But these are Epicureall tenents, tending to looseness of life, Luxury and Atheism, maintained alone by some Heathens, dissolute Arabians, prophane Christians, and are exploded by Rabbi Moses Tract. 4. Guliel. Placentinus lib. 1. cap. 8. Valescus de Taranta, and most accurately ventilated by Io. Sylvaticus, a late writer and Physician of Millan, med. cont. cap. 14. where you shall finde this tenent copiously confuted.

Howsoever you say, if this be true, that wine and strong drink have such vertue to expell fear and sorrow, and to exhilarate the minde, ever hereafter lets drink and be merry.

Prome reconditum Lyde strenua cæcubum, Capaciores puer huc affer Scyphos, Et Chia vina aut Lesbia.

Come lusty Lyda, fill’s a cup of sack, And sirrah Drawer, bigger pots we lack, And Scio wines that have so good a smack.

I say with him in A. Gellius, let us maintain the vigor of our souls with a moderate cup of wine, Natis in usum lætitiæ scyphis, and drink to refresh our minde; if there be any cold sorrow in it, or torpid bashfulness, lets wash it all away. ———Nunc vino pellite curas: so saith Horace, so saith Anacreon,

Μεθύοντα γὰρ με κεῖσθαι Πολὺ κρεῖσσον ἢ θανόντα.

Let’s drive down care with a cup of wine: and so say I too, (though I drink none my self) for all this may be done, so that it be modestly, soberly, opportunely used: So that, they be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess, which our Apostle forewarns;

for as Chrysostome well comments on that place, ad lætitiam datum est vinum, non ad ebrietatem, ’tis for mirth wine, but not for madness: And will you know where, when, and how that is to be understood? Vis discere ubi bonum sit vinum? Audi quid dicat Scriptura, hear the Scriptures, Give wine to them that are in sorrow, or as Paul bid Timothy drink wine for his stomack sake, for concoction, health, or some such honest occasion.

Otherwise as Pliny telleth us: If singular moderation be not had, nothing so pernicious, ’tis meer vinegar, blandus dæmon, poyson it self.

But hear a more fearfull doom, Habac. 2. 15. & 16. Wo be to him that makes his neighbour drunk, shamefull spewing shall be upon his glory.

Let not good fellows triumph therefore (saith Matthiolus) that I have so much commended wine; if it be immoderatly taken, in stead of making glad, it confounds both body and soul, it makes a giddy head, a sorrowfull heart.

And ’twas well said of the Poet of old, Vine causeth mirth and grief, nothing so good for some, so bad for others, especially as one observes, qui à causâ calida male habent, that are hot or inflamed. And so of spices, they alone, as I have shewed, cause head-melancholy themselves, they must not use wine as an ordinary drink, or in their diet.

But to determine with Laurentius c. 8. de melan. wine is bad for mad men, and such as are troubled with heat in their inner parts or brains; but to melancholy, which is cold (as most is) Wine soberly used, may be very good.

I may say the same of the decoction of China roots, Sassafras, Sarsaparilla, Guajacum: China, saith Manardus, makes a good colour in the face, takes away melancholy, and all infirmities proceeding from cold, even so Sarsaparilla provokes sweat mightily, Guajacum dries, Claudinus consult. 89. & 46. Montanus, Capivaccius consult. 188. Scoltzii. make frequent and good use of Guajacum, and China, so that the liver be not incensed, good for such as are cold, as most melancholy men are, but by no means to be mentioned in hot.

The Turks have a drink called Coffa (for they use no wine) so named of a berry as black as soot, and as bitter, (like that black drink which was in use amongst the Lacedemonians and perhaps the same) which they sip still of, and sup as warm as they can suffer; they spend much time in those Coffa-houses, which are somewhat like our Ale-houses or Taverns, and there they sit chatting and drinking to drive away the time, and to be merry together, because they finde by experience that kinde of drink so used helpeth digestion, and procureth alacrity. Some of them take Opium to this purpose.

Borrage, Bawm, Saffron, Gold, I have spoken of; Montaltus c. 23, commends Scorzonera roots condite. Garcius ab Horto plant. hist. lib. 2. cap. 25. makes mention of an hearb called Datura, which if it be eaten, for 24. hours following, takes away all sense of grief, makes them incline to laughter and mirth: and another called Bange, like in effect to Opium, Which puts them for a time into a kinde of Extasis, and makes them gently to laugh. One of the Roman Emperours had a seed, which he did ordinarily eat to exhilarate himself.

Christophorus Ayrerus prefers Bezoars stone, and the confection of Alkermes, before other cordials, and Amber in some cases. Alkermes comforts the inner parts: and Bezoar stone hath an especiall vertue against all melancholy affections, it refresheth the heart, and corroborates the whole body. Amber provokes urine, helps the body, breaks winde, &c.

After a purge, 3 or 4 gr. of Bezoar stone, and 3. gr. of Amber Greece, drunk, or taken in Borage or Bugloss water, in which gold hot hath been quenched, will do much good, and the purge shall diminish less (the heart so refreshed) of the strength and substance of the body.

℞. confect. Alkermes ʒ ß lap. Bezor. ℈ j. Succini albi subtiliss. pulverisat. ℈ jj. cum Syrup. de cort. citri; fiat electuarium.

To Bezoars stone most subscribe, Manardus, and many others, it takes away sadness, and makes him merry that useth it; I have seen some that have been much diseased with faintness, swounings, and melancholy, that taking the weight of three grains of this stone, in the water of Oxtongue, have been cured. Garcias ab Horto brags how many desperate cures he hath done upon melancholy men by this alone, when all Physicians had forsaken them.

But Alchermes many except against; in some cases it may help, if it be good and of the best, such as that of Monspelier in France, which Iodocus Sincerus Itinerario Galliæ, so much magnifies, and would have no traveller omit to see it made. But it is not so generall a medicine as the other. Fernelius consil. 49. suspects Alchermes, by reason of its heat, nothing (saith he) sooner exasperates this disease, then the use of hot working meats and medicines, and would have them for that cause warily taken.

I conclude therefore of this and all other medicines, as Thucydides of the plague at Athens; No remedy could be prescribed for it, Nam quod uni profuit, hoc aliis erat exitio: There is no Catholike medicine to be had: that which helps one, is pernicious to another.

Diamargaritum frigidum, Diambra, Diaboraginatum, Electuarium lætificans Galeni & Rhasis, de Gemmis, Dianthos, Diamoscum dulce & amarum, Electuarium Conciliatoris, syrup. Cidoniorum de pomis, conserves of Roses, Violets, Fumitory, Enula campana, Satyrion, Limmons, Orange-pills condite, &c. have their good use.

℞. Diamoschi dulcis & amari ana ʒ ij. Diabuglossati, Diaboraginati, sacchari violacei ana ʒ j. misce cum syrupo de pomis.

Every Physician is full of such receipts, one only I will add for the rareness of it, which I finde recorded by many learned Authors, as an approved medicine against dotage, head-melancholy, and such diseases of the brain.