The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton
page 314 of 2094 (14%)
page 314 of 2094 (14%)
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hot summer, [1491]"and so dried himself with chamber-work, that he became
in short space from melancholy, mad:" he cured him by moistening remedies. The like example I find in Laelius a Fonte Eugubinus, _consult. 129_, of a gentleman of Venice, that upon the same occasion was first melancholy, afterwards mad. Read in him the story at large. Any other evacuation stopped will cause it, as well as these above named, be it bile, [1492]ulcer, issue, &c. Hercules de Saxonia, _lib. 1. c. 16_, and Gordonius, verify this out of their experience. They saw one wounded in the head who as long as the sore was open, _Lucida habuit mentis intervalla_, was well; but when it was stopped, _Rediit melancholia_, his melancholy fit seized on him again. Artificial evacuations are much like in effect, as hot houses, baths, bloodletting, purging, unseasonably and immoderately used. [1493]Baths dry too much, if used in excess, be they natural or artificial, and offend extreme hot, or cold; [1494]one dries, the other refrigerates overmuch. Montanus, _consil. 137_, saith, they overheat the liver. Joh. Struthius, _Stigmat. artis. l. 4. c. 9_, contends, [1495]"that if one stay longer than ordinary at the bath, go in too oft, or at unseasonable times, he putrefies the humours in his body." To this purpose writes Magninus, _l. 3. c. 5._ Guianerius, _Tract. 15. c. 21_, utterly disallows all hot baths in melancholy adust. [1496]"I saw" (saith he) "a man that laboured of the gout, who to be freed of this malady came to the bath, and was instantly cured of his disease, but got another worse, and that was madness." But this judgment varies as the humour doth, in hot or cold: baths may be good for one melancholy man, bad for another; that which will cure it in this party, may cause it in a second. _Phlebotomy_.] Phlebotomy, many times neglected, may do much harm to the |
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