Chap. 56.] MEDTCIJfAL COMPOS1TIO^^S. 439 



CHAP. 56. EEMAEKS IN DlS^AKAGEME^"r OF MEDICINAL 



COMPOSITIONS. 



As to the different uses to which wax is applied, in combi- 

 nation with other substances in medicine, we could no more 

 make an enumeration of them than we could of all the other 

 ingredients which form part of our medicinal compositions. 

 These preparations, as we have already^^ observed, are the re- 

 sults of human invention. Cerates, poultices, ^^* plasters, eye- 

 salves, antidotes, — none of these have been formed by Nature, 

 that parent and divine framer of the universe ; they are merely 

 the inventions of the laboratory, or rather, to say the truth, 

 of human avarice.^*' The works of Nature are brought into 

 existence complete and perfect in every respect, her ingre- 

 dients being but few in number, selected as they are from a 

 due appreciation of cause and effect, and not from mere guess- 

 work ; thus, for instance, if a dry substance is wanted to as- 

 sume a liquefied form, a liquid, of course, must be employed as 

 a vehicle, while liquids, on the other hand, must be united with 

 a dry substance to render them consistent. But as for man, 

 when he pretends, with balance in^^ hand, to unite and com- 

 bine the various elementary substances, he employs himself 

 not merely upon guesswork, but proves himself guilty of down- 

 right impudence. 



It is not my intention to touch upon the medicaments af- 

 forded by the drugs of India, or Arabia and other foreign 

 climates : I have no liking for drugs that come from so great a 

 distance f' they are not produced for us, no, nor yet for the 

 natives of those countries, or else they would not be so ready 

 to sell them to us. Let people buy them if they please, as 

 ingredients in perfumes, unguents, and other appliances of 

 luxury ; let them buy them as adjuncts to their superstitions 

 even, if incense and costus we must have to propitiate the 

 gods; but as to health, we can enjoy that blessing without 



^ In c. 49 of this Book. ^^* " Malagmata." 



^ Fee, at some length, and with considerable justice, combats this 

 assertion ; though at the same time he remarks tliat Pliny is right in call- 

 ing the attention of the medical world to the use of simple substances. 



yi " Scripulatim " — " By scruples." 



92 He forgets that many of them could only be produced by the agency 

 of an Eastern sun. 



