William Stukeley

“ Such must be strangers to the generous and noble principle of philanthropy, that highest vertue our nature is capable of arriving to, an imitation of the supreme Being, the το αγαθον, an endeavor to do all the good we can: but especially to so great a part of mankind laboring under this formidable affliction: which must needs excite the highest degree of compassion from those who profess humanity. ”

“ In short, by continuance of time, it quarters itself upon every join of the spine, and at length, every joint and tendon of the body: till for want of proper objects, it reverts upon the stomach, brain and noble parts, and compleats the fatal tragedy. ”

“ Nevertheless those who have been used to live well, must not be so cynical as to confine themselves wholly to this watery course. Wine too is a blessing of Providence, appropriate to the necessary cares of human life. All the difficulty consists in being innocently merry and wise: so to adjust the quantity that shall give mirth to the heart, and no fewell to the gout. That if it comes unfought for, by means of our oyls we may meet it, not without a cheerful countenance, as a sickness easily to be subdu'd, as now, an earnest of health and long life. ”

“ For the gout will by no means spend its self that way, nor can that be wise nature's intention, in throwing it upon cold, extreme parts. The practise of physick dictates to us, that we are not to oppose nature, but assist her; and in that consists the excellency as well as safety of our remedy; It is exterminating the morbific matter in nature's own way; not opposing but assisting her. 'Tis not to be call'd tampering, there will be no after reckonings, the cure is compleat, nature leads the way her self; and therefore 'tis perfectly safe. ”

“ Right reason will inform us, the surest method of finding out a cure for distempers, is carefully to observe nature's steps, and discover, if we can, what method she takes for her own relief. To oppose her directly, is generally dangerous, but to assist her, safe and necessary. If then our foregoing theory be right, these oyls seem well calculated for this purpose. They are of a very warm, volatile, penetrating nature, and as much as we can conceive, in substance and use, like the oyly mucilage of the joints, of nature's own providing. ”

“ So much the more ought we to congratulate our selves for a remedy. These accidental fitts which I call the contagion of the gout, are certainly quell'd by one or two anointings, which without it, would produce regular fitts. And whenever we find the veins turgid and the part begin to look red and hot, the signs of an approaching fitt, we are instantly to apply to the remedy: which like pouring water upon fire extinguishes it. No words can paint out the pleasure we feel,when we so easily escape. ”

“ After the cure, a gentle purge or two is highly necessary, and to get into the air as soon as we can. Furious as a lyon the fitt comes one, but retires gentle as a lamb. Your strength returns very speedily, and you find your self in perfect health with pleasure and surprize.
The great indication for a regimen during the intermission of fitts, is to prevent, as much as may be, the growth of these rich, sulphureous and inflammatory salts, in our blood. ”

“ That in the ordinary method, the crisis of nature is by no means compleat, when a fiit has run its whole course, without moleslation. 2. That in our cure the crisis is compleat, and perfectly agreeable to nature's purpose, therefore certain and safe. Lastly, the author of this medicin has us'd it 5 years compleatly. The returns of fitts are much seldomer, they come without any ill symptoms or irregularity. He always subdues them with great ease and expedition; has the use of his limbs, and enjoys a much better state of health than he did for many years, before he began the unction. ”

“ A benefit not to be sufficiently valued! to redeem the solids from that fearful relaxation, by the humors lying upon them and puffing them up for months together; so that they pit like dough as in a dropsy, and at the last the skin comes off; instead of this fiery tryal, to have a speedy ease from disease, symptoms and bad consequences: this is the blessing which Dr. Harris hoped for from the assistance of art, and for which, he fays, we ought to thank God. This in reality is the completion of the admirable Sydenham's prediction. ”

“ When nature is in a disposition to separate this humor from the blood, which we call a fitt, she separates it continually in a certain equable tenor, till she has reliev'd her self as perfectly as she can. She does not separate it all at once, because she knows one joint cannot supply the remedy at one onset. The secretion of glands is a gradual thing and matter of time. This humor thus thrown out, according to my former theory, upon the oyl-glands of the joints, is extinguish'd by the oyl whether natural or artificial, as fast as it comes: if the oyl be sufficient in quantity. ”

“ How does he tacitly reprehend the present way of thinking in this distemper, of wishing joy upon the access of a fitt: as if a long and most miserable life was a blessing? As if it really gave along life, or was a truly judicial and salutary crisis. When at best it must be call'd such a goal-delivery only as consigns the prisoner to the executioner. Senseless must those be that maintain the pain of the gout is useful, and by no means to be rebated. 'Tis a high absurdity, and no other than a cloak of ignorance of the cure. ”

“ I have indulg'd my self no further liberty in speculation, than might be useful to discover the nature of the distemper; whereby we may better treat ourselves in a fitt and out of a fitt, better know how to prevent or protract its returns, or moderate them when they come. ”

“ To say the humor would have come into the part, had not the oyls been supply'd is but a guess. And be it fact, 'tis a happiness to divide the field of battle and spread the enemy's troops thin, that they may the easier be circumvented and attack'd on all sides. 'Tis a happiness to hinder an enemy from retiring a part already weakned and incapable of resistance or resisting with difficulty: and to meet him bending his forces against a fresh wing unbroken. ”

“ The vast evacuation of bile takes up a considerable quantity of these salts: every secretion whatever has a share of them: life requires this active principle in every part. Thus we see how anxious nature has been to relieve her self from any ill effects thereof and to lessen the quantity, as much as may be, of those untamable bodies; which yet are very necessary to be admitted into the blood for the sake of their energy; and by their good disposition and management, all vegetable and animal life very much subsists. ”

“ Practice makes good customs easy. But what can be more easy, safe and pleasant than temperance, when health, when natural dictates, when religion require it? What greater encouragement, than that you probably may find with it and our prescribed method, a constant relief from the gout. ”

“ What were joints and muscles and tendons and oyl-glands given us for, but motion? Life consists in it, and health is not to be expected without it. Motion contributes exceedingly to hinder the coalition of these salts in the blood, to break them in pieces, to expell them by sweat, urine, perspiration, and to keep the whole animal machine in due order. ”

“ These oyls may possibly, as the bark, prepare that critical matter for a beneficial and salutary evacuation, which we cannot at present account for: tho' this seems to be the intention desired in the case, by such as with other methods attempt to cure it. A small matter critically applied will drive off distempers; as a fever is sometimes cured with a fright, a fancy, a charm. And manifestly, when nature thus makes a discharge of the arthritic matter upon the solid parts, she makes a false crisis, and 'tis a dreadful remedy to prevent a worse present inconvenience. ”

“ All lovers of mankind will be pleas'd to have their fellow sufferers exempted from so excessive a misery; even those that are not obnoxious to it. For my own part, I cannot but look upon it as a most auspicious piece of fortune in my life, that I thus became acquainted with a method which may render my future days comfortable. ”

“ If excess in our thoughtless, juvenile days, or a habit of it in more advanced age, has been the occasion of the distemper, let us amend of it. But especially let not this noble remedy be, the occasion of our continuing therein, least a worse evil come upon us, than the gout. 'Tis a vast, invaluable happyness, with the moderate use of the good things of life, to be cur'd of this distemper, when it comes. But if we presume too much upon it, we are unworthy of the remedy, and will probably find other instances of the divine displeasure. ”

“ Sydenham more than once pronounces the constitution of podagrics to be luxurians & virosa, which we may translate poysonous, that is, their blood is of a rich nature apt to secern a juice of a poysnous quality, in other words the gout. Havers makes the matter of a Rheumatism or running gout acrious, subtle, hot and volatile, of a burning and fiery quality, saline, pungent, lancinating, corroiive. That it falls upon the mucilaginous glands in the coats of the muscles and coagulates their juices, just as spirit of nitre does, and the like acids when pour'd upon them. ”

“ And thus by continual succession of fitts, we are never from under its dominion: like an animal ty'd in a string, we are never at perfect liberty. But I apprehend, these oyls effectually kill the present material cause of the fitt, so as to suffer no part to return into the blood, unalter'd and capable to associate again or do any harm. For after those salts have been thus bridled by the oyls, the utmost they can do upon return into the blood, is to carry the sabulous matter along with them, the recrement of gout and gravel, and evacuate it by urine. ”

“ From Hippocrates we at first; observed, that the human body is very pervious. These oyls then actually insinuate themselves to the part, and supply the use of the natural, by extinguishing this fiery drop, which gives the onset of the distemper. And probably nature imbibes and attracts them greedily, for her relief. ”

“ Likewise upon every great tendon of a muscle, there is a gland to moisten it and keep it from breaking. Thus in that cavity for the head of the thigh-bone is a great gland, as big as a nut, the largest of this sort in the whole body as the largest joint: in the knee-joint are 4 or 5, in all the joints of the hands are considerable glands, well provided by wise nature for that organ of organs. ”

“ So that a fitt of the gout is most undoubtedly a crisis, and a just and useful crisis for a while. But after a few fitts, it ceases to be so. And 'tis hard to say whether we are to blame nature or the patient's own conduct, who scarce hitherto has had it in his power to assist her, for want of knowing what was the real nature of the distemper, Thus I shall explain my meaning. There are thousands of people, who live the most irregular, luxurious and debauch'd lives imaginable and yet enjoy a good state of health for many years, and escape the gout. ”

“ During the operation of the oyls, I observe nature plays this game in miniature, which shows beyond contradiction that the artificial cure is perfectly analogous to the natural, and form'd upon a true basis, for medicin is the handmaid of nature. The solution of a fitt of the gout by means of our oyls, is much like nature's progress in the whole life of a podagric: or as the sum of all the fitts of a man's life. ”

“ And the fitts, especially when they begin to return frequently, so incapacitate our limbs for action and necessary exercise, that the health and habit of the body and constitution suffer extremely, and grow every year worse and worse: they bring one nodose joints, as well as gravel, stone and other diseases, the consequents of Inactivity, that at best we maybe said, only to labor under a continual disease, which kills us by a more unkindly blow, because protracted. ”

“ But the distemper grows worse upon us, only because the oyl-glands are spoil'd and can't as usual restrain its fury: besides the inconveniences accruing to a constitution weakned from so many tedious months of inactivity, which necessarily follow frequent returns of fitts. Further, the joint-glands themselves grow rigid, and secern less of their proper humour. Hence when the gout falls upon people in years, it proves very wevere, for want of a necessary quantity of that oleaginous matter to extinguish it. ”

“ The pain being often so great, as to cause a symptomatic fever with it, we ought diligently to apply our selves, to remove this grievous pain. And a man may as well maintain that it would be injurious to the body, to part with a quartan ague, before it has been shook with it for a full year, as that it would not be safe, to lose the pain of the gout, before so many weeks are over: and nature it self has, as it were, in pity to the diseas'd at last given them a convenient respite. ”

“ By frequent fitts, all this oyly matter of the joint and tendons thereabouts, becomes deflagrated, and the glands that secrete it, so spoil'd in texture, that they cannot furnish a due quantity, either to lubricate the joint in walking, or to extinguish the matter of another fitt. Then nature is oblig'd to remand it to the next joint, the ancles. After that has sufficiently satiated its fury, the knees succeed, or perhaps the hands, elbows, shoulders or hips. She takes in a much compass as is necessary to her purpose. ”

“ So that 'tis no wonder if at last, when they meet in a gouty person who ufes not labor and exercise enough, from the smothness of surface and solidity they strongly attract one another, and assemble too much together; from the sharpness and hardness of their points they lancinate; from their fiery malignancy they burn, and from nature's expelling them as much as she can, out of the habit of the body, they cause what we call a fitt of the gout. ”

“ Hence walking will bring on a fitt of the gout, without any other predisposition, for want of sufficient mucilage. The action heats the joints, and sollicits the lurking humor out of the blood, before its time. Hence it emaciates the limbs and burns up all their fat, as a sacrifice to its rage. And at best the podagric, when in health, is but a criple, the joints being defrauded of due unction. Hence the cure of the gout, by our artificial oyls, analogous and succedaneous to the natural. ”

“ The gout, says he, is an habitual disposition in nature to throw off offensive humor, critically upon the joints. The cure of the gout and the cure of the fitt are two very different things. If instead of a fitt, that would, according to the course of nature, hold him 6 or 8 weeks in pain and weakness: he should be reliev'd of his pain in a few hours, and deliver'd of his weakness in a few days, he has reason to thank God for this assistance of art, and to embrace it with joy. ”

“ If nature cannot form a fitt of the gout, they suffer worse, perhaps by some violent or fatal distemper. For health consists chiefly in a due proportion, between the intaking and expending. Hence people of fortune and those of a studious, contemplative life, are most liable to it. Laborers that fare hardly and work daily, are sure to be free. Women are so, for the most part, because nature in them has it in her power, better to regulate the quantity and abate of a surcharge, than with us. ”

“ I am thro'ly persuaded, the humor of the gout is much more impetuous and fiery in young people, than in those advanc'd in years, cœteris paribus. And that 'tis a vulgar error to say, the distemper grows worse and worse upon us, in its own nature: unless we grow worse and worse in our way of living, which is not commonly the case. People should become wiser and more temperate with advancing years; if they have been guilty of extravagance in youth. And podagrics generally are more careful in their regimen than other people. ”

“ All the joints of the tarsus that were much swell'd and inflam'd, because the poyson was actually introduc'd upon them, suddenly recover their tone again as soon as the antidote can possibly operate. You must remember in this and all cases of the gout and rheumatism to pursue it with the oyls, and you find a speedy and prefect cure.
In a case where there is an extraordinary quantity of matter, in people that indulged their genius much; upon the accession of a fitt, it plays a bolder game. ”

“ He makes animal juices of a fermentative, active nature, fiery and corrosive, and those of human bodies ranker and more abounding in active salts than those of other creatures, which are continually repair'd and nourish'd by the juices of animals. And I may reasonably add, that of those creatures juices, such are least corrosive and fiery as are nourish'd by vegetable substances only. But from the Doctor's reasoning much may be obtain'd to illustrate the nature of the gout, and much towards its relief and cure, its retardation or eradication. ”

“ And this is assuredly the case in the application of the oyls. The enemy retires continually weakened with real loss of its virulence and quantity upon every unction. And which plainly shows that there is not the least danger to be apprehended, of the gouty humor falling upon the noble parts. The very warmth of the oyls attracts that humor to them, as well as deadens it when attracted; they are the proper pabulum. Just as any salt is slrongly attracted by the water which dissolves it. And nature determins it to them, for the same reason as she sends it to the oyl-glands. ”

“ They seek the fat of the viper, perhaps other fat may do as well, unless that of the creature be of a more volatile nature than others; and perhaps our oyls would supply its place. Surely the fat can act no other way, than by its unctuousness, which invelops and sheaths the fiery spicula of the poyson, and so do the oyls with the matter of the gout, according to my assumption. ”

“ Some that have open'd a vein upon the part, or made an incision into it, have cur'd it at present, and it has not return'd of some years after. This evidently proves, that the common fitts of the gout are not perfectly critical: but that when the matter of a fitt is wholly lett out or destroy'd; nature takes a considerable time (especially in people of temperate lives) to create enough de novo for the succeeding fitt. ”

“ Since the cruel pain is the only remedy in the ordinary way, nature is oblig'd to divide her tortures and quarter them upon different limbs, to save the life, which is her chief care. And as 'tis impossible that the joint-glands, in a great fitt of the gout, should instantaneously find oyl sufficient for a remedy, she is oblig'd to accomplish her purpose by long time; by bringing a huge afflux of blood and humors, to damp and quiet for a while, that flame which she cannot quench. ”

“ I need not scruple to affirm from judgment, as well as experience, that 'tis the greatest discovery that has been made in our own country, in the art of Medicin.
There are many instances, where people have had one fitt of the gout and no more; nature some way or other finding means totally to exterminate the disease and its feeds. ”