of the nerves being affected, it is presumed this part of the Essay
cannot be more interestingly concluded than by a summary of the
distinct symptomatic effects attending, more or less, complaints of the
nerves; and although the following symptoms are alarming with regard to
their number and variety, yet the reader may be assured there is not
one specified but what is either the immediate or ultimate effect of a
nervous affection, and which is too frequently the consequence of the
violent astringency of foreign tea taken injudiciously as a constant
aliment:--A faintness, succeeded with a delusive vision of motes,
mists, and clouds, falling backwards and forwards before the
distempered sight--A yawning, gaping, stretching out of the arms,
twitching of the nerves, sneezing, drowsiness, and contraction of the
breast--Dulness, debility, distress, and dismay, with a great sense of
weariness--A wan complexion, a languid eye, a loathing stomach, and an
uncertain appetite, which, if not immediately satisfied, is
irremediably lost--Heartburning, bilious vomitings, belchings, pains in
the pit of the stomach, and shortness of breath--Dizziness, inveterate
pains in the temples and other parts of the head, a tingling noise in
the ear, a throbbing of the brain, especially of the temporal
arteries--Symptoms of asthma, tickling coughs, visible inflations, and
unusual scents affecting the olfactory nerves--Sometimes costive and
sometimes relaxed--Sudden flushings of heat, and suffusions of
countenance--In the night, alternate sweats and shiverings, especially
down the back, which seems to feel as if water was poured down that
part of the body--A ptyalism, or discharge of phlegm from the glands of
the throat, which generally attends all the symptoms--Troublesome pains
between the shoulders, pains attended with hot sensations, cramps and
convulsive motions of the muscles, or a few of their fibres--Sudden
startings of the tendons of the legs and arms--Copious and frequent
discharges of pale and limpid urine--Vertigoes, long faintings, and
cold, moist, clammy sweat about the temples and forehead--Wandering
pains in the sides, back, knees, ancles, arms, wrists, and somewhat
resembling rheumatic pains--The head generally warm, while the rest of
the body is cold or chilly--Obstinate watchinqs, disturbed sleep,
frightful dreams, the night mare, startings when awake, and the mind
filled with the most terrific apprehensions--Tremors of the limbs, and
palpitations of the heart--A very variable and irregular
pulse--Periodical pains in the head--A sense of suffocation, frequent
sighings, and shedding of tears--Convulsive spasms of the muscles,
tendons, nerves of the back, loins, arms, hands, and a general
convulsion of the stomach, bowels, throat, legs, and indeed almost
every other part of the body--A quick apprehension, forgetful,
unsettled, and constant to nothing but inconstancy--A wandering and
delirious imagination, groundless fears, and an exquisite sense of his
sufferings--A gradually sinking into a nervous atrophy or
consumption--A perpetual alarm of approaching death--Sometimes
cheerful, and sometimes melancholy--Without present enjoyment or future
expectation of any thing but increasing misery and debility.--If these
symptoms are inconsiderately suffered to continue, they soon terminate
in palsy, hip, madness, epilepsy, apoplexy, or in some mortal disease,
as the black jaundice, dropsy, consumption, &c.
Having ascertained, from this enquiry, the injurious properties of
India tea, it may naturally be expected that I should propose some
article that might prove more beneficial. With this requisition I shall
most readily comply, although I may expose myself to the invidious
censure of having directed all my efforts to establish the celebrity of
whatever article I may recommend. But being convinced, that, by
publishing the virtue of a tea that I have investigated from physical
analysis and particular observation, I may essentially serve the
public, I am content to suffer the obloquy, provided it is productive
of a general benefit. Having, as before observed, examined, with the
greatest attention, the nature of most articles that have been offered
as morning and afternoon beverage, there are two which claim most
particularly the preference of all others that are sold under the
denomination of Tea: these are, 1st, that which was discovered by that
eminent botanist Sir Hans Sloane; and the other, by a botanist and
physician equally celebrated, Dr. Solander. I therefore, without
considering in what manner the interest of the proprietors of these
teas may be individually affected, propose two articles, in order to
shew that my partiality or opinion of the virtues of the one could not
prejudice me so far as to prevent my allowing due praise to any other
possessing qualities deserving approbation. I am happy to state that,
from my analysis of that invented by Sir Hans Sloane, called British
Tea, I found it possesses most singular virtues for relieving many
nervous complaints; but, from the same trials and experiments made on
that invented by Dr. Solander, I have been convinced that, although the
qualities of the former are exceedingly salutary, they are not so
general in their restoration and nutritious effects as the latter.
Being thus convinced of the extraordinary properties of Dr. Solander's
Tea, I have been induced to state, in a Treatise upon their Nature,
Preparation, and Effects, reasons founded on chemical analysis,
physical efficiency, and experimental observation, in support of their
most eminent virtues. After every trial I have made of coffee,
chocolate[1], and most other preparations that have been, and are at
present, offered to the public as a substitute for tea, none seem to
claim the preference so eminently as that invented by Dr. Solander.
From their analysis, I find their virtues are of the most corrective
and balsamic kind; they strengthen the tone of the stomach, not by
astringing the solids, but by lubricating the vessels, sheathing the
acrids, and attenuating the liquids.
[1] "_Coffee.--In bilious habits it is very hurtful._" Dr.
Carr's Med. Epist. p. 25.
"_Coffee.--I cannot advise it to those of hardness of
breathing._" Ibid. p. 29.
"_Coffee, according to Paule, a Danish physician, enervates men
and renders them incapable of generation, which injurious
tendency is certainly attributed to it by the Turks. From its
immoderate use they account for the decrease of population in
their provinces, that were so numerously peopled before this
berry was introduced among them. Mr. Boyle mentions an instance
of a person to whom Coffee always proved an emetic. He also says
that he has known great drinking of it produce the palsy._
"_Chocolate is too gross for many weak stomachs, and
exceedingly injurious to those liable to phlegm and viscid
humours._" Saunders's Nat. & Art. Direct. for Health.
"_Chocolate overloads the stomach, and renders the juices too
slow in their circulation._" Smith on the Nerves.
In this manner they restore the equilibrium of the oscillatory motions,
which establish the tone of the nervous system. This being
strengthened, the animal spirits are enabled to dispense their reviving
influence to the sensitive, digestive, and intellectual powers. And
these being thus restored to their vigour of operation, a simple and
moderate portion of food is rendered the most nutritious, and the body
is consequently established in the enjoyment of health and happiness.
The above virtues of the sanative tea are not here asserted as a
declamatory panegyric, but as the result of a physical analysis of
their nature, and a serious examination into their mode of operating as
a restorative and constant aliment. Without presuming their qualities
to be an unlimited remedy for all complaints, the nature of the
preparation of this tea is compared with the causes and effects of
nervous disorders: from this comparison their relative virtue to such
diseases are most clearly evinced: and thus is this invaluable
discovery proved to be the most effectual remedy for all those
complaints caused by drinking foreign teas, that was ever yet or may be
hereafter invented.
In proposing to the public any simple or compound, for the preserving,
increasing, or restoring health, the first object should be to explain
its nature. This is the principal test by which its merits can be
known, or mankind rationally induced to try its virtues. And as this
sanative tea is offered as a substitute for what is generally used as
two fourths of our aliment, and which, from the preceding enquiry, has
been found the principal cause of our present infirmities, the greater
necessity there is for a candid investigation of its nature.
Impressed with the above conviction, it is fairly stated that the
nature of this sanative tea is not from any combination of the animal
or mineral kingdom, but a collection of the most salutary native and
exotic herbs that are produced in the vegetable empire of nature. These
have not been collected by the fanatic devotees of occult qualities,
but by the scientific researches and personal experience of a character
that is equally and justly admired for his philosophical, medical, and
botanical knowledge. The discoverer, Dr. Solander, of this tea,
inquired into the virtues of each native and exotic herb of which it is
composed, not only by abstract reasoning upon its relative qualities,
but by the more immediate evidence of his senses: by submitting each
vegetable to his taste and smell, he derived the most certain physical
proof of its qualities. Thus he knew the particular virtues of each,
and what salutary effects they must, from their preparation as a
compound, produce when applied as a relief for the innumerable diseases
caused by drinking foreign teas. Not confining himself to _English
Plants_, he studied and examined the virtues of _Exotics_, among which
he discovered some that possess virtues he had not found in those of
his own country: by adopting these, he has increased the salutary
effects of his invaluable tea. From reading Hippocrates, Discorides,
and Galen, he found the ancients derived all their knowledge of plants
by their taste and smell. With these examples before him, and his own
propensity to study, joined to his penetrating judgement, it is no
wonder he should have so well succeeded. Thus he recurred to the
original mode of inquiry, which first established and raised the
eminence of physic; neglecting that delusive principle of Aristotle's
philosophy, which has since taught too many physicians to express the
virtue of medicines by hot, cold, moist, and dry, without deriving the
least information from their senses Dr. Solander, aided by chemical
analysis, distinguished the virtue by the taste or odour of every
plant. By this means their specific juices he found tasted either
earthy, mucilaginous, sweet, bitter, aromatic, fetid, acrid, or
corrosive. From this experience he found the observation of some
botanists to be true, "That there is no virtue yet known in plants but
what depends on the taste or smell, and may be known by them."[2] With
this infallible means of pursuing his enquiry, he formed a tea composed
of herbs that are in their nature astringent, balsamic, aromatic,
cephalic, and diaphoretic. These virtues combined may be said to form
one of the most incomparable specifics, as a nutritive and restoring
aliment, that has been discovered.
[2] _Floyer, Malpighus, Epew, Harvey, Willis, Lower, Needham,
Glisson, &c._
In the astringent, the acid fixing upon the more earthly parts, the
nutritious oil is more easily separated, which renders them also
pectoral, cleaning, and diuretic. This part of the tea is in its nature
particularly serviceable in all cases where vulnerary medicines are
requisite. They particularly amend the acid in the nervous juice, and
thus restore the equal motion of the spirits, which were obstructed or
retarded by spasms or convulsions. By the volatile oil and volatile
pungent salt, obstructions are opened, and the motions of the languid
blood increased to a healthy degree of circulation. They resolve
coagulated phlegm in the stomach, preserve the fluidity of the juices,
and promote digestion, by assisting the bile in its operation.
And with regard to their balsamic and aromatic nature, these qualities
warm the stomach and expel wind, by rarefying the flatuous exhalations
from chyle in the prima viæ. These, by their sweetness, allay the
sharpness of rheums, and lenify their acrimony. Being filled with an
oily salt, they open the passage of the lungs and kidnies. By opening
the pores, they extraordinarily discuss outward tumours, and attenuate
the internal coagulation. All these virtues may be said to be derived
from the union of their balsamic oil and volatile salt.
By a second class of aromatics, with which Dr. Solander composed this
sanative tea, is such as have a bitter astringency joined to their
volatile oil and salt. These united qualities correct acids in the
stomach, cleanse the lungs, and open obstructions in the glands caused
by coagulated serum; and the saline pungent oil altering the acids in
the glands of the brain, by correcting and attenuating its lympha and
succus nervosus, produces the same effect; for the lympha and nervous
juice are, like other glandulous humours, liable to acidity and
stagnation; therefore these aromatics, by exciting their motion and
correcting their acidities, render the liquids of the nerves more
volatile, and are therefore justly termed cephalics. And as it is the
property of volatiles to ascend, the reason is evident of the brain
being assisted by their salutary qualities. These aromatics likewise
evacuate serum from the blood, promote its circulation, and attenuate
the coagulations of chyle, lympha, and succus nervosus. And here, it is
proper to add, that all aromatics, by rarefying the blood, are cordial.
There being aromatic astringents in this tea, its infusion strengthens
the fibres and membranes of the stomach, and all the nervous system, in
such a manner as not to destroy their tensity by that too great
contraction caused by the foreign teas; and, having no acid in their
astringency, the blood is preserved from too great a rarefaction, which
would otherwise happen from the pungency of their oily qualities. These
also excite the appetite, by stimulating the natural progress of the
chyle, and thus prevent its too rapid fermentation of its spirituous
parts into windy flatulencies. For the same reason vinegar is taken
with hot meats and herbs. Having mentioned vinegar, it may not be
improper to state this vegetable acid is the best antidote against the
poison of any acrid herbs. That part of the tea which has a
mucilaginous taste is inwardly cooler than oil, although it be
different in nature. Such herbs defend the throat from the sharpness of
rheums, the stomach from corrosive humours of disease or acrimonious
medicines; the ureters from sharp, choleric, or acid urine, and
lubricate the passage for the stony gravel. Their crude parts cool the
heat of scorbutic blood, lessen its violent motion, and sheathe its
acrid saline particles.
By their different mucilaginous principles they produce the following
various salutary effects:
The earthy repel and cool outward inflammations.
The watery, which is thick and gummose, stop fluxes and correct sharp
humours.
Those of an oily odour alleviate pains.
Those of a pungent acrid dissolve tartareous concretions in the
kidnies.
From these and a variety of other salutary properties, it is evident
the general nature of Dr. Solander's tea is such as to correct acrid
humours, promote the secretions, restore the equilibrium between the
fluids and solids, and finally to brace every part of the relaxed
nervous system. The body being thus relieved from obstructions, its
circulations restored, the digestive faculties invigorated, and the
spirits re-animated, the debilitated constitution is reinstated in all
its enjoyments of health and hilarity. It may be therefore observed,
that the principle of this tea is to nourish as a general aliment,
while it renovates the human constitution, without having recourse to
the nauseous portions of galenical preparation, or the hazardous trial
of chalybeate waters. As this tea is particularly salutary in all cases
where mineral waters are generally recommended, it is very proper the
Public should be cautioned against the danger which too frequently
attends the constant drinking of them.
Chalybeate waters, it must be acknowledged, have effected very
extraordinary cures in certain cases. But when so great an author as
Helmont says, that such waters are fatal to all those who are afflicted
with peripneumonic complaints, it is surely necessary they should be
resorted to with the greatest caution; and even in complaints where
they may be serviceable, it is necessary to observe whether they really
possess those chalybeate qualities for which they are commended. Those
who have written upon their virtues assert, and with seeming propriety,
that where they deposit an ochreous sediment, they are certainly
dispossessed of their steely virtues; for ochre being no other than the
calx of iron, such a residue evinces the evaporation of the more
eminent properties of the chalybeate, by the phlogiston of the mineral
escaping by its extreme volatility. Every metal deprived of this
igneous principle is immediately reduced to a calx, and thus deprived
of its splendour, fusibility, and other properties, until restored
again by the readmission of its phlogiston. Calcined lead having lost
this inflammable quality, is reduced to a red calx or mineral earth,
which, if fluxed with any igneous body, such as oil, pitch, wax, fat,
wood, bone, or mineral oil or bitumen, the fiery principle is resorbed,
and the lead restored to its essential qualities; from these physical
observations the reader may be convinced of those mineral waters as
afford such a sediment being in a state of decomposition. They are thus
deprived of one of the four elements or principles of which they are
all more or less composed. Every analysis of mineral waters in their
perfect state has demonstrated that they possess a fixed air, a
volatile alkali, a volatile vitriolic acid, and the phlogiston. If,
therefore, either of these essential qualities is evaporated or
corrupted, the water, being in a state of decomposition, must lose the
virtues of a medicinal chalybeate.
It is only necessary to add a few further remarks, in order to shew in
what particular complaints chalybeates, even in their most perfect
state, are pernicious. By this means many of the diseased will be
guarded against a fatal error: and as the prejudice in favour of such
applications is so universally prevalent, it is hoped a few pages
allotted to this subject will be deemed a most essential service to a
deluded community. By removing such a pernicious partiality, the
health, if not the lives of thousands, may be saved, to the great
enjoyment of themselves and their relatives. Dr. Knight says very
justly, "that the explication of the manner of the operation of
chalybeate medicines in human bodies is grounded upon false principles,
and not matters of fact; to wit, that all chalybeate preparations, in a
liquid form, owe their medicinal efficacy to the metal dissolved,
whether in an aqueous or spirituous menstruum, retaining its metallic
texture." To avoid entering into the whole detail of this interesting
argument, it is only here stated in support of the above assertion,
that as mineral waters are impregnated with a combination of sulphurs,
salts, and earth, their virtues cannot be properly ascribed, as they
have been, to the metals which they contain. It might be further
proved, that iron cannot possibly enter the blood, retaining its
essential qualities; for metals in general, except mercury, are
suspended in liquids in _solutis principiis_, or principles disengaged,
which are thus deprived of their metallic properties. Iron, entering
the body as a volatile vitriolic acid, cannot act by its specific
gravity as mercury does; it therefore acts _per accidens_, and not _per
se_. But admitting that waters, however impregnated with iron, are
efficacious in checking all diarrhoea and other profuse evacuations,
by closing the relaxed vessels, and incrassating the fluids, yet as
they prove sometimes so astringent as to stop the natural secretions,
the consequences are frequently cramps, dangerous convulsions, which
often end in fevers, inflammations, and mortifications, their
indiscriminate use should be most cautiously avoided. Chalybeates, thus
contracting the least pervious glands, should not be taken in acute
inflammations, or in any complaints that are attended with a quick and
strong pulse, a plethora, or extravasation of humours. They are equally
dangerous in all nervous contractions, or where the blood is got into
the arteriolæ, or capillary vessels. Thus, instead of acting like the
sanative tea, which softens, smoothes, and unbends the two constringed
fibres, the vitriolic salts of this mineral water but more contract the
fibrillæ, by operating like so many wedges, which ultimately tear,
rend, or divide the tender filaments. It must, however, be admitted
that mineral waters are very beneficial in cachexies, scurvies,
jaundice, hypochondriacal and hysterical affections. Having paid this
tribute to their virtues, it is evident that what is above stated
respecting their pernicious effects has been dictated by candour, and
with no illiberal disposition to deny their absolute virtues[3]. These
few remarks have only been made in order to warn the community against
a prevailing and indiscriminate use which might otherwise, in many
complaints, prove at least fatal to their health, if not to their
existence. And as the tea discovered by Dr. Solander possesses all the
virtues of the chalybeate, without its dangerous principles, it was an
immediate duty not only to warn but direct the Public in their adoption
of an aliment so essential to their health, and consequently temporal
happiness.
[3] _Waters drank at their source are efficacious in many
complaints that are not accompanied with inflammatory symptoms;
but if they are drank after a long or short conveyance, their
effects must be proportionably injurious instead of beneficial._
PREPARATION.
As the native and exotic herbs of this tea are dried in a pure air,
without any artificial means of preparation to improve their colour or
increase their natural astringency, they must be free from those
deleterious, corrosive, and violent contractive effects with which we
have observed the general and indiscriminate use of foreign teas and
mineral waters are attended. In the first part of this Essay, it was
stated that foreign teas were dried upon iron, and thus produced those
astringent effects we have seen to characterize chalybeate waters. It
is therefore evident, that the simple preparation of these salutary
herbs being free from what renders teas and mineral waters in many
cases pernicious, must leave their qualities pure and unadulterated,
according to the intent and principle of nature in their production.
They are, therefore, found particularly free from those injurious
properties which render green tea so destructive to emaciated
constitutions. Instead of being, like the above foreign tea, hurtful to
those worn down by a long fever, or such as have weak and delicate
stomachs, their qualities are in such complaints essentially nutritious
and restorative. That stimulating roughness, which foreign teas imbibe
from their iron preparation, is not to be found in the sanative tea
discovered by Dr. Solander; the latter is therefore very beneficial
where the mucous coat of the bowels is very thin, or the ramification
of the nerves numerous, extensive, and exquisitely sensible of
impression. The cholic, gripes, or painful prickings of the nervous
coat by the India teas, are allayed by the drinking of the sanative
tea, from its tepid and lubricating nature not being perverted by any
corrosive preparation. To thin and meagre bodies, which are greatly
affected by green and bohea teas, the above is a most restorative
aliment. The atrophy and diabetes, so frequently caused by the foreign
teas, are, from the herbs of Dr. Solander's tea possessing their
natural nutritious qualities uncontaminated by metallic preparation,
often cured by using it as a morning and evening beverage; and the
depression of spirits occasioned by green and bohea, and which induces
many of its drinkers to take sal volatile, or spirits of hartshorn, is
avoided by the sanative tea; for the latter is found one of the
greatest and most salutary exhilarators of the nervous system. And thus
those who drink it as a constant aliment, are saved from the dangers
that attend rendering the blood too thin by the use of the above
volatile alkalies, or drams, which are too frequently taken to avoid
that lowness of spirits caused by the great, sudden, and violent
contraction of the nervous fibrillæ. As the inconveniencies of the
foreign teas arise from the metallic properties derived from their
preparation, the advantages of the sanative tea are evidently seen to
arise from the preparation being such as leaves every herb possessed of
its natural and essential quality. This clearly evincing the
superiority of Dr. Solander's tea to every herbal beverage, it only
remains to proceed to the two remaining enquiries respecting the mode
of using and the effects of this salutary combination of vegetables.
The next subject, therefore, of investigation is the
MANNER OF USING.