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SUBSECT. 3. Concerning Physick.
Physick it self in the last place is to be considered; for the Lord hath created medicines of the earth; and he that is wise will not abhorre them, Ecclus 38.4. ver.8. of such doth the Apothecary make a confection, &c.
Of these medicines there be divers & infinite kindes, Plants, Metals, Animals, &c. and those of severall natures, some good for one, hurtfull to another: some noxious in themselves, corrected by art, very wholesome and good, simples, mixt, &c. and therefore left to be managed by discreet and skilfull Physicians, and thence applied to mans use. To this purpose they have invented method, and severall rules of art, to put these remedies in order, for their particular ends.
Physick (as Hippocrates defines it) is naught else but addition and subtraction; and as it is required in all other diseases, so in this of melancholy it ought to be most accurate, it being (as Mercurialis acknowledgeth) so common an affection in these our times, & therefore fit to be understood.
Severall prescripts and methods I find in severall men, some take upon them to cure all maladies with one Medicine, severally applyed, as that Panacea, Aurum potabile, so much controverted in these dayes, Herba solis, &c.
Parecelsus reduceth all diseases to foure principall heads, to whom Severinus, Ravelascus, Leo Suavius, and others adhere and imitate: those are Leprosy, Gout, Dropsie, Falling-sickness. To which they reduce the rest; as to Leprosie, Ulcers, Itches, Furfures, Scabs, &c. To Gout, Stone, Cholick, Tooth-ach, Head-ach, &c. To Dropsie, Agues, Jaundies, Cachexia, &c. To the Falling-sicknesse, belong Palsy, Vertigo, Cramps, Convulsions, Incubus, Apoplexie, &c.
If any of these four principall be cured (saith Ravelascus) all the inferior are cured, and the same remedies commonly serve: but this is too generall, and by some contradicted: for this peculiar disease of Melancholy, of which I am now to speak, I find severall cures, severall methods and prescripts.
They that intend the practick cure of Melancholy, saith Duretus in his notes to Hollerius, set down nine peculiar scopes or ends; Savonarola prescribes seven especiall Canons. Ælianus Montaltus cap.26. Faventinus in his Empericks. Hercules de Saxoniâ, &c. have their severall injunctions and rules, all tending to one end.
The ordinary is threefold, which I meane to follow. Διαιτητικὴ, Pharmaceutica, and Chirurgica, Diet or Living, Apothecary, Chirurgery, which Wecker, Crato, Guianerius, &c. and most prescribe; of which I will insist, and speak in their order.