ABSTRACT
§I. Having deliver'd, in the best Manner I am able, the general Method of Cure of Nervous Distempers, the several Intentions to be follow'd in the Prosecution of it, and the best Medicines I can suggest from Experience, Observation, or the Nature of Things, for fulfilling each of these Intentions; I come now to the Diætetick Management, that Part which has the greatest Influence in the Cure of Chronical Distempers, without which the best and surest Remedies fail of their Effect, and yet in these later Ages the least cultivated and most neglected of all the curative Parts of Physick in England, (till of late, that my worthy, learned and ingenious Friend, Dr. Arhuthnott, thought fit to treat it according to its Use and Dignity, in the masterly Manner he executes every thing he undertakes) info-much that he hazards the Charge of introducing new and whimsical Opinions, who would pretend to stand up in its Defence, or bring it into his Practice. And yet, if we will make but a flender Enquiry into the Practice of the early and pureft Ages of Physick, or the great and universally approv'd Writers in the healing Art, we shall find Diet no such contemptible Help towards the Prevention or Cure or Difeases, as it is now held or imagin'd. On the contrary, we shall find the Works of all the most judicious and celebrated Practitioners full of particular Directions and Advices on this Topick in every Disease they treat of; and demonstrating that their Authors, as they did not find, so they did not imagine, that any (at least habitual and rooted) Distemper, could be remov'd without such Assistance. We are certainly provided with a greater Choice of more perfect Materials, as well as more elegant Forms of Medicines, than the Antients; and this probably will still increase, by length of Time, with Arts, the Knowledge of Nature, and even of our Diseases; but what is, and will be ever admired among the Antients, is their Method of Cure, the Truth and Justness of their Rules and Maxims, and the Solidity of their Intentions in following the Directions of Nature in the Way the intends or points out. Hippocrates, the Father of the Physicians, thought a Regimen of Diet of such Consequence, both to the Healthy and the Sick, that of about ninety Books of his which remain, or that pass under his Name, there are eight of them which treat of that Matter only or principally; and thro’ all the rest of his Works, he mentions much more of his Diætetick Management, than any Assistance he took from the Materia Medica. He complains, that * those who went before him, had written nothing concerning the Diet of sick Persons, which was nevertheless one of the most essential Parts of Physick, even in his Time, which we may justly suppose wanted it less than later Ages. Galen, tho’ more abounding in Medicines, yet is far from depriving Diet of its due Place. On the contrary he declares, † “That Physick has no Remedy so effectual as to be able to bring its wanted Relies where the Regimen of Diet either counter-acts or docs not assist it,” And in another Place he says, § “That by means of that part of Physick which prescribes a proper Diet, those who have deriv'd too tender and weakly a Constitution from their Parents, have brought themselves on to extreme old Age, without any Weakness of their Senses, free from all Pain and Diseases.” He adds afterwards concerning himself, “Even I, tho’ I had not a healthy Constitution from my Birth, nor led a Life of much Freedom and Ease of Mind, yet by the Precepts of this most useful part of Physick, which I praftised after the 28th Year of my Age, I never fell into any Dislemper, except a slight Fever of 24 Flours through Weariness or Excess of Labour.” The Methodists, a celebrated Sect among the Antient Physicians, laid the main Stress of the Cure upon Diet and Evacuations, and some of them carry'd this to an extravagant Heighth. But Celsus, who seems to have judiciously diftinguish'd, and kept in a proper Medium between the Extremes, that the different Sects of Physick in his Time, had carry'd each their particular and favourite Doctrines to, was yec sufficiently sensible and convinc'd of the Necessity of a proper Diet in the Cure of Diseases; for he is not only large and full in his Directions and Regulations about it, in every particular Difeafe he treats of: but where he distingusihes between internal and external Disorders, he calls the first those in which the Regulation of Diet is the principal Part of the Cure, and the latter those where Medicines make the chief Part of it. Even in the same Place, where he takes some Pains to resute the Doctrine of Asclepiades, who maintain'd that all Diseases were to be cured by Diet alone, and to restore Medicines to their proper Place. He goes further, to enjoin absolute Fasting in the first Attacks of a Disorder, and a strict Moderation in the Quantity as well as Quality of the Food, during all the Time that the Disease continues; for nothing, he says, is more beneficial to a sick Pcrson, than timely Abstinence. Then he proceeds to shew the Reasonableness of such a Conduit, and to blame and reprove those. luxurious Persons, who will allow their Physicians to determine the Kind and Quantity of their Food, but reserve to themselves the Times of taking it; or who think they act very generously if they submit to his Regulations in every thing besides the Kinds or Qualities of it: and ends with assuring them of the extreme Hurtsulness of any Error, either in the Quality, the Quantity, or the Times of taking their Nourishment. It were endless to produce Authorities for a Thing that makes a great Part of the Works of all the standard Writers in Physick, I mention these only, because they are acknowledg'd the great Masters in this Science, and whose Evidences must of Consequence, include the Suffrages of all their Approvers and Admirers; and as they will be fussicient to give the Reader, who is not conversant in these Matters, a just Notion of the Consequence of Diet in the Cure of Diseases. For I do not pretend to add (by what I have here said) any thing to the Knowledge of those whose Study or Profession has led them to search into these Affairs, since they will not want Conviction. But here one will naturally inquire how so necessary and essential a Part of Physick comes to be in such Disgrace, and so little regarded, as it is at present, since it was so much recommended, and made up so great a Part of the Practice of the most admired Physicians. The Original of this Evil seems to be owing to some over-zealous Abettors of Chymistry. The Al-chymists, or more conceited and whimsical sort of Chymists, were the great Men, that, depending solely upon Medicines, endeavour'd to discredit Diet in the Cure of Diseases, bragging and ranting in Honour of their Panacæa's, Elixirs of Life, and other wonderful Secrets, which, if you will believe the Inventors and Admirers of them, were sufficient, without any other Means, even a Regimen of Diet, or whatever; all Physicians before had thought most indispensible, to work infallible Cures in the most desperate Diseases. It was this, and nothing else, they pretended to. When once such an ill Practice is set on foot, the Patients themselves, as Celsus observ'd in his Time, are so averse to being consin'd by disagreeable Restraints, that they are prepar'd to believe every Impostor, that will take upon him to dispense with the most necessary Condition of Cure, and entertain a Prejudice against those who will honestly inlift upon the Necessity of what they dislike, being more willing to believe such Physicians are not fussiciently acquainted with the Virtues and Powers of Medicines, than that Medicines have no such Virtues as they would so fain find them possess'd of: And they are generally so fond of being prescrib'd to rather in the most agreeable than in the most effectual Manner, that not only few of them will submit to any Restraints in Diet, but by their Squeamishness and intemperate Delicacy, bring some of the most powerful Medicines into Disgrace, and less and lefs common Use; so that we may fear, not only the Bark (the A version of every nice Palate) but Mercury, Steel, and several other of the best Medicines, which on the first Discovery were look'd upon as great Gifts of God for the Relief of human Miseries, will in time be quite disus'd, and perhaps forgot. However, sincc we who are Physicians are bound by a most solemn Oath * (contriv'd by Hippocrates, for ought we know, at least it is handed down to us among his other Works, and is the Substance, I believe, of the Obligation and Vow that Candidates take in all the Universities in Europe, when they receive their Degrees of Physick) to order a Regimen of Diet proper and peculiar to each Distemper we undertake the Cure of, as well as proper Medicines, I shall proceed to inform the Reader of what I have found most beneficial or successful on this Head towards the Cure of the Disorders I am now treating of,
