can turn Mineral substances into Water and every whit as easily reduce them into what they were before 7. For he hath given a positive resolve of the Quere of transmutation having absolutely determined that these Salts do perfectly turn into Water according to his own words a little Water being put to them which through resolution of the point is totally exclusive of either his magis or minus so that according to his opinion Salt put into Broth becomes Broth and Sugar dissolv'd in white-White-wine or Sack becomes White-wine or Sack whereas any of these Liquors evaporated or distill'd he will find besides the whole body of the waterish part saved in the receiver the body of Salt or Sugar left entire in the distilling vessel the very same as before 8. This peripatetick notion I look upon no otherwise than that other analogous to it where in the same Sect. he saith that Water would evaporate into Ayr supposing a transmutability of Elements as if Water when evaporating were not as really Water though its parts undergo a large extension as when the parts are united in a fluid body in that texture of parts which the body of Water makes up for save in a receiver that which he imagines evaporates into Ayr and you shall find and so shall he too that it is no way distinguishable from that it was before Water still and not Ayr so Salts Sugars or what else dissolvable in Water are the same as at the first though appearing under the form of Water 9. For whatsoever is dissolv'd in Water if upon the superfusion of any other Liquor of a different property the parts of the first dissolvable begin to alter their position they either precipitate speedily or make the Liquor opacous and in time precipitates leaving the water either partly acuated with the additional Liquor or else insipid having all the saline parts coagulated one upon another which being wash't or dulcified gives you the very same dissolvable Concrete you first took in hand 10. As for instance Dissolve Vitriol in water filter it so as it become a clear solution upon which pour a Lixivium of salt of Tartar and you shall find immediately the first dissolvable viz. the vitrioline colcotar together with part of both the salts i. e. the acid connate salt of the vitriol and lixivial salt precipitated after precipitation the supernatant Liquor contains in it a neutrum or tertium quid from both the foresaid salts which it will make to appear by filtration and evaporation in the form of a Tartarum vitriolatum the Sediment which was precipitated gives the Terra vitrioli or metalline earth of vitriol all which happen from a complication of heterogeneous parts in the first dissolvable viz. vitriol having in it a metalline earth only to be made apparent in the form of a metal by force of fire and an essurine acid salt which salt meeting with a lixivial salt le ts go its first dissolvable and coagulates it self upon the last 11. But take a single salt as suppose salt of Tartar or the fixt salt of any vegetable dissolve it in water upon which strong solution pour distilled Vinegar Oyl of Vitriol Spirit of Nitre or Spirit of Salt or any of them or the like acid saline Liquors and you shall find that after a strong ebullition and boyling which they cause by fretting one upon another causing a very intense heat that in the mutual and as it were hostile action of the salt one upon another they precipitate each other to the bottom and leave the supernatant Liquor in a manner insipid But to return 12. He concludes this last manner of solution in confusion by an example of the Spaw water five quarts whereof being evaporated over the fire there will be found in the bottom of the Vessel an ounce of an ash-coloured blackish Sediment a considerable part whereof is Nitre Allom and Salt the rest the substance of Iron and Vitriol This is according to his last Hypothesis confusion in good earnest for here all the Ingredients are confused and jumbled together and by what Art the Doctor will learn to separate them that they may indeed appear to be so many as he speaks of I know not I think it would puzzle all his method to extricate them 13. One Argument more I shall produce against his two Ingredients in the body of Iron and Vitriol and this shall be instar omnium as being demonstrative and confirm'd by Autopsia An ingenious Friend of mine whom I shall not otherwise name than the Chymical Apothecary of York had a parcel of this ash-coloured Powder which remained in the bottom of the Vessel after the distillation or evaporation of the water of this Spaw given him by Dr. WITTIE himself This he put into a crucible and gave a very strong calcining fire as strong as for the calcining of Vitriol into Colcotar and that for the space of almost three hours and all this while without the least appearance of any red colour or the least footstep of either Colcotar or Vitriol or Crocus of Iron it became fixt and permanent in the fire and lost little of its weight it also became whiter in colour 14. Now for certain if there had been any thing of Vitriol or Iron in it the discovery would have been made and it forc't to confess its nature by its yellow red or purple colour with so great force of fire 15. This fixt Powder having thus indured the highest degrees of heat was dissolved filtred and evaporated which when dry became a most pure white clean Salt that part of it which would not dissolve and consequently not pass the filter being dryed was an almost insipid ash-coloured Powder somewhat whiter than that which was first taken Thus we discard these two Pillars of his Spaw viz. Vitriol and Iron as to the body of them SECT 6. 1. AFter the Doctor hath declar'd these several wayes whereby Waters are impregnated with Minerals and we as closely followed him to see whether it were so or no He proceeds to tell us the nature and virtue of these Minerals first of Vitriol he saith it is eminently hot of a biting and adustive quality and yet is also stiptick and astrictive and therefore dries up superfluous humidity c. according to the account that he receives from Galen Diascorides Serapio Paulus Oribatius Aelius Actuarius Fernelius enough to tire one in the naming it is a very short abreviary from so great a number of Authors concerning that Mineral which well understood and the Remedies thereof neatly prepared would make up as Paracelsus saith a fourth Column of Medicine 2. But methinks the Doctor 's long experience in re medica should ere this have furnished him plenty of observations of the worth and virtue of so noble a Mineral unless inopem se copia fecit he hath such store that he knows not where to begin These biting and adustive stiptick and astrictive qualities of Vitriol must surely belong
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
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
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
7. Or else the liquid potables coming by a shorter cut to the Reins by reason of their obstructions flows back and is heaped up between the Omentum and Peritoneum which stretching the membranes thereof bears up strongly against the Diaphragme thereby contracting the cavity of the Lungs makes the Patient short-winded as commonly they are 8. This congested potable latex accompanyed with a flatus gives being to a Tympany and hath no urinous Salt in it as that had which was about separating from the blood and by the obstruction of the Veins flowed back again into the mass and therefore those who are tapp'd for the Dropsie let forth an almost insipid liquor so that water which passeth from those who drinke plentifully of the Spaw has no urinous Salt and so neither tincture nor sapour 9. Now the Spaw water doth notably cleanse the stomach first by loosning and dissolving the close sitting sordes and that through the dissolving power of the alumenish Mineral Salt which gradually attenuates and thins the viscous recrements of the stomach after which solution of the otherwise fixt feculencies of the stomach the plentiful gulping of the water doth easily wash it away by stool besides which a great quantity of the water acuated with its Mineral Essurine Salt passeth the short way to the Reins I mean by those chanels that great drinkers of Wine and Strong Drink have to convey away suddainly the potulent parts of what they take in to the Reins whereby the penetrative power of the Essurine Salt which as a Solvent in the water dissolves the coagulated matter opens the obstructions and makes free passage both for it self and for the exit of the restagnating latex which before floted in the Abdomen and swell'd the belly 10. That obstruction of the Reins is the chief if not the essential cause of the super-abundant floting of the potable parts in the Abdomen is manifest because all Dropsical Persons piss very little and that often with difficulty so that the most part of that which should pass forth by urine through obstructions regurgitates back upon the bowels or else fills the bloody vessels with a dilating overplus latex whereas if the passages were open and the current kept clear all the superfluous watry parts would be dreined away by their natural and proper chanels and so all would be well 11. The Spaw therefore hath its efficacy in Cure of the Dropsie two ways viz. by abstersing the sordes of the digestions and by being a Diuretick not to say that in some obstinate Dropsies there may be an extravasated blood about the Reins which may so irritate the innate Spirit of those parts as to make a spontaneous occlusion of the vessels and resist all Medicines except the noblest of Chymical Arcana's 12. Those Medicines which chiefly relate to the Cure of the Dropsie are as I said such as are abstersive and diuretick together with such as have a restorative astringency communicable to the debilitated membranous parts of which sort are the lixivial Salts of Vegetables whether of Broom Juniper the Vine Wormwood or the like among which there is small difference wherewith the ordinary drink of the Patient is to be acuated also the Cinnabar of Antimony often resublim'd the Spirit of Salt of Tartar the saccharum Martis or Sugar of Steel Bezoardicum Minerale which is Riverius his Diaphoretick out of the Butter of Antimony the Pilulae lunares of which last I must confess I never found any considerable success and for the sake of the corroding Aqua fortial or nitrous Spirits shall for the future rather advise against than otherwise also the magistery of Wine which is the fixt Salt of Tartar so prepared as to dissolve in the most rectified alcool Spirit of Wine which being often purified by reduction is a noble Diuretick essential Salt of Tartar also the Precipitatus Diaphorcticus and Precipiolum Paracelsi the sappy liquor of the Birch c. For most of which Medicines if you consult the dispensatory you will be mistaken they are not attained to by idleness and meer speculation but by boldly handling the coals and putting our fingers into fire 13. The next Disease is the Stone and Strangury upon which the Spaw hath the more efficacy because a great part of the water glides through the Reins and Bladder the places where Gravel and the Stone have their nativity so that first by the abstersive virtue of the Essurine Salt in the water it hinders the encrease of growth of the bulk of the Stone by carrying away the recremental sordes of those parts also by often drinking and that too great quantities of the water it keeps the current open dilates the passages and takes the opportunity of slipping a Stone now and then with a stream of water through the sphincter of the Bladder 14. But as to a resolution of the Stone into a liquid juyce by a retrograde Analysis is not feasable either by this or any other Spring but only at least chiefly competible to the Alkahestical Preparation of the Ludus Paracelsi calculosorum Solamen magnum of which is the Alkahest distilled from the Ludus by which the Ludus is reduc'd into a Salt dissolvable in the Air into a Liquor this digested in a sealed glass until the Salt swim upon the top of the attracted moisture in the form of a greenish Oyl or Axungia of which Fourteen Grains sometimes repeated resolves the compage of the Stone of what magnitude soever and upon the solution is also expelled and thereby the Stone perfectly Cured according to the process of Paracelsus and Helmont who both as they say had it by which as Helmont reports not only the Stone was reduced into a liquid form and driven forth but also the inclinatio petrifica was taken away I have by a succedaneal Preparation so opened the body of the Ludus as that it would yield a deep saturate green tincture to Spirit of Salt as also to another liquor of Salt I have by me but what that will effect as to the Stone I have not yet tryed The well prepared Spirit of Salt Helmont highly commends for the Strangury and the Tinctura Aroph Paracelsi 15. The Jaundise if not too deeply graduated into that called the Black is also curable by the Spaw and that because this Disease proceeds from an error of Crudities in the second digestion transmitted into the fifth or habit of the body where that which should of due have been separated by the right fermentation in the second digestion was carryed into the last digestion and there discoloured the blood in the ultimate fibres through the whole habit of the body Now the Spaw as I said helps to separate that which of due ought to be separated by opening the obstructions of the second digestion and so may prevent the feeding of the Disease from its own original scource and by the help of specificks may thoroughly be Cured of which sort are Ens Veneris
one draught of hot Posset-drink which let commonly be three hours after the taking of them and sometimes to take nothing after them till noon and then take a porringer of broth and eat a little warm meat airing the drink at dinner and for that day if it be cold not to stir abroad They may be taken two daies together and rest the third or may be taken every other day or every third fourth or fifth day or once a week as the necessity of the disease requires and opportunity gives leave For diseases of long continuance will require frequent takings thereof while you take them eat but sparingly but especially at Suppers You may with safety take often of them for they do not work by any fretting corrosion of the Liquids and Solids of the body but by gentle reminding the digestions of their due separations and by their Balsamick Ingredients make the patient more cheerful and lively by adding vigour to the ferment of the stomach and that in all the Diseases aforesaid They may be taken at any Season of the Year Secondly As to the Cordial Elixir the dose is from a thimblefull to a spoonful and that either taken alone to those who can so take it putting a piece of Sugar or Sugar-Candy into their mouths which dissolving takes away the bitterness and heat of the mouth and Larynx which the Elixir taken alone leaves behind it or else those who cannot take it so are to take it in a glass of Sack or White-Wine but the other way of taking it alone is the better for though it be more bitter and hot while it is going down yet as soon as it comes into the stomach it becomes grateful and thereupon acceptable thereto doing its work more really by becoming a more effectual Cordialâ— for discussing Wind and Diseases thereon depending The Patient is to Fast two or three hours after the taking thereof and to take it those mornings they take not the Scorbutick Pills and sometimes as afore directed to take thereof about three or four by the Clock in the afternoon of that day the Pills are taken or at going to bed according to former direction and that in all the Diseases afore named And Lastly As to the Diaphoretick or Sweating Pills The Dose thereof is one two or three Pills but two is the ordinary Dose which are to be swallowed down in a spoonful of Burnt-Wine Mace-Ale or Posset-drink taking a draught of the same hot-drink after them But those who cannot swallow them as Pills may dissolve them in any of the foresaid Liquors and wash it down with a little of the same clear drink These are to be taken last at night at bed-time which without laying many more cloths than ordinary will bring the Patient into a pleasant gentle breathing Sweat more than any other Medicine I ever yet met with and will allay the greatest thirst and bring the Patient into a desired calmness and quietness of Spirits abating the most rigorous Symptoms of most Diseases whether Acute or Chronical The next morning after the taking the Sweating Pills the Patient is to take either a Dose of the Cordial Elixir with a glass of Burnt-Wine or a draught of other hot drink after it or only so much clear Burnt-Wine Mace-Ale or Posset-drink while he is in bed and to lie two or three hours after which will bring the Patient again into an easie breathing Sweat which if he please he may help forward with the addition of one Covering more than ordinary But these are generally to be taken after a gentle evacuation by the Scorbutick Pills in Chronick Diseases or by them or Clysters in Fevers Lastly To number the varieties of Cures that have by the Blessing of God been performed by the help of this Ternary of Medicines would but prove tedious and therefore I shall purposely wave it THE Epilogue OR The ESSENCE OF SCARBOROVGH-SPAW THat I might inform my self more satisfactorily of the true Constituent Parts of the water of the Scarborough-Spaw without any other additionals I took three Gallons and three Pints thereof which I let stand a while to settle whose first Precipitation was a reddish Sediment from which I filtred the water and this dryed in the Sun proved to be a red Earth or a kind of Ocre or rather Terra Vitrioli being that which falls to the bottom of the Chanels of all or most Mineral Springs whether Sowes or others and tingeth the Earth it runs along red Then I placed the water in great glasses upon a sand-Furnace with a gentle heat and in a days time a thin crust or film swom upon the top thereof which I took off with a silver spoon and dryed it in the Sun and it was a white scaly light Floscule after a while longer some more of the same separated it self by heat in the water some of which swom and other parts precipitated to the bottom therefore I filtred all the water therefrom which dryed in the Sun as the former was much what the same Then I evaporated the clear filtred water in glasses to a dryness which I found to have an Alumino-nitrous taste or rather indeed more nitrous and would relent in the Air. This I took and dissolv'd it in simple distill'd Rain-water and filtred it which left an other insipid gritty powder with a sparkling lustre The clear filtred water which with Oyl of Tartar poured thereto I found gave a milky separation as if taken fresh from the Spring but with Gauls it gave no purple Tincture after the precipitation of the red earth but became pale-coloured thereby This filtred water I say being again evaporated to a dryness was dissolv'd filtred and evaporated again and so a third time separating still what would be separated by frequent filtration Of the foresaid quantity of Spaw-water I took about two quarts which having filtred I put it in a skillet and boiled away two thirds then I let it cool and a sediment of an insipid Calx fell to the bottom from which I filtred the water dryed up the Calx and then boyled up the water to the dryness of a Salt which was pretty white This I dissolv'd in simple distill'd Rain-water and then filtred and the Calx being dryed in the Sun was a bright sparkling powder The filtred water I evaporated in glasses with a gentle heat to almost a dryness then I filtred it again and so on Thus I can separate from the limpid Spaw as it 's taken out of the Fountain eleven or twelve distinguishable Earths or Sabulums somewhat different in colour shape and consistence one from an other which the Alumino-nitrous Salt in the water razeth off from several Rocks or Quarries of Stone which it passeth through as I can shew at any time to those whose curiosity prompts them to see Rarities of this nature I being the first I think that hath made so many several Separations therefrom All these Earths or Sabulums were equally dryed in the Sun or
to conclude No flattering Encomiasticks shall usher in this work nor pedantick Rapsodists attend these lines nor need we Casta Napaearum to adorn our Water-Nymphs nor let the Reader expect our contemplation upon our Water-Works nor yet any Chronogram or Anagram to sound abroad our fame nor shall we court great Patronages to cast a favourable aspect upon it Praevalet ipsa veritas imo in aeternum praevalebit For if the substance of the Discourse and what the Piece it self offers give not matter of entertanimet for the Reader whose Genius bends that way without such previous antick Stage-Playes Or if it sound not Harmoniously in the Readers Ear without such pratling School-Boy Preludes let it be thrown by and for ever buried in Oblivion If I have writ any thing in this following Tractate Judicious Reader worth thy while it is well If thou have but as much pleasure in reading as I had in writing it is enough If it find any encouragement abroad it may probably brood again Peruse and censure not till thou hast run it through and then do as thou seest cause Farewel Thine W. S. HYDROLOGIA-CHYMICA OR The ANATOMY OF SCARBROVGH SPAW BEING Some Animadversions upon Dr. WITTIE's Discourse of SCARBROVGH SPAW Pars Prima SECT 1. HAving lately seen a Tractate Intituled Scarbrough Spaw or the Description of the Natures and Virtues of the Scarbrough Spaw Written by Dr. Wittie being the second Edition by the same Author who therein undertakes to Discourse of the Nature of that and other Mineral Waters to omit all prolixity we will examine his deposited Principles of that Mineral Spring 2. He tells us of five Ingredients of which this water partakes and hath its Virtues from which are the Constitutive principles of this Spring as he supposeth and those are Vitriol Iron Allom Nitre and Salt with these he currently passeth along through his book where he hath occasion to elucidate the Virtues of the Well and make all the five Volens nolens contribute to this Spring 3. First as for Vitriol the Doctor might have distinguished whether he understood it to be Vitridelum martis or veneris viz. the Vitrio◠of Iron or of Copper for if it be of Iron then is one of the principles viz. Iron Superfluous because the Iron would be the Metalline part of the Vitriol in as much as every Vitriol is made of an Essurine Salt dissolv'd in the Subterraneal veins of a Spring which passing along the Minera of a Metal doth lambere venam licks upon that Vein of Metal whether Iron or Copper which it partly dissolves into it self and carries it as I may say in its belly to the visible appearance of a Spring which evaporated gives a Vitriol either of Iron or Copper according as the Metal was that it passed through 4. But if the Vitriol in Scarbrough Spaw be of Copper then would the operation of the water be most what Emetick or Vomitive because the body of Copper being dissolv'd by an Essurine liquor save that of the primum ens Salium or liquor Alkahest of Paracelsus and Helmont becomes desperately Emetick and can but with very great difficulty by the Chymical Art be separated from that Essurine Salt which hath coagulated it self thereon 5. Again If it was such a Vitriol the other ingredient of Iron would by their mutual imbraces be ting'd and almost transmuted into Copper which I have found by a strong decoction of Iron in Vitriolin Water but to omit that Let us suppose that there were a Vitriol of Venus dissolved in this Spring and in so small a proportion as being mixed in a great quantity of water viz. of 3 or 4 Quarts which is the quantity Patients frequently drink as not to work frequently by Vomit but most what by Stool and that the Purgatives property was from the mixture of this Vitriol and other Ingredients named by the Doctor 6. This being granted in favour of his Ingredients or Mineral Principles then let us see what will be the sequel viz. whether or no we may not lay by as useless one of his Principles I am now discoursing of viz. Iron as an impertinent and insignificant Ingredient I mean as to the body of it 7. For if the Essurine salt dissolved in the Water-Spring meet with a Vein of Copper in the bowels of the Earth which Essurine Salt is always required for the making a Vitriol of what sort soever fretting thereon dissolves it and at the same time that acidity is coagulated upon the metalline dissolv'd parts solutio coagulatio fiunt unico instanti una edeamque res solvit ac à solventi coagulatur and so both together become dissolv'd in the solitary Spring Water in an almost indissolvable nexure then and not till then is the action of that Essurine acidity terminated so as it can act no more and though it should in the secret meanders of the Earth in its incircling perambulation meet with a Vein of Iron yet could it take nothing thence because it had already lost its sting I mean its fretting Salt had satiated it self in coro metallico in the embraces of an already espoused Metal 8. Mars cannot be dissolv'd and appear in the form of a liquor without a dissolvent but this dissolvent viz. the Essurine acidity being already satiated and turned into a Vitriol to make up one of Dr. Witties precanious Principles is not at leisure to make another of them unless we grant such an indulgence to Nature which she never was yet so kind to her self as to take I mean to dissolve Mineral or Metalline Body without an agent proper for that purpose 9. So that indeed we find a flaw in the main Timber of his Building an inconsistency of two of his chief Principles of this Mineral Water Vitriol and Iron that which makes the one disannuls the other so that certainly they are not of the Fraternity of this Spaw however we come to find them thus thrust in by head and shoulders SECT 2. 1. THe Doctor undertakes to discourse of Vitriol and first he gives us an account of the several sorts not such as he had seen but such as he saith Sect. 12. late Writers name viz. three sorts viz. Roman Vitriol or Copperas which two I do not understand to be Synonima's for Romas Vitriol is factitious and adulterated with other mixtures to make it shoot into curious figures and to heighten the colour for pleasing the Eye having great quantity of the sluggish body of Copper is it which is the main Ingredient but very languid as to Spirits wherewith natural Vitriol is more replete as by distillation of both we have found and Helmont mentioning a distillation of it saith dedit parum spiritus ignavi acidi cessavity mox infra pauca hor as omnis spiritus c. as for Copperas it is a name most proper to most sorts of natural Vitriols cupirosum i. e. cuprum erosum The second sort is Cipryan Vitriol partaking of the nature
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
answer first by observing to you that if you put the powders of Pearl Coral c. into a glass upon which pour distilled Vineager or the like you may observe that though the powder lie in the bottom and the Liquor only touch it superficially and therefore according to the form of the Objection should only alter and sweeten those very parts only which they touch yet in a little time we see it sweetens the whole mass of Liquor and that upon this reason as I apprehend viz. because the nature of water consisting in fluidity is always in motion so that in a little time all the parts of water whirl and circle about so long till they have all touch'd the powder and all thence received a like dulcification so in like manner the juyces of the body being liquid do so circulate about by reason of their fluidity that in a little time there be few parts of the body through which the fluid juyces have not circulated and so consequently meet with those bodies if any such thing be inwardly taken as may rob them of their sowrish sharpness which being extra lares prove hostile to the Nerves Veins Arteries c. 26. Another instance let Silver be dissolv'd in Aqua fortis there the corrosive Menstruum hath totally though not radically dissolv'd the body of the Metal upon which it is also coagulated although in a liquid form if into this somewhat diluted with water you put plates of Copper as Refiners sometimes do for the separating of Silver you will find the Silver desert the Aqua fortis precipitating upon the cuprous plates and will thereby be totally separated from the Menstruum and that too notwithstanding the plates as they always do lie constantly in the bottom of the Vessel 27. You will ask how comes the upper part of the restagnant Menstruum which hath an equal proportion of Silver in it as well as the lower part thereof to be acted upon by the plates at such a distance to which as before I reply That the liquid parts of the Menstruum being in a constant motion of fluidity and carrying the dissolved Metal in it doth in a little time circulate all the parts of the Vessel as far as the upper superficies thereof one place constantly changing places with another till they have at length all glided along the surface of the plates which by a peculiar Metallick assimilation put a stop to its current in the Menstruum and hooks it to it self which is one of the best and most thorough separations of Silver that is commonly known 28. The like is done if Copper be dissolv'd in Aqua fortis if plates of Iron be put therein separating the Copper from the Menstruum and that by the great affinity or likeness of texture of parts of those two Metals 29. Thus in like manner when any good preparation of Steel of Pearl of Coral and Crabs Eyes are given though they themselves pass actually no further than into the first and second digestion and so proceed yet being all the juyces and liquors of the body are in a constant fluid motion and always circulating therefore of course they must in time touch upon these forenamed fixed concretes which if they touch they lose their pontick sharpness by which they become hostile to nature and have laid the foundation of many Diseases which thus being dulcified the juyces do redire in gratiam and circulate as good companions as ever 30. Steel our now present subject operates by separating this corrosive acidity which had coagulated it self upon the bowels viz. the Spleen Liver Matrix c. which spurious sowrness meeting with a body to which it claims more affinity then to the parts it had settled it self upon joyns with it and becomes coagulated thereon and so the bowels become set at liberty from their former obstructions and the circulation of the blood and humours become thereby more florid the exorbitant latex which before was extravasated runs in its own chanels again and what was superfluous that would not redire in gratiam Nature finds some peculiar manner of exclusion or other either of Stool Urine Sweat or insensible Transpiration 31. Thus the Dropsie and Scurvy Cachexia defectus Menstruorum c. become Cured besides which we might name many more Diseases which by a skilful managing and ordering of these Medicines might by the blessing of God be Cured as the Hypocondriack Melancholly which chiefly proceeds from a coagulation of this Tartarum resolutum this Sal excrementitium we are now treating of upon the Spleen whereby its proper digestion or peculiar function of seperation of some heterogenious parts from the blood is vitiated which digestion of the Spleen so promoting the blood in its tincture and height of spirituosity wherewith the Spleen inriched with that plenty and complication of Arteries seems to be destin'd to being no doubt thereby replete with a noble ferment which should exalt and spiritualize the blood by a kind of Chymical separation of some innate impurities restagnant in the blood until it come to partake of the exalting digestive ferment of that part which to me seems to be the very proximate ferment of the blood before the converting thereof into those nimble spirituous parts or animal spirits which flote along the Brain cerebel medulla spinalis and so in the cavities of the Nerves becomes Liquor Spermaticus nervorum the agent of all operations attributable to the genus nervosum 32. I say this fermental digestion of the Spleen becomes obstructed and vitiated by a coagulation of the foresaid spurious acidity which consequently vitiating its next product the nimble animal spirits the very immediate corporeal Organ of the Soul which spirits if I may so call them are the immediate corporeal reflecting glass of the Soul which it useth for the receiving and contemplating all visible objects and being vitiated by such an obstructive coagulative Salt in the Spleen according to the strength and degree of the obstruent is the blood perverted in its prolifick off-spring of animal spirits which become irregular and altogether erroneous thence making false representations of things to the Soul whence strange fancyful apprehensions arise which excrementitious Salt radicated in the Spleen hath commonly a flatus concomitant which therefore is called flatus hypochondraicus 33. Not but that this Disease may be inserted in the very semnials of the natural constitution and as also some others become hereditary in whom the Ideae dementes cuduntur in ipso viscere splenis vitiato those madeling fancyful impressions or erring apprehensions being forg'd from the disturbed oeconomy of the Spleen vitiating those animal spirits which lodge in the Brain or genus nervosum here these extravagant and erratick idea's feign to themselves strange pains in a moment make quick and speedy transits are always upon the wheel of uncertainties 34. But now at length returning to view the Doctors qualities methinks they begin to play least in sight and
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
to the Galenists proceeds from an hot and dry Distemper of the stomach to answer which indication they most frequently order cool and moist things which if the cause of thirst were as they suppose they would have a most facile ready way of Cure in case that were true Contraria suis contrariis curantur viz. That every distemperature were curable by its contrary for then supposing such and such degree of heat and dryness of stomach in a Fever it is but applying the same answerable degree of cooling and moistning liquors and the Cure would forthwith be effected If so Why are not the thirst in Fevers presently quenched That after great draughts of cooling Julips and the like are drunke down they yet cry out Drie Drie as thirsty after a while as ever 50. What Can the elementary properties of cold and moist so much conspire the Patients prejudice as to forget their own natures of cooling and moistning Surely these qualities if they may be so call'd of heat and cold of dryness and moisture must act one upon another upon the very contact and no sooner can heat be encountred with cold but the heat must be abated and if the degree of cold be proportionable must become quite extinct so neither can driness meet with moisture in the like degree but the driness will cease 51. So that indeed a Feverish thirst hath not these elementary qualities for its efficient and so is not curable by the contrary qualities but hath a more abstruse cause and that is from a depravation of the ferment of the stomack which not being able to digest after the wonted manner what is upon the stomach turns it into recrement which by the heat of the part having lost its curb the ferment is burnt into a kind of Alkali or friable mass which being fast impacted in the tunicles of the stomach becomes the efficient cause of a febrile thirst 52. These burnt Alkalizate sordes parch the very membranous parts of the stomach oesophagus and tongue which membrane is but as one continued web overspreading all those parts thence the intollerable thirst foulness roughness and parchedness of the tongue which by abstinence from drink as is the foolish custome of some Physicians who understand not the Disease too strictly prohibit the Fever becomes the more increased the thirst the stronger and all the symptomes more exasperated For there must be some liquid thing of necessity to dilute and soften these burnt sordes though it do not satisfie and quench the thirst or else all things go the worse but if the skill of the Physician be such as to mingle with these diluting potable liquids something to absterse these sordes and to satiate these Alkalizate recrements then he effects something as to the real quenching of thirst which otherwise proves obstinate and rebellious to all simple liquids 53. For if all simple water or fermentally married to a vegetable juyce viz. Beer Ale or Wine be thrown into the stomach upon these friable sordes they do but and that scarcely for a moment quench the thirst but by the untameable heat of the stomach are cast into vapours and by sweat or insensibly are driven through the pores of the body and in the conclusion encrease the heat cause cold sweats faintness debilitudes and wasting lassitudes after the manner of water poured on an hot stone is presently dispersed vapore tenus or as Spirit of Wine poured upon an Alkali of Tartar causeth a great heat more than was before 54. But if these adust sordes be absters'd by the well prepared Salt of Vitriol or other proper emeticks or some proper solutive that may cleanse downward the recrement of the primary digestions and be seconded with Spirit of Salt Sulphur or Vitriol acuating the Patients common drink together with the use of some anodynous Diaphoreticks not only the thirst will be abated and quenched but the Feverish fermentation and consequently the Fever it self I have often wondred the Galenists should not more seriously take into consideration the efficacy of Diaphoreticks or sweating Medicines in Fevers in as much as in the whole round of their Practice they find not a more effectual means to quench thirst and to abate a Fever than by Sudorificks which is most obvious both to them and to ordinary People and yet there is nothing they less frequent If it were no more than observing the operation of a Dose of Laudanum methinks it might convince them of the excellency of Diaphoreticks and put them upon ingenuous enquiries how they might promote and improve that stock of Diaphoreticks they have in the Shops might I say put them upon enquiring how a few grains of Laudanum should so quiet the Spirits for a time quench thirst and allay pains and all this as a Diaphoretick which surely if the narcotick Sulphur was castigated and the power of the volatile Diaphoretick Salt thereof exalted would prove a much more effectual Diaphoretick than any Laudanum in the Shops 55. As for Antimonium Diaphoreticum because it is Chymical they are afraid of it and if they order any it is in so inconsiderable a quantity as the effect cannot answer the Patients expectation They will prescribe 3 grains it may be 4 5 6 or 7 grains and a great Dose too and this forsooth must be clogg'd with some other farraginous mixture which together makes such a confus'd jumble upon the stomach that the Archeus or vital regent knows not what to make of it for by their mixtures they miss the mark of Specificks and thereby of the best Diaphoreticks In effect do nothing sincerely viz. without mixtures in the whole course of their Practice They will wonder perhaps if I tell them that of this Antimonium Diaphoretick which they scruple to give 6 7 or 8 grains I can and do with good success give from one scruple to an whole dragm which is 60 grains and that without scruple or danger but with great satisfaction to the Patient Bezoardicum Minerale another as dangerous anti-febrile Diaphoretick as they account it as the former of which they scarce dare give above 3 4 or 5 grains of which I with the like success as the former give from half a scruple to 24 grains Indeed they are both of my own Preparation and therefore dare more confide in them 56. Now the conclusion of all this is That Diaphoreticks whether Vegetable or Mineral after a previous abstersion of the primary digestions are the only quenchers of thirst abaters of pains allayers of Feverish fermentations composers of the Spirits and in fine the chief Curers of Fevers and therefore whether duely to be considered let the World judge seeing it conserves thousands of Lives Thus far as to particular Diaphoreticks Besides which Helmont speaks of an universal Diaphoretick or Panacea by the name of Mercurius Precipitatus Diaphoreticus which is a fixation of Precipitate by the cohobating the Elementum ignis extracted out of the Vitriol of Venus at last
and laxation of the vessels thereof the cause of great evacuations which sometimes happen to the great impoverishment of the blood and spirits and much enfeebling of the Patient and the cause of Syncope's Lypopsychia's Faintness Swoonings c. and that meerly by the loss of blood and scirits 35. The Cure of these uterine Diseases is next to be confidered where if the Diseases be from obstructions making the blood flow back into the mass thereof before a menstrual defedation of the same in such the Spaw if in any Diseases is effectual and that because the Essurine Salt thereof is very prevalent in opening of obstructions walheth away the sordes which usually cling to the osculations of the vessels of the Womb and absterseth notably every tartareous recrement fastened to the sides of the said vessels in as much as there is a Sal quoddam minerale excrementitium or tartarum resolutum of which whether the Womb Liver Spleen Reins Pancreas Mesentery or Stomach be the minera thereof it causeth as Helmont saith great trouble to the Patient insignes parere laborantibus molâ—stias which will not obey the mandates of common solutives 36. In order to which if Sal Martis viz. the Sugar of Steel or the Crocus Martis or Powder of Steel it self be given after a due manner as soon as they come into the stomach the Salt of Steel being in a Vehicle whether water or wine the Crocus therein contained precipitates unto which the foresaid spurious excrementitious Salt hasts becomes coagulated thereon and carryed away by seidge whence the blackness of excrements in those who take chalibeate Medicines The same also happens if either the Crocus of Steel and powder of Steel be inwardly taken and in some cases very proper and effectnal 37. Now because in the Spaw water there is no Crocus Martis no body of Iron at all but only a sleight touch of the minera thereof I should advise for helping the waters to work this effect to dissolve therein at sometimes half a scruple or more of rightly prepared Sugar of Steel which no doubt would make the water more effectual for precipitating and carrying away this foresaid Tartarum solutum which otherwise often pertinaciously adheres to the vessels and proves rebellious to ordinary solutives or purging Medicines to which purpose some vitrioline waters especially where a larger portion of the body of Iron is dissolved is of more efficacy in this case than this which as I said before may easily be helped by an artificial addition For commonly in the most obdurate obstructions and Diseases thence depending this Sal excrementitium clings closely to the osculations of the vessels and is the cause why the Green-Sickness in some young women is so difficult to Cure Which sometimes bends not to the single help of this or other Spaws where little or no body of a Mineral is found nor to a Galenical method of Blooding Purging c. but only or chiefly to chalibeate Medicines and some resolving penetrating Diaphoreticks 38. In the defects of Critical evacuations in young women the obstructions may be so great as to cause an uterine Asthma Suffocation Epilepsie Palsie c. Which obstructions being removed by the Spaws and chalibeate Medicines those Diseases because uterine and depending thereon are forthwith Cured to which the change of Air doth not a little contribute by adding a volatizing ferment to the blood whereby it becomes more capable of being absolv'd from the tartareous recrement to circulate the more freely in the vessels 39. As the Spaw water and chalibeate Medicines have an aperient virtue of refolving the tartareous obstruent so also they strengthen and constringe the fibrous Systole of the Membranous parts helping them to do their work which before they flagged under hence they are proper for Diarrhea's Dysenteria's Lienteria's Coeliaca's c. All which proceeding from a coagulation of the foresaid tartareous recrement upon the fibres of the Membranous parts which makes them forget their functions weakens and loosens the fibres whereby they cannot retain what they should but carries all off with a preposterous Diastole The Fibres of the uterine Membranes are often very well constring'd by the Spaws as I said and chalibeate Medicines and reduc'd from being too great prodigals that before spent their own and a great part of the stock of the body 40. But if the uterine Disease rise a note higher by being graduated from a virulency in the blood so as thence to cause Hysterical Fits Syncope's Lypopsychia's c. Then will Medicines of an higher rank be requisite for the Spaws and Chalibeats will not reach them To which purpose I have seen Elixir Proprietatis well Prepared after a previous proper purgation operate notably in allaying these uterine furies mitigating the acrimonious virulency of the blood and thereby composing the otherwise furibund Archeal Faber of the Womb. 41. Helmont in these cases commends the volatile tincture of Coral and the Arcanum ignis sive dulcedo Sulphuris è Vitriolo Veneris which Ignis Veneris doth allay the ragings of that furious animal by the anodyne Sulphur thereof also his Electrum Minerale which is a bright resplendent Mineral Marcasite of Gold also Asafoetida and Castor and the Oyl of Amber Paracelsus highly extolls the fume of Horse-warts taken ex infundibulo per inferâ—ora sometimes a draught of cold Spring-water the smoak of burnt Feathers also Amulet as Asafoetida hung about the neck which two last save one with the like of that tribe do only palliate the Disease 42. A good Deoppilative Medicine together with a proper Diaphoretick and sutable Anodynes are most requisite in these Diseases such I mean as may answer the indications thereof both by aperient Diaphoretick and Nepenthine Remedies A short Description of Malton Spaw 1. THe like Ingredients of the Scarborough Spaw hath also the Spaw at Malton and consequently according to all probability the same operation as to the parity of Mineral Ingredients will appear if you put either the powder or solution of Gauls thereto it presently gives an opacity first purple then black after the manner as the same doth to the Scarborough water or to a solution of Allom stone into which if Spirit or Oyl of Vitriol be dropt that water of the Malton Spaw as well as the rest will become clear again If Oyl of Tartar be dropt into the same cleared water it becomes troubled again c. 2. If Oyl of Tartar be dropt into some fresh water of the Malton Spaw it makes a white Coagulum or milky separation dispersed through the whole if Oyl of Vitriol be dropt into that milk water it clears it after a little ebullition from the two contrary Salts The same Spaw with the addition of the volatile spirit of Harts-horn c. makes a white separation and with Oyl of Vitriol becomes clear 3. This water I have distilled in a glass-Retort with a gentle fire and after the simple elementary water was come off there
World and that without having their Letters of Advice or Bills of Exchange Translated by an Interpreter out of one Language into another or of being confin'd to have one of their own Language imploy'd as their Factor And to conclude all liberal Sciences Ingenuous Arts and thriving Manufactures with Mechanical inventions would receive no small improvement by this way of communication through the help of the Universal Character and by observations in Physiological Essays from all parts abroad the Structure of a body of true Genuine Philosophy might in a little time be raised to the great use and benefit of mankind in all sorts of useful learning both speculative and practick So that thereby in a few years more might be done as to the Compleating thereof then hath been in whole Centuries of years before And here concluding this Digression I re-asume my first intended matter and further assert That THus would Physiology be advanced in every part and branch thereof becoming more facile certain and grateful by being grounded upon experiments then by any other conjectural Hypothesis though as I said it is but Scientia naturalis à posteriori being as far or more short of that intuitive knowledge which Adam had in Paradise as conjectural Hypothesis is of it yet is this very acceptable because it joyns issue with our Senses whence we now after a Preposterous manner assume most of our knowledge of natural things A considerable part of this Book of Philosophia Naturalis would be spent in the Physical or Medical Science By which we should know what concrets how us'd and by what means they become helpful for the reliefe of our infirm and diseased Bodyes in which that improvement made in the Laboratories by various preparations and trials thereof upon sick persons would be of great importance And this brings me to the third and last thing I propounded to my self to discourse of viz. to signifie the use and efficacy of Chymical remedies I mean how much more assistance nature hath by the help of Chymical Medicines in order to the cure of diseases then by the vulgar Shop-preparations and here me thinks the Cabinets of natures rarities are opened and by this noble Art we are let into the grand Mysteries and choyce Secrets of medicinal Preparations which being seperated from their terrene Faeces and corrected from their annexed virulencies penetrate into the very intimate recesses and secret Meanders of the Body helping nature at every turn both to manifest what is useful by solution incision and abstersion of the peccant Sordes as also by fortifying the vital powers and functions and that corroboration and restauration of the vital Principals No Ingenious Person can longer satisfie himself in the common practice of the Galenical Physick when he once begins to reflect upon the uncertainty of the Method and unsuccesfulness of his Curing Diseases especially when he comes to consider the reasons thereof viz. the rawness and incongruity of the dispensatory Preparations the Farraginous mixtures whereof render them less effectual then if they were more simple and puts the young practitioner to a great loss whilst the elder and therefore accounted the more experienced Physician jogs on right or wrong according to his methodical rules of Art for when he expects as wel for his credit sake as his desire of doing good some great Cures he finds nothing considerable done And this gives cause to many Industrious searching Physitians now of late to begin to throw off this Galenical yoak and fall to work themselves making some neat Preparations according to the Chymical Art for their own practice by the efficacy of which they are encouraged to proceed further to the Preparation of more noble Arcana which they must do whilst they are young other wise when they grow old they either become too lazie to begin to work or too much settled upon their Lees then they think themselves to old to enter into the Chmycal Matrix to be born Philosophers by the fire The Chymical Preparations have these following advantages of the Shop-Medicines first they are commonly much less in bulk than the other are and therefore they less offend the Patient in taking them What nauseating Potions are frequently prescribed not to say that they are in their taste inferiour to Horse-Drenches which are apt to make the stomachs of some who have taken thereof even at the sight of the next Potion to Vomit whereas a few drops of a Spagyrical Liquor given in a proper Vehicle or a Mineral Powder given in a few grains which in some Preparations hath some taste in others none operates effectually enough according to the intention of the Physician 2. Chymical Medicines if rightly prepared are less dangerous than the Galenical I shall not here vindicate the confident boastings of some quacking Pretenders to Chymistry who presume to cure all Diseases with some secret Powder Oyl or the like which when known is but a meer trifle and scarce worthy the name of a genuine Chymical Preparation and yet forsooth these Medicasters boast themselves though you shall scarce hear it from any of their Patients what great wonders they can do vilifying all others that are more modest than themselves and yet are Possessors of more noble Medicines I am not ignorant how the Galenists have designedly insinuated into the Vulgar the great danger as I said before of Chymical Medicines which hath been no small Remora to the progress of Chymical Physicians till their unwearied diligence hath with time mostwhat worn off that apprehension of danger and they now begin to observe by ocular demonstration the great efficacy together with the safety of Spagyrical Remedies For where the Galenists in their Dispensatories ends there the Chymical Physician begins both to correct what they have done by making their compositions more homogeneal and to proceed further to what they have not done witness the elaborate Chymical Animadversions on the Augustane Dispensatory by the ingenious Swelfer who undoubtedly doth correct most demonstrably the errors of the vulgar Galenical Preparations shewing very evidently their incongruous and farraginous mixtures and besides adds other dexterous Preparations both Vegetable Animal and Mineral which they have not In whose Book of Animadversions with his Mantissa Hermetica and Appendix thereto the Reader may view plainly as in a glass the errors of the received opinions of the vulgar Practice of Physick 3. The Chymical Remedies are more purified and refined from their terrene feculencies than the Galenical for in Decoctions Syrups Conserves Electuaries Lohochs and some other Shop-Preparations there are but very small separations of the terrestrial Faeces little depurations made as for Decoctions either the Menstruum which commonly is water perhaps with the addition of some Wine is not proper for extracting the virtues of the Ingredients or by too much boyling they let the volatile and therefore most effectual parts flie away so that the virtues of the Concretes are not sufficiently hereby extricated from
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
what was mentioned in the foregoing Page And therefore to use gentle purgations even in the first months after Conception is not so dangerous as Physicians usually suppose and not onely harmless but also of great use for preventing bad fits and making them more healthful during the time of being with child Nay I have known pretty strong purges given soon after conception which hath wrought pretty smartly and yet no prejudice at all to the Foetus so that Physicians need not be so curious nor women at that time so cautious as by denying them the benefit of gentle purges to prevent them of that healthfulness which otherwise they might much more happily enjoy then otherwise they do That there is a Sympathetical combination betwixt the Matrix and the Stomach is evident both because if a good Uterine medicine be given in cases of Uterine discomposures that many times whilst the Medicine is yet in the stomach hath an influence upon the Matrix composing the disturbances thereof and allaying the Furibund inragements of that unquiet Animal as also in cases of difficulty of birth I know a certain Specifick of whose efficacy I have had frequent experience even to admiration Which while it is yet in the Stomach especially if the birth be brought to Maturity it opens the mouth of the womb enlargeth the passages unhingeth the Os sacrum and making the throws effectual expelleth the Foetus whether dead or alive which I have experienced upon several Women that have laboured one two or sometimes three daies in vain and within half or a whole hour have been very safely delivered with the same and some other additions I have known a Mola expell'd out of the womb almost as big as my head and to expel the after-birth those Quisquiliae Matricis nothing is more effectual and all this from the influential vertue of a Medicine whilst in the stomach upon the Womb. But to return All the Nutriment which the Foetus hath is either from the blood which in young women or such as do not conceive gives matter for the Natural evacuations or from the Succus Spermaticus digested by a peculiar Ferment of the parts it is circulated in both which saving that they receive a particular and determinate difference by Ferments are materially nothing els but water out of which by the power of the Plastick Spirit is the Foetus form'd both as to the parts containing and contained viz. both as to the solid parts and vessels as Juyces c. but the specifical Ferments are peculiarly inherent in the Syngamical Spermatick Liquor which being gradually transmuted into blood by a further maturation of the Spermatick Principles becomes fettled in several parts of the body after the following manner The Plastick Faber lurking in the Spermatick Juyce begins to hew forth the form of an humane Embryo out of that Albuminous liquor which is brought in together with the blood from the Mass thereof as Materials for this Animal Fabrick ou◠of these two by the Energy of its own power it shapes the body gives a current to the newly ingendred Juyces in their own pellicles or membranes and begins to make these Juyces circulate which as they circulate are coagulated upon the Solid parts whence the Accretion thereof and upon some particular parts they impress a tincture which retains a seminal Character being some separable parts of the circulating juyces which by further maturation become radicated and essential Ferments but are not yet vital till they are inspired with the Aura vitalis thus one riseth up after another in the wheel of Formation and thus all the powers and seminal Characters of the prolifick Sperme become awakened one after another until the Foetus become complete Now I say the Ferments are nothing but levened parts separable from the primary Spermatick Juyces with a seminal impression which makes them Essential agents especially after their illumination by the Aura vitalis till then they act not and after that ceaseth their operation also is at an end for all the Art we have cannot make them perform the wonted Transmutations after as before death and therefore as to their seminal impressions they are as Helmont saith indemonstrable à priori because they owe their specifical Energy of Transmutation immediately to the Seed and Plastick power thereof Now the Elementary Juyces and blood brought into the Matrix are nothing else but a Carva of water and so also the blood and succulent parts of the Embryo are the same yet further remov'd by additional Ferments for the Plastick Spirit awakeneth the Ferments and Anima sensitiva out of its own bosom and by the mediation of the Ferments makes all those Transmutations requisite for the nourishment and growth of the Foetus The subject matter that the Ferments work upon is water from this by the alteration thereof as I said by Ferments our bodies are shaped nourished and increased in the womb and after that when we are brought forth we feed upon Milk generally and that either of Womans Milk which is nothing but water or the succulent parts of Meat and Drink altered first by the Ferment of the Concrete we feed upon and next by the Ferment of the stomach and Intestines and lastly by the Ferments of the Breasts themselves which perfects the Lucteous Cremor or Milky Juyce passing from the Intestines by the Venae lactae glandutes and Thoraical vessels through the Mammilary Conduits into the breasts themselves or of Cows milk which is nothing else but water first altered by Seed out of the Leffas terrae into Vegetables and then again altered by the Ferment of the Cows stomach and lastly is complered by the Ferment of the duggs When we grow up to feed upon stronger meat as flesh and the like this is nothing but the foresaid Cremor or milky Juyce transmuted by other Ferments into flesh For we see that when Cows are dried of their Milk and have good Pastures that they then fatten a pace because that which otherwise passeth into milk and by the plenty thereof keeps them poor is now by other Ferments coagulated into flesh so that flesh is but water yet further remov'd by Ferments And as for bread which is the staff of Life that I mean Corn may be reckoned amongst Vegetables which with them hath its Original from the Leffas and that from water and is only altered in its shape from the seed thereof which gives difference to all things And for our Drink as I shewed before it 's nothing but water which whether it appear under the form of Wine Sider Perry Ale Beer c. is nothing but the disguises of water altered only by Seed and Ferments Thus like Plants we grow from water as if indeed we had taken rooting therefrom and like Amphibions we live and walk upon the face of the Earth whilst we feed upon water Also we grow and increase in bulk from water until we come to our full stature and then the Ferments
and such like Commodities Also before that time for divers days the Air is troubled being full of black and ponderous Clouds with a continual rumbling threatning as it were to drown the whole Country yet seldom so much as dropping but are carryed Southward by the Northern Winds which constantly blow at that Season 20. Now these Clouds being kept together by these Northern Winds and not suffered by the force thereof to be let down upon the Country of Aegypt in showers are upon the reversion of the Peroledi the soft Southern or South-East Winds wheeling from an other point make the hovering Clouds discharge themselve in great Rain for many days together which falling upon the Mountains of Aethiopia are partly washed down from the Mountains immediately into Nilus and partly running into intermediate Chanels and Rivulets amongst the hills are at length conveyed into Nilus which together make the River gradually to swell from the Seventeenth of June until the beginning of August at which time they cut the banks and let it overflow the whole Country for the enriching the Soyl thereof 21. Now that the overflowing of Nile is from Rain let down near the head thereof which is found to be in the Province of Agaos near the Kingdom of Goia in the Land called Sabala in the top of a Mountain whose Diameter is not past one Foot and an half is I say further apparent because the temperature of the Air all over the Country is the same at that time as it is in other places where Rain falls in moist Seasons For we see in our own Island of Great Britain where Rain happens frequently that for some days together the Air will be so cloudy and moist and yet kept off from showers by Winds that bear them up as that it moistens the walls and floors of Stone-buildings and make the stones look wet and moist as if it had actually rain'd upon them when not a shower has happened for many days together 22. In like manner I say the temperature of the Air in Aegypt at that Season is very moist yea so moist as though we suppose it did rain yet could it not be much more moist a Demonstration whereof is this following Experiment viz. Take of the earth of Aegypt adjoyning to the River preserve it carefully that it neither come to be wet nor wasted weigh it daily and you shall find it neither more nor less heavy until the Seventeenth of June at which day it beginneth to grow more ponderous and augmenteth with the augmentation of the River Whereby they have amongst themselves an infallible knowledge of the State of the Deluge 23. So that hence it clearly appears that great falls of Rain upon the Mountains near the head-Spring of Nilus at such a Season give increase to that River and that these Clouds which contain that great quantity of water which well nigh would threaten the drowning of the Country is carryed over the face of the Land by Northern Winds which meeting with other Winds from different quarters are there stay'd and let down in great abundance upon the Mountains of Aethiopia 24. And whereas Dr. Wittie saith That in Aegypt there are no Springs at all I am very much apt to suspect the truth thereof For how should the Inhabitants and Travellers in that Country be supplyed with water who Live and Travel at remote distances from Nile both for themselves and Cattle their Camels Asses c. The waters they find must needs be from Springs and those Quick-Springs too because no Rain falls on the Country to cause any Land-Springs or Rivulets therefrom 25. And although he seems to himself to give a solution to that objection made by Seneca viz. That the greatest Rain that can fall never sinks above Ten Foot into the ground by alleadging that though into the solid earth the Rain sinks not above Ten Foot yet What becomes saith he of that immense quantity of Rain which continues for many Weeks together nay oft times for some Moneths beside the infinite quantity of wet and Snow that is falling all Winter long causing inundations of water over all the Country round about Can it be suppos'd saith he that Ten Foot of earth will drink up all this water To which I answer 26. That in those great and long continued falls of Rain which cause inundations of water the greater part thereof falling upon hills champion and high grounds runs down into Rivulets and from thence is conveyed into Rivers which coming suddenly overflow their banks drown Marshes and adjacent low grounds but presently after are discharged into the Ocean Now that Rain which falls upon low Fenny grounds where the water has not that usual current into Rivers either restagnates upon the Superficies and causeth Marshes Lakes Ditches Bogs c. or sinks into the earth especially where the crust or course of earthy Clay is but thin before an other Fundus of Gravel or Sand appear for in some low moorish grounds the outward Fundus or crust is a bituminous spongy earth such are the Turf-Moors into which Rain-water sinks deep others are of a more stiff Clay or Marle and those both high and low grounds which cause Rain-water to restagnate or lye long upon them 27. So that It 's the difference of Soyls which makes Rain-water either sink or lye above where the Soyl is sandy the Rain sinks presently and therefore such High-ways are the best to Travel in Summer or Winter-Now I say ten foot is deep enough to contain all that which remains after the greatest part is carryed away by Runnels and divers Currents into Rivers and those again into the Sea for I have observ'd that in two or three days Rain it hath scarce sunk a Graft-depth in our Garden-earth But suppose we should say with Dr. Wittie That by some secret passages into the caverns of the earth it should sink much deeper than ten foot yet we shall meet with two difficulties the solving of which will prove Ominous to the Doctor 's Opinion of the Original of Springs The first is How shall rain-water sink into the earth by empty crevises or clefts which I imagine he supposeth to be at some distance from each other Now what is that that must bring the intermediate particles of water which fall between one crevise or cleft and another into the distant crevises He should have done well to have assigned those particular Conveyers before he had determin'd these crevises I am apt to think he hath grounded his supposition of these crevises and clefts from those chinks and clefts in the earth which he hath seen happen in a long drought as if those were not forc'd by the extream dryness of its Superficies and fill'd again upon the access of Rain when the earth being moistened comes together the Rain sinks no more down those clefts or crevises than down any other more solid part thereof 28. Why might not he rather and that more truly suppose the
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
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
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-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-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-Spaw-water it self cannot with efficacy be drunk because too much diluted with Rain or snow-Snow-water in a glass of White or rhenish-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-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
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
Cucumers Hollands Squash c. would if wounded do the like for they have great store of Water which comes for their supply which by the Ferment of the Plants is easily coagulated into the pulpous substance thereof so the heads of wounded Poppies weep forth a considerable quantity of Liquor which condens'd by the Sun becomes Opium or the heads of the same bruis'd make Meconium In both which Water is the material subject which passing up the secret Meanders of that Plant is by the Ferment thereof particularly appropriate to that Plant and its kindes in the same family determin'd into that coagulating juyce of which Opium and Meconium is made and so of the rest of Plants Trees and Fruits Thus we see how Water in the great Circulation taking in the lesser of Rain and Snow which is repleted with a volatile Nitrous Salt the one joyning issue with the other becomes the Material subject of all Vegetable Fruits of the Earth 81. Seventhly And lastly The Circulation of Water passing through varieties of Glebes in the Meanders of the Earth makes different Waters of various uses for the service of man as for instance some Waters will bear Soap and Yeast viz. River-Water and some River-Water better then others also some Waters are better and more peculiar for Bleaching dying Washing Brewing salving boyling of Meat c. than others 82. Now the great difference as to the common use of Waters is betwixt that of Springs and that of Rivers for the Rivers are generally supply'd from Springs in the round of our Circulation yet passing along the Surface of the Earth and sometime running down Hills and steep places in torrents and mixing with Rain-Water as it runs along into Rivers it both may and doth give a considerable difference to Waters in Rivers from the same as running immediately from Springs and that because it washeth over several sorts or soyls of Earth as Marle Limestone Manur'd ground and the like where it licks up the Nitrous Salt wherewith several Sorts of Earth are repleted and by the help of this becomes Saponary viz. bears Soap well bears Yeast bleacheth well c. 83. Whereas simple Quick-Spring Water passing through the Colander of the Sabulum is frequently drein'd of all the Salts it had imbib'd in other more Patent places of the Earth and perhaps onely retains a small portion of a minute Sabulum inconspicuous in Water but remains visible after distillation thereof or being little indiscernable Fragments of some Marcasites or Stones which it razeth off as it runs along which water I say being percolated from all Salts through the strainer of the Sabulum hath not that Saponary property that River-Water hath and therefore will neither wash bleach nor bear yeast Besides many Land-Springs which drein through Nitrous Earth empty themselves by their proper Chanels into Rivers Which also frequently upon sudden falls of Rain overflow low grounds and so do wash from thence a Nitrous or Alkalizate Salt which contributes much to the making River-Water more useful for the common intentions of Washing Bleaching Brewing c. 84. For that which makes Soyls more fertile makes Waters also more useful which is an Alkalizate or Nitrous Salt For what doth Limestone Manure Marle c. add to the inriching of Soyls but either by impregnating the ground with a Nitrous Salt or making the Earth to become more Magnetical to center upon it self the Volatile Nitrous Aereal Salt which floats to and again in the Atmosphere whence it is that the Country-man lets some part of his tillage or arable ground ly fallow every year on purpose that this Nitrous Salt which circulates in the Air and is the main wheel of Vegetation may coagulate it self upon the ground made fit thereto by the addition of Limestone Marle or Manure and thereby become fitter to bring forth many fold which if the ground be exhausted of this Salt as in a few years by bringing forth much Corn it will then it becomes barren until it be manur'd by dung ashes limestone or marle and is laid fough or fallow as the Country-man calls it which in the conclusion impregnates the Soyl again with a fresh Salt or spirit whereby it is made fruitful You are the Salt of the Earth saith our Saviour to his Disciples which if it hath lost it's savour wherewith shall it be salted So that the Earth hath a Salt which makes it fruitful and the loss of that Salt makes it barren and useless 85. As for Lime-stone that contributes to the manuring and inriching of ground after a double manner and that first by communicating its Alkalizate Salt which it hath in it to the ground and next which indeed I think is the cheif that it becomes as a proper Magnet to attract if such there be or center upon it self the volatile fructifying Nitrous Salt which floats in the Air in which I am confirm'd because the Country-man observes that though it be quench'd already with Water or Rain before it be thrown upon the ground as most frequently it is yet nevertheless it makes the ground as fruitful as if it were not yea Lime that hath laid long and that one would think hath had all its Salt wash'd from it if it be thrown upon impoverish'd ground will yet make it fruitful The same will the Faeces of Soap-Ashes do after all the Salts are wash'd both from the Ashes of Breccans or Brogg as they call it and from the Lime which is much us'd where it 's to be had to lay up grounds to fertilize them And that certainly for no other cause but that it helps as a proper Magnet the Nitrous Salt to settle upon that soyl whence it is that they plow that ground often thereby exposing new parts of the Earth to the Air to become impregnate with the Salt thereof so dung and ashes have Salts in them the one a volatile the other a fixt but are both much altered by a Ferment both from the Air and Earth before they become transmuted into the Leffas terrae or are turn'd into the true fructifying Nitrous Salt Also Marle doth inrich Soyls two manner of wayes the one is by having a Nitrous Salt inherent in it self as I have found by imbibing it in distill'd Water Filtering and Evaporating where I have had actually a Nitrous Salt The next way is by being as a Magnet to the Nitre in the Air to make it settle upon that Soyl where Marle is most found therefore that Soyl which is naturally a Marle or is at least well manur'd therewith keeps in heart as the Country-man saith the longest and will need little or no other assistance for many years because its a proper sort of earth for the fructifying salt in the air to settle upon which makes that soyl hold fruitful the longer And from the different dispositions of ground in order to the degrees of reception of this salt in the air the great variety of soyls proceed 86. And from