inky 11. By all which it appeared that the solution of calcin'd stone of Allom admitted the same precipitations and resolutions with that of the Spaw by acid Liquors and alkalizate Salts 12. Then we poured forth these Liquors and took fresh Spaw water and fresh solution of Allom upon both I poured some Oyl of Tartar per deliquium which caused a whitish curdling separation much-what alike in both which would again become clear by the addition of some drops of the spirit or Vitriol 13. Now the Query is how comes Oyl of Tartar or any lixivial Salt or volatile spirit to cause this separation of parts in all Mineral or Metalline solutions that are made by acid Menstruums Whether they do it by coagulating themselves upon the bodies of Minerals and Metals or by uniting with the Salts of the Menstruums and so thrusting forth the other bodies of Minerals or Metals 14. For the solving of which doubt we must first know that there are three sorts of Salts or Spirits out of which ordiarily Menstruums are made for the dissolving of most bodies commonly dissolvable commonly dissolvable I said because the Liquor
water had before dissolv'd into it self fall to the bottom and that without the least perception either of Vitriol Iron or any other Ingredient SECT 2. 1. THus far I assented to Dr. WITTIE viz. that an alluminous salt from a Mineral acidity had dissolved a slight touch of the Minera of Iron and both dissolv'd in the current spring of water makes up the Spaw I asked him how he would demonstrate his other three Principles and first as to Vitriol he said that in the carriage of the water from the spring to remote places there was found to be a loss of spirits which he called Vitrioline spirits first that these were Vitrioline spirits and that they were lost remained to be proved that there was an alteration in the water by carrying to distant places I granted but that I told him I apprehended was from a quassation of parts which a wooden vessels might easily admit of an incipient putrefaction whence might really proceed an inversion of parts which would beget a great alteration in the texture of the water not to say what alteration may be made from oken vessels which by precipitation may make a great alteration 2. But an ingenious person being by asked the Doctor whether suppose the water was sealed up in a glass bottle hermetically and so carryed to a remote place whether it would be altered by carriage or no he answered he thought it would if so thâ—â— it was not from any volatility of parts because the glass was supposed sealed up therefore the alteration of the water was not from the loss of any volatile spirits and consequently not from the loss of the Vitrioline But the foresaid ingenious person put some of the Spaw water into a glass bottle and stopt it up from the air into an other glass bottle he also put of the same water but let it stand open the first he observ'd that though it was kept until the water suffered a little putrefaction did yet give a tincture to Gauls he tryed another bottle after the very same maner which yet did not give the tincture as the other did but the bottle that stood open to the air within two or three days lost its tincturing property so that though we should grant there are volatile parts which take wing in the air yet are they not Vitriol because though kept in closely stopt vessels yet in time they lose themselves which if a body of Vitriol was there would be permanent it is therefore an apporrhea mineralis whether Vitrioline or Alluminous 3. But being he mentions this loss of Vitrioline spirits which by agitation of the water in carrying it at distance evaporates I wonder seeing those are so considerable according to his own supposal making the water act more lively why I say in his experimenting the water he did not set upon the distilling of it and saving by accurately closed joints those Vitrioline spirits that he might have tasted them or by other means have brought them upon the test and examined their nature but he very civilly because they are volatile le ts them go 4. If you view the Doctors tools by which he undertakes to hew out the rudiments of this Spaw they are indeed very rude and of a low rank viz. a skellet a culinary fire but not a word of a glass Still which an ingenious Artist supposing volatile spirits would rather have chosen for the satisfaction of himself and the World he tells us almost a wonder viz. that when the water was almost evaporated and spent it riseth up in billows making a bubling noise like the boiling of Allom in the Mines at Whithy which he might see very frequently in the evaporations of most Mineral Metalline nay vegetable solutions but that it may be it is the first he hath seen and therefore excusable 5. I arguing with him against Vitriol as being inconsistent with that of Iron in the Spaw told him that I apprehended that if there were any common Vitriol in it would be emetick or vomitive that it had no such operation constant experience convinc'd as also an example he produc'd of a man that every morning drank Eighteen Quarts for two weeks together without any vomiting at all 6. But the reason he blusht not to urge why though Vitriol be in the water yet it should not vomit you will wonder at it is this viz. we frequently give in our Cordials saith he spirit of Vitriol as also to quench thirst but doth not at all make the Patient vomit saith the Doctor 7. As if according to his account the spirits of Vitriol were nothing else but Vitriol it self and then indeed it would hold good what he saith that when the Vitrioline spirits were gone the Vitriol it self would also take wing to which we return'd that the spirits were but one part or element of Vitriol and the caput mortum or Coltotar another and that the chief vomitive property lay not singly and distinctly in either of these for if the Colcotar should cause vomit yet it is because there remains still some salts or spirits unseparated which when throughly dulcified hath nothing near if at all that emetick property it had when the salts were joyned to it 8. Copper amongst all the Metals if resolv'd into a Viridaeris or Vitriol by any acid salt is the most if not the only emetick Metal excepting Mercury which although mater metallorum yet is reckoned one of the seven which by Aqua fortis or Oyl of Vitriol is brought in to precipitate or turbith Mineral either of which is desperately emetick I say Copper or the Minera of Copper being resolv'd by an acidity becomes emetick these salts being separated either by distillation or otherwise by a Menstruum the Metal or Minera becomes what it was again 9. Now the Quety is whence the vomitive quality of this cuprous solution should proceed It is not surely singly from the Sulphur of that Metal because it being separated from that Metal by the Liquor Alkahest becomes as Helmont saith a sweet fixt anodynous Sulphur and therefore quite contrary to an emetick property nor is it alone from the Mercurial part because then the same would be had from Saturn Jupiter Luna c. inasmuch as they have as great a proportion if not a greater of Mercury than Venus Now the Saccharum Saturni nor the Sal Jovis as far as I understand hath any thing near such if at all Emetick qualities and as for the Sal Lunae or Salt of Silver that is chiefly purgative witness the Pillulae Lunares 10. It is therefore from the Salts preying both upon the mercurial and sulphureous parts jointly considered which together make up so hostile a texture of parts as that they become wholly inimical to nature becoming totally refrectary to the acid ferment of the stomach which not admitting so tyrannical an Enemy gathers all its Forces together rallies them and opposeth with all its might this grand Antagonist 11. But reduce again this
Vitriol into its primitive Elements viz. Sal acidum terra Mineralis sive Colcotar veneris or reduce viride eris into the acid Salt and cuprous body and none of these singly and alone shall be Emetick for the Spirit of Vinegar nor soure Juyce of Grapes nor the Spirit of Verdigreese is at all vomitive nor yet is the Salt of Vitriol of Venus if totally by an artificial Menstruum it be separated Emetick nor is the Spirit of the same Vitriol at all vomitive So that it 's very clear that the hostile property of vomiting is jointly from the commixtion of the Menstruum that dissolves either the Minera of Copper whence the Vitriolum cupri or of that acidity that coagulates upon the very body of Copper for making of it viride eris SECT 3. 1. I Queried with the Doctor how he came to understand that Nitre was an Ingredient and that the chief in the Spaw water being as he writes the most predominant his arguments for it were twofold the first argument he urged was this which as he thought was grounded upon experiment Take saith he the Spaw water into which put some Gauls which strikes a colour then after it hath stood awhile give the vessel a shake and somewhat like a blackish sediment will fall to the bottom then pour off the clear water and set it upon the fire and in a little time there will be a separation of a whitish curdling matter take it off the fire and let it stand to cool and there will be found another whiter precipitation than before and pour off the clear water again and this precipitate saith he tasts somewhat like to Nitre the clear remaining water being boyled up to a dryness give the rest of the Minerals 2. To which I replyed that after the first precipitation was made by the addition of Gauls the the clearly decanted water receiving an alteration from the fire begun to make a spontaneous separation of part of the contents thereof which I had no other cause from any argument of his to look upon otherwise than of the very same nature with the sediment which remained after the boyling up the rest of the water as to the taste of it which he thought was somewhat Nitrous I suppose might be spoke in favour of what he would willingly it should have tasted 3. Many solutions may upon the fire give a separation of parts which are yet but of the same nature with those left after the evaporation or distillation of the Liquor so that this whitish separation severs no distinct Ingredient from the Spaw water neither doth it evince any truth in favour of the multiplicity of principles in that water 4. His other argument which indeed is the chief he insists upon is twofold viz. first from the Nitre which is frequently found upon the Cliff at the bottom whereof the Spring break out this he thinks must needs because so near the Well contribute its assistance to the water and that which confirms him in his judgement as he imagines is that when the Rain comes it washed off this Nitre and after that more sweats thorough the earth as he supposeth and fills the vacancy of the former 5. To which we answer that it is true there is Nitre found along the Cliff near the Well but that this Nitre should contribute any influence to the water I deny by shewing first that that Nitre is ingendred chiefly from the air and next to that that it is only superficially to be found 6. First that it is chiefly begotten from the air is apparent because it is to be found very plentifully on old Walls either Brick or Free stone upon the Lime in the seams of the Walls especially where the Rain comes not but the air hath free access for otherwise the Rain washeth it off when it comes this is called Nitrum murarium or Nitrum aereum being a volatile aereal Salt coagulated upon Lime Allom Stone or the Mineral Earth of Allom. 7. To the coagulation of which Salt is required a competent body or subject which may answer the indication of a Magnet upon which these Nitrous particles floting in the air settle themselves of which sort are the forenamed bodies viz. Lime Allom Stone Mineral Earth of the same as also any fixed salt penetrating the body of an earthen Pot as likewise an Essurine Colcotar made barren of its imbred spirits by force of fire all which centre upon themselves the volatile Nitrous Atoms dispersed in the air 8. So that this Nitre lyeth not in veins of the earth as a Mineral salt as Dr. Wittie supposeth but is meerly superficial and therefore washed away by every dash of Rain for if a solution were made of the same Mineral earth where this is found it is very probable we should upon examination find nothing of Nitre in it 9. The other part of his argument which he thinks is instar omnium to confirm his opinion of Nitre the chief Ingredient is this experiment viz. that upon the exposing of the Minerals as he calls the sediment left after evaporation of the water some while in a moist and cold air that there have been found stiries or little Icikles among them which is the form of Nitre as to the veracity of the experiment we are not incredulous but that this should evince the preexistence of Nitre in that sediment is the thing we contend and very much question 10. For we say that the alluminous body left behind after evaporation of the water is of the same nature with the Mineral earth or stone of Allom found upon the Cliff and so the one as well as the other becomes equall magnetical and attract or centre upon themselves the floting Nitrous particles dispersed abroad in the air so that it is not the moist air that extraverts any preexistent nitrous parts from the body of the minerals but the vollatile nitrous salt fluctuating in the air settles it self upon proper magnetical bodies among which the sediment of the Spaw water being chiefly an Alluminous Salt is most peculiar SECT 4. 1. BUt that we may the better illustrate the truth of what we assert viz. That an acid alumenish mineral Salt preying upon and dissolving a slight touch of the Minera of Iron gives essence to this Spaw consider this following Experiment Take a duskish yellow Earth which lyeth much in veins as also interspersedly here and there upon the Cliff near the Well which is discernable enough in taste being sweet and stiptick like Vitriol or Allom or both 2. This I dissolv'd in simple distill'd Water and filtred with which mixing a little powder of Gauls gave an alteration of colour towards a purple though not speedily which with Spirit of Vitriol became clear again after the manner of the Spaw water 3. The same clear Solution of this Minera found upon the Bank under which the Spaw runs being mixed with Oyl of Tartar gives a white Coagulum of milky separation
Country-man chuseth for some grounds rather than Manure That there is an acid Salt therein is somewhat distinguishable by the taste Another sort of heat I have observed to proceed from the contact of Salts and the Calx of Metals as for instance in the following experiment I took of the Caput mort of Viride Eris from whence the Spiritus Veneris had been rectified being a very subtile Calx of Venus with which I mixed an Anatical proportion of Sal Armoniack pulverized very well in a large brass Mortar in mixing it came to such an impalpable powder as the particles seemed to be as minute and almost as continuous as the particles of water are for it was almost as fluid as water so that by the by it is plain minuteness and adaption of parts amongst themselves are mainly if not solely conducible to fluidity and fluidity the essential property of water When I had well incorporated them together for so they should be in as much as when any sutable body or Spirit is to penetrate and work an alteration in another body they then do it best when they touch each other per minima thence Contritions and Sublimations are the Pistilla Chymica by which alterations are made of one body by another I say when I had well incorporated them I put them into a paper thinking the next day to have put them into a Retort but within less than one quarter of an hour I perceived such a strong penetrating urinous smell as made me admire whence it should proceed which put me in fear of some glass being broke in my Balneum At length I came near the paper and presently found it to be that which sent forth such a strong odour which when I took up off the Table was so hot as I could scarce suffer to hold it I made hast to put it into a Retort which before I could do it well-nigh burnt my hand By this experiment thus far Two things considerable appeared one conducing to illustrate as I said the nature of fluidity to consist in minuteness of parts the other is That heat and so consequently the rest of the qualities so call'd are a certain disposition and adaption of parts of bodies amongst themselves after such and such a manner as to work differently upon one and the same body so that a brisk motion of the constituent particles either by an innate fermentation or extrinsick excitation from another subtile body is sufficient to cause that we call heat Some other causes there are of hot Springs viz. Subterraneal Fires set on work by the flagration of Bitumen or Sulphur which being kindled in some parts of the Earth where being close pent up not finding vent causeth Earthquakes but when it breaks forth it sometimes forceth with that violence as that if it break forth under the Sea it throws up stones and earth in such abundance as that a new Island is thrown up of a suddain in the midst of the Sea and that for many Leagues together the Sea is at that time covered over with the spongy Pumice-stone which is the Caput mort in the flagration of that Mineral Other places there are by which as Chimneys or Flewes the Subterraneal Fire finds vent as Aetna Vesuvius Strongilo Vulcano c. These Subterraneal Fires the ingenuous Kircker in his Mundus Subterraneus calls Pyrophylacia which being conveighed by several Subterraneal Pipes or Chanels to those Cisterns or receptacles of water called Hydrophylacia which thereby become heated and that in places not far from day I mean the superficies of the Earth breaks forth in hot Springs These Pyrophylacia it is very probable are the cause of some hot Springs as the kindling of Calx Vive are of others Of which last Fallopius tells us In agro Volaterrano ad castellum montis Cerbari vocatum sunt lacus dicti vulgo lagoni quasi lacunae ubi est aqua ferventissima undique cinis quinimo mons qui ibidem est totus calce cinere refertus est calido adeo ut calceamenta exurat uti ipse sum inquit aliquando expertus These Phyrophylacia heat the waters sometimes in ipsis cuniculis otherwhile they heat Mineral stones through which water passeth either way make hot Springs Thus having numbred up the several sorts of heats and amongst them pitched upon that which is the efficient of hot Springs amongst which also by the by the preparation of the body of Steel is performed whereby it will the most part of it readily dissolve in any Vehicle and make a Mineral water like Tunbridge Epsom and Knarsborough Spaw Let us now consider how artificial Baths may be made and those are either such as are more common as the decoctions of Vegetables and Salts in water and other liquors wherein Diseased Persons are frequently put also to have the body all but the head inclos'd within the steams of hot water or to sit under a frame of Pastboard with Spirit of Wine flaming in a large Lamp-vessel which is a kind of Stoving Bath or Stoves c. or such Baths as are more rare viz. Spirit of Wine with Salt of Tartar either for some particular parts of the body or for the whole if some Patients upon extraordinary occasions would go to the charge thereof also Sulphur so artificially contriv'd as that the flame thereof shall heat a large vessel of water in imitation of the terrestrial fires wherewith some Baths or Springs are made hot which Bath might constantly be kept hot by the continual supply of fresh Sulphur in manner of the Fountain which the Romans made constantly by art to flow hot which was performed by some brass Pipes wound up in Gyres In spiras voluti instar Draconis which were therefore called Dracones under which they made a fire by which the first Spires were made warm the next more the next again yet hotter so that the water did continually flow forth hot After which sort with some little variation Physicians might keep hot baths with Medicinal waters suted for the Patients Disease constantly at work with a small charge after the vessels were once artificially contriv'd To which purpose I have had a Balneum Maria kept hot for digestions by Leaden Pipes placed in Gyres in a wooden vessel The advantage of such artificial contriv'd Baths is this That the Physician may presently change his medicated waters as occasion offers can give what degree of warmth he pleaseth and keep them constantly in an equal heat which cannot easily be performed by the common sort of Baths and therefore comes nearer in efficacy to the natural hot Springs than the other and so consequently more effectual Now as to the virtues of Baths natural or artificial they are of large extent and may be if skillfully managed of much use in helping many Diseases as the Palsie Convulsions c. Which by opening the pores and thereby removing the obstructing or afflicting causes of the Genus Nervosum may
and for ought we know most of the Islands have been belcht forth of the belly of the Earth and also are incompassed with the waters are therefore more inclinable to Subterraneal Belchings Ructures Vapours Exhalations c. which in some Islands not finding vent is the cause of frequent Earthquakes in others finding Flewes or Chimnies belch forth fire smoak stones c. But in the third sort of Islands where there is neither those actual Vent-holes nor indeed is in need of them nor is the Vapours so pent up as to force the Earth to a tremulation but finding passages or pores large enough breaks forth and being carryed according to the Lation of the Air is the probable cause of those Storms Winds Hurry-canes and other alterations of weather within the Orb of the Atmosphere to which Islands and the adjacent Seas are more expos'd than the large Continent 33. Cold we see in Animals is that which benumbs the Joynts stupifies the parts forceth the vital heat to retreat into its inward and more strong forts which if assaulted there and overcome death 's at hand and the combat over Now if Cold be so great an enemy to vital heat as is evident not only from what I have said but from what every doth or may experiment than no Medicine as a Medicine is or ought to be cold in its operation 34. And therefore to talk of Curing a Fever with cooling Medicines as the Galenists frequently speak is very improper not to say absurd and argues no less than ignorance of the essential cause of a Fever which because there is a great heat arising from the boyling and spurious fermenting of the Spirits therefore they think according to their own maxim Contraria contrariis curantur that it must surely be Cured by cold things and to that purpose they follow a method of cooling to a purpose both by frequent Phlebotomy robbing the blood of its vital treasure whereby Cold the great enemy of life may indeed have better access to the vitals and destroy the sooner as also by cooling Julips and cooling glisters Why do not they give them cold water in Glisters or blow a little cold wind into their breech surely that would cool notably and do the work more speedily 35. It is very strange to me that their own dayly observation doth not convince of the folly of administring cooling things They cannot but observe that no good effect follows thereon It is much to me they should notwithstanding the fruitlessness of such a method yet again and again trace the same trod unless they be resolved never to go out of their pace Spaniard like though they be lashed for it both in their Reputation and otherwise 36. Next to which they cannot but observe which also most old wives take notice of that the best and most hopeful Medicines in Fevers are such as cause sweat and therefore ordinary people will frequently without the advice of a Physician give Feverish Persons something to endevour sweating and that often times with very good success Which is a very fair admonition to Physicians to be more serious and copious in Diaphoreticks for therein indeed lyes the main hinge of Curing all sorts of Fevers which very thing is the least consulted of any other They will Blood twice or thrice and Purge as often and yet scarce will they order one good Diaphoretick which if they do is commonly compounded with such a farraginous mixture as Nature abhors and as soon sweats to see the folly of the mixture as naturally inclin'd thereto by the virtue thereof 37. Now no Diaphoretick was ever cold in its operation but always of an heating attenuating property and therefore of power to promote the natural fermentation of the blood and of abstersing the vessels of their recrements and of carrying away by transpiration the superfluous tainted Latex together with other Heterogeneities before disturbing the oeconomy of the blood and that through the pores of the body though not always actually by sweat but sometimes by insensible transpiration for there is no better way of taking away the cause of excessive heat in Fevers than by removing or allaying the bastard fermentation in the blood which is most aptly done by Diaphoreticks especially after a previous abstersion of the primary digestions by some generous Salts or well prepared Solutives together with an anodyne as an additional auxiliary 38 This and no way else according to the tenure of Nature is if we must speak in the vulgar Idiom to cool the immoderate heat in Fevers or rather according to our own language to reduce the blood and humors from their spurious and Feverish into their own natural genuine fermentation where the erratrick excentrick motions becomes regular and every thing falls into its natural course again 39. So that by this time I hope any ingenuous Person will apprehend it to be dissonant to the rules of Nature and contrary to reason to administer cooling things in order to the Cure of a Fever and further that hot things such I mean as are actually Diaphoretick with their previous preparatory abstersive Salts are the chief if not the only means to Cure burning Fevers whether intermittent or continual and consequently that the Galenical notion and application of cooling things is very flat and frigid 40. They altogether prohibite the use of Wine in Fevers as being they say too hot mistaking still upon the old Hypothesis that heat is the efficient essential cause of a Fever and therefore must be abated by the actual presence of a proportionate cold whereas sometimes I indulge the Feverish Patient with a glass of the richest Sack he can procure especially after the use of some noble abstersive Salt or as a Vehicle to give my Medicine in and that too because I am satisfied that heat is not the efficient cause of a Fever but only a supervening symptome consequent to the Feverish fermentation 41. To confirm the truth of what I have said in order to the application of hot things in Fevers or acute distempers of Colicks or the like I have had an experimental observation upon my self in a Colical Distemper together with a Feverishness that accompanyed it which surpriz'd me since the writing of the last Section or numerical division which whether it proceeded from cold or the transmission of an acid juyce into the intestines or from both as the occasional cause thereof or from what other concurring cause I know not but however this I am sure of and felt to my own great trouble the tormina Pains or Gripings of the Colick which proceeding from a fermental acidity rouzed up an acrimonious flatus that not finding passage per inferiera that vent-hole of intestine flatus or wind returned upwards oppress'd the stomach and vital Spirits thence I became very sick and was somewhat provoked to vomit 42. Whereupon in order to my assistance I took a Dose of a gentle Emetick but that nor reaching the Minera Morbi
proper place viz. the convex part of the Earth and yet these Springs sometimes break forth in the top of high Hills and in the uppermost part of high Heaths as to go no further that of Knarsborough Spaw the vitrioline I mean is a pretty strong Spring and yet is upon the uppermost part of that high Heath which in the greatest droughts ceaseth not to spring so that He and the followers of this opinion must of necessity grant that either it is not improper for water to ascend and then they must assign the true efficient causes thereof that forceth Water after it has fallen from the Clouds and sinks into the cavityes of the earth up again to the Superficies thereof and that too to the tops of many high Hills Or else they must retrive their Opinion that the convex part of the Earth is the proper place of the Water For if water as in many Springs it 's found ascends and breaks forth above the level of Plains and that too without any compulsive force is a more firme argument that the Water whilst there is rather in its proper place then when thrust forth into declive Places along the convex part of the earth where it doth forthwith undergo Hydraulick Laws is ponderous and runs down any Declive Current 14. The arguments Dr. Wittie urgeth for the confirming his Opinion of Rain and Snow-Water to be the Original of Springs are Three The first of which is because it is found by experience saith he that Fountains and consequently Rivers are greater and do abound more with Water in Winter and moyst weather than in Summer To which I answer That it 's granted that they do indeed abound more in Winter and moyst weather but yet I deny that therefore it should follow That Fountains and Rivers shuuld have their Original therefrom For it is onely Land-Springs or at the most a Co-incidence of them with some few Quick-springs that receive so great increase from Rain and Snow Water as joyned with declive Currents of Water that run down Hills Mountains and other steep Places which fill Rivers make them overflow their banks and drown the Fens and other low grounds in Winter and sometimes in Summer by great sudden falls of Rain-Water whereas Quick-Springs saving their additionals the Land-springs are the same then as at other times I mean as to their own Channels from their proper source 15. Secondly In those years when great floods of rain do fall in Summer and great store of Snow in winter we find saith he Springs durable whereas in droughty Seasons when there is but little or no Rain or Snow the Springs dry up To which I answer that first as to the durablenes of those Fontes perennes the sudden falls of Rain contribute nothing and that because they indure after the dreining away and exhausting of the Land-Springs by continued droughts Whereas if the continuance of these Quick-Springs did depend upon those falls of rain then would they in great droughts being denied of their supply also as I said before cease The great plenty of water in wet Seasons do indeed as I said set the Land-Springs a-flote yea and begets other Springs that appear not at all in other Seasons witness the Gypsies in the Woulds in York-shire which by the in-lets of Chanels each into other may for a time increase the current of Quick-Springs but adds nothing at all to its durableness for the earth is no sooner dreyned of the superfluous water which come by great falls of wet but the living Springs as they may not improperly be call'd are reduced in statu quo prius And as to what he saith That in droughty Seasons when there is but little or no Rain or Snow the Springs dry up As to the truth thereof I shall I say appeal to the observations of all such Persons as have taken notice thereof A sure Proof of which we had he saith in England in the Years 1654 55 and 56 when our Climate was dryer than ever any Stories mention so as we had very little Rain in Summer or Snow in Winter most of our Springs were dryed up even those sorts of Springs we call Fontes perennes which I say as to matter of fact the Country-People can testifie was not so and though I grant many Springs were through the drought and penury of rain-Rain-water dryed up yet do I deny these to be Quick-Springs excepting some few which as I said before might be diverted by the extream dryness of the adjacent thirsty ground which might drink it up as it came or by having its Auxiliaries of a Land-Spring drawn off or lastly by having its current intercepted and carryed by longer stretch'd Subterraneal Chanels into other Springs I must confess that it 's more than probable that those Land-Springs which are ordinarily fed by Snow and water and which supply many Draw-Wells were indeed dryed up for the most part in those droughty Seasons but that the true Quick-Springs those I mean which always run along the Sabulum bulliens or bubbling Sand should be dryed up in droughty Seasons excepting as aforesaid is neither agreeable to reason or observation 17. A third reason which saith he perswades to this original from Snow and Rain is Because in those Climates and Countries where little Rain falls few or no Springs and Rivers are seen as in the Desarts of Aethiopia and in most parts of Africa near the Equinoctial they have little water To which I answer That though this seemingly be the most cogent Argument that Dr. Wittie urgeth for the vindication of this Opinion yet I see no more that it evinceth than this viz. That in those places where there are but rare falls of Rain-water those Auxiliarie helps and conveyances by Land-Springs which in other places by great dashes of Rain fill other Rivers very plentifully are mostwhat cut off and the simple Quick-Springs are left solitary which as such cannot make many Rivers nor much swell those already made 18. Hence in Aegypt where it Rains very seldom they are supplyed instead thereof by the overflowing of Nilus whose River begins to arise on the the Seventeenth of June swelling by degrees until it mounts to sometimes Twenty four Cubits though heretofore Sixteen was the most it attained to represented by that Image of Nilus having Sixteen Children playing about it brought from thence and dedicated to the gods by Vespasian in his Temple of Peace and now to be seen as Sandys in his Travails faith in the Vatican in Rome 19. Which constant rising of Nilus at such a day as aforesaid is imputed by Diodorus Siculus unto the abundance of Rain falling on the Aethiopian Mountains for Forty days together at such time as the Sun approcheth Cancer which is affirmed to be true saith Sandys by the Inhabitants of Aegypt who receive it from Strangers frequenting Cairo from sundry parts of Aethiopia and Libya who come down with the floud and bring with them Slaves Monkies Parrots
may mutually promote the motion of an other that all the parts and motions thereof may joyntly conspire the good and intirenes of the whole But that we may in some few particulars view the Wisdom of God in ordering this Circulation of Water and that it is not done in vain but hath its various uses and those of larg extent for the benefit of man and other Creatures and that as followeth 75. First Waters by this great Circulation are kept from putrefaction and corruption motion being to Waters as it is to the vapours in the Air viz. hinders them from corrupting and as wind fan the Air from putrid vapours so motion keeps Water from Stagnating and consequently from putridness and therefore a peice of raw flesh laid in a constant current of Water will keep from corrupting a considerable time 76 Secondly In times of drought when Land-Springs are mostwhat dryed up These viz the Springs Rivulets c. contain'd in the great Circulation serve for the use of Man and Cattle and that in places at great distance from large Rivers for the Quick-Springs constantly moving in the great Wheel are never dry and that by reason that where the cause doth perpetuate the effect must do the same but the causes as aforesaid are alwaies at work therefore Springs I mean Quick-Springs must never fail as long as the Fabrick of the World is upheld by the same Fiat as at first 77. Thirdly By great Rivers which are made of Rivulets and Fountains which in the great Circulation run thereinto we can easily pass from one Place and Country into an other and that by Oaken vessels which if the Water whether in Rivers or Seas were Stagnant could not move thereon half so well so that in Ships by the motion of the Sea and Winds we visit forreign Countrys and the Merchants Traffique abroad and that for a general good of Mankind 78. Fourthly By this grand Circulation all Mineral Springs for the health of man are produc'd For the Water circulating in the bowels of the earth being pressed by the foresaid causes as it meets with various Mineral Earths and Salts becomes impregnated with the Tinctures or tasts thereof making some slight solutions of the Mineral juyces into it self passeth on to the head of the next Spring where breaking forth makes Spaws of different sorts as Vitrioline Alluminous Nitrous Salinous Sulphureous c according to the nature of the mineral Glebe the Water passeth through to the Spring-head whence is the great variety of Waters 79. Fifthly Water by this great Circulation in the bowels of the Earth being dispers'd as I may say by capillary veins into the whole habit of the earthy body is coagulated by various Ferments and Specifick Mineral or Metalline Seeds into such like Bodyes For as we have else where demonstrated Water is the Material subject of all Minerals and consequently of Metalline Bodyes and that it needs onely different Seeds with their various Archeal Ferments to shape it into all sorts of bodyes found in Vulcan's shop each according to its Seminal difference For from whence proceeds the great variety of all Stones Marcasites Minerals Mineral Earths Metals c. but from Water shap'd by Seeds and Ferments into bodyes under various disguises Which here by this grand Circulation is alwayes at hand and ready for the Seminal Faber or Vulcan to work upon 80. Sixthly This circulation joyning Issue with that lesser one of Rain and Snow Impregnated with Coelestial influences doth make the ground fruitful and makes the Superficies thereof bring forth all manner of Seed Bearing plants and Trees according to the kinds of the first Seeds or Seminal Principles implanted by God therein at the first and so being impregnated with the Salt of the Earth promotes vegetation upon the green carpet thereof For when when I view Plants and Trees in their Verdure in the Spring or Summer times methinks I see nothing but Water altered by Seeds and Ferments which thereupon Proteus like puts on various Garbs and appears in different diesses and to me it s as easy to apprehend how Water moved by the foresaid causes riseth up into Hills and Mountains there breaking forth into Springs as to conceive how Water riseth up into the tops of the highest Trees and there to bud forth into leaves Fruit and Seed or how between the Bark and bole of the Tree Water should ascend up like as in Syphons and that in some Trees without any considerable alteration of tast or consistence from simple distill'd Water save a sleight touch of a Medicinal Odor as for instance cut a Vine in January or February but especially in March and you shall find it weep forth a deal of insipid Water at the knots or joynts where it 's cut so if you wound a Branch of the Birch Tree or lop the bole thereof in March if it be done below near the ground the Latex thence issuing is a mere insipid Water but if a Branch of about 3 Fingers thickness be wounded to the Semidiameter thereof and fill'd with Wooll it Weeps forth a Subacid Liquor in great abundance insomuch that in one day such a wounded Branch may give 8 or 10 pound of that Liquor concerning the vertue whereof Helmont saith Qui in ipso lithiasis tormento solatur afflictes tribus quatuorve cochlearibus assumptis viz. that it gives help in the torments of the Stone being taken to the quantity of three or four spoonfulls which he saith is Balsumus Lithioisis merus which great quantity of Water must come from the root and that must receive it by its Fibers from the Capillary Veins of the earth carryed thither by the grand Circulation of Water with its included circle of Rain and Snow which the one meeting with the other becomes the material subject of all Plants Trees and Fruits of the earth which earth is onely the Matrix where water becomes coagulated by the Fracedinous Odor thereof and by the Fermental operation of Seed into all sorts of Vegetable Concrets which spring up in the Superficies of the Earth Now the Medicinal virtue that this Liquor hath is from a Ferment which it receives from the Tree as it passeth along the Channels thereof for the same Liquor weeping from a wound of the bole near the Earth hath not that virtue Therefore it must be from a Medicinal Ferment it receives from the Tree above that place also if a Pompion be cut while it's growing will as a Friend of mine told me upon his own triall run a great deal of a limpid Water which by the heat of the Sun will be congeal'd into a pulpie substance and that because the Water which comes for the nourishment thereof hath received a Specifical Ferment from the Pompion which if it were intire would presently be coagulated for the growth and increase thereof but being let forth by a wound is at last by the heat of the Sun coagulated into somewhat Analogous thereto so probably Melons
flotes otherwise indiscernably in the Air which very thing rightly understood is no small Key to the Hermetick Philosophy which I shall at present purposely wave further to discourse upon Now the Proportion of this Nitrous Salt to the whole bulk of the water after the separation of all these stony Concretions is no less according to my compute than as one is to one hundred twenty eight so that it is at least but the one hundred twenty eighth part of the whole This pure Salt which as to taste is somewhat bitter dissolv'd is that I call the Essence of the Scarborough-Spaw a little of which taken in a glass of White or Rhenish Wine or in a glass of simple spring-Spring-water will as I have tryed purge gently by Stool and without doubt is that by whose efficacy whatever the Spaw-water drunk alone effects is performed and that too with a triple advantage First In that the sabulous Concretions are separated by Art which sometimes precipitating otherwise as I said before upon the bowels may do harm And secondly the smallness of its quantity prevents that hazard to some bodies which the gulping down great draughts of water may produce For such large quantities of Spaw-water as are usually drunk doth in some Constitutions too much dilute the Ferment debilitate the Digestions and vitiate the tone of the Membranous parts both of the stomach and other bowels and so cause Fevers Dropsies defluxions of Rheume c. And lastly The fitness of it to be taken at any Season of the Year whether Winter Spring Summer or Autumn whereas the waters from the Spaw it self are only to be drunk in the Summer-Season But this Essence may not only be drunk then which at that time of the year may be taken in three four or five glasses of any good simple Spring-water especially to those who cannot come to the Spaws but also may conveniently enough be taken in the Winter and in the Spring when the Spaw-water it self cannot with efficacy be drunk because too much diluted with Rain or Snow-water in a glass of White or Rhenish-Wine as I said which though it be taken in such a proportion as not to work sensibly by stool yet will it have a safe and innocent though an insensible Operation Yea What Diseases the Spaw-water is found proper for being taken from the Fountain for the same the Essence thereof is also as proper and according to all reason most effectual as in the Scurvy Scorbutical Asthma's Dropsie Hypocondriack Melancholy Fevers Obstructions of the Vessels in Women and Diseases thence depending together with several other Distempers as may be further seen in the Discourse it self The Essence of the Spaw hath this priviledge in the Cure at least in the assistance of the Cure of Fevers above that of the whole body of the Spaw-water viz. That it may be administred in a glass of Wine and so may readily be carried to absterse the vessels of the blood and other spurious fermenting liquors from their Heterogeneities and recremental Tartar which if taken in the whole bulk of water would be prejudicial and dangerous on all hands as hazarding too sudden a stop to the Fermentation and thereby occasion a preposterous stifling of the volatile Spirits before they can work themselves into a new state by separating Heterogene parts which they constantly attempt in most Fevers Also if this Spaw-water contribute as it 's highly extoll'd to that purpose to the making Women fruitful by removing Obstructions of the Womb the frequent concurring cause of Barrenness it doth it I say by virtue of this Nitro-hermetick Salt viz. That which I call the Essence of the Spaw which indeed is muchwhat of the same nature with that Salt which fructifies all Plants and Fruits of the Earth makes all Soyls multiply in great plenty and may give probability of fruitfulness to Women by opening those Obstructions which frequently hinder Conception By the help of this concentred Essence every simple Current-Spring may be made a Spaw by dissolving a competent quantity hereof in four five six or seven glasses of any Spring-water in the Summer-time which may also not a little increase its purgative quality in as much as the Spaw-waters often Purge downward by their very weight witness the Vitrioline-Spaw at Knarsborough which rarely purgeth any other way than downwards by its very weight either by Stool or Urine So that this very Essence might very properly be taken in the same Sweet Spaw at the Season of the Year and so you might have the virtue of both Spaws in one which would probably thereby answer more general Indications And lastly By the help of our aforesaid Ternary of Medicines together with some other good Specificks joyning issue at the Season of the Year with the use of the Scarborough-Spaw-water might effect very considerable Cures in most Chronick Diseases or the same with the Essence of the same Spaw to be taken in the Winter Spring or any other Season of the Year might not improbably effect the like Cures FINIS FRAGMENT I. Insert this first Fragment between the 29th Section ending with these words the extinction of the vital flame and the beginning of the 30th Section thus 30. This fourth Digestion as I conceive c. in Page 75. Part II. NOw this regurgitated Latex or separated Serum of the Blood let forth of the Abdomen by tapping the Bellies of such are afflicted with that sort of Dropsie call'd Ascites is a limpid liquor whose Tabes whereby it depraves and corrupts the membranous parts where it restagnates is not originally from the Liver that part so generally accus'd by the Galenists for being the grand Patron of Dropsies is apparent by matter of Fact both by the observation of the profound Inquisitor into Nature Baptista Van Helmont who upon the dissection of Bodies whose Diseases were Dropsies has found the Liver firm and sound both in colour and solidness of Parenchyme The same an ingenious and skilful Physician an Acquaintance of mine told me that upon his cutting up a Dropsical Body which Dropsie had worn away the Patient with an Atrophy of all the parts like a Tabes The limpid Liquor that he took forth of his Belly was near two Gallons the Liver was sound and good as any could be so likewise his Heart but the Spleen was discoloured and vitiated the Omentum was black rotten and foetid Some of this Liquor he caus'd to be plac'd over a fire to evaporate some of the moisture the remaining part thicken'd and was as stiff as a gelly and that of a very green colour It was of so stiff a consistence as that a spoon might have stood in it Which Experiment evinceth the truth of these following Considerations First That the Liver is innocent in the genesis of Dropsies In Hydrope insons est hepar saith Helmont and therefore all Medicines that are directed in the Galenical road to the opening Obstructions in the Liver or to any other Indication
fastened to the sides of the tunicles of those vessels and the more the Heterogeneities are the stronger is the Nisus or endevour to separate them and consequently the greater is the sensible heat which thereby perverting the sense makes it irregular in its pressing after cold things 28. That the coveting of cold drink and cold things in Fevers is as I said a deception of the sense and a depravation of the appetite further appears because notwithstanding the inordinate desire of cold things yet if by any cold drink taken into the stomach or by any accidental uncovering of the body the Archeus or Regent Spirit of any part becomes offended at its antagonist the cold the Fever or other Distemper doth certainly encrease the spurious fermentation of the blood becomes stronger and consequently the Feverish heat which is the constant product thereof is more violent and all symptomes grow worse And all this because cold the great enemy of vital heat makes its onset upon the vital principles unawares through some incautious accident or designedly through the depravedness of the appetite which is bent to require that which is harmful to it yea of which even in the very taking it becomes convinc'd of its folly by finding it doth not answer its expectation viz. the quenchiing its thirst 29. That cold is a real positive quiddity something really existent in nature and not a meer negative of heat as some would suppose which if so would in effect be nothing but vital heat and mortal cold stand both positives counter one opposing another is I say demonstrable by matter of fact In cold Countries in New England Freezeland Swethland Russia where in the Winter time the cold is actually so intense as that if they do not by some artifice defend themselves from the rigour thereof it will freeze off their very Noses yea their fingers will become mortified if they are too much exposed to the injury of the cold But we need not go so far for we see in our own Country in the Winter time in strong Frosts that some parts become mortified for instance About three Years ago a man was drunk at a Country Town and in returning home his partner left him upon a Bridge where expos'd to the cold frost upon the hard stones he had his lodging that night the next morning he was found alive but his hands and feet the most remote parts from the fort of vital heat the heart were absolutely mortified grew black as Pitch and never reducible to life or vital heat again and therefore were cut off It 's very probable if the man had not been drunk the cold would absolutely have kill'd him but the Spirits of the Liquor fortified the vital Spirits against the total subversion thereof by cold 30. And not only upon Animals but also upon Vegetables Cold exerciseth its tyranny How are tender Plants in the Spring nipt with cold frost How do they flag and as it were hang the wing after a sharp cold morning Nay How actually are the blossoms of fruit-Trees mortified and kill'd by frosts the grass nipt and kept back from growing And all this by the mortal enemy Cold. That it is not a meer privation of heat appears further because though the Sun be got into Taurus or Gemini and thereby is in great force and very vigorous yet we see that frosts come in May and prove then mortal to many tender Plants yea as intense Cold will often happen in the latter end of May when the Sun is approching to the Tropick of Cancer as when he is depress'd as far below in the Tropick of Capricorn yea and more too it is sometimes warmer weather in December than in some parts of May So that the height and nearness of Sun is not always the cause of heat nor the lowness or remoteness thereof of cold 31. And though some suppose the cause of Cold and frosts in the Spring to happen from the approch of the Sun into the Northern Signes whereby the frozen Seas near the Pole become melted and the cold being driven away by those winds which comes over us give us the cold and frosty air at that season of the Year which suppose it were so yet would it nothing infringe our doctrine of the positive essence of cold but rather confirm it yet we cannot imagin that to be the cause of intense cold frosts in the Spring and because if it were so then when the Sun came to such a point as that its heat begun to resolve those frozen Northern Seas as the heat I say of the Sun would be continually resolving those frozen Seas so answerably the cold frosts which should thereby annoy us would prove as constant which we see to the contrary for in March April and May the frosts and cold weather are very uncertain some days and nights together very warm others again as cold then warm again c. 32 I rather think that Winds Heat and Cold Rain Snow and Drought are the Treasures of God in the deep and that they are committed to tutelary influences of the Stars which have keys to let them out upon the face of the Earth at their due seasons appointed by God and that by those Peroledi and secret sluces or chanels in the Air over which the Stars are placed as Vicegerents which whether they receive their influences immediately from God or from some intermediate intelligences or Angelical Powers which are deeper than themselves yet certainly this Divine Chain of coordinate and subordinate cause reacheth from the Earth as the Poets feign'd to Jupiter's Chair I mean from the ultimate product to the primitive original cause God himself Although indeed its far otherwise as to difference of weather in Islands than upon the Continent for upon the main Continent the temperature of the Air is much at a certainty according to the points of the Aphaelion or Perichaelion remoteness or neerness thereof to the Sun and that according to the several positions thereof in different Climates which as the reverberation of the beam of the Sun is more or less in the lowest part of the Atmosphere or along the surface of the Earth so is the heat or temperature of the Air answerable in those places Whereas in Islands it 's far different for those being environed with Seas on all hands and it may be some of them old thrown up as an Abortive Birth out of the Womb of the Earth by the great Demogorgon or Subterraneal Vulcan witness the Islands of Strongilo Vulcano c. As well as others have been swallowed up in the vast Caverns thereof and drowned in the Seas witness the Terra Atlantica which was reputed bigger than Asia and Africa was swallowed up by the Atlantick Ocean as the ingenuous Kircker relates out of Plato Of which great Island those called the Canary Islands and others in the Atlantick Ocean are suppos'd to be the highest and therefore left after that Deluge I say seeing many