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that fees a fordid ulcer in another's thigh will almost always take hold of or feel his own thigh; there fore we are true clock-work, ex. hibiting a confonancy with external objects, and we are even in voluntarily drawn away to gefticulations; and therefore, alfo, for fuch ideas in women there is a much greater application of the hand to that part.

If the woman is afterwards de livered of a deformed fœtus, the mark of the imagination is always found in the place that has been touched; and, if she had touched another part, the mark would have probably been in another place. The will is here of no effect, for there have been women who defired to bring forth mon fters, in order that they might promote their trade of begging, and yet had handfome children; but the contrary often takes place in others against their will. In this city (Leyden) the happy mo. ther of feveral well-formed children was asked an alms by a beggarman; and, to move compaffion, he fhewed her that he had two thumbs, and therefore a hand unfit for earning his bread: fhe gives him an alms, fuffers all that has been above obferved, and is afterwards delivered of a child with two thumbs. I examined the bones of thofe thumbs, and they were all as in the other thumb; and this happened to a woman whom, before and after, the like never befel.

I was acquainted with a noble lady in this city, who had many beautiful children. As fhe was fitting in her parlour at the window, and was eight months gone with child, fhe was accofted by an

impudent beggar with a red hair. lip; fhe trembles all over, ftrikes her mouth, and gives him an alms. Not long after, the was delivered of a beautiful child, with the like wound, and as it were bloody. It was wonderful in this cafe, that all the parts of the body were fo well formed, and the holy wice was in the lips, and the palate was perfectly fit within the noftrils, as in that beggar.

A lady is ftill living, in this city, who, in her pregnancy, wanted to have a fine mulberry the faw on a tree. One chanced to fall on the tip of her nofe, which the immediately rubbed. She was afterwards delivered of a girl, exceedingly handsome, but had on a tip of her nofe as perfect a mulberry as any painter could draw, which afterwards, however, by the help of vinegar and falt ammoniac, fo fenfibly diminished, as to leave no veftige of it remaining.

A woman with child faw, at Mechlin, two foldiers fighting, one of which cut off the other's hand. She, in a fright, draws back her hand, and was delivered of a child maimed in one arm, which, from the cut-off hand, fuftained an hæmorrhage and died; and yet the hand was not found in the afterbirth, nor did any ill confequences attend the woman.

When the Dutch defended Of. tend against the Spaniards, a Spanifh foldier loft his arm, and, being cured, went about begging, fhewing the place bound up, which the wife of Mark de Vogelaar feeing, was feized with a horror and great internal commotions: the afterwards brought forth a daughter without the right arm, and the fhoulder ran fo with blood, that the

fur.

furgeon was obliged to ftop and confolidate it, to prevent the child's dying of an hæmorrhage; and yet the arm was not found in the afterbirth. The infant was healed, and, marrying at a proper time, lived to the years of feventy-fix.

The duke of Alva having or dered three hundred citizens to be put to death together at Antwerp, a lady that was with child was very defirous of feeing the fight. She was not long returned home, when, taken with the, pains of labour, he was delivered of a child without a head, which alfo was not found in the after-birth. Some authors are of opinion, that this cannot happen when the fœtus is thoroughly formed; but, whether fo or not, the thing happens, and the proofs of it cannot be contested.

Father Malebranche relates, in his Recherche de la Verite,' that there was a young man, an idiot from his birth, in the Hofpital of the Incurables at Paris, whofe limbs were broke in all the places where it is customary to break the limbs of those who are condemned to fuffer upon the wheel. He lived in this condition near twenty years. Numbers were curious to fee and examine his broken limbs, and, among others, the queen. The caufe of his misfortune was his mother's going to fee, when fhe was with child of him, a criminal broke upon the wheel. Every ftroke the criminal received, vehemently ftruck the mother's imagination, and the infant was broke exactly in the fame parts of the body.

Father Malebranche relates another inftance of the force of imagination, which happened at folemnifing the canonifation of St.

Pius, at Paris. A pregnant woman, having too attentively confidered that faint's image, was delivered of a child perfectly refembling it: it had the face of an old man, as far as could be expreffed in a beardlefs infant: its arms ran across its breaft; its eyes were raifed to heaven, its forehead was very narrow, becaufe the forehead of the image was raised towards the vaulted roof of the church, looking up, as it were, to heaven: in fhort, the child was exceeding like the image, according as the mother had formed it by the force of her imagination. The author adds, "Every one could fee it at Paris as well as myfelf, the infant being kept for a confiderable time in fpirits of wine."

Here is a hiftory of various cafes, out of which I have selected fuch particulars as incredulity cannot difprove! But I do not understand how this connection is between the mother's idea and the corporeal change of the foetus; neither do I find it properly accounted for by any author. None of them have found fuch principles founded in nature, from which, being under. ftood and applied, is known a fufficient reafon of this effect, and anfwering to this idea. I am therefore greatly furprised, that Malebranche undertook to explain it. He fays, the fibres of the mother's body are affected in a certain place by certain ideas; grant that this fometimes happens: He fays, that, on thofe ideas being formed, certain determinate fpirits run through the body this alfo feems true; but what then? The mother is moved, not changed, and yet the infant is changed; but, Has the infant, whilft inits mother's womb,

the fame motions, fenfations, and ideas? This is obfcure, yet we may alfo grant it. But how can the infant's bones be broke, and not the mother's? He fays, this happens by percuffion and horror; but this is an effect, and not a caufe; and it does not appear why the mother's bones fhould not be broke, which are harder and there fore more brittle.

Paracelfus has deduced this from other caufes he fays, that there is in man an imagination, which really effects and brings to pafs the things that did not before exift; for a man, by imagination willing to move his body, moves it in fact; but, by his imagination and the commerce of invifible powers, he may also move another body; and this he calls MAGICAL IMAGINATION, which, by the help of demons, or invifible fpirits, can communicate the force of imagination to other bodies, and operate at a diftance. Van Helmont is of the fame opinion; but, for my part, I defpair to illuftrate this matter, and do think it inexplicable, or that the cause of the phænomenon is unknown to us.

in a determinate time. And aliments are fubftances, which are fo changed by a living body, as to be affimilated to it. Now the degrees of poifons are various, according to their peculiar violence, quan: tity, and the part they act upon. Half a grain of the glafs of antimony is a strong emetic, but given to the amount of a drachm is a very potent poifon. Moft poifons act only on the ftomach. If the crocus of metals, well prepared, is applied to the eyes as a collyrium, it takes away fpecks in the pellucid membranes of the eye, and occafions no pain; if mixed up with plafters, and applied to the naked nerves in a wound, it is a good de. tergent; if tasted, it has no tafte; but, if one or two grains are received into the ftomach, a prodi gious vomiting will enfue, and, from a greater quantity, death.

An ounce of it given to horfes affords a general remedy for their violent difeafes, and yet they are but little purged by it. Therefore the ftomach and its nerves are fo conftituted, by the Author of nature, which, indeed, feems inexplicable from the nature of the nerves, that the fubftance, which is not poisonous elsewhere, is fo in

Of the common fenfory, affected by the ftomach.

poifons. From the fame. HOSE fubftances are called

on being applied to a human living body, fo change all its actions, as not to be conquered by the force of life, whence that vital force is deftroyed but medicaments are fubftances, which fo change the actions, as to fubdue the disease, and life triumphs over difeafes; therefore medicaments cease to act

The berries of night-fhade do no harm in the eye; their tafte is fweet, their smell flat; if one of

ftomach, a perturbation fuddenly arifes in every action; if you give the gilla of Theophraftus, and the berry is vomited up, the brain again recovers its former ftate. This too cannot be explained from the affections of the nerves in general, but only from a phyfical fitnefs between this juice and the nerves

of

of the ftomach. If opium fpread in a plafter is applied to the external skin, it causes, in the part it is applied to, an exceeding great heat, and painful; it excites a blifter, erofion, and incipient gangrene; it has a naufeous and virulent fmell; if applied to the naked nerves, it takes away all fenfation; if received into the ftomach, it firft caufes a fenfation of mirth, and then a fnoring and apoplexy; its efficacy lafts about eight hours, unless it caufes death by being given in too great a dofe; when its force is quite enervated, the next day vomiting enfues, in which the opium pill is often again brought up, fo that this remedy againft vomiting now excites it. The Starkeyan pills confift of opium, hellebore, liquorice, and a foap made of alkali and cold-drawn oil. The author writes of them, that they caufe fweating, mitigate the fevereft pains, bring forth the morbific matter, and fo make an excellent purge; but thofe effects are proper to opium. When the brain is affected, a naufea and vomiting often enfue; fo that every thing affecting the brain, affects alfo the ftomach, and whatever affects the ftomach, affects likewife the brain.

We are in a great measure obliged to think, that opium is a poifon; it bears, as it were, the fway in the ftomach, checking by a fmall dofe the difeafes that arife from the ftomach, and at the fame time compofing the brain; but if given against the disease proper to the brain, which is the phrenitis, the diforder most commonly will be increased. It takes away not only pain, but also corrects the humours of the body. We fee confumptive

VOL. X.

perfons, from the erofion of their lungs, cough almost every time they draw their breath, and their diforder is made worfe by coughing, because the ulcerated place is perpetually irritated; if this coughing continues during the night, a little phlegm is evacuated; but, let one grain of opium be given, they will have no cough, and will fleep compofed; but in the morning they expectorate a drachm or two of purulent matter. If taken in a great quantity, it is poison, as we have feen in a phyfician tired of life; and in another, who repenting of his rafh action, by taking vinegar enervated its force, and afterwards felt no bad confequences from it. It fufpends not only the fenfes, but alfo motions, nay, almost all excretions, and hence thofe who use it, have no evacuation of urine for fix or eight hours; even when its force is vanished, they ftill complain of a want of this evacuation. If alfo you give a grain of opium to a man labouring under a diarrhoea, it will be entirely stopt.

There is therefore fomething very wonderful in those nerves, that, from being touched by thofe bodies, fuch a change fhould happen in all the functions, which ceafes, as foon as fuch body is dif engaged from the ftomach.

A lawyer had been taken ill of the cholic; he was advised the use of anife-feed; but, by mistake, the apothecary had given him the feeds of henbane. The pain was allayed, but he became very delirious. All his functions were disordered; he fat by the fire, talked much, but did not speak one coherent fentence. A phyfician, being fent for, gave him a vomit of vitriol; the

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feed

feed was thrown up, and he was immediately delivered.

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There is an umbelliferous plant, called fium, with the eruca leaf, water-hemlock by Gefner, which has a fucculent bulb, white, not unlike a turnip; and, being wounded, diftils a plenty of milk, that grows yellow in the air; its fmell is not virulent, and its pleafant tafte allures unwary children. If but a fmall particle of it adheres to the ftomach, it makes an entire change in all the animal functions, caufing vertigoes, horrible imaginations, terrors, convulfions, the abolition of all the external and internal fenfes, and, in three or four hours time, inevitable death. This body then, though apparently fo innocent, will very fuddenly bring on death. If dif. charged by a fpontaneous vomit, no harm will enfue; if an emetic is given in the midst of the mad fit, all the fymptoms will ceafe when the ftomach is eafed. Its chief power is therefore exercifed on the nerves of the ftomach, for, if it were mixed with the blood, a vomit would not have been immediately of fervice. Therefore Van Helmont was not in the wrong, when he placed the feat of life in the ftomach, and judged that it extended its influence and power for health to diftant and various parts of the body; for, the ftomach being freed, the head is freed; and nothing else remains for amendment.

It has been obferved, that thorn apple is attended with the fame fymptoms with water- hemlock, but with this difference, that its fmell is intolerable. A gardener having thrown out of a garden

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fome thorn-apple into the public highway, fome boys, feeing it, examine the heads, and eat the feed: They are feized with all the abovementioned fymptoms, and those that did not vomit, died.

The belladona, or night-fhade with black berries, entices every paffer-by; there is nothing ungrateful in its berries; their juice has a purple colour, fweet tafte, and no fetid fmell; yet fwallowed down they kill one much the fame way. A vomit is a prefent remedy; but their poifon may be corrected, and the patient at length delivered, by taking a good quantity of vinegar.

Stalpartius Vander Weil relates the cafe of two citizens of the Hague, who, having tafted the root of the oenanthes that is like hemlock, with virofe juice, were taken ill not long after with a great heat of the throat and ftomach, which was followed by a perturbation of the mind, vertigo, heart-burn, naufea, flux of the belly, running of blood from the nofe, and fuch vio. lent convulfions, that one of them died in two, and the other in three hours.

Van Helmont tafted the root of the napellus or monkshood on the tip only of his tongue, and in a moment his faculty of understand. ing and thinking was much bright. er, which gave him great pleasure: At length, in about two hours af ter, he was twice attacked by a flight vertigo, and he then found his understanding as ufual; and, though he fometimes afterwards tafted of the fame, nothing of the like ever more happened to him. The fmoking of tobacco, for the first time, is attended with fome

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