12 



BENEDETTI AND FICINO. 



Alessandro Benedetti, anatomist and military surgeon, wrote a 

 treatise on pest, published in the last decade of the fifteenth century, 

 in which is presented a resume of his doctrine concerning pest. 

 Pest, he declared, is not only catching by contact with the sick, but 

 by fomites. The latter, he believed, are capable of receiving and pre- 

 serving the contagion for long periods. Convalescents from pest, 

 and the things that have been in relation with them, should, he said, 

 be purified before being brought in touch with healthy persons. 



Marsilio Ficino was born in Florence in 1433, and passed his child- 

 hood in the court of Cosmo de' Medici. He was a priest as well as a 

 physician. Pest had, in Ficino's time, tormented Tuscany, and in 

 1479 broke out in Florence. The Grand Duke Cosmo de' Medici 

 requested Ficino to prepare a book treating of the pest with the scope 

 of instructing the people how to protect themselves from the scourge. 

 The book, published about 1480, was written in Italian. In writing 

 it, Ficino was associated with Tommaso del Garbo, Mengo da Faenza, 

 and others, and the volume bore the title of Counsel Regarding the 

 Pest. The book is a rare one in its original tongue, but fortunately 

 was translated into Latin and is still preserved in different libraries. 

 The list of the works of Ficino refers to this treatise by the title of 

 Antidotus, and it is so cited in many medical books printed in later 

 years. The theories given in this work as to the origin and nature of 

 epidemic disease are the same fantastic stuff that antecedent writers 

 dealt out, but the ideas as to how the disease may be imparted are of 

 a much better sort. The view is advanced that pest can be communi- 

 cated from man to swine, and that cats and dogs convey the disease. 

 The reader is informed that pestilential poison may abide in the air 

 for long periods and may infect food. Advice is given to boil all 

 drinking water, or to impregnate it with iron rust; to dilute wine 

 with water so prepared; to add an acid sauce to the food; to choose 

 dry food and fruit grown in balsamic and elevated regions, and to 

 dwell on hills or in the mountains. Treating of prophylaxis and die- 

 tetics during times of pest, there is a long list of injunctions relative 

 to exercises of the body and the quality of the food. For example, it 

 is enjoined to shun the heat of the sun and of fires; to avoid sweating 

 and the drying of sweat on the body; not to eat fish, or if needs be, 

 to eat small fish from some clear running stream with a rocky bed 

 and to fry them in oil and treat them liberally with lemon juice, pep- 

 per, and cinnamon; and, lastly, there is an enumeration of fruit and 

 vegetables to be chosen or avoided. Overeating and overdrinking are 

 admonished, and it is advised to cook all meat well and prepare it with 

 aromatic condiments. To preserve the health of those in attendance 



