526 USES OF HONEY. 



don, 1707, will show the estimate which the old writers set 

 upon bee-products: 



"Natural wax is altered by distillation into an oyl of mar- 

 vellous vertue; it is rather a Divine medicine than humane, 

 because, in wounds or inward diseases, it worketh miracles. 

 The bee helpeth to cure all your diseases, and is the best little 

 friend a man has in the world. . . .Honey is of subtil parts, and 

 therefore doth pierce as oyl, and easily passeth the parts of 

 the body; it openeth obstructions, and cleareth the heart and 

 lights of those humors which fall from the head; it purgeth 

 the foulness of the body, cureth phlegmatick matter, and sharp- 

 eneth the stomach; it purgeth those things which hurt the 

 clearness of the eyes, breedeth good blood, stirreth up natural 

 heat, and prolongeth life; it keepeth all things uncorrupt which 

 are put into it, and is a sovereign medicament, both for out- 

 ward and inward maladies; it helpeth the grief of the jaws, 

 the kernels growing within the month, and the squinancy; it is 

 drank against the biting of a serpent or a mad dog; it is good 

 for such as have eaten mushrooms, for the falling sickness, and 

 against the surfeit. Being boiled, it is lighter of digestion, and 

 more nourishing." 



848. When Augustus-Julius-Caesar, dining with Pollio- 

 Rumilius on his hundredth birthday, inquired of him how he 

 had preserved both vigor of body and mind, PoUio replied: 

 "Interius melle, exterius oleo." — Internally by honey, ex- 

 ternally by oil. 



Honey is in daily use on our table, and we find that children 

 prefer it to sugar. The only cause of its not being in gen- 

 eral use in place of "vile syrups" is the high price at which it 

 was formerly sold. 



Mr. Newman in his little pamphlet above quoted, says:— 



"It is a common expression that honey is a luxury, having 

 nothing to do with the life-giving principle. This is an error — 

 honey is food in one of its most concentrated forms. True, it 

 does not add so much to the growth of the muscles as does beef- 

 steak, but it does impart other properties no less necessary to 

 health aid vigorous physical and intellectual action! It gives 



