The Evolution of Modern Medicine [62]
which led to a great discussion with the theologians and to Van Helmont's arrest for heresy, and small wonder, when he makes such bold statements as "Let the Divine enquire only concerning God, the Naturalist concerning Nature," and "God in the production of miracles does for the most part walk hand in hand with Nature."
[16] An English translation by Walter Charleton appeared in 1650, entitled "A Ternary of Paradoxes."
That wandering genius, Sir Kenelm Digby, did much to popularize this method of treatment by his lecture on the "Powder of Sympathy."[17] His powder was composed of copperas alone or mixed with gum tragacanth. He regarded the cure as effected through the subtle influence of the sympathetic spirits or, as Highmore says, by "atomicall energy wrought at a distance," and the remedy could be applied to the wound itself, or to a cloth soaked in the blood or secretions, or to the weapon that caused the wound. One factor leading to success may have been that in the directions which Digby gave for treating the wound (in the celebrated case of James Howell, for instance), it was to be let alone and kept clean. The practice is alluded to very frequently by the poets. In the "Lay of the Last Minstrel" we find the following:
[17 French edition, 1668, English translation, same year. For a discussion on the author of the weapon salve see Van Helmont, who gives the various formulas. Highmore (1651) says the "powder is a Zaphyrian salt calcined by a celestial fire operating in Leo and Cancer into a Lunar complexion."
But she has ta'en the broken lance, And wash'd it from the clotted gore, And salved the splinter o'er and o'er. William of Deloraine, in trance, Whene'er she turn'd it round and round, Twisted, as if she gall'd his wound, Then to her maidens she did say, That he should be whole man and sound,
(Canto iii, xxiii.)
and in Dryden's "Tempest" (V, 1) Ariel says:
Anoint the Sword which pierc'd him with the Weapon-Salve, And wrap it close from Air till I have time To visit him again.
From Van Helmont comes the famous story of the new nose that dropped off in sympathy with the dead arm from which it was taken, and the source of the famous lines of Hudibras. As I have not seen the original story quoted of late years it may be worth while to give it: "A certain inhabitant of Bruxels, in a combat had his nose mowed off, addressed himself to Tagliacozzus, a famous Chirurgein, living at Bononia, that he might procure a new one; and when he feared the incision of his own arm, he hired a Porter to admit it, out of whose arm, having first given the reward agreed upon, at length he dig'd a new nose. About thirteen moneths after his return to his own Countrey, on a sudden the ingrafted nose grew cold, putrified, and within few days drops off. To those of his friends that were curious in the exploration of the cause of this unexpected misfortune, it was discovered, that the Porter expired, neer about the same punctilio of time, wherein the nose grew frigid and cadaverous. There are at Bruxels yet surviving,some of good repute, that were eye-witnesses of these occurrences."[18]
[18] Charleton: Of the Magnetic Cure of Wounds, London, 1650, p. 13.
Equally in the history of science and of medicine, 1542 is a starred year, marked by a revolution in our knowledge alike of Macrocosm and Microcosm. In Frauenburg, the town physician and a canon, now nearing the Psalmist limit and his end, had sent to the press the studies of a lifetime--"De revolutionibus orbium coelestium." It was no new thought, no new demonstration that Copernicus thus gave to his generation. Centuries before, men of the keenest scientific minds from Pythagoras on had worked out a heliocentric theory, fully promulgated by Aristarchus, and very generally accepted by the brilliant investigators of the Alexandrian school; but in the long interval, lapped in Oriental lethargy, man had been content to acknowledge that the heavens declare the glory of God and that the firmament sheweth his handiwork. There had been great
[16] An English translation by Walter Charleton appeared in 1650, entitled "A Ternary of Paradoxes."
That wandering genius, Sir Kenelm Digby, did much to popularize this method of treatment by his lecture on the "Powder of Sympathy."[17] His powder was composed of copperas alone or mixed with gum tragacanth. He regarded the cure as effected through the subtle influence of the sympathetic spirits or, as Highmore says, by "atomicall energy wrought at a distance," and the remedy could be applied to the wound itself, or to a cloth soaked in the blood or secretions, or to the weapon that caused the wound. One factor leading to success may have been that in the directions which Digby gave for treating the wound (in the celebrated case of James Howell, for instance), it was to be let alone and kept clean. The practice is alluded to very frequently by the poets. In the "Lay of the Last Minstrel" we find the following:
[17 French edition, 1668, English translation, same year. For a discussion on the author of the weapon salve see Van Helmont, who gives the various formulas. Highmore (1651) says the "powder is a Zaphyrian salt calcined by a celestial fire operating in Leo and Cancer into a Lunar complexion."
But she has ta'en the broken lance, And wash'd it from the clotted gore, And salved the splinter o'er and o'er. William of Deloraine, in trance, Whene'er she turn'd it round and round, Twisted, as if she gall'd his wound, Then to her maidens she did say, That he should be whole man and sound,
(Canto iii, xxiii.)
and in Dryden's "Tempest" (V, 1) Ariel says:
Anoint the Sword which pierc'd him with the Weapon-Salve, And wrap it close from Air till I have time To visit him again.
From Van Helmont comes the famous story of the new nose that dropped off in sympathy with the dead arm from which it was taken, and the source of the famous lines of Hudibras. As I have not seen the original story quoted of late years it may be worth while to give it: "A certain inhabitant of Bruxels, in a combat had his nose mowed off, addressed himself to Tagliacozzus, a famous Chirurgein, living at Bononia, that he might procure a new one; and when he feared the incision of his own arm, he hired a Porter to admit it, out of whose arm, having first given the reward agreed upon, at length he dig'd a new nose. About thirteen moneths after his return to his own Countrey, on a sudden the ingrafted nose grew cold, putrified, and within few days drops off. To those of his friends that were curious in the exploration of the cause of this unexpected misfortune, it was discovered, that the Porter expired, neer about the same punctilio of time, wherein the nose grew frigid and cadaverous. There are at Bruxels yet surviving,some of good repute, that were eye-witnesses of these occurrences."[18]
[18] Charleton: Of the Magnetic Cure of Wounds, London, 1650, p. 13.
Equally in the history of science and of medicine, 1542 is a starred year, marked by a revolution in our knowledge alike of Macrocosm and Microcosm. In Frauenburg, the town physician and a canon, now nearing the Psalmist limit and his end, had sent to the press the studies of a lifetime--"De revolutionibus orbium coelestium." It was no new thought, no new demonstration that Copernicus thus gave to his generation. Centuries before, men of the keenest scientific minds from Pythagoras on had worked out a heliocentric theory, fully promulgated by Aristarchus, and very generally accepted by the brilliant investigators of the Alexandrian school; but in the long interval, lapped in Oriental lethargy, man had been content to acknowledge that the heavens declare the glory of God and that the firmament sheweth his handiwork. There had been great