useth all his pleasure without necessity, animae vitio, and thence come
many inconveniences unto him. For there is no meat whatsoever, though
otherwise wholesome and good, but if unseasonably taken, or
immoderately used, more than the stomach can well bear, it will
engender crudity, and do much harm. Therefore [2927]Crato adviseth his
patient to eat but twice a day, and that at his set meals, by no means
to eat without an appetite, or upon a full stomach, and to put seven
hours' difference between dinner and supper. Which rule if we did
observe in our colleges, it would be much better for our healths: but
custom, that tyrant, so prevails, that contrary to all good order and
rules of physic, we scarce admit of five. If after seven hours'
tarrying he shall have no stomach, let him defer his meal, or eat very
little at his ordinary time of repast. This very counsel was given by
Prosper Calenus to Cardinal Caesius, labouring of this disease; and
[2928] Platerus prescribes it to a patient of his, to be most severely
kept. Guianerius admits of three meals a day, but Montanus, consil. 23.
pro. Ab. Italo, ties him precisely to two. And as he must not eat
overmuch, so he may not absolutely fast; for as Celsus contends, lib.
1. Jacchinus 15. in 9. Rhasis, [2929]repletion and inanition may both
do harm in two contrary extremes. Moreover, that which he doth eat,
must be well [2930]chewed, and not hastily gobbled, for that causeth
crudity and wind; and by all means to eat no more than he can well
digest. Some think (saith [2931] Trincavelius, lib. 11. cap. 29. de
curand. part. hum.) the more they eat the more they nourish themselves:
eat and live, as the proverb is, not knowing that only repairs man,
which is well concocted, not that which is devoured. Melancholy men
most part have good [2932]appetites, but ill digestion, and for that
cause they must be sure to rise with an appetite; and that which
Socrates and Disarius the physicians in [2933]Macrobius so much
require, St. Hierom enjoins Rusticus to eat and drink no more than,
will [2934]satisfy hunger and thirst. [2935]Lessius, the Jesuit, holds
twelve, thirteen, or fourteen ounces, or in our northern countries,
sixteen at most, (for all students, weaklings, and such as lead an idle
sedentary life) of meat, bread, &c., a fit proportion for a whole day,
and as much or little more of drink. Nothing pesters the body and mind
sooner than to be still fed, to eat and ingurgitate beyond all measure,
as many do. [2936] By overmuch eating and continual feasts they stifle
nature, and choke up themselves; which, had they lived coarsely, or
like galley slaves been tied to an oar, might have happily prolonged
many fair years.
A great inconvenience comes by variety of dishes, which causeth the
precedent distemperature, [2937]than which (saith Avicenna) nothing is
worse; to feed on diversity of meats, or overmuch, Sertorius-like, in
lucem caenare, and as commonly they do in Muscovy and Iceland, to
prolong their meals all day long, or all night. Our northern countries
offend especially in this, and we in this island (ampliter viventes in
prandiis et caenis, as [2938]Polydore notes) are most liberal feeders,
but to our own hurt. [2939]Persicos odi puer apparatus: Excess of meat
breedeth sickness, and gluttony causeth choleric diseases: by
surfeiting many perish, but he that dieteth himself prolongeth his
life, Ecclus. xxxvii. 29, 30. We account it a great glory for a man to
have his table daily furnished with variety of meats: but hear the
physician, he pulls thee by the ear as thou sittest, and telleth thee,
[2940]that nothing can be more noxious to thy health than such variety
and plenty. Temperance is a bridle of gold, and he that can use it
aright, [2941]ego non summis viris comparo, sed simillimum Deo judico,
is liker a God than a man: for as it will transform a beast to a man
again, so will it make a man a God. To preserve thine honour, health,
and to avoid therefore all those inflations, torments, obstructions,
crudities, and diseases that come by a full diet, the best way is to
[2942]feed sparingly of one or two dishes at most, to have ventrem bene
moratum, as Seneca calls it, [2943]to choose one of many, and to feed
on that alone, as Crato adviseth his patient. The same counsel
[2944]Prosper Calenus gives to Cardinal Caesius, to use a moderate and
simple diet: and though his table be jovially furnished by reason of
his state and guests, yet for his own part to single out some one
savoury dish and feed on it. The same is inculcated by [2945]Crato,
consil. 9. l. 2. to a noble personage affected with this grievance, he
would have his highness to dine or sup alone, without all his
honourable attendance and courtly company, with a private friend or so,
[2946]a dish or two, a cup of Rhenish wine, &c. Montanus, consil. 24.
for a noble matron enjoins her one dish, and by no means to drink
between meals. The like, consil. 229. or not to eat till he be an
hungry, which rule Berengarius did most strictly observe, as Hilbertus,
Cenomecensis Episc. writes in his life,
———cui non fuit unquam
Ante sitim potus, nec cibus ante famem,
and which all temperate men do constantly keep. It is a frequent
solemnity still used with us, when friends meet, to go to the alehouse
or tavern, they are not sociable otherwise: and if they visit one
another's houses, they must both eat and drink. I reprehend it not
moderately used; but to some men nothing can be more offensive; they
had better, I speak it with Saint [2947]Ambrose, pour so much water in
their shoes.
It much avails likewise to keep good order in our diet, [2948]to eat
liquid things first, broths, fish, and such meats as are sooner
corrupted in the stomach; harder meats of digestion must come last.
Crato would have the supper less than the dinner, which Cardan,
Contradict. lib. 1. tract. 5. contradict. 18. disallows, and that by
the authority of Galen. 7. art. curat. cap. 6. and for four reasons he
will have the supper biggest: I have read many treatises to this
purpose, I know not how it may concern some few sick men, but for my
part generally for all, I should subscribe to that custom of the
Romans, to make a sparing dinner, and a liberal supper; all their
preparation and invitation was still at supper, no mention of dinner.
Many reasons I could give, but when all is said pro and con,
[2949]Cardan's rule is best, to keep that we are accustomed unto,
though it be naught, and to follow our disposition and appetite in some
things is not amiss; to eat sometimes of a dish which is hurtful, if we
have an extraordinary liking to it. Alexander Severus loved hares and
apples above all other meats, as [2950]Lampridius relates in his life:
one pope pork, another peacock, &c.; what harm came of it? I conclude
our own experience is the best physician; that diet which is most
propitious to one, is often pernicious to another, such is the variety
of palates, humours, and temperatures, let every man observe, and be a
law unto himself. Tiberius, in [2951]Tacitus, did laugh at all such,
that thirty years of age would ask counsel of others concerning matters
of diet; I say the same.
These few rules of diet he that keeps, shall surely find great ease and
speedy remedy by it. It is a wonder to relate that prodigious
temperance of some hermits, anchorites, and fathers of the church: he
that shall but read their lives, written by Hierom, Athanasius, &c.,
how abstemious heathens have been in this kind, those Curii and
Fabritii, those old philosophers, as Pliny records, lib. 11. Xenophon,
lib. 1. de vit. Socrat. Emperors and kings, as Nicephorus relates,
Eccles. hist. lib. 18. cap. 8. of Mauritius, Ludovicus Pius, &c., and
that admirable [2952]example of Ludovicus Cornarus, a patrician of
Venice, cannot but admire them. This have they done voluntarily and in
health; what shall these private men do that are visited with sickness,
and necessarily [2953]enjoined to recover, and continue their health?
It is a hard thing to observe a strict diet, et qui medice vivit,
misere vivit, [2954]as the saying is, quale hoc ipsum erit vivere, his
si privatus fueris? as good be buried, as so much debarred of his
appetite; excessit medicina malum, the physic is more troublesome than
the disease, so he complained in the poet, so thou thinkest: yet he
that loves himself will easily endure this little misery, to avoid a
greater inconvenience; e malis minimum better do this than do worse.
And as [2955]Tully holds, better be a temperate old man than a
lascivious youth. 'Tis the only sweet thing (which he adviseth) so to
moderate ourselves, that we may have senectutem in juventute, et in
juventute senectutem, be youthful in our old age, staid in our youth,
discreet and temperate in both.
MEMB. II.
_Retention and Evacuation rectified_.
I have declared in the causes what harm costiveness hath done in
procuring this disease; if it be so noxious, the opposite must needs be
good, or mean at least, as indeed it is, and to this cure necessarily
required; maxime conducit, saith Montaltus, cap. 27. it very much
avails. [2956] Altomarus, cap. 7, commends walking in a morning, into
some fair green pleasant fields, but by all means first, by art or
nature, he will have these ordinary excrements evacuated. Piso calls
it, Beneficium ventris, the benefit, help or pleasure of the belly, for
it doth much ease it. Laurentius, cap. 8, Crato, consil. 21. l. 2.
prescribes it once a day at least: where nature is defective, art must
supply, by those lenitive electuaries, suppositories, condite prunes,
turpentine, clysters, as shall be shown. Prosper Calenus, lib. de atra
bile, commends clysters in hypochondriacal melancholy, still to be used
as occasion serves; [2957] Peter Cnemander in a consultation of his pro
hypocondriaco, will have his patient continually loose, and to that end
sets down there many forms of potions and clysters. Mercurialis,
consil. 88. if this benefit come not of its own accord, prescribes
[2958]clysters in the first place: so doth Montanus, consil. 24.
consil. 31 et 229. he commends turpentine to that purpose: the same he
ingeminates, consil. 230. for an Italian abbot. 'Tis very good to wash
his hands and face often, to shift his clothes, to have fair linen
about him, to be decently and comely attired, for sordes vitiant,
nastiness defiles and dejects any man that is so voluntarily, or
compelled by want, it dulleth the spirits.
Baths are either artificial or natural, both have their special uses in
this malady, and as [2959]Alexander supposeth, lib. 1. cap. 16. yield
as speedy a remedy as any other physic whatsoever. Aetius would have
them daily used, assidua balnea, Tetra. 2. sect. 2. c. 9. Galen cracks
how many several cures he hath performed in this kind by use of baths
alone, and Rufus pills, moistening them which are otherwise dry. Rhasis
makes it a principal cure, Tota cura sit in humectando, to bathe and
afterwards anoint with oil. Jason Pratensis, Laurentius, cap. 8. and
Montanus set down their peculiar forms of artificial baths. Crato,
consil. 17. lib. 2. commends mallows, camomile, violets, borage to be
boiled in it, and sometimes fair water alone, and in his following
counsel, Balneum aquae dulcis solum saepissime profuisse compertum
habemus. So doth Fuchsius, lib. 1. cap. 33. Frisimelica, 2. consil. 42.
in Trincavelius. Some beside herbs prescribe a ram's head and other
things to be boiled. [2960] Fernelius, consil. 44. will have them used
ten or twelve days together; to which he must enter fasting, and so
continue in a temperate heat, and after that frictions all over the
body. Lelius Aegubinus, consil. 142. and Christoph. Aererus, in a
consultation of his, hold once or twice a week sufficient to bathe, the
[2961]water to be warm, not hot, for fear of sweating. Felix Plater,
observ. lib. 1. for a melancholy lawyer, [2962] will have lotions of
the head still joined to these baths, with a ley wherein capital herbs
have been boiled. [2963]Laurentius speaks of baths of milk, which I
find approved by many others. And still after bath, the body to be
anointed with oil of bitter almonds, of violets, new or fresh butter,
[2964]capon's grease, especially the backbone, and then lotions of the
head, embrocations, &c. These kinds of baths have been in former times
much frequented, and diversely varied, and are still in general use in
those eastern countries. The Romans had their public baths very
sumptuous and stupend, as those of Antoninus and Diocletian. Plin. 36.
saith there were an infinite number of them in Rome, and mightily
frequented; some bathed seven times a day, as Commodus the emperor is
reported to have done; usually twice a day, and they were after
anointed with most costly ointments: rich women bathed themselves in
milk, some in the milk of five hundred she-asses at once: we have many
ruins of such, baths found in this island, amongst those parietines and
rubbish of old Roman towns. Lipsius, de mag. Urb. Rom. l. 3, c. 8,
Rosinus, Scot of Antwerp, and other antiquaries, tell strange stories
of their baths. Gillius, l. 4. cap. ult. Topogr. Constant. reckons up
155 public [2965]baths in Constantinople, of fair building; they are
still [2966]frequented in that city by the Turks of all sorts, men and
women, and all over Greece, and those hot countries; to absterge belike
that fulsomeness of sweat, to which they are there subject.
[2967]Busbequius, in his epistles, is very copious in describing the
manner of them, how their women go covered, a maid following with a box
of ointment to rub them. The richer sort have private baths in their
houses; the poorer go to the common, and are generally so curious in
this behalf, that they will not eat nor drink until they have bathed,
before and after meals some, [2968]and will not make water (but they
will wash their hands) or go to stool. Leo Afer. l. 3. makes mention of
one hundred several baths at Fez in Africa, most sumptuous, and such as
have great revenues belonging to them. Buxtorf. cap. 14, Synagog. Jud.
speaks of many ceremonies amongst the Jews in this kind; they are very
superstitious in their baths, especially women.
Natural baths are praised by some, discommended by others; but it is in
a divers respect. [2969]Marcus, de Oddis in Hip. affect. consulted
about baths, condemns them for the heat of the liver, because they dry
too fast; and yet by and by, [2970]in another counsel for the same
disease, he approves them because they cleanse by reason of the
sulphur, and would have their water to be drunk. Areteus, c. 7.
commends alum baths above the rest; and [2971]Mercurialis, consil. 88.
those of Lucca in that hypochondriacal passion. He would have his
patient tarry there fifteen days together, and drink the water of them,
and to be bucketed, or have the water poured on his head. John
Baptista, Sylvaticus cont. 64. commends all the baths in Italy, and
drinking of their water, whether they be iron, alum, sulphur; so doth
[2972]Hercules de Saxonia. But in that they cause sweat and dry so
much, he confines himself to hypochondriacal melancholy alone,
excepting that of the head and the other. Trincavelius, consil. 14.
lib. 1. refers those [2973]Porrectan baths before the rest, because of
the mixture of brass, iron, alum, and consil. 35. l. 3. for a
melancholy lawyer, and consil. 36. in that hypochondriacal passion, the
[2974]baths of Aquaria, and 36. consil. the drinking of them.
Frisimelica, consulted amongst the rest in Trincavelius, consil. 42.
lib. 2. prefers the waters of [2975]Apona before all artificial baths
whatsoever in this disease, and would have one nine years affected with
hypochondriacal passions fly to them as to a [2976]holy anchor. Of the
same mind is Trincavelius himself there, and yet both put a hot liver
in the same party for a cause, and send him to the waters of St. Helen,
which are much hotter. Montanus, consil. 230. magnifies the
[2977]Chalderinian baths, and consil 237. et 239. he exhorteth to the
same, but with this caution, [2978]that the liver be outwardly anointed
with some coolers that it be not overheated. But these baths must be
warily frequented by melancholy persons, or if used, to such as are
very cold of themselves, for as Gabelius concludes of all Dutch baths,
and especially of those of Baden, they are good for all cold diseases,
[2979]naught for choleric, hot and dry, and all infirmities proceeding
of choler, inflammations of the spleen and liver. Our English baths, as
they are hot, must needs incur the same censure: but D. Turner of old,
and D. Jones have written at large of them. Of cold baths I find little
or no mention in any physician, some speak against them: [2980]Cardan
alone out of Agathinus commends bathing in fresh rivers, and cold
waters, and adviseth all such as mean to live long to use it, for it
agrees with all ages and complexions, and is most profitable for hot
temperatures. As for sweating, urine, bloodletting by haemrods, or
otherwise, I shall elsewhere more opportunely speak of them.
Immoderate Venus in excess, as it is a cause, or in defect; so
moderately used to some parties an only help, a present remedy. Peter
Forestus calls it aptissimum remedium, a most apposite remedy,
[2981]remitting anger, and reason, that was otherwise bound. Avicenna
Fen. 3. 20. Oribasius med. collect. lib. 6. cap. 37. contend out of
Ruffus and others, [2982] that many madmen, melancholy, and labouring
of the falling sickness, have been cured by this alone. Montaltus cap.
27. de melan. will have it drive away sorrow, and all illusions of the
brain, to purge the heart and brain from ill smokes and vapours that
offend them: [2983]and if it be omitted, as Valescus supposeth, it
makes the mind sad, the body dull and heavy. Many other inconveniences
are reckoned up by Mercatus, and by Rodericus a Castro, in their tracts
de melancholia virginum et monialium; ob seminis retentionem saviunt
saepe moniales et virgines, but as Platerus adds, si nubant sanantur,
they rave single, and pine away, much discontent, but marriage mends
all. Marcellus Donatus lib. 2. med. hist. cap. 1. tells a story to
confirm this out of Alexander Benedictus, of a maid that was mad, ob
menses inhibitos, cum in officinam meritoriam incidisset, a quindecem
viris eadem nocte compressa, mensium largo profluvio, quod pluribus
annis ante constiterat, non sine magno pudore mane menti restituta
discessit. But this must be warily understood, for as Arnoldus objects,
lib. 1. breviar. 18. cap. Quid coitus ad melancholicum succum? What
affinity have these two? [2984]except it be manifest that
superabundance of seed, or fullness of blood be a cause, or that love,
or an extraordinary desire of Venus, have gone before, or that as Lod.
Mercatus excepts, they be very flatuous, and have been otherwise
accustomed unto it. Montaltus cap. 27. will not allow of moderate Venus
to such as have the gout, palsy, epilepsy, melancholy, except they be
very lusty, and full of blood. [2985]Lodovicus Antonius lib. med.
miscet. in his chapter of Venus, forbids it utterly to all wrestlers,
ditchers, labouring men, &c. [2986]Ficinus and [2987]Marsilius Cognatus
puts Venus one of the five mortal enemies of a student: it consumes the
spirits, and weakeneth the brain. Halyabbas the Arabian, 5. Theor. cap.
36. and Jason Pratensis make it the fountain of most diseases,
[2988]but most pernicious to them who are cold and dry: a melancholy
man must not meddle with it, but in some cases. Plutarch in his book de
san. tuend. accounts of it as one of the three principal signs and
preservers of health, temperance in this kind: [2989]to rise with an
appetite, to be ready to work, and abstain from venery, tria
saluberrima, are three most healthful things. We see their opposites
how pernicious they are to mankind, as to all other creatures they
bring death, and many feral diseases: Immodicis brevis est aetas et
rara senectus. Aristotle gives instance in sparrows, which are parum
vivaces ob salacitatem, [2990]short lived because of their salacity,
which is very frequent, as Scoppius in Priapus will better inform you.
The extremes being both bad, [2991]the medium is to be kept, which
cannot easily be determined. Some are better able to sustain, such as
are hot and moist, phlegmatic, as Hippocrates insinuateth, some strong
and lusty, well fed like [2992]Hercules, [2993] Proculus the emperor,
lusty Laurence, [2994]prostibulum faeminae Messalina the empress, that
by philters, and such kind of lascivious meats, use all means to
[2995]enable themselves: and brag of it in the end, confodi multas
enim, occidi vero paucas per ventrem vidisti, as that Spanish
[2996]Celestina merrily said: others impotent, of a cold and dry
constitution, cannot sustain those gymnics without great hurt done to
their own bodies, of which number (though they be very prone to it) are
melancholy men for the most part.
MEMB. III.
_Air rectified. With a digression of the Air_.