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-*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***

-

-The Augustan Reprint Society

-

-JOHN HILL

-

-HYPOCHONDRIASIS

-

-A Practical Treatise.

-

-(1766)

-

-Introduction by

-

-G. S. ROUSSEAU

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-Publication Number 135

-William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

-University Of California, Los Angeles

-1969

-

-

-

-

-GENERAL EDITORS

-

-  William E. Conway, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-  George Robert Guffey, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Maximillian E. Novak, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-

-

-ASSOCIATE EDITOR

-

-  David S. Rodes, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-

-

-ADVISORY EDITORS

-

-  Richard C. Boys, _University of Michigan_

-  James L. Clifford, _Columbia University_

-  Ralph Cohen, _University of Virginia_

-  Vinton A. Dearing, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Arthur Friedman, _University of Chicago_

-  Louis A. Landa, _Princeton University_

-  Earl Miner, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Samuel H. Monk, _University of Minnesota_

-  Everett T. Moore, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Lawrence Clark Powell, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-  James Sutherland, _University College, London_

-  H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Robert Vosper, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-CORRESPONDING SECRETARY

-

-  Edna C. Davis, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-EDITORIAL ASSISTANT

-

-  Mary Kerbret, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-

-

-INTRODUCTION

-

-     "When I first dabbled in this art, the old distemper call'd

-     _Melancholy_ was exchang'd for _Vapours_, and afterwards for the

-     _Hypp_, and at last took up the now current appellation of the

-     _Spleen_, which it still retains, tho' a learned doctor of the

-     west, in a little tract he hath written, divides the _Spleen_ and

-     _Vapours_, not only into the _Hypp_, the _Hyppos_, and the

-     Hyppocons; but subdivides these divisions into the _Markambles_,

-     the _Moonpalls_, the _Strong-Fiacs_, and the _Hockogrokles_."

-

-

-     Nicholas Robinson, _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and

-     Hypochondriack Melancholy_ (London, 1729)

-

-

-Treatises on hypochondriasis--the seventeenth-century medical term for a

-wide range of nervous diseases--were old when "Sir" John Hill, the

-eccentric English scientist, physician, apothecary, and hack writer,

-published his _Hypochondriasis_ in 1766.[1] For at least a century and a

-half medical writers as well as lay authors had been writing literature

-of all types (treatises, pamphlets, poems, sermons, epigrams) on this

-most fashionable of English maladies under the variant names of

-"melancholy," "the spleen," "black melancholy," "hysteria," "nervous

-debility," "the hyp." Despite the plethora of _materia scripta_ on the

-subject it makes sense to reprint Hill's _Hypochondriasis_, because it

-is indeed a "practical treatise" and because it offers the modern

-student of neoclassical literature a clear summary of the best thoughts

-that had been put forth on the subject, as well as an explanation of the

-causes, symptoms, and cures of this commonplace malady.

-

-No reader of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English literature

-needs to be reminded of the interest of writers of the period in the

-condition--"disease" is too confining a term--hypochondriasis.[2] Their

-concern is apparent in both the poetry and prose of two centuries. From

-Robert Burton's Brobdingnagian exposition in _The Anatomy of Melancholy_

-(1621) to Tobias Smollett's depiction of the misanthropic and ailing

-Matthew Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771), and, of course, well into

-the nineteenth century, afflicted heroes and weeping heroines populate

-the pages of England's literature. There is scarcely a decade in the

-period 1600-1800 that does not contribute to the literature of

-melancholy; so considerable in number are the works that could be placed

-under this heading that it actually makes sense to speak of the

-"literature of melancholy." A kaleidoscopic survey of this literature

-(exclusive of treatises written on the subject) would include mention of

-Milton's "Il Penseroso" and "L'Allegro," the meditative Puritan and

-nervous Anglican thinkers of the Restoration (many of whose narrators,

-such as Richard Baxter, author of the _Reliquiae Baxterianae_,[3] are

-afflicted), Swift's "School of Spleen" in _A Tale of a Tub_, Pope's

-hysterical Belinda in the "Cave of Spleen," the melancholic "I" of

-Samuel Richardson's correspondence, Gray's leucocholy, the

-psychosomatically ailing characters of _The Vicar of Wakefield_ and

-_Tristram Shandy_, Boswell's _Hypochondriack Papers_ (1777-1783)

-contributed to the _London Magazine_, and such "sensible" and

-"sensitive" women as Mrs. Bennett and Miss Bates in the novels of Jane

-Austen. So great in bulk is this literature in the mid eighteenth

-century, that C. A. Moore has written, "statistically, this deserves to

-be called the Age of Melancholy."[4] The vastness of this literature is

-sufficient to justify the reprinting of an unavailable practical

-handbook on the subject by a prolific author all too little known.[5]

-

-The medical background of Hill's pamphlet extends further back than the

-seventeenth century and Burton's _Anatomy_. The ancient Greeks had

-theorized about hypochondria: hypochondriasis signified a disorder

-beneath (hypo) the gristle (chondria) and the disease was discussed

-principally in physiological terms. The belief that hypochondriasis was

-a somatic condition persisted until the second half of the seventeenth

-century at which time an innovation was made by Dr. Thomas Sydenham. In

-addition to showing that hypochondriasis and hysteria (thought previously

-by Sydenham to afflict women only) were the same disease, Sydenham noted

-that the external cause of both was a mental disturbance and not a

-physiological one. He also had a theory that the internal and immediate

-cause was a disorder of the animal spirits arising from a clot and

-resulting in pain, spasms, and bodily disorders. By attributing the

-onset of the malady to mental phenomena and not to obstructions of the

-spleen or viscera, Sydenham was moving towards a psychosomatic theory of

-hypochondriasis, one that was to be debated in the next century in

-England, Holland, and France.[6] Sydenham's influence on the physicians

-of the eighteenth century was profound: Cheyne in England, Boerhaave in

-Holland, La Mettrie in France. Once the theory of the nervous origins of

-hypochondria gained ground--here I merely note coincidence, not historical

-cause and effect--the disease became increasingly fashionable in England,

-particularly among the polite, the aristocratic, and the refined. Students

-of the drama will recall Scrub's denial in _The Beaux' Stratagem_ (1707)

-of the possibility that Archer has the spleen and Mrs. Sullen's

-interjection, "I thought that distemper had been only proper to people of

-quality."

-

-Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, hypochondria was so

-prevalent in people's minds and mouths that it soon assumed the

-abbreviated name "the hyp." Entire poems like William Somervile's _The

-Hyp: a Burlesque Poem in Five Canto's_ (1731) and Tim Scrubb's _A Rod

-for the Hyp-Doctor_ (1731) were devoted to this strain; others, like

-Malcom Flemyng's epic poem, _Neuropathia: sive de morbis hypochondriacis

-et hystericis, libri tres, poema medicum_ (1740), were more technical

-and scientific. Professor Donald Davie has written that he has often

-"heard old fashioned and provincial persons [in England and Scotland]

-even in [my] own lifetime say, 'Oh, you give me the hyp,' where we

-should say 'You give me a pain in the neck'"[7]; and I myself have heard

-the expression, "You give me the pip," where "pip" may be a corruption

-of "hyp." As used in the early eighteenth century, the term "hyp" was

-perhaps not far from what our century has learned to call _Angst_. It

-was also used as a synonym for "lunacy," as the anonymous author of

-_Anti-Siris_ (1744), one of the tracts in the tar-water controversy,

-informs us that "Berkeley tells his Countrymen, they are all mad, or

-_Hypochondriac_, which is but a fashionable name for Madness." Bernard

-Mandeville, the Dutch physician and author of _The Fable of the Bees_,

-seems to have understood perfectly well that hypochondriasis is a

-condition encompassing any number of diseases and not a specific and

-readily definable ailment; a condition, moreover, that hovers

-precariously and bafflingly in limbo between mind and body, and he

-stressed this as the theme of his _Treatise of the Hypochondriack and

-Hysteric Passions, Vulgarly Call'd the Hypo in Men and Vapours in Women_

-(1711). The mental causes are noted as well in an anonymous pamphlet in

-the British Museum, _A Treatise on the Dismal Effects of

-Low-Spiritedness_ (1750) and are echoed in many similar early and

-mid-eighteenth century works. Some medical writers of the age, like

-Nicholas Robinson, had reservations about the external mental bases of

-the hyp and preferred to discuss the condition in terms of internal

-physiological causes:

-

-     ...of that Disorder we call the Vapours, or _Hypochondria_; for

-     they have no material distinctive Characters, but what arise from

-     the same Disease affecting different Sexes, and the Vapours in

-     Women are term'd the _Hypochondria_ in Men, and they proceed from

-     the Contraction of the Vessels being depress'd a little beneath the

-     Balance of Nature, and the Relaxation of the Nerves at the same

-     Time, which creates that Uneasiness and Melancholy that naturally

-     attends Vapours, and which generally is an Intemperature of the

-     whole Body, proceeding from a Depression of the Solids beneath the

-     Balance of Nature; but the Intemperature of the Parts is that

-     Peculiar Disposition whereby they favour any Disease.[8]

-

-

-But the majority of medical thinkers had been persuaded that the

-condition was psychosomatic, and this belief was supported by research

-on nerves by important physicians in the 1740's and 1750's: the Monro

-brothers in London, Robert Whytt in Edinburgh, Albrecht von Haller in

-Leipzig. By mid century the condition known as the hyp was believed to

-be a real, not an imaginary ailment, common, peculiar in its

-manifestations, and indefinable, almost impossible to cure, producing

-very real symptoms of physical illness, and said to originate sometimes

-in depression and idleness. It was summed up by Robert James in his

-_Medicinal Dictionary_ (London, 1743-45):

-

-     If we thoroughly consider its Nature, it will be found to be a

-     spasmodico-flatulent Disorder of the _Primae Viae_, that is, of the

-     Stomach and Intestines, arising from an Inversion or Perversion of

-     their peristaltic Motion, and, by the mutual consent of the Parts,

-     throwing the whole nervous System into irregular Motions, and

-     disturbing the whole Oeconomy of the Functions.... no part or

-     Function of the Body escapes the Influence of this tedious and long

-     protracted Disease, whose Symptoms are so violent and numerous,

-     that it is no easy Task either to enumerate or account for them....

-     No disease is more troublesome, either to the Patient or Physician,

-     than hypochondriac Disorders; and it often happens, that, thro' the

-     Fault of both, the Cure is either unnecessarily protracted, or

-     totally frustrated; for the Patients are so delighted, not only

-     with a Variety of Medicines, but also of Physicians.... On the

-     contrary, few physicians are sufficiently acquainted with the true

-     Genius and Nature of this perplexing Disorder; for which Reason

-     they boldly prescribe almost everything contained in the Shops, not

-     without an irreparable Injury to the Patient (article on

-     "Hypochondriacus Morbis").

-

-This is a more technical description than Hill gives anywhere in his

-handbook, but it serves well to summarize the background of the condition

-about which Sir John wrote.

-

-Hill's _Hypochondriasis_ adds little that is new to the theory of the

-disease. It incorporates much of the thinking set forth by the writings

-mentioned above, particularly those of George Cheyne, whose medical

-works _The English Malady_ (1733) and _The Natural Method of Cureing the

-Diseases of the Body, and the Disorders of the Mind Depending on the

-Body_ (1742) Hill knew. He is also conversant with some Continental

-writers on the subject, two of whom--Isaac Biberg, author of The

-_Oeconomy of Nature_ (1751), and René Réaumur who had written a history

-of insects (1722)[9]--he mentions explicitly, and with William

-Stukeley's _Of the Spleen_ (1723). Internal evidence indicates that Hill

-had read or was familiar with the ideas propounded in Richard

-Blackmore's _Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours_ (1725) and Nicholas

-Robinson's _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and Hypochondriack

-Melancholy_ (1729).

-

-Hill's arrangement of sections is logical: he first defines the

-condition (I), then proceeds to discuss persons most susceptible to it

-(II), its major symptoms (III), consequences (IV), causes (V), and cures

-(VI-VIII). In the first four sections almost every statement is

-commonplace and requires no commentary (for example, Hill's opening

-remark: "To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and

-cruel. It is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by

-thickened and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver,

-and other parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick

-scarce knows one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.") His

-belief that the condition afflicts sedentary persons, particularly

-students, philosophers, theologians, and that it is not restricted to

-women alone--as some contemporary thinkers still maintained--is also

-impossible to trace to a single source, as is his description (p. 12) of

-the most prevalent physiological _symptoms_ ("lowness of spirits, and

-inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love of solitude....

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness") and _causes_ (the poor and damp

-English climate and the resultant clotting of blood in the spleen) of

-the illness.

-

-Sections V-VIII, dealing with causes and cures, are less commonplace and

-display some of Hill's eccentricities as a writer and thinker. He uses

-the section entitled "Cures" as a means to peddle his newly discovered

-cure-all, water dock,[10] which Smollett satirized through the mouth of

-Tabitha Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771). Hill also rebelled against

-contemporary apothecaries and physicians who prescribed popular

-medicines--such as Berkeley's tar-water, Dover's mercury powders, and

-James's fever-powders--as universal panaceas for the cure of the hyp.

-"No acrid medicine must be directed, for that may act too hastily,

-dissolve the impacted matter at once, and let it loose, to the

-destruction of the sufferer; no antimonial, no mercurial, no martial

-preparation must be taken; in short, no chymistry: nature is the shop

-that heaven has set before us, and we must seek our medicine there"

-(p. 24). However scientifically correct Hill may have been in minimizing

-the efficacy of current pills and potions advertised as remedies for the

-hyp, he was unusual for his time in objecting so strongly to them. Less

-eccentric was his allegiance to the "Ancients" rather than to the

-"Moderns" so far as chemical treatment (i.e., restoration of the humours

-by chemical rearrangement) of hypochondriasis is concerned.[11] "The

-venerable ancients," Hill writes, "who knew not this new art, will lead

-us in the search; and (faithful relators as they are of truth) will tell

-us whence we may deduce our hope; and what we are to fear" (p. 24).

-

-Still more idiosyncratic, perhaps, is Hill's contention (p. 25) that the

-air of dry, high grounds worsens the condition of the patient. Virtually

-every writer I have read on the subject believed that onset of the hyp

-was caused by one of the six non-naturals--air, diet, lack of sufficient

-sleep, too little or too much exercise, defective evacuation, the

-passions of the mind; and although some medical writers emphasized the

-last of these,[12] few would have concurred with Hill that the fetid air

-of London was less harmful than the clearer air at Highgate. All readers

-of the novel of the period will recall the hypochondriacal Matt

-Bramble's tirade against the stench of London air. Beliefs of the

-variety here mentioned cause me to question Hill's importance in the

-history of medicine; there can be no question about his contributions to

-the advancement of the science of botany through popularization of

-Linnaeus' system of bisexual classification, but Hill's medical

-importance is summarized best as that of a compiler. His recommendation

-of the study of botany as a cure for melancholics is sensible but verges

-on becoming "a digression in praise of the author," a poetic _apologia

-pro vita sua_ in Augustan fashion:

-

-     For me, I should advise above all other things the study of nature.

-     Let him begin with plants: he will here find a continual pleasure,

-     and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful things; even of

-     the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to walk; and

-     every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket, will

-     afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually in

-     the air; and continually to change the nature and quality of the

-     air, by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the

-     lawn, the heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be

-     abroad; and the unceasing variety of the subjects of his

-     observation, will prevent his walking hastily: he will pursue his

-     studies in the air; and that contemplative turn of mind, which in

-     his closet threatened his destruction, will thus become the great

-     means of his recovery (pp. 26-27).

-

-Hill was forever extolling the claims of a life devoted to the study of

-nature, as we see in a late work, _The Virtues of British Herbs_ (1770).

-Judicious as is the logic of this recommendation, one cannot help but

-feel that the emphasis here is less on diversion as a cure and more on

-the botanic attractions of "every hedge and hillock, every foot-path

-side, and thicket."

-

-While Hill's rules and regulations regarding proper diet (Section VII)

-are standard, several taken almost _verbatim et literatim_ from Cheyne's

-list in _The English Malady_ (1733), his recommendation (Section VIII)

-of "Spleen-Wort" as the best medicine for the hypochondriac patient is

-not. Since Hill devotes so much space to the virtues of this herb and

-concludes his work extolling this plant, a word should be said about it.

-Throughout his life he was an active botanist. Apothecary, physician,

-and writer though he was, it was ultimately botany that was his ruling

-passion, as is made abundantly clear in his correspondence.[13] Wherever

-he lived--whether in the small house in St. James's Street or in the

-larger one on the Bayswater Road--he cultivated an herb garden that

-flattered his knowledge and ability. Connoisseurs raved about its

-species and considered it one of the showpieces of London. His arrogant

-personality alone prevented him from becoming the first Keeper of the

-Apothecary's Garden in Chelsea, although he was for a time

-superintendent to the Dowager Princess of Wales's gardens at Kensington

-Palace and at Kew. His interest in cultivation of herbs nevertheless

-continued; over the years Hill produced more than thirty botanical

-works, many of them devoted to the medical virtues of rare herbs such as

-"Spleen-Wort." Among these are _The British Herbal_ (1756), _On the

-Virtues of Sage in Lengthening Human Life_ (1763), _Centaury, the Great

-Stomachic_ (1765), _Polypody_ (1768), _A Method of Curing Jaundice_

-(1768), _Instances of the Virtue of Petasite Root_ (1771), and _Twenty

-Five New Plants_ (1773).[14] It is therefore not surprising that he

-should believe a specific herb to be the best remedy for a complicated

-medical condition. Nor is his reference to the Ancients as authority for

-the herbal pacification of an inflamed spleen surprising in the light of

-his researches: he was convinced that every illness could be cured by

-taking an appropriate herb or combination of herbs. Whereas a few

-nonmedical writers--such as John Wesley in _Primitive Physick_

-(1747)--had advocated the taking of one or two herbs in moderate dosage

-as anti-hysterics (the eighteenth-century term for all cures of the

-hyp), no medical writer of the century ever promoted the use of herbs to

-the extent that Hill did. In fairness to him, it is important to note

-that his herbal remedies were harmless and that many found their way

-into the official _London Pharmacopeia_. "The virtues of this smooth

-Spleen-wort," he insists, "have stood the test of ages; and the plant

-every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbarists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it"

-(p. 37).[15] The greatest portion of Hill's concluding section combines

-advertisement for the powder medicine he was himself manufacturing at a

-handsome profit together with a protest against competing apothecaries:

-"An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right" (p. 42).

-

-Treatises on hypochondriasis did not cease to be printed after Hill's in

-1766, but continued to issue from the presses into the nineteenth

-century. A good example of this is the tome by John Reid, physician to

-the Finsbury Dispensary in London, _Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis

-and Other Nervous Affections_ (1816), which summarizes theories of the

-malady.[16] A bibliographical study of such works would probably reveal

-a larger number of titles in the nineteenth century than in the previous

-one, but by this time the nature and definition of hypochondria had

-changed significantly.

-

-If John Hill's volume is not an important contribution in the history of

-medicine, it is a lucid and brief exposition of many of the best ideas

-that had been thought and written on the hyp, with the exception of his

-uninhibited prescribing of herbal medicines as cure-alls. An

-understanding of this disease is essential for readers of neoclassical

-English literature, especially when we reflect upon the fact that some

-of the best literature of the period was composed by writers whom it

-afflicted. It is perhaps not without significance that the greatest poet

-of the Augustan age, Alexander Pope, thought it necessary as he lay on

-his deathbed in May 1744 to exclaim with his last breath, "I never was

-hippish in my whole life."[17]

-

-  University of California,

-  Los Angeles

-

-

-

-

-NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION

-

-

-[1] The text here reproduced is that of the copy in the Library of the

-Royal Society of Medicine, London. Title pages of different copies of

-the first edition of 1766 vary. For example, the title page of the copy

-in the British Museum reads, _Hypochondriasis; a Practical Treatise On

-the Nature and Cure of that Disorder, Commonly called the Hyp and the

-Hypo_. The copy in the Royal Society of Medicine contains, among other

-additions, the words "by Sir John Hill" in pencil, and "8vo Lond.

-1766," written in ink and probably a later addition.

-

-[2] Melancholy, hypochondriasis, and the spleen were considered in the

-seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to be one complex condition, a

-malady rather than a malaise, which is but a symptom. Distinctions among

-these, of interest primarily to medical historians, cannot be treated

-here. As good a definition as any is found in Dr. Johnson's _Dictionary_

-(1755): "Hypochondriacal.... 1. Melancholy; disordered in the

-imagination.... 2. Producing melancholy...." The literature of

-melancholy has been surveyed in part by C. A. Moore, "The English

-Malady," _Backgrounds of English Literature 1700-1760_ (Minneapolis,

-1953), pp. 179-235. In medical parlance, "hypochondria" means the soft

-parts of the body below the costal cartilages, and the singular form of

-the word, "hypochondrium," means the viscera situated in the

-hypochondria, i.e., the liver, gall bladder, and spleen.

-

-[3] See Samuel Clifford's _The Signs and Causes of Melancholy, with

-directions suited to the case of those who are afflicted with it.

-Collected out of the works of Mr. Richard Baxter_ (London, 1716) in the

-British Museum.

-

-[4] _Backgrounds of English Literature_, p. 179.

-

-[5] See my forthcoming biography, _The Literary Quack: A Life of 'Sir'

-John Hill of London_, and John Kennedy's _Some Remarks on the Life and

-Writings of Dr. J---- H----, Inspector General of Great Britain_

-(London, 1752).

-

-[6] For some of this background see L. J. Rather, _Mind and Body in

-Eighteenth Century Medicine: A Study Based on Jerome Gaub's De Regimine

-Mentis_ (London, 1965), pp. 135-90 _passim_.

-

-[7] _Science and Literature 1700-1740_ (London, 1964), pp. 50-51.

-

-[8] _A New Theory of Physick_ (London, 1725), p. 56.

-

-[9] Biberg was a Swedish naturalist and had studied botany under

-Linnaeus in Uppsala; Réaumur, a French botanist, had contributed papers

-to the _Philosophical Transactions_ of the Royal Society in London.

-

-[10] _The Power of Water-Dock against the Scurvy whether in the Plain

-Root or Essence...._ (London, 1765), had been published six months

-earlier than _Hypochondriasis_ and had earned Hill a handsome profit.

-

-[11] I have treated aspects of this subject in my article, "Matt Bramble

-and The Sulphur Controversy in the XVIIIth Century: Medical Background

-of _Humphry Clinker_," _JHI_, XXVIII (1967), 577-90.

-

-[12] See, for example, Jeremiah Waineright, _A Mechanical Account of the

-Non-Naturals_ (1707); John Arbuthnot, _An Essay Concerning the Effects

-of Air on Human Bodies_ (1733); Frank Nichols, _De Anima Medica_ (1750).

-

-[13] Hill's correspondence is not published but shall be printed as an

-appendix to my forthcoming biography.

-

-[14] I have discussed some of these works in connection with the medical

-background of John Wesley's _Primitive Physick_ (1747). See G. S.

-Rousseau, _Harvard Library Bulletin_, XVI (1968), 242-56.

-

-[15] It is difficult to know with certainty when Hill first became

-interested in the herb. He mentions it in passing in _The British

-Herbal_ (1756), I, 526 and may have sold it as early as 1742 when he

-opened an apothecary shop.

-

-[16] Reid's dissertation at Edinburgh, entitled _De Insania_ (1798),

-contains materials on the relationship of the imagination to all forms

-of mental disturbance. Secondary literature on hypochondria is

-plentiful. Works include: R. H. Gillespie, _Hypochondria_ (London,

-1928), William K. Richmond, _The English Disease_ (London, 1958),

-Charles Chenevix Trench, _The Royal Malady_ (New York, 1964), and Ilza

-Vieth, _Hysteria: The History of a Disease_ (Chicago, 1965), and "On

-Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Afflictions," _Bulletin of the History of

-Medicine_, XXX (1956), 233-40.

-

-[17] Joseph Spence, _Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books

-and Men_, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, 264.

-

-I am indebted to A. D. Morris, M.D., F.R.S.M., for help of various sorts

-in writing this introduction.

-

-

-

-

-BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

-

-The text of this facsimile of _Hypochondriasis_ is reproduced from a

-copy in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, London.

-

-

-

-

-     HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-            A

-

-  PRACTICAL TREATISE, &c.

-

-

-

-HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-SECT. I.

-

-The NATURE of the DISORDER.

-

-

-To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and cruel. It

-is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by thickened

-and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver, and other

-parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick scarce knows

-one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.

-

-The blood is a mixture of many fluids, which, in a state of health, are

-so combined, that the whole passes freely through its appointed vessels;

-but if by the loss of the thinner parts, the rest becomes too gross to

-be thus carried through, it will stop where the circulation has least

-power; and having thus stopped it will accumulate; heaping by degrees

-obstruction on obstruction.

-

-Health and chearfulness, and the quiet exercise of mind, depend upon a

-perfect circulation: is it a wonder then, when this becomes impeded the

-body looses of its health, and the temper of its sprightliness? to be

-otherwise would be the miracle; and he inhumanly insults the afflicted,

-who calls all this a voluntary frowardness. Its slightest state brings

-with it sickness, anguish and oppression; and innumerable ills follow

-its advancing steps, unless prevented by timely care; till life itself

-grows burthensome.

-

-The disease was common in antient Greece; and her physicians understood

-it, better than those perhaps of later times, in any other country; who

-though happy in many advantages these fathers of the science could not

-have, yet want the great assistance of frequent watching it in all its

-stages.

-

-Those venerable writers have delivered its nature, and its cure: in the

-first every thing now shews they were right; and what they have said as

-to the latter will be found equally true and certain. This, so far as

-present experience has confirmed it, and no farther, will be here laid

-before the afflicted in a few plain words.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. II.

-

-Persons Subject to it.

-

-

-Fatigue of mind, and great exertion of its powers often give birth to

-this disease; and always tend to encrease it. The finer spirits are

-wasted by the labour of the brain: the Philosopher rises from his study

-more exhausted than the Peasant leaves his drudgery; without the benefit

-that he has from exercise. Greatness of mind, and steady virtue;

-determined resolution, and manly firmness, when put in action, and

-intent upon their object, all also lead to it: perhaps whatever tends to

-the ennobling of the soul has equal share in bringing on this weakness

-of the body.

-

-From this we may learn easily who are the men most subject to it; the

-grave and studious, those of a sedate temper and enlarged understanding,

-the learned and wise, the virtuous and the valiant: those whom it were

-the interest of the world to wish were free from this and every other

-illness; and who perhaps, except for this alloy, would have too large a

-portion of human happiness.

-

-Though these are most, it is not these alone, who are subject to it.

-There are countries where it is endemial, and in other places some have

-the seeds of it in their constitution; and in some it takes rise from

-accidents. In these last it is the easiest of cure; and in the first

-most difficult.

-

-Beside the Greeks already named, the Jews of old time were heavily

-afflicted with this disease; and in their descendants to this day it is

-often constitutional: the Spaniards have it almost to a man; and so have

-the American Indians. Perhaps the character of these several nations may

-be connected with it. The steady honour, and firm valour of the

-Spaniard, very like that of the ancient Doric nation, who followed the

-flute not the trumpet to the field; and met the enemy, not with shouts

-and fury, but with a determined virtue: it is the temper of the

-Hypochondriac to be slow, but unmoveably resolved: the Jew has shewn

-this mistakenly, but almost miraculously; and the poor Indian, untaught

-as he is, faces all peril with composure, and sings his death-song with

-an unalter'd countenance.

-

-Among particular persons the most inquiring and contemplative are those

-who suffer oftenest by this disease; and of all degrees of men I think

-the clergy. I do not mean the hunting, shooting, drinking clergy, who

-bear the tables of the great; but the retir'd and conscientious; such as

-attend in midnight silence to their duty; and seek in their own cool

-breasts, or wheresoever else they may be found, new admonitions for an

-age plunged in new vices. To this disease we owe the irreparable loss of

-Dr. YOUNG; and the present danger of many other the best and most

-improved amongst us. May what is here to be proposed assist in their

-preservation!

-

-The Geometrician or the learned Philosopher of whatever denomination,

-whose course of study fixes his eye for ever on one object, his mind

-intensely and continually employed upon one thought, should be warned

-also that he is in danger; or if he find himself already afflicted, he

-should be told that the same course of life, which brought it on, will,

-without due care, encrease it to the most dreaded violence.

-

-The middle period of life is that in which there is the greatest danger

-of an attack from this disease; and the latter end of autumn, when the

-summer heats have a little time been over, is the season when in our

-climate its first assaults are most to be expected. The same time of the

-year always increases the disorder in those who have been before

-afflicted with it; and it is a truth must be confessed, that from its

-first attack the patient grows continually, though slowly, worse; unless

-a careful regimen prevent it.

-

-The constitutions most liable to this obstruction are the lean, and dark

-complexioned; the grave and sedentary. Let such watch the first

-symptoms; and obviate, (as they may with ease) that which it will be

-much more difficult to remove.

-

-It is happy a disease, wherein the patient must do a great deal for

-himself, falls, for the most part, upon those who have the powers of

-reason strongest. Let them only be aware of this, that the distemper

-naturally disposes them to inactivity; and reason will have no use

-unless accompanied with resolution to enforce it.

-

-Though the physician can do something toward the cure, much more depends

-upon the patient; and here his constancy of mind will be employed most

-happily. No one is better qualified to judge on a fair hearing what

-course is the most fit; and having made that choice, he must with

-patience wait its good effects. Diseases that come on slowly must have

-time for curing; an attention to the first appearances of the disorder

-will be always happiest; because when least established it is easiest

-overthrown: but when that happy period has been neglected, he must wait

-the effects of such a course as will dilute and melt the obstructing

-matter gradually; for till that be done it is not only vain, but

-sometimes dangerous, to attempt its expulsion from the body.

-

-The blood easily separates itself into the grosser and the thinner

-parts: we see this in bleeding; and from the toughness of the red cake

-may guess how very difficult it will be to dissolve a substance of like

-firmness in the vessels of the body. That it can thus become thickened

-within the body, a Pleurisy shews us too evidently: in that case it is

-brought on suddenly, and with inflammation; in this other, slowly and

-without; and here, even before it forms the obstruction, can bring on

-many mischiefs. Various causes can produce the same effect, but that in

-all cases operates most durably, which operates most slowly. The watery

-part of the blood is its mild part; in the remaining gross matter of it,

-are acrid salts and burning oils, and these, when destitute of that

-happy dilution nature gives them in a healthy body, are capable of doing

-great mischief to the tender vessels in which they are kept stagnant.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. III.

-

-The SYMPTOMS of the DISORDER.

-

-

-The first and lightest of the signs that shew this illness are a lowness

-of spirits, and inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love

-of solitude and a habit of thinking, even on trifling subjects, with too

-much steadiness. A very little help may combat these: but if that

-indolence which is indeed a part of the disorder, will neglect them;

-worse must be expected soon to follow.

-

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness, weight, and oppression in the body,

-a want of appetite, or, what is worse, an appetite without digestion;

-for these are the conditions of different states of the disease, a

-fullness and a difficulty of breathing after meals, a straitness of the

-breast, pains and flatulencies in the bowels, and an unaptness to

-discharge their contents.

-

-The pulse becomes low, weak, and unequal; and there are frequent

-palpitations of the heart, a little dark-coloured urine is voided at

-some times; and a flood of colourless and insipid at others; relieving

-for a moment, but increasing the distemper: there is in some cases also

-a continual teazing cough, with a choaking stoppage in the throat at

-times; then heartburn, sickness, hardness of the belly, and a costive

-habit, or a tormenting and vain irritation.

-

-The lips turn pale, the eyes loose their brightness and by degrees the

-white grows as it were greenish, the gums want their due firmness, with

-their proper colour; and an unpleasing foulness grows upon the teeth:

-the inside of the mouth is pale and furred, and the throat dry and

-husky: the colour of the skin is pale (though there are periods when the

-face is florid) and as the obstruction gathers ground, and more affects

-the liver, the whole body becomes yellow, tawny, greenish, and at length

-of that deep and dusky hue, to which men of swift imagination have given

-the name of blackness.

-

-These symptoms do not all appear in any one period of the disease, or in

-one case, but at one time or other all of them, as well as those which

-follow: the flesh becomes cold to the touch, though the patient does not

-himself perceive it; the limbs grow numbed and torpid, the breathing

-dull and slow, and the voice hollow; and usually the appetite in this

-period declines, and comes almost to nothing: night sweats come on,

-black swellings appear on the veins, the flesh wastes and the breast

-becomes flat and hollow: the mouth is full of a thin spittle, the head

-is dizzy and confus'd, and sometimes there is an unconquerable numbness

-in the organs of speech.

-

-I have known the temporary silence that follows upon this last symptom

-become a jest to the common herd; and the unhappy patient, instead of

-compassion and assistance, receive the reproof of sullenness, from those

-who should have known and acted better.

-

-About twenty years ago I met on a visit at Catthorpe in Leicestershire a

-young gentleman of distinguished learning and abilities, who at certain

-times was speechless. The vulgar thought it a pretence: and a jocose

-lady, where he was at tea with company, putting him as she said to a

-trial, poured out a dish very strong and without sugar. He drank it and

-returned the cup with a bow of great reserve, and his eye bent on the

-ground: she then filled the cup with sugar, and pouring weak tea on it,

-sent it him: he drank that too, looked at her steadily, and blushed for

-her. The lady declared the man was dumb; the rest thought him perverse,

-and obstinate; but a constant and steady perseverance in an easy method

-cured him.

-

-All these are miseries which the disease, while it retains its natural

-form, can bring upon the patient; and thus he will in time be worn out,

-and led miserably, though slowly, to the grave. Let him not indulge his

-inactivity so far as to give way to this, because it is represented as

-far off; the disease may suddenly and frightfully change its nature; and

-swifter evils follow.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. IV.

-

-The DANGER.

-

-

-We have done with the obstruction considered in itself; but this, though

-often unsurmountable by art, at least by the methods now in use, will be

-sometimes broken through at once by nature, or by accidents; and bring

-on fatal evils. These are strictly different diseases, and are no

-otherway concerned here, than as the consequences of that of which we

-are treating.

-

-The thick and glutinous blood which has so long stagnated in the spleen,

-will have in that time altered its nature, and acquired a very great

-degree of acrimony: while it lies dormant, this does no more mischiefs,

-than those named already; but when violent exercise, a fit of outrageous

-anger, or any thing else that suddenly shocks and disturbs the frame,

-puts it in motion, it melts at once into a kind of liquid putrefaction.

-Being now thin, it mixes itself readily with the blood again, and brings

-on putrid fevers; destroys the substance of the spleen itself, or being

-thrown upon some other of the viscera, corrodes them, and leads on this

-way a swift and miserable death. If it fall upon the liver, its tender

-pulpy substance is soon destroyed, jaundices beyond the help of art

-first follow, then dropsies and all their train of misery; if on lungs,

-consumptions; if on the brain, convulsions, epilepsy, palsy, apoplexy;

-if on the surface, leprosy.

-

-The intention of cure is to melt this coagulation softly, not to break

-it violently; and then to give it a very gentle passage through the

-bowels. There is no safe way for it to take but that; and even that when

-urged too far may bring on fatal dysenteries.

-

-Let none wonder at the sudden devastation which sometimes arises from

-this long stagnant matter, when liquified too hastily: how long, how

-many years the impacted matter will continue quiet in a schirrous tumour

-of the breast; but being once put in motion, whether from accident, or

-in the course of nature, what can describe; or what can stop its

-havock!

-

-Instances of the other are too frequent. A nobleman the other day died

-paralytick: dissection shewed a spleen consumed by an abscess, formed

-from the dissolved matter of such an obstruction: and 'tis scarce longer

-since, a learned gentleman, who had been several years lost to his

-friends, by the extreams of a Hypochondriacal disorder, seem'd gradually

-without assistance to recover: but the lungs suffered while the spleen

-was freed; and he died very soon of what is called a galloping

-consumption.

-

-When the obstruction is great and of long continuance, if it be thus

-hastily moved, the consequence is, equally, a sudden and a miserable

-death, whether, like the matter of a cancer, it remains in its place; or

-like that of a bad small pox, be thrown upon some other vital part.

-

-Let not the patient be too much alarmed; this is laid down to caution,

-not to terrify him: it is fit he should know his danger, and attend to

-it; for the prevention is easy; and the cure, even of the most advanced

-stages, when undertaken by gentle means, is not at all impracticable: to

-assist the physician, let him look into himself, and recollect the

-source of his complaint. This he may judge of from the following

-notices.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. V.

-

-The Causes of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-The obstruction which forms this disease, may take its origin from

-different accidents: a fever ill cured has often caused it; or the

-piles, which had been used to discharge largely, ceasing; a marshy soil,

-poisoned with stagnant water, has given it to some persons; and altho'

-indolence and inactivity are oftenest at the root, yet it has arisen

-from too great exercise.

-

-Real grief has often brought it on; and even love, for sometimes that is

-real. Study and fixed attention of the mind have been accused before;

-and add to these the stooping posture of the body, which most men use,

-though none should use it, in writing and in reading. This has

-contributed too much to it; but of all other things night studies are

-the most destructive. The steady stillness, and dusky habit of all

-nature in those hours, enforce, encourage, and support that settled

-gloom, which rises from fixt thought; and sinks the body to the grave;

-even while it carries up the mind to heaven. He who would have his lamp

-

-        _At midnight hour

-  Be seen in some high lonely tower,_[18]

-

-will waste the flame of this unheeded life: and while he labours to

-unsphere the spirit of Plato[18] will let loose his own.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VI.

-

-The Cure of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-Let him who would escape the mischiefs of an obstructed spleen, avoid

-the things here named: and let him who suffers from the malady,

-endeavour to remember to which of them it has been owing; for half the

-hope depends upon that knowledge.

-

-Nature has sometimes made a cure herself, and we should watch her ways;

-for art never is so right as when it imitates her: sometimes the

-patient's own resolution has set him free. This is always in his power,

-and at all times will do wonders.

-

-The bleeding of the piles, from nature's single efforts, has at once

-cured a miserable man; where their cessation was the cause of the

-disorder. A leprosy has appeared upon the skin, and all the symptoms of

-the former sickness vanished. This among the Jews happened often: both

-diseases we know were common among them: and I have here seen something

-very like it: Water-Dock has thrown out scorbutic eruptions, and all the

-former symptoms of an Hypochondriacal disorder have disappeared:

-returning indeed when these were unadvisedly struck in; but keeping off

-entirely when they were better treated. A natural purging unsuppressed

-has sometimes done the same good office: but this is hazardous.

-

-It is easy to be directed from such instances; only let us take the

-whole along with us. Bleeding would have answered nature's purpose, if

-she could not have opened of herself the hæmorrhoidal vessels; but he

-who should give medicines for that purpose, might destroy his patient by

-too great disturbance. If a natural looseness may perform the cure, so

-may an artificial; when the original source of the disorder points that

-way. But these are helps that take place only in particular cases.

-

-The general and universal method of cure must be by some mild and gently

-resolving medicine, under the influence of which the obstructing matter

-may be voided that, or some other way with safety. The best season to

-undertake this is the autumn, but even here there must be caution.

-

-In the first place, no strong evacuating remedy must be given; for that,

-by carrying off the thinner parts of the juices, will tend to thicken

-the remainder; and certainly encrease the distemper. No acrid medicine

-must be directed, for that may act too hastily, dissolve the impacted

-matter at once, and let it loose, to the destruction of the sufferer; no

-antimonial, no mercurial, no martial preparation must be taken; in

-short, no chymistry: nature is the shop that heaven has set before us,

-and we must seek our medicine there. The venerable ancients, who knew

-not this new art, will lead us in the search; and (faithful relators as

-they are of truth) will tell us whence we may deduce our hope; and what

-we are to fear.

-

-But prior to the course of any medicine, and as an essential to any good

-hope from it, the patient must prescribe himself a proper course of

-life, and a well chosen diet: let us assist him in his choice; and speak

-of this first, as it comes first in order.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VI.

-

-Rules of Life for Hypochondriac Persons.

-

-

-Air and exercise, as they are the best preservers of health, and

-greatest assistants in the cure of all long continued diseases, will

-have their full effect in this; but there requires some caution in the

-choice, and management of them. It is common to think the air of high

-grounds best; but experience near home shews otherwise: the

-Hypochondriac patient is always worse at Highgate even than in London.

-

-The air he breathes should be temperate; not exposed to the utmost

-violences of heat and cold, and the swift changes from one to the

-other; which are most felt on those high grounds. The side of a hill is

-the best place for him: and though wet grounds are hurtful; yet let

-there be the shade of trees, to tempt him often to a walk; and soften by

-their exhalation the over dryness of the air.

-

-The exercise he takes should be frequent; but not violent. Motion

-preserves the firmness of the parts, and elasticity of the vessels; it

-prevents that aggregation of thick humours which he is most to fear. A

-sedentary life always produces weakness, and that mischief always

-follows: weak eyes are gummy, weak lungs are clogged with phlegm, and

-weak bowels waste themselves in vapid diarrhoeas.

-

-Let him invite himself abroad, and let his friends invite him by every

-innocent inducement. For me, I should advise above all other things the

-study of nature. Let him begin with plants: he will here find a

-continual pleasure, and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful

-things; even of the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to

-walk; and every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket,

-will afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually

-in the air, and continually to change the nature and quality of the air,

-by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the lawn, the

-heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be abroad; and the

-unceasing variety of the subjects of his observation, will prevent his

-walking hastily: he will pursue his studies in the air; and that

-contemplative turn of mind, which in his closet threatened his

-destruction, will thus become the great means of his recovery.

-

-If the mind tire upon this, from the repeated use, another of nature's

-kingdoms opens itself at once upon him; the plant he is weary of

-observing, feeds some insect he may examine; nor is there a stone that

-lies before his foot, but may afford instruction and amusement.

-

-Even what the vulgar call the most abject things will shew a wonderful

-utility; and lead the mind, in pious contemplation higher than the

-stars. The poorest moss that is trampled under foot, has its important

-uses: is it at the bottom of a wood we find it? why there it shelters

-the fallen seeds; hides them from birds, and covers them from frost;

-and thus becomes the foster father of another forest! creeps it along

-the surface of a rock? even there its good is infinite! its small roots

-run into the stone, and the rains make their way after them; the moss

-having lived its time dies; it rots and with the mouldered fragments of

-the stone forms earth; wherein, after a few successions, useful plants

-may grow, and feed more useful cattle![19]

-

-Is there a weed more humble in its aspect, more trampled on, or more

-despised than knot grass! no art can get the better of its growth, no

-labour can destroy it; 'twere pity if they could, for the thing lives

-where nothing would of use to us; and its large and most wonderfully

-abundant seeds, feed in hard winters, half the birds of Heaven.

-

-What the weak moss performs upon the rock the loathed toadstool brings

-about in timber: is an oak dead where man's eye will not find it? this

-fungus roots itself upon the bark, and rots the wood beneath it; hither

-the beetle creeps for shelter, and for sustenance; him the woodpecker

-follows as his prey; and while he tears the tree in search of him, he

-scatters it about the ground; which it manures.

-

-Nor is it the beetle alone that thus insinuates itself into the

-substance of the vegetable tribe: the tender aphide[20], whom a touch

-destroys, burrows between the two skins of a leaf, for shelter from his

-winged enemies; tracing, with more than Dedalæan art, his various

-meanders; and veining the green surface with these white lines more

-beautifully than the best Ægyptian marble.

-

-'Twere endless to proceed; nor is it needful: one object will not fail

-to lead on to another, and every where the goodness of his God will

-shine before him even in what are thought the vilest things; his

-greatness in the lead of them.

-

-Let him pursue these thoughts, and seek abroad the objects and the

-instigations to them: but let him in these and all other excursions

-avoid equally the dews of early morning, and of evening.

-

-The more than usual exercise of this prescription will dispose him to

-more than customary sleep, let him indulge it freely; so far from

-hurting, it will help his cure.

-

-Let him avoid all excesses: drink need scarce be named, for we are

-writing to men of better and of nobler minds, than can be tempted to

-that humiliating vice. Those who in this disorder have too great an

-appetite, must not indulge it; much eaten was never well digested: but

-of all excesses the most fatal in this case is that of venery. It is the

-excess we speak of.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VII.

-

-The proper DIET.

-

-

-In the first place acids must be avoided carefully; and all things that

-are in a state of fermentation, for they will breed acidity. Provisions

-hardened by salting never should be tasted; much less those cured by

-smoaking, and by salting. Bacon is indigestible in an Hypochondriac

-stomach; and hams, impregnated as is now the custom, with acid fumes

-from the wood fires over which they are hung, have that additional

-mischief.

-

-Milk ought to be a great article in the diet: and even in this there

-should be choice. The milk of grass-fed cows has its true quality: no

-other. There are a multitude of ways in which this may be made a part

-both of our foods and drinks, and they should all be used.

-

-The great and general caution is that the diet be at all times of a kind

-loosening and gently stimulating; light but not acrid. Veal, lamb,

-fowls, lobsters, crabs, craw-fish, fresh water fish and mutton broth,

-with plenty of boiled vegetables, are always right; and give enough

-variety.

-

-Raw vegetables are all bad: sour wines, old cheese, and bottled beer are

-things never to be once tasted. Indeed much wine is wrong, be it of what

-kind soever. It is the first of cordials; and as such I would have it

-taken in this disease when it is wanted: plainly as a medicine, rather

-than a part of diet. Malt liquor carefully chosen is certainly the best

-drink. This must be neither new, nor tending to sourness; perfectly

-clear, and of a moderate strength: it is the native liquor of our

-country, and the most healthful.

-

-Too much tea weakens; and even sugar is in this disorder hurtful: but

-honey may supply its place in most things; and this is not only harmless

-but medicinal; a very powerful dissolvent of impacted humours, and a

-great deobstruent.

-

-What wine is drank should be of some of the sweet kinds. Old Hock has

-been found on enquiry to yield more than ten times the acid of the sweet

-wines; and in red Port, at least in what we are content to call so,

-there is an astringent quality, that is most mischievous in these cases:

-it is said there is often alum in it: how pregnant with mischief that

-must be to persons whose bowels require to be kept open, is most

-evident. Summer fruits perfectly ripe are not only harmless but

-medicinal; but if eaten unripe they will be very prejudicial. A light

-supper, which will leave an appetite for a milk breakfast, is always

-right; this will not let the stomach be ravenous for dinner, as it is

-apt to be in those who make that their only meal.

-

-One caution more must be given, and it may seem a strange one: it is

-that the patient attend regularly to his hours of eating. We have to do

-with men for the most part whose soul is the great object of their

-regard; but let them not forget they have a body.

-

-The late Dr. STUKELY has told me, that one day by appointment visiting

-Sir ISAAC NEWTON, the servant told him, he was in his study. No one was

-permitted to disturb him there; but as it was near dinner time, the

-visitor sat down to wait for him. After a time dinner was brought in; a

-boil'd chicken under a cover. An hour pass'd, and Sir ISAAC did not

-appear. The doctor eat the fowl, and covering up the empty dish, bad

-them dress their master another. Before that was ready, the great man

-came down; he apologiz'd for his delay, and added, "give me but leave to

-take my short dinner, and I shall be at your service; I am fatigued and

-faint." Saying this, he lifted up the cover; and without any emotion,

-turned about to STUKELY with a smile; "See says he, what we studious

-people are, I forgot I had din'd."

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VIII.

-

-The MEDICINE.

-

-

-'Tis the ill fate of this disease, more than of all others to be

-misunderstood at first, and thence neglected; till the physician shakes

-his head at a few first questions. None steals so fatally upon the

-sufferer: its advances are by very slow degrees; but every day it grows

-more difficult of cure.

-

-That this obstruction in the spleen is the true malady, the cases

-related by the antients, present observation, and the unerring

-testimonies of dissections leave no room to doubt. Being understood, the

-path is open where to seek a remedy: and our best guides in this, as in

-the former instance, will be those venerable Greeks; who saw a thousand

-of these cases, where we see one; and with less than half our theory,

-cured twice as many patients.

-

-One established doctrine holds place in all these writers; that whatever

-by a hasty fermentation dissolves the impacted matter of the

-obstruction, and sends it in that state into the blood, does incredible

-mischief: but that whatever medicine softens it by slow degrees, and, as

-it melts, delivers it to the bowels without disturbance; will cure with

-equal certainty and safety.

-

-For this good purpose, they knew and tried a multitude of herbs; but in

-the end they fixed on one: and on their repeated trials of this, they

-banished all the rest. This stood alone for the cure of the disease; and

-from its virtue received the name of SPLEEN-WORT[21]. O wise and happy

-Greeks! authors of knowledge and perpetuators of it! With them the very

-name they gave a plant declared its virtues: with us, a writer calls a

-plant from some friend; that the good gardener who receives the honour,

-may call another by his name who gave it. We now add the term _smooth_

-to this herb, to distinguish it from another, called by the same general

-term, though not much resembling it.

-

-The virtues of this smooth Spleen-wort have flood the test of ages; and

-the plant every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbalists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it;

-and all the miserable symptoms vanish; thought Spleen-wort not enough

-expressive of its excellence; but stamp'd on it the name of MILT-WASTE.

-

-In the Greek Islands now, the use of it is known to every one; and even

-the lazy monks who take it, are no longer splenetic. In the west of

-England, the rocks are stripped of it with diligence; and every old woman

-tells you how charming that leaf is for bookish men: in Russia they use

-a plant of this kind in their malt liquor: it came into fashion there

-for the cure of this disease; which from its constant use is scarce

-known any longer; and they suppose 'tis added to their liquor for a

-flavour.

-

-The ancients held it in a kind of veneration; and used what has been

-called a superstition in the gathering it. It was to be taken up with a

-sharp knife, without violence, and laid upon the clean linen: no time

-but the still darkness of the night was proper, and even the moon was

-not to shine upon it[22]. I know they have been ridiculed for this; for

-nothing is so vain as learned ignorance: but let me be permitted once to

-vindicate them.

-

-The plant has leaves that can close in their sides; and their under part

-is covered thick with a yellow powder, consisting of the seeds, and seed

-vessels: in these they knew the virtue most resided: this was the golden

-dust[23] they held so valuable; and this they knew they could not be too

-cautious to preserve. They were not ignorant of the sleep of plants; a

-matter lately spoken of by some, as if a new discovery; and being

-sensible that light, a dry air, an expanded leaf, and a tempestuous

-season, were the means of losing this fine dust; and knowing also that

-darkness alone brought on that closing of the leaf which thence has

-been called sleep; and which helped to defend and to secure it, they

-therefore took such time, and used such means as could best preserve the

-plant entire; and even save what might be scattered from it.--And now

-where is their superstition?

-

-From this plant thus collected they prepared a medicine, which in a

-course of forty days scarce ever failed to make a perfect cure.

-

-We have the plant wild with us; and till the fashion of rough chemical

-preparations took off our attention from these gentler remedies, it was

-in frequent use and great repute. I trust it will be so again: and many

-thank me for restoring it to notice.

-

-Spleen-wort gives out its virtues freely in a tincture; and a small dose

-of this, mixing readily with the blood and juices, gradually dissolves

-the obstruction; and by a little at a time delivers its contents to be

-thrown off without pain, from the bowels. Let this be done while the

-viscera are yet sound and the cure is perfect. More than the forty days

-of the Greek method is scarce ever required; much oftener two thirds of

-that time suffice; and every day, from the first dose of it, the patient

-feels the happy change that is growing in his constitution. His food no

-more turns putrid on his stomach, but yields its healthful nourishment.

-The swelling after meals therefore vanishes; and with that goes the

-lowness, and anxiety, the difficult breath, and the distracting cholick:

-he can bear the approach of rainy weather without pain; he finds himself

-more apt for motion, and ready to take that exercise which is to be

-assistant in his cure; life seems no longer burthensome. His bowels get

-into the natural condition of health, and perform their office once at

-least a day; better if a little more: the dull and dead colour of his

-skin goes off, his lips grow red again, and every sign of health

-returns.

-

-Let him who takes the medicine, say whether any thing here be

-exaggerated. Let him, if he pleases to give himself the trouble, talk

-over with me, or write to me, this gradual decrease of his complaints,

-as he proceeds in his cure. My uncertain state of health does not

-permit me to practise physic in the usual way, but I am very desirous to

-do what good I can, and shall never refuse my advice, such as it may be,

-to any person rich or poor, in whatever manner he may apply for it. I

-shall refer him to no apothecary, whose bills require he should be

-drenched with potions; but tell him, in this as in all other cases,

-where to find some simple herb; which he may if he please prepare

-himself; or if he had rather spare that trouble, may have it so prepared

-from me.

-

-With regard to Spleen-wort, no method of using it is more effectual than

-simply taking it in powder; the only advantage of a tincture, is that a

-proper dose may be given, and yet the stomach not be loaded with so

-large a quantity: it is an easier and pleasanter method, and nothing

-more.

-

-If any person choose to take it in the other way, I should still wish

-him once at least to apply to me; that he may be assured what he is

-about to take is the right plant. Abuses in medicines are at this time

-very great, and in no instance worse than what relates to herbs. The

-best of our physicians have complained upon this head with warmth, but

-without redress: they know the virtues and the value of many of our

-native plants, but dread to prescribe them; lest some wrong thing should

-be administered in their place; perhaps inefficacious, perhaps

-mischievous, nay it may be fatal. The few simple things I direct are

-always before me; and it will at all times be a pleasure to me, in this

-and any other instance, to see whether what any person is about to take

-be right. I have great obligations to the public, and this is the best

-return that I know how to make.

-

-To see the need of such a caution, hear a transaction but of yesterday!

-An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right. Such is the chance of

-health in those hands through which the best means of it usually pass;

-even in the most regular course of application.

-

-I would not be understood to limit the little services I may this way be

-able to render the afflicted, to this single instance; much less to

-propose to myself any advantages from it. Whoever pleases will be

-welcome to me, upon any such occasion; and whatever be the herb on which

-he places a dependance, he shall be shewn it growing. I once recommended

-a garden to be established for this use, at the public expence: one

-great person has put it in my power to answer all its purposes.

-

-

-                        F  I  N  I  S.

-

-

-

-

-THE AUGUSTAN REPRINT SOCIETY

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-

-WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY

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-UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES

-

-PUBLICATIONS IN PRINT

-

-

-1948-1949

-

-16. Henry Nevil Payne, _The Fatal Jealousie_ (1673).

-

-18. Anonymous, "Of Genius," in _The Occasional Paper_, Vol. III, No. 10

-(1719), and Aaron Hill, Preface to _The Creation_ (1720).

-

-

-1949-1950

-

-19. Susanna Centlivre, _The Busie Body_ (1709).

-

-20. Lewis Theobald, _Preface to the Works of Shakespeare_ (1734).

-

-22. Samuel Johnson, _The Vanity of Human Wishes_ (1749), and two

-_Rambler_ papers (1750).

-

-23. John Dryden, _His Majesties Declaration Defended_ (1681).

-

-

-1951-1952

-

-31. Thomas Gray, _An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard_ (1751), and

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-1952-1953

-

-41. Bernard Mandeville, _A Letter to Dion_ (1732).

-

-

-1963-1964

-

-104. Thomas D'Urfey, _Wonders in the Sun; or, The Kingdom of the Birds_

-(1706).

-

-

-1964-1965

-

-110. John Tutchin, _Selected Poems_ (1685-1700).

-

-111. Anonymous, _Political Justice_ (1736).

-

-112. Robert Dodsley, _An Essay on Fable_ (1764).

-

-113. T. R., _An Essay Concerning Critical and Curious Learning_ (1698).

-

-114. _Two Poems Against Pope_: Leonard Welsted, _One Epistle to Mr. A.

-Pope_ (1730), and Anonymous, _The Blatant Beast_ (1742).

-

-

-1965-1966

-

-115. Daniel Defoe and others, _Accounts of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal_.

-

-116. Charles Macklin, _The Covent Garden Theatre_ (1752).

-

-117. Sir George L'Estrange, _Citt and Bumpkin_ (1680).

-

-118. Henry More, _Enthusiasmus Triumphatus_ (1662).

-

-119. Thomas Traherne, _Meditations on the Six Days of the Creation_

-(1717).

-

-120. Bernard Mandeville, _Aesop Dress'd or a Collection of Fables_

-(1704).

-

-

-1966-1967

-

-123. Edmond Malone, _Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Mr.

-Thomas Rowley_ (1782).

-

-124. Anonymous, _The Female Wits_ (1704).

-

-125. Anonymous, _The Scribleriad_ (1742). Lord Hervey, _The Difference

-Between Verbal and Practical Virtue_ (1742).

-

-126. _Le Lutrin: an Heroick Poem, Written Originally in French by

-Monsieur Boileau: Made English by N. O._ (1682).

-

-

-1967-1968

-

-127-

-

-128. Charles Macklin, _A Will and No Will, or a Bone for the Lawyers_

-(1746). _The New Play Criticiz'd, or The Plague of Envy_ (1747).

-

-129. Lawrence Echard, Prefaces to _Terence's Comedies_ (1694) and

-_Plautus's Comedies_ (1694).

-

-130. Henry More, _Democritus Platonissans_ (1646).

-

-131. John Evelyn, _The History of Sabatai Sevi, The Suppos'd Messiah of

-the Jews_ (1669).

-

-132. Walter Harte, _An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad_

-(1730).

-

-Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)

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-REGULAR PUBLICATIONS FOR 1968-1969

-

-133. John Courtenay, _A Poetical Review of the Literary and Moral

-Character of the Late Samuel Johnson_ (1786). Introduction by Robert E.

-Kelley.

-

-134. John Downes, _Roscius Anglicanus_ (1708). Introduction by John

-Loftis.

-

-135. Sir John Hill, _Hypochondriasis, a Practical Treatise on the Nature

-and Cure of that Disorder Call'd the Hyp or Hypo_ (1766). Introduction

-by G. S. Rousseau.

-

-136. Thomas Sheridan, _Discourse ... Being Introductory to His Course of

-Lectures on Elocution and the English Language_ (1759). Introduction by

-G. P. Mohrman.

-

-137. Arthur Murphy, _The Englishman From Paris_ (1756). Introduction by

-Simon Trefman. Previously unpublished manuscript.

-

-138. [Catherine Trotter], _Olinda's Adventures_ (1718). Introduction by

-Robert Adams Day.

-

-

-SPECIAL PUBLICATION FOR 1968-1969

-

-_After THE TEMPEST_. Introduction by George Robert Guffey.

-

-Next in the continuing series of special publications by the Society

-will be _After THE TEMPEST_, a volume including the Dryden-Davenant

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-Duffet's _Mock-Tempest_ (1675); and the "Garrick" _Tempest_ (1756), with

-an Introduction by George Robert Guffey.

-

-Already published in this series are:

-

-1. John Ogilby, _The Fables of Aesop Paraphras'd in Verse_ (1668), with

-an Introduction by Earl Miner.

-

-2. John Gay, _Fables_ (1727, 1738), with an Introduction by Vinton A.

-Dearing.

-

-3. Elkanah Settle, _The Empress of Morocco_ (1673) with five plates;

-_Notes and Observations on the Empress of Morocco_ (1674) by John

-Dryden, John Crowne and Thomas Shadwell; _Notes and Observations on the

-Empress of Morocco Revised_ (1674) by Elkanah Settle; and _The Empress

-of Morocco. A Farce_ (1674) by Thomas Duffet; with an Introduction by

-Maximillian E. Novak.

-

-Price to members of the Society, $2.50 for the first copy of each title,

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-Blackwell, Broad Street, Oxford, England.

-

-

-

-

-Footnotes:

-

-[18] Milton's Penseroso.

-

-[19] Biberg.

-

-[20] Reaumur.

-

-[21] asplenon

-

-[22] Silente Luna.

-

-[23] Pulvis Aureus.

-

-

-

-

-      *      *      *      *      *

-

-

-

-

-Transcriber's Notes:

-

-  Long "s" has been modernized.

-

-  Page 21 contains two markers referring to the same footnote.

-

-  The original text contains two sections labeled "Sect. V."

-

-  Passages in italics are indicated by _underscore_.

-

-  Additional spacing after some of the quotes is intentional to indicate

-  both the end of a quotation and the beginning of a new paragraph as

-  presented in the original text.

-

-  The original text includes Greek characters. For this text version these

-  letters have been replaced with transliterations.

-

-  The following misprints have been corrected:

-    "the the" corrected to "the" (page v)

-    "sympton" corrected to "symptom" (page 14)

-    "symptons" corrected to "symptoms" (page 23)

-

-  Other than the corrections listed above, printer's inconsistencies in

-  spelling, punctuation, hyphenation, and ligature usage have been

-  retained.

-

-*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***

+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***
+
+The Augustan Reprint Society
+
+JOHN HILL
+
+HYPOCHONDRIASIS
+
+A Practical Treatise.
+
+(1766)
+
+Introduction by
+
+G. S. ROUSSEAU
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Publication Number 135
+William Andrews Clark Memorial Library
+University Of California, Los Angeles
+1969
+
+
+
+
+GENERAL EDITORS
+
+  William E. Conway, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_
+  George Robert Guffey, _University of California, Los Angeles_
+  Maximillian E. Novak, _University of California, Los Angeles_
+
+
+ASSOCIATE EDITOR
+
+  David S. Rodes, _University of California, Los Angeles_
+
+
+ADVISORY EDITORS
+
+  Richard C. Boys, _University of Michigan_
+  James L. Clifford, _Columbia University_
+  Ralph Cohen, _University of Virginia_
+  Vinton A. Dearing, _University of California, Los Angeles_
+  Arthur Friedman, _University of Chicago_
+  Louis A. Landa, _Princeton University_
+  Earl Miner, _University of California, Los Angeles_
+  Samuel H. Monk, _University of Minnesota_
+  Everett T. Moore, _University of California, Los Angeles_
+  Lawrence Clark Powell, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_
+  James Sutherland, _University College, London_
+  H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., _University of California, Los Angeles_
+  Robert Vosper, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_
+
+
+CORRESPONDING SECRETARY
+
+  Edna C. Davis, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_
+
+
+EDITORIAL ASSISTANT
+
+  Mary Kerbret, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+     "When I first dabbled in this art, the old distemper call'd
+     _Melancholy_ was exchang'd for _Vapours_, and afterwards for the
+     _Hypp_, and at last took up the now current appellation of the
+     _Spleen_, which it still retains, tho' a learned doctor of the
+     west, in a little tract he hath written, divides the _Spleen_ and
+     _Vapours_, not only into the _Hypp_, the _Hyppos_, and the
+     Hyppocons; but subdivides these divisions into the _Markambles_,
+     the _Moonpalls_, the _Strong-Fiacs_, and the _Hockogrokles_."
+
+
+     Nicholas Robinson, _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and
+     Hypochondriack Melancholy_ (London, 1729)
+
+
+Treatises on hypochondriasis--the seventeenth-century medical term for a
+wide range of nervous diseases--were old when "Sir" John Hill, the
+eccentric English scientist, physician, apothecary, and hack writer,
+published his _Hypochondriasis_ in 1766.[1] For at least a century and a
+half medical writers as well as lay authors had been writing literature
+of all types (treatises, pamphlets, poems, sermons, epigrams) on this
+most fashionable of English maladies under the variant names of
+"melancholy," "the spleen," "black melancholy," "hysteria," "nervous
+debility," "the hyp." Despite the plethora of _materia scripta_ on the
+subject it makes sense to reprint Hill's _Hypochondriasis_, because it
+is indeed a "practical treatise" and because it offers the modern
+student of neoclassical literature a clear summary of the best thoughts
+that had been put forth on the subject, as well as an explanation of the
+causes, symptoms, and cures of this commonplace malady.
+
+No reader of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English literature
+needs to be reminded of the interest of writers of the period in the
+condition--"disease" is too confining a term--hypochondriasis.[2] Their
+concern is apparent in both the poetry and prose of two centuries. From
+Robert Burton's Brobdingnagian exposition in _The Anatomy of Melancholy_
+(1621) to Tobias Smollett's depiction of the misanthropic and ailing
+Matthew Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771), and, of course, well into
+the nineteenth century, afflicted heroes and weeping heroines populate
+the pages of England's literature. There is scarcely a decade in the
+period 1600-1800 that does not contribute to the literature of
+melancholy; so considerable in number are the works that could be placed
+under this heading that it actually makes sense to speak of the
+"literature of melancholy." A kaleidoscopic survey of this literature
+(exclusive of treatises written on the subject) would include mention of
+Milton's "Il Penseroso" and "L'Allegro," the meditative Puritan and
+nervous Anglican thinkers of the Restoration (many of whose narrators,
+such as Richard Baxter, author of the _Reliquiae Baxterianae_,[3] are
+afflicted), Swift's "School of Spleen" in _A Tale of a Tub_, Pope's
+hysterical Belinda in the "Cave of Spleen," the melancholic "I" of
+Samuel Richardson's correspondence, Gray's leucocholy, the
+psychosomatically ailing characters of _The Vicar of Wakefield_ and
+_Tristram Shandy_, Boswell's _Hypochondriack Papers_ (1777-1783)
+contributed to the _London Magazine_, and such "sensible" and
+"sensitive" women as Mrs. Bennett and Miss Bates in the novels of Jane
+Austen. So great in bulk is this literature in the mid eighteenth
+century, that C. A. Moore has written, "statistically, this deserves to
+be called the Age of Melancholy."[4] The vastness of this literature is
+sufficient to justify the reprinting of an unavailable practical
+handbook on the subject by a prolific author all too little known.[5]
+
+The medical background of Hill's pamphlet extends further back than the
+seventeenth century and Burton's _Anatomy_. The ancient Greeks had
+theorized about hypochondria: hypochondriasis signified a disorder
+beneath (hypo) the gristle (chondria) and the disease was discussed
+principally in physiological terms. The belief that hypochondriasis was
+a somatic condition persisted until the second half of the seventeenth
+century at which time an innovation was made by Dr. Thomas Sydenham. In
+addition to showing that hypochondriasis and hysteria (thought previously
+by Sydenham to afflict women only) were the same disease, Sydenham noted
+that the external cause of both was a mental disturbance and not a
+physiological one. He also had a theory that the internal and immediate
+cause was a disorder of the animal spirits arising from a clot and
+resulting in pain, spasms, and bodily disorders. By attributing the
+onset of the malady to mental phenomena and not to obstructions of the
+spleen or viscera, Sydenham was moving towards a psychosomatic theory of
+hypochondriasis, one that was to be debated in the next century in
+England, Holland, and France.[6] Sydenham's influence on the physicians
+of the eighteenth century was profound: Cheyne in England, Boerhaave in
+Holland, La Mettrie in France. Once the theory of the nervous origins of
+hypochondria gained ground--here I merely note coincidence, not historical
+cause and effect--the disease became increasingly fashionable in England,
+particularly among the polite, the aristocratic, and the refined. Students
+of the drama will recall Scrub's denial in _The Beaux' Stratagem_ (1707)
+of the possibility that Archer has the spleen and Mrs. Sullen's
+interjection, "I thought that distemper had been only proper to people of
+quality."
+
+Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, hypochondria was so
+prevalent in people's minds and mouths that it soon assumed the
+abbreviated name "the hyp." Entire poems like William Somervile's _The
+Hyp: a Burlesque Poem in Five Canto's_ (1731) and Tim Scrubb's _A Rod
+for the Hyp-Doctor_ (1731) were devoted to this strain; others, like
+Malcom Flemyng's epic poem, _Neuropathia: sive de morbis hypochondriacis
+et hystericis, libri tres, poema medicum_ (1740), were more technical
+and scientific. Professor Donald Davie has written that he has often
+"heard old fashioned and provincial persons [in England and Scotland]
+even in [my] own lifetime say, 'Oh, you give me the hyp,' where we
+should say 'You give me a pain in the neck'"[7]; and I myself have heard
+the expression, "You give me the pip," where "pip" may be a corruption
+of "hyp." As used in the early eighteenth century, the term "hyp" was
+perhaps not far from what our century has learned to call _Angst_. It
+was also used as a synonym for "lunacy," as the anonymous author of
+_Anti-Siris_ (1744), one of the tracts in the tar-water controversy,
+informs us that "Berkeley tells his Countrymen, they are all mad, or
+_Hypochondriac_, which is but a fashionable name for Madness." Bernard
+Mandeville, the Dutch physician and author of _The Fable of the Bees_,
+seems to have understood perfectly well that hypochondriasis is a
+condition encompassing any number of diseases and not a specific and
+readily definable ailment; a condition, moreover, that hovers
+precariously and bafflingly in limbo between mind and body, and he
+stressed this as the theme of his _Treatise of the Hypochondriack and
+Hysteric Passions, Vulgarly Call'd the Hypo in Men and Vapours in Women_
+(1711). The mental causes are noted as well in an anonymous pamphlet in
+the British Museum, _A Treatise on the Dismal Effects of
+Low-Spiritedness_ (1750) and are echoed in many similar early and
+mid-eighteenth century works. Some medical writers of the age, like
+Nicholas Robinson, had reservations about the external mental bases of
+the hyp and preferred to discuss the condition in terms of internal
+physiological causes:
+
+     ...of that Disorder we call the Vapours, or _Hypochondria_; for
+     they have no material distinctive Characters, but what arise from
+     the same Disease affecting different Sexes, and the Vapours in
+     Women are term'd the _Hypochondria_ in Men, and they proceed from
+     the Contraction of the Vessels being depress'd a little beneath the
+     Balance of Nature, and the Relaxation of the Nerves at the same
+     Time, which creates that Uneasiness and Melancholy that naturally
+     attends Vapours, and which generally is an Intemperature of the
+     whole Body, proceeding from a Depression of the Solids beneath the
+     Balance of Nature; but the Intemperature of the Parts is that
+     Peculiar Disposition whereby they favour any Disease.[8]
+
+
+But the majority of medical thinkers had been persuaded that the
+condition was psychosomatic, and this belief was supported by research
+on nerves by important physicians in the 1740's and 1750's: the Monro
+brothers in London, Robert Whytt in Edinburgh, Albrecht von Haller in
+Leipzig. By mid century the condition known as the hyp was believed to
+be a real, not an imaginary ailment, common, peculiar in its
+manifestations, and indefinable, almost impossible to cure, producing
+very real symptoms of physical illness, and said to originate sometimes
+in depression and idleness. It was summed up by Robert James in his
+_Medicinal Dictionary_ (London, 1743-45):
+
+     If we thoroughly consider its Nature, it will be found to be a
+     spasmodico-flatulent Disorder of the _Primae Viae_, that is, of the
+     Stomach and Intestines, arising from an Inversion or Perversion of
+     their peristaltic Motion, and, by the mutual consent of the Parts,
+     throwing the whole nervous System into irregular Motions, and
+     disturbing the whole Oeconomy of the Functions.... no part or
+     Function of the Body escapes the Influence of this tedious and long
+     protracted Disease, whose Symptoms are so violent and numerous,
+     that it is no easy Task either to enumerate or account for them....
+     No disease is more troublesome, either to the Patient or Physician,
+     than hypochondriac Disorders; and it often happens, that, thro' the
+     Fault of both, the Cure is either unnecessarily protracted, or
+     totally frustrated; for the Patients are so delighted, not only
+     with a Variety of Medicines, but also of Physicians.... On the
+     contrary, few physicians are sufficiently acquainted with the true
+     Genius and Nature of this perplexing Disorder; for which Reason
+     they boldly prescribe almost everything contained in the Shops, not
+     without an irreparable Injury to the Patient (article on
+     "Hypochondriacus Morbis").
+
+This is a more technical description than Hill gives anywhere in his
+handbook, but it serves well to summarize the background of the condition
+about which Sir John wrote.
+
+Hill's _Hypochondriasis_ adds little that is new to the theory of the
+disease. It incorporates much of the thinking set forth by the writings
+mentioned above, particularly those of George Cheyne, whose medical
+works _The English Malady_ (1733) and _The Natural Method of Cureing the
+Diseases of the Body, and the Disorders of the Mind Depending on the
+Body_ (1742) Hill knew. He is also conversant with some Continental
+writers on the subject, two of whom--Isaac Biberg, author of The
+_Oeconomy of Nature_ (1751), and René Réaumur who had written a history
+of insects (1722)[9]--he mentions explicitly, and with William
+Stukeley's _Of the Spleen_ (1723). Internal evidence indicates that Hill
+had read or was familiar with the ideas propounded in Richard
+Blackmore's _Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours_ (1725) and Nicholas
+Robinson's _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and Hypochondriack
+Melancholy_ (1729).
+
+Hill's arrangement of sections is logical: he first defines the
+condition (I), then proceeds to discuss persons most susceptible to it
+(II), its major symptoms (III), consequences (IV), causes (V), and cures
+(VI-VIII). In the first four sections almost every statement is
+commonplace and requires no commentary (for example, Hill's opening
+remark: "To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and
+cruel. It is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by
+thickened and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver,
+and other parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick
+scarce knows one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.") His
+belief that the condition afflicts sedentary persons, particularly
+students, philosophers, theologians, and that it is not restricted to
+women alone--as some contemporary thinkers still maintained--is also
+impossible to trace to a single source, as is his description (p. 12) of
+the most prevalent physiological _symptoms_ ("lowness of spirits, and
+inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love of solitude....
+Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness") and _causes_ (the poor and damp
+English climate and the resultant clotting of blood in the spleen) of
+the illness.
+
+Sections V-VIII, dealing with causes and cures, are less commonplace and
+display some of Hill's eccentricities as a writer and thinker. He uses
+the section entitled "Cures" as a means to peddle his newly discovered
+cure-all, water dock,[10] which Smollett satirized through the mouth of
+Tabitha Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771). Hill also rebelled against
+contemporary apothecaries and physicians who prescribed popular
+medicines--such as Berkeley's tar-water, Dover's mercury powders, and
+James's fever-powders--as universal panaceas for the cure of the hyp.
+"No acrid medicine must be directed, for that may act too hastily,
+dissolve the impacted matter at once, and let it loose, to the
+destruction of the sufferer; no antimonial, no mercurial, no martial
+preparation must be taken; in short, no chymistry: nature is the shop
+that heaven has set before us, and we must seek our medicine there"
+(p. 24). However scientifically correct Hill may have been in minimizing
+the efficacy of current pills and potions advertised as remedies for the
+hyp, he was unusual for his time in objecting so strongly to them. Less
+eccentric was his allegiance to the "Ancients" rather than to the
+"Moderns" so far as chemical treatment (i.e., restoration of the humours
+by chemical rearrangement) of hypochondriasis is concerned.[11] "The
+venerable ancients," Hill writes, "who knew not this new art, will lead
+us in the search; and (faithful relators as they are of truth) will tell
+us whence we may deduce our hope; and what we are to fear" (p. 24).
+
+Still more idiosyncratic, perhaps, is Hill's contention (p. 25) that the
+air of dry, high grounds worsens the condition of the patient. Virtually
+every writer I have read on the subject believed that onset of the hyp
+was caused by one of the six non-naturals--air, diet, lack of sufficient
+sleep, too little or too much exercise, defective evacuation, the
+passions of the mind; and although some medical writers emphasized the
+last of these,[12] few would have concurred with Hill that the fetid air
+of London was less harmful than the clearer air at Highgate. All readers
+of the novel of the period will recall the hypochondriacal Matt
+Bramble's tirade against the stench of London air. Beliefs of the
+variety here mentioned cause me to question Hill's importance in the
+history of medicine; there can be no question about his contributions to
+the advancement of the science of botany through popularization of
+Linnaeus' system of bisexual classification, but Hill's medical
+importance is summarized best as that of a compiler. His recommendation
+of the study of botany as a cure for melancholics is sensible but verges
+on becoming "a digression in praise of the author," a poetic _apologia
+pro vita sua_ in Augustan fashion:
+
+     For me, I should advise above all other things the study of nature.
+     Let him begin with plants: he will here find a continual pleasure,
+     and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful things; even of
+     the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to walk; and
+     every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket, will
+     afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually in
+     the air; and continually to change the nature and quality of the
+     air, by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the
+     lawn, the heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be
+     abroad; and the unceasing variety of the subjects of his
+     observation, will prevent his walking hastily: he will pursue his
+     studies in the air; and that contemplative turn of mind, which in
+     his closet threatened his destruction, will thus become the great
+     means of his recovery (pp. 26-27).
+
+Hill was forever extolling the claims of a life devoted to the study of
+nature, as we see in a late work, _The Virtues of British Herbs_ (1770).
+Judicious as is the logic of this recommendation, one cannot help but
+feel that the emphasis here is less on diversion as a cure and more on
+the botanic attractions of "every hedge and hillock, every foot-path
+side, and thicket."
+
+While Hill's rules and regulations regarding proper diet (Section VII)
+are standard, several taken almost _verbatim et literatim_ from Cheyne's
+list in _The English Malady_ (1733), his recommendation (Section VIII)
+of "Spleen-Wort" as the best medicine for the hypochondriac patient is
+not. Since Hill devotes so much space to the virtues of this herb and
+concludes his work extolling this plant, a word should be said about it.
+Throughout his life he was an active botanist. Apothecary, physician,
+and writer though he was, it was ultimately botany that was his ruling
+passion, as is made abundantly clear in his correspondence.[13] Wherever
+he lived--whether in the small house in St. James's Street or in the
+larger one on the Bayswater Road--he cultivated an herb garden that
+flattered his knowledge and ability. Connoisseurs raved about its
+species and considered it one of the showpieces of London. His arrogant
+personality alone prevented him from becoming the first Keeper of the
+Apothecary's Garden in Chelsea, although he was for a time
+superintendent to the Dowager Princess of Wales's gardens at Kensington
+Palace and at Kew. His interest in cultivation of herbs nevertheless
+continued; over the years Hill produced more than thirty botanical
+works, many of them devoted to the medical virtues of rare herbs such as
+"Spleen-Wort." Among these are _The British Herbal_ (1756), _On the
+Virtues of Sage in Lengthening Human Life_ (1763), _Centaury, the Great
+Stomachic_ (1765), _Polypody_ (1768), _A Method of Curing Jaundice_
+(1768), _Instances of the Virtue of Petasite Root_ (1771), and _Twenty
+Five New Plants_ (1773).[14] It is therefore not surprising that he
+should believe a specific herb to be the best remedy for a complicated
+medical condition. Nor is his reference to the Ancients as authority for
+the herbal pacification of an inflamed spleen surprising in the light of
+his researches: he was convinced that every illness could be cured by
+taking an appropriate herb or combination of herbs. Whereas a few
+nonmedical writers--such as John Wesley in _Primitive Physick_
+(1747)--had advocated the taking of one or two herbs in moderate dosage
+as anti-hysterics (the eighteenth-century term for all cures of the
+hyp), no medical writer of the century ever promoted the use of herbs to
+the extent that Hill did. In fairness to him, it is important to note
+that his herbal remedies were harmless and that many found their way
+into the official _London Pharmacopeia_. "The virtues of this smooth
+Spleen-wort," he insists, "have stood the test of ages; and the plant
+every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good
+herbarists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and
+hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it"
+(p. 37).[15] The greatest portion of Hill's concluding section combines
+advertisement for the powder medicine he was himself manufacturing at a
+handsome profit together with a protest against competing apothecaries:
+"An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in
+the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was
+written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and
+almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but
+what is very striking, not one of them the right" (p. 42).
+
+Treatises on hypochondriasis did not cease to be printed after Hill's in
+1766, but continued to issue from the presses into the nineteenth
+century. A good example of this is the tome by John Reid, physician to
+the Finsbury Dispensary in London, _Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis
+and Other Nervous Affections_ (1816), which summarizes theories of the
+malady.[16] A bibliographical study of such works would probably reveal
+a larger number of titles in the nineteenth century than in the previous
+one, but by this time the nature and definition of hypochondria had
+changed significantly.
+
+If John Hill's volume is not an important contribution in the history of
+medicine, it is a lucid and brief exposition of many of the best ideas
+that had been thought and written on the hyp, with the exception of his
+uninhibited prescribing of herbal medicines as cure-alls. An
+understanding of this disease is essential for readers of neoclassical
+English literature, especially when we reflect upon the fact that some
+of the best literature of the period was composed by writers whom it
+afflicted. It is perhaps not without significance that the greatest poet
+of the Augustan age, Alexander Pope, thought it necessary as he lay on
+his deathbed in May 1744 to exclaim with his last breath, "I never was
+hippish in my whole life."[17]
+
+  University of California,
+  Los Angeles
+
+
+
+
+NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION
+
+
+[1] The text here reproduced is that of the copy in the Library of the
+Royal Society of Medicine, London. Title pages of different copies of
+the first edition of 1766 vary. For example, the title page of the copy
+in the British Museum reads, _Hypochondriasis; a Practical Treatise On
+the Nature and Cure of that Disorder, Commonly called the Hyp and the
+Hypo_. The copy in the Royal Society of Medicine contains, among other
+additions, the words "by Sir John Hill" in pencil, and "8vo Lond.
+1766," written in ink and probably a later addition.
+
+[2] Melancholy, hypochondriasis, and the spleen were considered in the
+seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to be one complex condition, a
+malady rather than a malaise, which is but a symptom. Distinctions among
+these, of interest primarily to medical historians, cannot be treated
+here. As good a definition as any is found in Dr. Johnson's _Dictionary_
+(1755): "Hypochondriacal.... 1. Melancholy; disordered in the
+imagination.... 2. Producing melancholy...." The literature of
+melancholy has been surveyed in part by C. A. Moore, "The English
+Malady," _Backgrounds of English Literature 1700-1760_ (Minneapolis,
+1953), pp. 179-235. In medical parlance, "hypochondria" means the soft
+parts of the body below the costal cartilages, and the singular form of
+the word, "hypochondrium," means the viscera situated in the
+hypochondria, i.e., the liver, gall bladder, and spleen.
+
+[3] See Samuel Clifford's _The Signs and Causes of Melancholy, with
+directions suited to the case of those who are afflicted with it.
+Collected out of the works of Mr. Richard Baxter_ (London, 1716) in the
+British Museum.
+
+[4] _Backgrounds of English Literature_, p. 179.
+
+[5] See my forthcoming biography, _The Literary Quack: A Life of 'Sir'
+John Hill of London_, and John Kennedy's _Some Remarks on the Life and
+Writings of Dr. J---- H----, Inspector General of Great Britain_
+(London, 1752).
+
+[6] For some of this background see L. J. Rather, _Mind and Body in
+Eighteenth Century Medicine: A Study Based on Jerome Gaub's De Regimine
+Mentis_ (London, 1965), pp. 135-90 _passim_.
+
+[7] _Science and Literature 1700-1740_ (London, 1964), pp. 50-51.
+
+[8] _A New Theory of Physick_ (London, 1725), p. 56.
+
+[9] Biberg was a Swedish naturalist and had studied botany under
+Linnaeus in Uppsala; Réaumur, a French botanist, had contributed papers
+to the _Philosophical Transactions_ of the Royal Society in London.
+
+[10] _The Power of Water-Dock against the Scurvy whether in the Plain
+Root or Essence...._ (London, 1765), had been published six months
+earlier than _Hypochondriasis_ and had earned Hill a handsome profit.
+
+[11] I have treated aspects of this subject in my article, "Matt Bramble
+and The Sulphur Controversy in the XVIIIth Century: Medical Background
+of _Humphry Clinker_," _JHI_, XXVIII (1967), 577-90.
+
+[12] See, for example, Jeremiah Waineright, _A Mechanical Account of the
+Non-Naturals_ (1707); John Arbuthnot, _An Essay Concerning the Effects
+of Air on Human Bodies_ (1733); Frank Nichols, _De Anima Medica_ (1750).
+
+[13] Hill's correspondence is not published but shall be printed as an
+appendix to my forthcoming biography.
+
+[14] I have discussed some of these works in connection with the medical
+background of John Wesley's _Primitive Physick_ (1747). See G. S.
+Rousseau, _Harvard Library Bulletin_, XVI (1968), 242-56.
+
+[15] It is difficult to know with certainty when Hill first became
+interested in the herb. He mentions it in passing in _The British
+Herbal_ (1756), I, 526 and may have sold it as early as 1742 when he
+opened an apothecary shop.
+
+[16] Reid's dissertation at Edinburgh, entitled _De Insania_ (1798),
+contains materials on the relationship of the imagination to all forms
+of mental disturbance. Secondary literature on hypochondria is
+plentiful. Works include: R. H. Gillespie, _Hypochondria_ (London,
+1928), William K. Richmond, _The English Disease_ (London, 1958),
+Charles Chenevix Trench, _The Royal Malady_ (New York, 1964), and Ilza
+Vieth, _Hysteria: The History of a Disease_ (Chicago, 1965), and "On
+Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Afflictions," _Bulletin of the History of
+Medicine_, XXX (1956), 233-40.
+
+[17] Joseph Spence, _Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books
+and Men_, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, 264.
+
+I am indebted to A. D. Morris, M.D., F.R.S.M., for help of various sorts
+in writing this introduction.
+
+
+
+
+BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
+
+The text of this facsimile of _Hypochondriasis_ is reproduced from a
+copy in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, London.
+
+
+
+
+     HYPOCHONDRIASIS.
+
+            A
+
+  PRACTICAL TREATISE, &c.
+
+
+
+HYPOCHONDRIASIS.
+
+
+SECT. I.
+
+The NATURE of the DISORDER.
+
+
+To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and cruel. It
+is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by thickened
+and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver, and other
+parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick scarce knows
+one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.
+
+The blood is a mixture of many fluids, which, in a state of health, are
+so combined, that the whole passes freely through its appointed vessels;
+but if by the loss of the thinner parts, the rest becomes too gross to
+be thus carried through, it will stop where the circulation has least
+power; and having thus stopped it will accumulate; heaping by degrees
+obstruction on obstruction.
+
+Health and chearfulness, and the quiet exercise of mind, depend upon a
+perfect circulation: is it a wonder then, when this becomes impeded the
+body looses of its health, and the temper of its sprightliness? to be
+otherwise would be the miracle; and he inhumanly insults the afflicted,
+who calls all this a voluntary frowardness. Its slightest state brings
+with it sickness, anguish and oppression; and innumerable ills follow
+its advancing steps, unless prevented by timely care; till life itself
+grows burthensome.
+
+The disease was common in antient Greece; and her physicians understood
+it, better than those perhaps of later times, in any other country; who
+though happy in many advantages these fathers of the science could not
+have, yet want the great assistance of frequent watching it in all its
+stages.
+
+Those venerable writers have delivered its nature, and its cure: in the
+first every thing now shews they were right; and what they have said as
+to the latter will be found equally true and certain. This, so far as
+present experience has confirmed it, and no farther, will be here laid
+before the afflicted in a few plain words.
+
+
+
+
+SECT. II.
+
+Persons Subject to it.
+
+
+Fatigue of mind, and great exertion of its powers often give birth to
+this disease; and always tend to encrease it. The finer spirits are
+wasted by the labour of the brain: the Philosopher rises from his study
+more exhausted than the Peasant leaves his drudgery; without the benefit
+that he has from exercise. Greatness of mind, and steady virtue;
+determined resolution, and manly firmness, when put in action, and
+intent upon their object, all also lead to it: perhaps whatever tends to
+the ennobling of the soul has equal share in bringing on this weakness
+of the body.
+
+From this we may learn easily who are the men most subject to it; the
+grave and studious, those of a sedate temper and enlarged understanding,
+the learned and wise, the virtuous and the valiant: those whom it were
+the interest of the world to wish were free from this and every other
+illness; and who perhaps, except for this alloy, would have too large a
+portion of human happiness.
+
+Though these are most, it is not these alone, who are subject to it.
+There are countries where it is endemial, and in other places some have
+the seeds of it in their constitution; and in some it takes rise from
+accidents. In these last it is the easiest of cure; and in the first
+most difficult.
+
+Beside the Greeks already named, the Jews of old time were heavily
+afflicted with this disease; and in their descendants to this day it is
+often constitutional: the Spaniards have it almost to a man; and so have
+the American Indians. Perhaps the character of these several nations may
+be connected with it. The steady honour, and firm valour of the
+Spaniard, very like that of the ancient Doric nation, who followed the
+flute not the trumpet to the field; and met the enemy, not with shouts
+and fury, but with a determined virtue: it is the temper of the
+Hypochondriac to be slow, but unmoveably resolved: the Jew has shewn
+this mistakenly, but almost miraculously; and the poor Indian, untaught
+as he is, faces all peril with composure, and sings his death-song with
+an unalter'd countenance.
+
+Among particular persons the most inquiring and contemplative are those
+who suffer oftenest by this disease; and of all degrees of men I think
+the clergy. I do not mean the hunting, shooting, drinking clergy, who
+bear the tables of the great; but the retir'd and conscientious; such as
+attend in midnight silence to their duty; and seek in their own cool
+breasts, or wheresoever else they may be found, new admonitions for an
+age plunged in new vices. To this disease we owe the irreparable loss of
+Dr. YOUNG; and the present danger of many other the best and most
+improved amongst us. May what is here to be proposed assist in their
+preservation!
+
+The Geometrician or the learned Philosopher of whatever denomination,
+whose course of study fixes his eye for ever on one object, his mind
+intensely and continually employed upon one thought, should be warned
+also that he is in danger; or if he find himself already afflicted, he
+should be told that the same course of life, which brought it on, will,
+without due care, encrease it to the most dreaded violence.
+
+The middle period of life is that in which there is the greatest danger
+of an attack from this disease; and the latter end of autumn, when the
+summer heats have a little time been over, is the season when in our
+climate its first assaults are most to be expected. The same time of the
+year always increases the disorder in those who have been before
+afflicted with it; and it is a truth must be confessed, that from its
+first attack the patient grows continually, though slowly, worse; unless
+a careful regimen prevent it.
+
+The constitutions most liable to this obstruction are the lean, and dark
+complexioned; the grave and sedentary. Let such watch the first
+symptoms; and obviate, (as they may with ease) that which it will be
+much more difficult to remove.
+
+It is happy a disease, wherein the patient must do a great deal for
+himself, falls, for the most part, upon those who have the powers of
+reason strongest. Let them only be aware of this, that the distemper
+naturally disposes them to inactivity; and reason will have no use
+unless accompanied with resolution to enforce it.
+
+Though the physician can do something toward the cure, much more depends
+upon the patient; and here his constancy of mind will be employed most
+happily. No one is better qualified to judge on a fair hearing what
+course is the most fit; and having made that choice, he must with
+patience wait its good effects. Diseases that come on slowly must have
+time for curing; an attention to the first appearances of the disorder
+will be always happiest; because when least established it is easiest
+overthrown: but when that happy period has been neglected, he must wait
+the effects of such a course as will dilute and melt the obstructing
+matter gradually; for till that be done it is not only vain, but
+sometimes dangerous, to attempt its expulsion from the body.
+
+The blood easily separates itself into the grosser and the thinner
+parts: we see this in bleeding; and from the toughness of the red cake
+may guess how very difficult it will be to dissolve a substance of like
+firmness in the vessels of the body. That it can thus become thickened
+within the body, a Pleurisy shews us too evidently: in that case it is
+brought on suddenly, and with inflammation; in this other, slowly and
+without; and here, even before it forms the obstruction, can bring on
+many mischiefs. Various causes can produce the same effect, but that in
+all cases operates most durably, which operates most slowly. The watery
+part of the blood is its mild part; in the remaining gross matter of it,
+are acrid salts and burning oils, and these, when destitute of that
+happy dilution nature gives them in a healthy body, are capable of doing
+great mischief to the tender vessels in which they are kept stagnant.
+
+
+
+
+SECT. III.
+
+The SYMPTOMS of the DISORDER.
+
+
+The first and lightest of the signs that shew this illness are a lowness
+of spirits, and inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love
+of solitude and a habit of thinking, even on trifling subjects, with too
+much steadiness. A very little help may combat these: but if that
+indolence which is indeed a part of the disorder, will neglect them;
+worse must be expected soon to follow.
+
+Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness, weight, and oppression in the body,
+a want of appetite, or, what is worse, an appetite without digestion;
+for these are the conditions of different states of the disease, a
+fullness and a difficulty of breathing after meals, a straitness of the
+breast, pains and flatulencies in the bowels, and an unaptness to
+discharge their contents.
+
+The pulse becomes low, weak, and unequal; and there are frequent
+palpitations of the heart, a little dark-coloured urine is voided at
+some times; and a flood of colourless and insipid at others; relieving
+for a moment, but increasing the distemper: there is in some cases also
+a continual teazing cough, with a choaking stoppage in the throat at
+times; then heartburn, sickness, hardness of the belly, and a costive
+habit, or a tormenting and vain irritation.
+
+The lips turn pale, the eyes loose their brightness and by degrees the
+white grows as it were greenish, the gums want their due firmness, with
+their proper colour; and an unpleasing foulness grows upon the teeth:
+the inside of the mouth is pale and furred, and the throat dry and
+husky: the colour of the skin is pale (though there are periods when the
+face is florid) and as the obstruction gathers ground, and more affects
+the liver, the whole body becomes yellow, tawny, greenish, and at length
+of that deep and dusky hue, to which men of swift imagination have given
+the name of blackness.
+
+These symptoms do not all appear in any one period of the disease, or in
+one case, but at one time or other all of them, as well as those which
+follow: the flesh becomes cold to the touch, though the patient does not
+himself perceive it; the limbs grow numbed and torpid, the breathing
+dull and slow, and the voice hollow; and usually the appetite in this
+period declines, and comes almost to nothing: night sweats come on,
+black swellings appear on the veins, the flesh wastes and the breast
+becomes flat and hollow: the mouth is full of a thin spittle, the head
+is dizzy and confus'd, and sometimes there is an unconquerable numbness
+in the organs of speech.
+
+I have known the temporary silence that follows upon this last symptom
+become a jest to the common herd; and the unhappy patient, instead of
+compassion and assistance, receive the reproof of sullenness, from those
+who should have known and acted better.
+
+About twenty years ago I met on a visit at Catthorpe in Leicestershire a
+young gentleman of distinguished learning and abilities, who at certain
+times was speechless. The vulgar thought it a pretence: and a jocose
+lady, where he was at tea with company, putting him as she said to a
+trial, poured out a dish very strong and without sugar. He drank it and
+returned the cup with a bow of great reserve, and his eye bent on the
+ground: she then filled the cup with sugar, and pouring weak tea on it,
+sent it him: he drank that too, looked at her steadily, and blushed for
+her. The lady declared the man was dumb; the rest thought him perverse,
+and obstinate; but a constant and steady perseverance in an easy method
+cured him.
+
+All these are miseries which the disease, while it retains its natural
+form, can bring upon the patient; and thus he will in time be worn out,
+and led miserably, though slowly, to the grave. Let him not indulge his
+inactivity so far as to give way to this, because it is represented as
+far off; the disease may suddenly and frightfully change its nature; and
+swifter evils follow.
+
+
+
+
+SECT. IV.
+
+The DANGER.
+
+
+We have done with the obstruction considered in itself; but this, though
+often unsurmountable by art, at least by the methods now in use, will be
+sometimes broken through at once by nature, or by accidents; and bring
+on fatal evils. These are strictly different diseases, and are no
+otherway concerned here, than as the consequences of that of which we
+are treating.
+
+The thick and glutinous blood which has so long stagnated in the spleen,
+will have in that time altered its nature, and acquired a very great
+degree of acrimony: while it lies dormant, this does no more mischiefs,
+than those named already; but when violent exercise, a fit of outrageous
+anger, or any thing else that suddenly shocks and disturbs the frame,
+puts it in motion, it melts at once into a kind of liquid putrefaction.
+Being now thin, it mixes itself readily with the blood again, and brings
+on putrid fevers; destroys the substance of the spleen itself, or being
+thrown upon some other of the viscera, corrodes them, and leads on this
+way a swift and miserable death. If it fall upon the liver, its tender
+pulpy substance is soon destroyed, jaundices beyond the help of art
+first follow, then dropsies and all their train of misery; if on lungs,
+consumptions; if on the brain, convulsions, epilepsy, palsy, apoplexy;
+if on the surface, leprosy.
+
+The intention of cure is to melt this coagulation softly, not to break
+it violently; and then to give it a very gentle passage through the
+bowels. There is no safe way for it to take but that; and even that when
+urged too far may bring on fatal dysenteries.
+
+Let none wonder at the sudden devastation which sometimes arises from
+this long stagnant matter, when liquified too hastily: how long, how
+many years the impacted matter will continue quiet in a schirrous tumour
+of the breast; but being once put in motion, whether from accident, or
+in the course of nature, what can describe; or what can stop its
+havock!
+
+Instances of the other are too frequent. A nobleman the other day died
+paralytick: dissection shewed a spleen consumed by an abscess, formed
+from the dissolved matter of such an obstruction: and 'tis scarce longer
+since, a learned gentleman, who had been several years lost to his
+friends, by the extreams of a Hypochondriacal disorder, seem'd gradually
+without assistance to recover: but the lungs suffered while the spleen
+was freed; and he died very soon of what is called a galloping
+consumption.
+
+When the obstruction is great and of long continuance, if it be thus
+hastily moved, the consequence is, equally, a sudden and a miserable
+death, whether, like the matter of a cancer, it remains in its place; or
+like that of a bad small pox, be thrown upon some other vital part.
+
+Let not the patient be too much alarmed; this is laid down to caution,
+not to terrify him: it is fit he should know his danger, and attend to
+it; for the prevention is easy; and the cure, even of the most advanced
+stages, when undertaken by gentle means, is not at all impracticable: to
+assist the physician, let him look into himself, and recollect the
+source of his complaint. This he may judge of from the following
+notices.
+
+
+
+
+SECT. V.
+
+The Causes of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.
+
+
+The obstruction which forms this disease, may take its origin from
+different accidents: a fever ill cured has often caused it; or the
+piles, which had been used to discharge largely, ceasing; a marshy soil,
+poisoned with stagnant water, has given it to some persons; and altho'
+indolence and inactivity are oftenest at the root, yet it has arisen
+from too great exercise.
+
+Real grief has often brought it on; and even love, for sometimes that is
+real. Study and fixed attention of the mind have been accused before;
+and add to these the stooping posture of the body, which most men use,
+though none should use it, in writing and in reading. This has
+contributed too much to it; but of all other things night studies are
+the most destructive. The steady stillness, and dusky habit of all
+nature in those hours, enforce, encourage, and support that settled
+gloom, which rises from fixt thought; and sinks the body to the grave;
+even while it carries up the mind to heaven. He who would have his lamp
+
+        _At midnight hour
+  Be seen in some high lonely tower,_[18]
+
+will waste the flame of this unheeded life: and while he labours to
+unsphere the spirit of Plato[18] will let loose his own.
+
+
+
+
+SECT. VI.
+
+The Cure of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.
+
+
+Let him who would escape the mischiefs of an obstructed spleen, avoid
+the things here named: and let him who suffers from the malady,
+endeavour to remember to which of them it has been owing; for half the
+hope depends upon that knowledge.
+
+Nature has sometimes made a cure herself, and we should watch her ways;
+for art never is so right as when it imitates her: sometimes the
+patient's own resolution has set him free. This is always in his power,
+and at all times will do wonders.
+
+The bleeding of the piles, from nature's single efforts, has at once
+cured a miserable man; where their cessation was the cause of the
+disorder. A leprosy has appeared upon the skin, and all the symptoms of
+the former sickness vanished. This among the Jews happened often: both
+diseases we know were common among them: and I have here seen something
+very like it: Water-Dock has thrown out scorbutic eruptions, and all the
+former symptoms of an Hypochondriacal disorder have disappeared:
+returning indeed when these were unadvisedly struck in; but keeping off
+entirely when they were better treated. A natural purging unsuppressed
+has sometimes done the same good office: but this is hazardous.
+
+It is easy to be directed from such instances; only let us take the
+whole along with us. Bleeding would have answered nature's purpose, if
+she could not have opened of herself the hæmorrhoidal vessels; but he
+who should give medicines for that purpose, might destroy his patient by
+too great disturbance. If a natural looseness may perform the cure, so
+may an artificial; when the original source of the disorder points that
+way. But these are helps that take place only in particular cases.
+
+The general and universal method of cure must be by some mild and gently
+resolving medicine, under the influence of which the obstructing matter
+may be voided that, or some other way with safety. The best season to
+undertake this is the autumn, but even here there must be caution.
+
+In the first place, no strong evacuating remedy must be given; for that,
+by carrying off the thinner parts of the juices, will tend to thicken
+the remainder; and certainly encrease the distemper. No acrid medicine
+must be directed, for that may act too hastily, dissolve the impacted
+matter at once, and let it loose, to the destruction of the sufferer; no
+antimonial, no mercurial, no martial preparation must be taken; in
+short, no chymistry: nature is the shop that heaven has set before us,
+and we must seek our medicine there. The venerable ancients, who knew
+not this new art, will lead us in the search; and (faithful relators as
+they are of truth) will tell us whence we may deduce our hope; and what
+we are to fear.
+
+But prior to the course of any medicine, and as an essential to any good
+hope from it, the patient must prescribe himself a proper course of
+life, and a well chosen diet: let us assist him in his choice; and speak
+of this first, as it comes first in order.
+
+
+
+
+SECT. VI.
+
+Rules of Life for Hypochondriac Persons.
+
+
+Air and exercise, as they are the best preservers of health, and
+greatest assistants in the cure of all long continued diseases, will
+have their full effect in this; but there requires some caution in the
+choice, and management of them. It is common to think the air of high
+grounds best; but experience near home shews otherwise: the
+Hypochondriac patient is always worse at Highgate even than in London.
+
+The air he breathes should be temperate; not exposed to the utmost
+violences of heat and cold, and the swift changes from one to the
+other; which are most felt on those high grounds. The side of a hill is
+the best place for him: and though wet grounds are hurtful; yet let
+there be the shade of trees, to tempt him often to a walk; and soften by
+their exhalation the over dryness of the air.
+
+The exercise he takes should be frequent; but not violent. Motion
+preserves the firmness of the parts, and elasticity of the vessels; it
+prevents that aggregation of thick humours which he is most to fear. A
+sedentary life always produces weakness, and that mischief always
+follows: weak eyes are gummy, weak lungs are clogged with phlegm, and
+weak bowels waste themselves in vapid diarrhoeas.
+
+Let him invite himself abroad, and let his friends invite him by every
+innocent inducement. For me, I should advise above all other things the
+study of nature. Let him begin with plants: he will here find a
+continual pleasure, and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful
+things; even of the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to
+walk; and every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket,
+will afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually
+in the air, and continually to change the nature and quality of the air,
+by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the lawn, the
+heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be abroad; and the
+unceasing variety of the subjects of his observation, will prevent his
+walking hastily: he will pursue his studies in the air; and that
+contemplative turn of mind, which in his closet threatened his
+destruction, will thus become the great means of his recovery.
+
+If the mind tire upon this, from the repeated use, another of nature's
+kingdoms opens itself at once upon him; the plant he is weary of
+observing, feeds some insect he may examine; nor is there a stone that
+lies before his foot, but may afford instruction and amusement.
+
+Even what the vulgar call the most abject things will shew a wonderful
+utility; and lead the mind, in pious contemplation higher than the
+stars. The poorest moss that is trampled under foot, has its important
+uses: is it at the bottom of a wood we find it? why there it shelters
+the fallen seeds; hides them from birds, and covers them from frost;
+and thus becomes the foster father of another forest! creeps it along
+the surface of a rock? even there its good is infinite! its small roots
+run into the stone, and the rains make their way after them; the moss
+having lived its time dies; it rots and with the mouldered fragments of
+the stone forms earth; wherein, after a few successions, useful plants
+may grow, and feed more useful cattle![19]
+
+Is there a weed more humble in its aspect, more trampled on, or more
+despised than knot grass! no art can get the better of its growth, no
+labour can destroy it; 'twere pity if they could, for the thing lives
+where nothing would of use to us; and its large and most wonderfully
+abundant seeds, feed in hard winters, half the birds of Heaven.
+
+What the weak moss performs upon the rock the loathed toadstool brings
+about in timber: is an oak dead where man's eye will not find it? this
+fungus roots itself upon the bark, and rots the wood beneath it; hither
+the beetle creeps for shelter, and for sustenance; him the woodpecker
+follows as his prey; and while he tears the tree in search of him, he
+scatters it about the ground; which it manures.
+
+Nor is it the beetle alone that thus insinuates itself into the
+substance of the vegetable tribe: the tender aphide[20], whom a touch
+destroys, burrows between the two skins of a leaf, for shelter from his
+winged enemies; tracing, with more than Dedalæan art, his various
+meanders; and veining the green surface with these white lines more
+beautifully than the best Ægyptian marble.
+
+'Twere endless to proceed; nor is it needful: one object will not fail
+to lead on to another, and every where the goodness of his God will
+shine before him even in what are thought the vilest things; his
+greatness in the lead of them.
+
+Let him pursue these thoughts, and seek abroad the objects and the
+instigations to them: but let him in these and all other excursions
+avoid equally the dews of early morning, and of evening.
+
+The more than usual exercise of this prescription will dispose him to
+more than customary sleep, let him indulge it freely; so far from
+hurting, it will help his cure.
+
+Let him avoid all excesses: drink need scarce be named, for we are
+writing to men of better and of nobler minds, than can be tempted to
+that humiliating vice. Those who in this disorder have too great an
+appetite, must not indulge it; much eaten was never well digested: but
+of all excesses the most fatal in this case is that of venery. It is the
+excess we speak of.
+
+
+
+
+SECT. VII.
+
+The proper DIET.
+
+
+In the first place acids must be avoided carefully; and all things that
+are in a state of fermentation, for they will breed acidity. Provisions
+hardened by salting never should be tasted; much less those cured by
+smoaking, and by salting. Bacon is indigestible in an Hypochondriac
+stomach; and hams, impregnated as is now the custom, with acid fumes
+from the wood fires over which they are hung, have that additional
+mischief.
+
+Milk ought to be a great article in the diet: and even in this there
+should be choice. The milk of grass-fed cows has its true quality: no
+other. There are a multitude of ways in which this may be made a part
+both of our foods and drinks, and they should all be used.
+
+The great and general caution is that the diet be at all times of a kind
+loosening and gently stimulating; light but not acrid. Veal, lamb,
+fowls, lobsters, crabs, craw-fish, fresh water fish and mutton broth,
+with plenty of boiled vegetables, are always right; and give enough
+variety.
+
+Raw vegetables are all bad: sour wines, old cheese, and bottled beer are
+things never to be once tasted. Indeed much wine is wrong, be it of what
+kind soever. It is the first of cordials; and as such I would have it
+taken in this disease when it is wanted: plainly as a medicine, rather
+than a part of diet. Malt liquor carefully chosen is certainly the best
+drink. This must be neither new, nor tending to sourness; perfectly
+clear, and of a moderate strength: it is the native liquor of our
+country, and the most healthful.
+
+Too much tea weakens; and even sugar is in this disorder hurtful: but
+honey may supply its place in most things; and this is not only harmless
+but medicinal; a very powerful dissolvent of impacted humours, and a
+great deobstruent.
+
+What wine is drank should be of some of the sweet kinds. Old Hock has
+been found on enquiry to yield more than ten times the acid of the sweet
+wines; and in red Port, at least in what we are content to call so,
+there is an astringent quality, that is most mischievous in these cases:
+it is said there is often alum in it: how pregnant with mischief that
+must be to persons whose bowels require to be kept open, is most
+evident. Summer fruits perfectly ripe are not only harmless but
+medicinal; but if eaten unripe they will be very prejudicial. A light
+supper, which will leave an appetite for a milk breakfast, is always
+right; this will not let the stomach be ravenous for dinner, as it is
+apt to be in those who make that their only meal.
+
+One caution more must be given, and it may seem a strange one: it is
+that the patient attend regularly to his hours of eating. We have to do
+with men for the most part whose soul is the great object of their
+regard; but let them not forget they have a body.
+
+The late Dr. STUKELY has told me, that one day by appointment visiting
+Sir ISAAC NEWTON, the servant told him, he was in his study. No one was
+permitted to disturb him there; but as it was near dinner time, the
+visitor sat down to wait for him. After a time dinner was brought in; a
+boil'd chicken under a cover. An hour pass'd, and Sir ISAAC did not
+appear. The doctor eat the fowl, and covering up the empty dish, bad
+them dress their master another. Before that was ready, the great man
+came down; he apologiz'd for his delay, and added, "give me but leave to
+take my short dinner, and I shall be at your service; I am fatigued and
+faint." Saying this, he lifted up the cover; and without any emotion,
+turned about to STUKELY with a smile; "See says he, what we studious
+people are, I forgot I had din'd."
+
+
+
+
+SECT. VIII.
+
+The MEDICINE.
+
+
+'Tis the ill fate of this disease, more than of all others to be
+misunderstood at first, and thence neglected; till the physician shakes
+his head at a few first questions. None steals so fatally upon the
+sufferer: its advances are by very slow degrees; but every day it grows
+more difficult of cure.
+
+That this obstruction in the spleen is the true malady, the cases
+related by the antients, present observation, and the unerring
+testimonies of dissections leave no room to doubt. Being understood, the
+path is open where to seek a remedy: and our best guides in this, as in
+the former instance, will be those venerable Greeks; who saw a thousand
+of these cases, where we see one; and with less than half our theory,
+cured twice as many patients.
+
+One established doctrine holds place in all these writers; that whatever
+by a hasty fermentation dissolves the impacted matter of the
+obstruction, and sends it in that state into the blood, does incredible
+mischief: but that whatever medicine softens it by slow degrees, and, as
+it melts, delivers it to the bowels without disturbance; will cure with
+equal certainty and safety.
+
+For this good purpose, they knew and tried a multitude of herbs; but in
+the end they fixed on one: and on their repeated trials of this, they
+banished all the rest. This stood alone for the cure of the disease; and
+from its virtue received the name of SPLEEN-WORT[21]. O wise and happy
+Greeks! authors of knowledge and perpetuators of it! With them the very
+name they gave a plant declared its virtues: with us, a writer calls a
+plant from some friend; that the good gardener who receives the honour,
+may call another by his name who gave it. We now add the term _smooth_
+to this herb, to distinguish it from another, called by the same general
+term, though not much resembling it.
+
+The virtues of this smooth Spleen-wort have flood the test of ages; and
+the plant every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good
+herbalists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and
+hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it;
+and all the miserable symptoms vanish; thought Spleen-wort not enough
+expressive of its excellence; but stamp'd on it the name of MILT-WASTE.
+
+In the Greek Islands now, the use of it is known to every one; and even
+the lazy monks who take it, are no longer splenetic. In the west of
+England, the rocks are stripped of it with diligence; and every old woman
+tells you how charming that leaf is for bookish men: in Russia they use
+a plant of this kind in their malt liquor: it came into fashion there
+for the cure of this disease; which from its constant use is scarce
+known any longer; and they suppose 'tis added to their liquor for a
+flavour.
+
+The ancients held it in a kind of veneration; and used what has been
+called a superstition in the gathering it. It was to be taken up with a
+sharp knife, without violence, and laid upon the clean linen: no time
+but the still darkness of the night was proper, and even the moon was
+not to shine upon it[22]. I know they have been ridiculed for this; for
+nothing is so vain as learned ignorance: but let me be permitted once to
+vindicate them.
+
+The plant has leaves that can close in their sides; and their under part
+is covered thick with a yellow powder, consisting of the seeds, and seed
+vessels: in these they knew the virtue most resided: this was the golden
+dust[23] they held so valuable; and this they knew they could not be too
+cautious to preserve. They were not ignorant of the sleep of plants; a
+matter lately spoken of by some, as if a new discovery; and being
+sensible that light, a dry air, an expanded leaf, and a tempestuous
+season, were the means of losing this fine dust; and knowing also that
+darkness alone brought on that closing of the leaf which thence has
+been called sleep; and which helped to defend and to secure it, they
+therefore took such time, and used such means as could best preserve the
+plant entire; and even save what might be scattered from it.--And now
+where is their superstition?
+
+From this plant thus collected they prepared a medicine, which in a
+course of forty days scarce ever failed to make a perfect cure.
+
+We have the plant wild with us; and till the fashion of rough chemical
+preparations took off our attention from these gentler remedies, it was
+in frequent use and great repute. I trust it will be so again: and many
+thank me for restoring it to notice.
+
+Spleen-wort gives out its virtues freely in a tincture; and a small dose
+of this, mixing readily with the blood and juices, gradually dissolves
+the obstruction; and by a little at a time delivers its contents to be
+thrown off without pain, from the bowels. Let this be done while the
+viscera are yet sound and the cure is perfect. More than the forty days
+of the Greek method is scarce ever required; much oftener two thirds of
+that time suffice; and every day, from the first dose of it, the patient
+feels the happy change that is growing in his constitution. His food no
+more turns putrid on his stomach, but yields its healthful nourishment.
+The swelling after meals therefore vanishes; and with that goes the
+lowness, and anxiety, the difficult breath, and the distracting cholick:
+he can bear the approach of rainy weather without pain; he finds himself
+more apt for motion, and ready to take that exercise which is to be
+assistant in his cure; life seems no longer burthensome. His bowels get
+into the natural condition of health, and perform their office once at
+least a day; better if a little more: the dull and dead colour of his
+skin goes off, his lips grow red again, and every sign of health
+returns.
+
+Let him who takes the medicine, say whether any thing here be
+exaggerated. Let him, if he pleases to give himself the trouble, talk
+over with me, or write to me, this gradual decrease of his complaints,
+as he proceeds in his cure. My uncertain state of health does not
+permit me to practise physic in the usual way, but I am very desirous to
+do what good I can, and shall never refuse my advice, such as it may be,
+to any person rich or poor, in whatever manner he may apply for it. I
+shall refer him to no apothecary, whose bills require he should be
+drenched with potions; but tell him, in this as in all other cases,
+where to find some simple herb; which he may if he please prepare
+himself; or if he had rather spare that trouble, may have it so prepared
+from me.
+
+With regard to Spleen-wort, no method of using it is more effectual than
+simply taking it in powder; the only advantage of a tincture, is that a
+proper dose may be given, and yet the stomach not be loaded with so
+large a quantity: it is an easier and pleasanter method, and nothing
+more.
+
+If any person choose to take it in the other way, I should still wish
+him once at least to apply to me; that he may be assured what he is
+about to take is the right plant. Abuses in medicines are at this time
+very great, and in no instance worse than what relates to herbs. The
+best of our physicians have complained upon this head with warmth, but
+without redress: they know the virtues and the value of many of our
+native plants, but dread to prescribe them; lest some wrong thing should
+be administered in their place; perhaps inefficacious, perhaps
+mischievous, nay it may be fatal. The few simple things I direct are
+always before me; and it will at all times be a pleasure to me, in this
+and any other instance, to see whether what any person is about to take
+be right. I have great obligations to the public, and this is the best
+return that I know how to make.
+
+To see the need of such a caution, hear a transaction but of yesterday!
+An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in
+the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was
+written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and
+almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but
+what is very striking, not one of them the right. Such is the chance of
+health in those hands through which the best means of it usually pass;
+even in the most regular course of application.
+
+I would not be understood to limit the little services I may this way be
+able to render the afflicted, to this single instance; much less to
+propose to myself any advantages from it. Whoever pleases will be
+welcome to me, upon any such occasion; and whatever be the herb on which
+he places a dependance, he shall be shewn it growing. I once recommended
+a garden to be established for this use, at the public expence: one
+great person has put it in my power to answer all its purposes.
+
+
+                        F  I  N  I  S.
+
+
+
+
+THE AUGUSTAN REPRINT SOCIETY
+
+
+WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY
+
+UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES
+
+PUBLICATIONS IN PRINT
+
+
+1948-1949
+
+16. Henry Nevil Payne, _The Fatal Jealousie_ (1673).
+
+18. Anonymous, "Of Genius," in _The Occasional Paper_, Vol. III, No. 10
+(1719), and Aaron Hill, Preface to _The Creation_ (1720).
+
+
+1949-1950
+
+19. Susanna Centlivre, _The Busie Body_ (1709).
+
+20. Lewis Theobald, _Preface to the Works of Shakespeare_ (1734).
+
+22. Samuel Johnson, _The Vanity of Human Wishes_ (1749), and two
+_Rambler_ papers (1750).
+
+23. John Dryden, _His Majesties Declaration Defended_ (1681).
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+
+1951-1952
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+31. Thomas Gray, _An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard_ (1751), and
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+41. Bernard Mandeville, _A Letter to Dion_ (1732).
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+
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+104. Thomas D'Urfey, _Wonders in the Sun; or, The Kingdom of the Birds_
+(1706).
+
+
+1964-1965
+
+110. John Tutchin, _Selected Poems_ (1685-1700).
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+111. Anonymous, _Political Justice_ (1736).
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+112. Robert Dodsley, _An Essay on Fable_ (1764).
+
+113. T. R., _An Essay Concerning Critical and Curious Learning_ (1698).
+
+114. _Two Poems Against Pope_: Leonard Welsted, _One Epistle to Mr. A.
+Pope_ (1730), and Anonymous, _The Blatant Beast_ (1742).
+
+
+1965-1966
+
+115. Daniel Defoe and others, _Accounts of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal_.
+
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+
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+(1717).
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+120. Bernard Mandeville, _Aesop Dress'd or a Collection of Fables_
+(1704).
+
+
+1966-1967
+
+123. Edmond Malone, _Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Mr.
+Thomas Rowley_ (1782).
+
+124. Anonymous, _The Female Wits_ (1704).
+
+125. Anonymous, _The Scribleriad_ (1742). Lord Hervey, _The Difference
+Between Verbal and Practical Virtue_ (1742).
+
+126. _Le Lutrin: an Heroick Poem, Written Originally in French by
+Monsieur Boileau: Made English by N. O._ (1682).
+
+
+1967-1968
+
+127-
+
+128. Charles Macklin, _A Will and No Will, or a Bone for the Lawyers_
+(1746). _The New Play Criticiz'd, or The Plague of Envy_ (1747).
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+129. Lawrence Echard, Prefaces to _Terence's Comedies_ (1694) and
+_Plautus's Comedies_ (1694).
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+130. Henry More, _Democritus Platonissans_ (1646).
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+131. John Evelyn, _The History of Sabatai Sevi, The Suppos'd Messiah of
+the Jews_ (1669).
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+132. Walter Harte, _An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad_
+(1730).
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+135. Sir John Hill, _Hypochondriasis, a Practical Treatise on the Nature
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+136. Thomas Sheridan, _Discourse ... Being Introductory to His Course of
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+137. Arthur Murphy, _The Englishman From Paris_ (1756). Introduction by
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+138. [Catherine Trotter], _Olinda's Adventures_ (1718). Introduction by
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+Footnotes:
+
+[18] Milton's Penseroso.
+
+[19] Biberg.
+
+[20] Reaumur.
+
+[21] asplenon
+
+[22] Silente Luna.
+
+[23] Pulvis Aureus.
+
+
+
+
+      *      *      *      *      *
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+  Long "s" has been modernized.
+
+  Page 21 contains two markers referring to the same footnote.
+
+  The original text contains two sections labeled "Sect. V."
+
+  Passages in italics are indicated by _underscore_.
+
+  Additional spacing after some of the quotes is intentional to indicate
+  both the end of a quotation and the beginning of a new paragraph as
+  presented in the original text.
+
+  The original text includes Greek characters. For this text version these
+  letters have been replaced with transliterations.
+
+  The following misprints have been corrected:
+    "the the" corrected to "the" (page v)
+    "sympton" corrected to "symptom" (page 14)
+    "symptons" corrected to "symptoms" (page 23)
+
+  Other than the corrections listed above, printer's inconsistencies in
+  spelling, punctuation, hyphenation, and ligature usage have been
+  retained.
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***
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-<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***</div>

-<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Hypochondriasis, by John Hill</h1>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<hr class="full" />

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h2>JOHN HILL</h2>

-<h1>HYPOCHONDRIASIS</h1>

-<h3>A PRACTICAL TREATISE.</h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h3>(1766)</h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h4><i>Introduction by</i><br />

-<span class="smcap">G. S. Rousseau</span></h4>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h4>PUBLICATION NUMBER 135<br />

-WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY<br />

-<span class="smcap">University of California, Los Angeles</span><br />

-1969</h4>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="editors">

-<tr>

-<td align="center">

-<b>GENERAL EDITORS</b><br />

-William E. Conway, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-George Robert Guffey, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Maximillian E. Novak, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>ASSOCIATE EDITOR</b><br />

-David S. Rodes, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>ADVISORY EDITORS</b><br />

-Richard C. Boys, <i>University of Michigan</i><br />

-James L. Clifford, <i>Columbia University</i><br />

-Ralph Cohen, <i>University of Virginia</i><br />

-Vinton A. Dearing, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Arthur Friedman, <i>University of Chicago</i><br />

-Louis A. Landa, <i>Princeton University</i><br />

-Earl Miner, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Samuel H. Monk, <i>University of Minnesota</i><br />

-Everett T. Moore, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Lawrence Clark Powell, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-James Sutherland, <i>University College, London</i><br />

-H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Robert Vosper, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>CORRESPONDING SECRETARY</b><br />

-Edna C. Davis, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>EDITORIAL ASSISTANT</b><br />

-Mary Kerbret, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i></td></tr></table>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[Pg i]</a></span></p>

-<h3>INTRODUCTION</h3>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p>"When I first dabbled in this art, the old distemper call'd

-<i>Melancholy</i> was exchang'd for <i>Vapours</i>, and afterwards for the

-<i>Hypp</i>, and at last took up the now current appellation of the

-<i>Spleen</i>, which it still retains, tho' a learned doctor of the

-west, in a little tract he hath written, divides the <i>Spleen</i> and

-<i>Vapours</i>, not only into the <i>Hypp</i>, the <i>Hyppos</i>, and the

-Hyppocons; but subdivides these divisions into the <i>Markambles</i>,

-the <i>Moonpalls</i>, the <i>Strong-Fiacs</i>, and the <i>Hockogrokles</i>."</p>

-

-<p class="right">Nicholas Robinson, <i>A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and

-Hypochondriack Melancholy</i> (London, 1729)</p></div>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>Treatises on hypochondriasis&mdash;the seventeenth-century medical term for a

-wide range of nervous diseases&mdash;were old when "Sir" John Hill, the

-eccentric English scientist, physician, apothecary, and hack writer,

-published his <i>Hypochondriasis</i> in 1766.<small><a name="f1.1" id="f1.1" href="#f1">[1]</a></small> For at least a century and a

-half medical writers as well as lay authors had been writing literature

-of all types (treatises, pamphlets, poems, sermons, epigrams) on this

-most fashionable of English maladies under the variant names of

-"melancholy," "the spleen," "black melancholy," "hysteria," "nervous

-debility," "the hyp." Despite the plethora of <i>materia scripta</i> on the

-subject it makes sense to reprint Hill's <i>Hypochondriasis</i>, because it

-is indeed a "practical treatise" and because it offers the modern

-student of neoclassical literature a clear summary of the best thoughts

-that had been put forth on the subject, as well as an explanation of the

-causes, symptoms, and cures of this commonplace malady.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[Pg ii]</a></span>No reader of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English literature

-needs to be reminded of the interest of writers of the period in the

-condition&mdash;"disease" is too confining a term&mdash;hypochondriasis.<small><a name="f2.1" id="f2.1" href="#f2">[2]</a></small> Their

-concern is apparent in both the poetry and prose of two centuries. From

-Robert Burton's Brobdingnagian exposition in <i>The Anatomy of Melancholy</i>

-(1621) to Tobias Smollett's depiction of the misanthropic and ailing

-Matthew Bramble in <i>Humphry Clinker</i> (1771), and, of course, well into

-the nineteenth century, afflicted heroes and weeping heroines populate

-the pages of England's literature. There is scarcely a decade in the

-period 1600-1800 that does not contribute to the literature of

-melancholy; so considerable in number are the works that could be placed

-under this heading that it actually makes sense to speak of the

-"literature of melancholy." A kaleidoscopic survey of this literature

-(exclusive of treatises written on the subject) would include mention of

-Milton's "Il Penseroso" and "L'Allegro," the meditative Puritan and

-nervous Anglican thinkers of the Restoration (many of whose narrators,

-such as Richard Baxter, author of the <i>Reliquiae Baxterianae</i>,<small><a name="f3.1" id="f3.1" href="#f3">[3]</a></small> are

-afflicted), Swift's "School of Spleen" in <i>A Tale of a Tub</i>, Pope's

-hysterical Belinda in the "Cave of Spleen," the melancholic "I" of

-Samuel Richardson's correspondence, Gray's leucocholy, the

-psychosomatically ailing characters of <i>The Vicar of Wakefield</i> and

-<i>Tristram Shandy</i>, Boswell's <i>Hypochondriack Papers</i> (1777-1783)

-contributed to the <i>London Magazine</i>, and such "sensible" and

-"sensitive" women as Mrs. Bennett and Miss Bates in the novels of Jane

-Austen. So great in bulk is this literature in the mid eighteenth

-century, that C. A. Moore has written, "statistically, this deserves to

-be called the Age of Melancholy."<small><a name="f4.1" id="f4.1" href="#f4">[4]</a></small> The vastness of this literature is

-sufficient to justify the reprinting of an unavailable practical

-handbook on the subject by a prolific author all too little known.<small><a name="f5.1" id="f5.1" href="#f5">[5]</a></small></p>

-

-<p>The medical background of Hill's pamphlet extends further back than the

-seventeenth century and Burton's <i>Anatomy</i>. The ancient Greeks had

-theorized about hypochondria: &#8016;&#960;&#959;&#967;&#972;&#957;&#948;&#961;&#953;&#945;&#963;&#953;&#962; signified a

-disorder beneath (&#8016;&#960;&#972;) the gristle (&#967;&#972;&#957;&#948;&#961;&#953;&#945;) and the

-disease was discussed principally in physiological terms. The belief

-that hypochondriasis was a somatic condition persisted until<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span> the second

-half of the seventeenth century at which time an innovation was made by

-Dr. Thomas Sydenham. In addition to showing that hypochondriasis and

-hysteria (thought previously by Sydenham to afflict women only) were the

-same disease, Sydenham noted that the external cause of both was a

-mental disturbance and not a physiological one. He also had a theory

-that the internal and immediate cause was a disorder of the animal

-spirits arising from a clot and resulting in pain, spasms, and bodily

-disorders. By attributing the onset of the malady to mental phenomena

-and not to obstructions of the spleen or viscera, Sydenham was moving

-towards a psychosomatic theory of hypochondriasis, one that was to be

-debated in the next century in England, Holland, and France.<small><a name="f6.1" id="f6.1" href="#f6">[6]</a></small>

-Sydenham's influence on the physicians of the eighteenth century was

-profound: Cheyne in England, Boerhaave in Holland, La Mettrie in France.

-Once the theory of the nervous origins of hypochondria gained

-ground&mdash;here I merely note coincidence, not historical cause and

-effect&mdash;the disease became increasingly fashionable in England,

-particularly among the polite, the aristocratic, and the refined.

-Students of the drama will recall Scrub's denial in <i>The Beaux'

-Stratagem</i> (1707) of the possibility that Archer has the spleen and Mrs.

-Sullen's interjection, "I thought that distemper had been only proper to

-people of quality."</p>

-

-<p>Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, hypochondria was so

-prevalent in people's minds and mouths that it soon assumed the

-abbreviated name "the hyp." Entire poems like William Somervile's <i>The

-Hyp: a Burlesque Poem in Five Canto's</i> (1731) and Tim Scrubb's <i>A Rod

-for the Hyp-Doctor</i> (1731) were devoted to this strain; others, like

-Malcom Flemyng's epic poem, <i>Neuropathia: sive de morbis hypochondriacis

-et hystericis, libri tres, poema medicum</i> (1740), were more technical

-and scientific. Professor Donald Davie has written that he has often

-"heard old fashioned and provincial persons [in England and Scotland]

-even in [my] own lifetime say, 'Oh, you give me the hyp,' where we

-should say 'You give me a pain in the neck'"<small><a name="f7.1" id="f7.1" href="#f7">[7]</a></small>; and I myself have heard

-the expression, "You give me the pip," where "pip" may be a corruption

-of "hyp." As used in the early eighteenth century, the term "hyp" was

-perhaps not far from what our century has learned to call <i>Angst</i>. It

-was also used as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span> synonym for "lunacy," as the anonymous author of

-<i>Anti-Siris</i> (1744), one of the tracts in the tar-water controversy,

-informs us that "Berkeley tells his Countrymen, they are all mad, or

-<i>Hypochondriac</i>, which is but a fashionable name for Madness." Bernard

-Mandeville, the Dutch physician and author of <i>The Fable of the Bees</i>,

-seems to have understood perfectly well that hypochondriasis is a

-condition encompassing any number of diseases and not a specific and

-readily definable ailment; a condition, moreover, that hovers

-precariously and bafflingly in limbo between mind and body, and he

-stressed this as the theme of his <i>Treatise of the Hypochondriack and

-Hysteric Passions, Vulgarly Call'd the Hypo in Men and Vapours in Women</i>

-(1711). The mental causes are noted as well in an anonymous pamphlet in

-the British Museum, <i>A Treatise on the Dismal Effects of

-Low-Spiritedness</i> (1750) and are echoed in many similar early and

-mid-eighteenth century works. Some medical writers of the age, like

-Nicholas Robinson, had reservations about the external mental bases of

-the hyp and preferred to discuss the condition in terms of internal

-physiological causes:</p>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p>...of that Disorder we call the Vapours, or <i>Hypochondria</i>; for

-they have no material distinctive Characters, but what arise from

-the same Disease affecting different Sexes, and the Vapours in

-Women are term'd the <i>Hypochondria</i> in Men, and they proceed from

-the Contraction of the Vessels being depress'd a little beneath the

-Balance of Nature, and the Relaxation of the Nerves at the same

-Time, which creates that Uneasiness and Melancholy that naturally

-attends Vapours, and which generally is an Intemperature of the

-whole Body, proceeding from a Depression of the Solids beneath the

-Balance of Nature; but the Intemperature of the Parts is that

-Peculiar Disposition whereby they favour any Disease.<small><a name="f8.1" id="f8.1" href="#f8">[8]</a></small></p></div>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>But the majority of medical thinkers had been persuaded that the

-condition was psychosomatic, and this belief was supported by research

-on nerves by important physicians in the 1740's and 1750's: the Monro

-brothers in London, Robert Whytt in Edinburgh, Albrecht von Haller in

-Leipzig. By mid century the condition known<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span> as the hyp was believed to

-be a real, not an imaginary ailment, common, peculiar in its

-manifestations, and indefinable, almost impossible to cure, producing

-very real symptoms of physical illness, and said to originate sometimes

-in depression and idleness. It was summed up by Robert James in his

-<i>Medicinal Dictionary</i> (London, 1743-45):</p>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p>If we thoroughly consider its Nature, it will be found to be a

-spasmodico-flatulent Disorder of the <i>Primae Viae</i>, that is, of the

-Stomach and Intestines, arising from an Inversion or Perversion of

-their peristaltic Motion, and, by the mutual consent of the Parts,

-throwing the whole nervous System into irregular Motions, and

-disturbing the whole Oeconomy of the Functions.... no part or

-Function of the Body escapes the Influence of this tedious and long

-protracted Disease, whose Symptoms are so violent and numerous,

-that it is no easy Task either to enumerate or account for them....

-No disease is more troublesome, either to the Patient or Physician,

-than hypochondriac Disorders; and it often happens, that, thro' the

-Fault of both, the Cure is either unnecessarily protracted, or

-totally frustrated; for the Patients are so delighted, not only

-with a Variety of Medicines, but also of Physicians.... On the

-contrary, few physicians are sufficiently acquainted with the true

-Genius and Nature of this perplexing Disorder; for which Reason

-they boldly prescribe almost everything contained in the Shops, not

-without an irreparable Injury to the Patient (article on

-"Hypochondriacus Morbis").</p></div>

-

-<p>This is a more technical description than Hill gives anywhere in his

-handbook, but it serves well to summarize the background of <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'the the'">the</ins> condition

-about which Sir John wrote.</p>

-

-<p>Hill's <i>Hypochondriasis</i> adds little that is new to the theory of the

-disease. It incorporates much of the thinking set forth by the writings

-mentioned above, particularly those of George Cheyne, whose medical

-works <i>The English Malady</i> (1733) and <i>The Natural Method of Cureing the

-Diseases of the Body, and the Disorders of the Mind Depending on the

-Body</i> (1742) Hill knew. He is also con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span>versant with some Continental

-writers on the subject, two of whom&mdash;Isaac Biberg, author of The

-<i>Oeconomy of Nature</i> (1751), and Ren&eacute; R&eacute;aumur who had written a history

-of insects (1722)<small><a name="f9.1" id="f9.1" href="#f9">[9]</a></small>&mdash;he mentions explicitly, and with William

-Stukeley's <i>Of the Spleen</i> (1723). Internal evidence indicates that Hill

-had read or was familiar with the ideas propounded in Richard

-Blackmore's <i>Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours</i> (1725) and Nicholas

-Robinson's <i>A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and Hypochondriack

-Melancholy</i> (1729).</p>

-

-<p>Hill's arrangement of sections is logical: he first defines the

-condition (<a href="#Page_3">I</a>), then proceeds to discuss persons most susceptible to it

-(<a href="#Page_6">II</a>), its major symptoms (<a href="#Page_12">III</a>), consequences (<a href="#Page_16">IV</a>), causes (<a href="#Page_20">V</a>), and cures

-(<a href="#Page_22">VI-VIII</a>). In the first four sections almost every statement is

-commonplace and requires no commentary (for example, Hill's opening

-remark: "To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and

-cruel. It is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by

-thickened and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver,

-and other parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick

-scarce knows one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.") His

-belief that the condition afflicts sedentary persons, particularly

-students, philosophers, theologians, and that it is not restricted to

-women alone&mdash;as some contemporary thinkers still maintained&mdash;is also

-impossible to trace to a single source, as is his description (p. <a href="#Page_12">12</a>) of

-the most prevalent physiological <i>symptoms</i> ("lowness of spirits, and

-inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love of solitude....

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness") and <i>causes</i> (the poor and damp

-English climate and the resultant clotting of blood in the spleen) of

-the illness.</p>

-

-<p>Sections <a href="#Page_20">V-VIII</a>, dealing with causes and cures, are less commonplace and

-display some of Hill's eccentricities as a writer and thinker. He uses

-the section entitled "Cures" as a means to peddle his newly discovered

-cure-all, water dock,<small><a name="f10.1" id="f10.1" href="#f10">[10]</a></small> which Smollett satirized through the mouth of

-Tabitha Bramble in <i>Humphry Clinker</i> (1771). Hill also rebelled against

-contemporary apothecaries and physicians who prescribed popular

-medicines&mdash;such as Berkeley's tar-water, Dover's mercury powders, and

-James's fever-powders<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span>&mdash;as universal panaceas for the cure of the hyp.

-"No acrid medicine must be directed, for that may act too hastily,

-dissolve the impacted matter at once, and let it loose, to the

-destruction of the sufferer; no antimonial, no mercurial, no martial

-preparation must be taken; in short, no chymistry: nature is the shop

-that heaven has set before us, and we must seek our medicine there"

-(p. <a href="#Page_24">24</a>). However scientifically correct Hill may have been in minimizing

-the efficacy of current pills and potions advertised as remedies for the

-hyp, he was unusual for his time in objecting so strongly to them. Less

-eccentric was his allegiance to the "Ancients" rather than to the

-"Moderns" so far as chemical treatment (i.e., restoration of the humours

-by chemical rearrangement) of hypochondriasis is concerned.<small><a name="f11.1" id="f11.1" href="#f11">[11]</a></small> "The

-venerable ancients," Hill writes, "who knew not this new art, will lead

-us in the search; and (faithful relators as they are of truth) will tell

-us whence we may deduce our hope; and what we are to fear" (p. <a href="#Page_24">24</a>).</p>

-

-<p>Still more idiosyncratic, perhaps, is Hill's contention (p. <a href="#Page_25">25</a>) that the

-air of dry, high grounds worsens the condition of the patient. Virtually

-every writer I have read on the subject believed that onset of the hyp

-was caused by one of the six non-naturals&mdash;air, diet, lack of sufficient

-sleep, too little or too much exercise, defective evacuation, the

-passions of the mind; and although some medical writers emphasized the

-last of these,<small><a name="f12.1" id="f12.1" href="#f12">[12]</a></small> few would have concurred with Hill that the fetid air

-of London was less harmful than the clearer air at Highgate. All readers

-of the novel of the period will recall the hypochondriacal Matt

-Bramble's tirade against the stench of London air. Beliefs of the

-variety here mentioned cause me to question Hill's importance in the

-history of medicine; there can be no question about his contributions to

-the advancement of the science of botany through popularization of

-Linnaeus' system of bisexual classification, but Hill's medical

-importance is summarized best as that of a compiler. His recommendation

-of the study of botany as a cure for melancholics is sensible but verges

-on becoming "a digression in praise of the author," a poetic <i>apologia

-pro vita sua</i> in Augustan fashion:</p>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[Pg viii]</a></span>For me, I should advise above all other things the study of nature.

-Let him begin with plants: he will here find a continual pleasure,

-and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful things; even of

-the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to walk; and

-every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket, will

-afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually in

-the air; and continually to change the nature and quality of the

-air, by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the

-lawn, the heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be

-abroad; and the unceasing variety of the subjects of his

-observation, will prevent his walking hastily: he will pursue his

-studies in the air; and that contemplative turn of mind, which in

-his closet threatened his destruction, will thus become the great

-means of his recovery (pp. <a href="#Page_26">26-27</a>).</p></div>

-

-<p>Hill was forever extolling the claims of a life devoted to the study of

-nature, as we see in a late work, <i>The Virtues of British Herbs</i> (1770).

-Judicious as is the logic of this recommendation, one cannot help but

-feel that the emphasis here is less on diversion as a cure and more on

-the botanic attractions of "every hedge and hillock, every foot-path

-side, and thicket."</p>

-

-<p>While Hill's rules and regulations regarding proper diet (<a href="#Page_31">Section VII</a>)

-are standard, several taken almost <i>verbatim et literatim</i> from Cheyne's

-list in <i>The English Malady</i> (1733), his recommendation (<a href="#Page_35">Section VIII</a>)

-of "Spleen-Wort" as the best medicine for the hypochondriac patient is

-not. Since Hill devotes so much space to the virtues of this herb and

-concludes his work extolling this plant, a word should be said about it.

-Throughout his life he was an active botanist. Apothecary, physician,

-and writer though he was, it was ultimately botany that was his ruling

-passion, as is made abundantly clear in his correspondence.<small><a name="f13.1" id="f13.1" href="#f13">[13]</a></small> Wherever

-he lived&mdash;whether in the small house in St. James's Street or in the

-larger one on the Bayswater Road&mdash;he cultivated an herb garden that

-flattered his knowledge and ability. Connoisseurs raved about its

-species and considered it one of the showpieces of London. His arrogant

-personality alone prevented him from becoming the first Keeper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span> of the

-Apothecary's Garden in Chelsea, although he was for a time

-superintendent to the Dowager Princess of Wales's gardens at Kensington

-Palace and at Kew. His interest in cultivation of herbs nevertheless

-continued; over the years Hill produced more than thirty botanical

-works, many of them devoted to the medical virtues of rare herbs such as

-"Spleen-Wort." Among these are <i>The British Herbal</i> (1756), <i>On the

-Virtues of Sage in Lengthening Human Life</i> (1763), <i>Centaury, the Great

-Stomachic</i> (1765), <i>Polypody</i> (1768), <i>A Method of Curing Jaundice</i>

-(1768), <i>Instances of the Virtue of Petasite Root</i> (1771), and <i>Twenty

-Five New Plants</i> (1773).<small><a name="f14.1" id="f14.1" href="#f14">[14]</a></small> It is therefore not surprising that he

-should believe a specific herb to be the best remedy for a complicated

-medical condition. Nor is his reference to the Ancients as authority for

-the herbal pacification of an inflamed spleen surprising in the light of

-his researches: he was convinced that every illness could be cured by

-taking an appropriate herb or combination of herbs. Whereas a few

-nonmedical writers&mdash;such as John Wesley in <i>Primitive Physick</i>

-(1747)&mdash;had advocated the taking of one or two herbs in moderate dosage

-as anti-hysterics (the eighteenth-century term for all cures of the

-hyp), no medical writer of the century ever promoted the use of herbs to

-the extent that Hill did. In fairness to him, it is important to note

-that his herbal remedies were harmless and that many found their way

-into the official <i>London Pharmacopeia</i>. "The virtues of this smooth

-Spleen-wort," he insists, "have stood the test of ages; and the plant

-every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbarists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it"

-(p. <a href="#Page_37">37</a>).<small><a name="f15.1" id="f15.1" href="#f15">[15]</a></small> The greatest portion of Hill's concluding section combines

-advertisement for the powder medicine he was himself manufacturing at a

-handsome profit together with a protest against competing apothecaries:

-"An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right" (p. <a href="#Page_42">42</a>).</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[Pg x]</a></span>Treatises on hypochondriasis did not cease to be printed after Hill's in

-1766, but continued to issue from the presses into the nineteenth

-century. A good example of this is the tome by John Reid, physician to

-the Finsbury Dispensary in London, <i>Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis

-and Other Nervous Affections</i> (1816), which summarizes theories of the

-malady.<small><a name="f16.1" id="f16.1" href="#f16">[16]</a></small> A bibliographical study of such works would probably reveal

-a larger number of titles in the nineteenth century than in the previous

-one, but by this time the nature and definition of hypochondria had

-changed significantly.</p>

-

-<p>If John Hill's volume is not an important contribution in the history of

-medicine, it is a lucid and brief exposition of many of the best ideas

-that had been thought and written on the hyp, with the exception of his

-uninhibited prescribing of herbal medicines as cure-alls. An

-understanding of this disease is essential for readers of neoclassical

-English literature, especially when we reflect upon the fact that some

-of the best literature of the period was composed by writers whom it

-afflicted. It is perhaps not without significance that the greatest poet

-of the Augustan age, Alexander Pope, thought it necessary as he lay on

-his deathbed in May 1744 to exclaim with his last breath, "I never was

-hippish in my whole life."<small><a name="f17.1" id="f17.1" href="#f17">[17]</a></small></p>

-

-<p>University of California,<br />

-Los Angeles<br />

-</p>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span></p>

-<h3>NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION</h3>

-

-<p><a name="f1" id="f1" href="#f1.1">[1]</a> The text here reproduced is that of the copy in the Library of the

-Royal Society of Medicine, London. Title pages of different copies of

-the first edition of 1766 vary. For example, the title page of the copy

-in the British Museum reads, <i>Hypochondriasis; a Practical Treatise On

-the Nature and Cure of that Disorder, Commonly called the Hyp and the

-Hypo</i>. The copy in the Royal Society of Medicine contains, among other

-additions, the words "by Sir John Hill" in pencil, and "8<sup>vo</sup> Lond.

-1766," written in ink and probably a later addition.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f2" id="f2" href="#f2.1">[2]</a> Melancholy, hypochondriasis, and the spleen were considered in the

-seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to be one complex condition, a

-malady rather than a malaise, which is but a symptom. Distinctions among

-these, of interest primarily to medical historians, cannot be treated

-here. As good a definition as any is found in Dr. Johnson's <i>Dictionary</i>

-(1755): "Hypochondriacal.... 1. Melancholy; disordered in the

-imagination.... 2. Producing melancholy...." The literature of

-melancholy has been surveyed in part by C. A. Moore, "The English

-Malady," <i>Backgrounds of English Literature 1700-1760</i> (Minneapolis,

-1953), pp. 179-235. In medical parlance, "hypochondria" means the soft

-parts of the body below the costal cartilages, and the singular form of

-the word, "hypochondrium," means the viscera situated in the

-hypochondria, i.e., the liver, gall bladder, and spleen.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f3" id="f3" href="#f3.1">[3]</a> See Samuel Clifford's <i>The Signs and Causes of Melancholy, with

-directions suited to the case of those who are afflicted with it.

-Collected out of the works of Mr. Richard Baxter</i> (London, 1716) in the British Museum.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f4" id="f4" href="#f4.1">[4]</a> <i>Backgrounds of English Literature</i>, p. 179.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f5" id="f5" href="#f5.1">[5]</a> See my forthcoming biography, _The Literary Quack: A Life of 'Sir'

-John Hill of London_, and John Kennedy's <i>Some Remarks on the Life and

-Writings of Dr. J&mdash;&mdash; H&mdash;&mdash;, Inspector General of Great Britain</i> (London, 1752).</p>

-

-<p><a name="f6" id="f6" href="#f6.1">[6]</a> For some of this background see L. J. Rather, <i>Mind and Body in

-Eighteenth Century Medicine: A Study Based on Jerome Gaub's De Regimine Mentis</i> (London, 1965), pp. 135-90 <i>passim</i>.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f7" id="f7" href="#f7.1">[7]</a> <i>Science and Literature 1700-1740</i> (London, 1964), pp. 50-51.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f8" id="f8" href="#f8.1">[8]</a> <i>A New Theory of Physick</i> (London, 1725), p. 56.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f9" id="f9" href="#f9.1">[9]</a> Biberg was a Swedish naturalist and had studied botany under

-Linnaeus in Uppsala; Réaumur, a French botanist, had contributed papers

-to the <i>Philosophical Transactions</i> of the Royal Society in London.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f10" id="f10" href="#f10.1">[10]</a> <i>The Power of Water-Dock against the Scurvy whether in the Plain

-Root or Essence....</i> (London, 1765), had been published six months

-earlier than <i>Hypochondriasis</i> and had earned Hill a handsome profit.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f11" id="f11" href="#f11.1">[11]</a> I have treated aspects of this subject in my article, "Matt Bramble

-and The Sulphur Controversy in the XVIIIth Century: Medical Background

-of <i>Humphry Clinker</i>," <i>JHI</i>, XXVIII (1967), 577-90.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f12" id="f12" href="#f12.1">[12]</a> See, for example, Jeremiah Waineright, <i>A Mechanical Account of the

-Non-Naturals</i> (1707); John Arbuthnot, <i>An Essay Concerning the Effects

-of Air on Human Bodies</i> (1733); Frank Nichols, <i>De Anima Medica</i> (1750).</p>

-

-<p><a name="f13" id="f13" href="#f13.1">[13]</a> Hill's correspondence is not published but shall be printed as an appendix to my forthcoming biography.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f14" id="f14" href="#f14.1">[14]</a> I have discussed some of these works in connection with the medical

-background of John Wesley's <i>Primitive Physick</i> (1747). See G. S.

-Rousseau, <i>Harvard Library Bulletin</i>, XVI (1968), 242-56.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f15" id="f15" href="#f15.1">[15]</a> It is difficult to know with certainty when Hill first became

-interested in the herb. He mentions it in passing in <i>The British

-Herbal</i> (1756), I, 526 and may have sold it as early as 1742 when he opened an apothecary shop.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f16" id="f16" href="#f16.1">[16]</a> Reid's dissertation at Edinburgh, entitled <i>De Insania</i> (1798),

-contains materials on the relationship of the imagination to all forms

-of mental disturbance. Secondary literature on hypochondria is

-plentiful. Works include: R. H. Gillespie, <i>Hypochondria</i> (London,

-1928), William K. Richmond, <i>The English Disease</i> (London, 1958),

-Charles Chenevix Trench, <i>The Royal Malady</i> (New York, 1964), and Ilza

-Vieth, <i>Hysteria: The History of a Disease</i> (Chicago, 1965), and "On

-Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Afflictions," <i>Bulletin of the History of Medicine</i>, XXX (1956), 233-40.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f17" id="f17" href="#f17.1">[17]</a> Joseph Spence, <i>Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books

-and Men</i>, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, 264.</p>

-

-<p>I am indebted to A. D. Morris, M.D., F.R.S.M., for help of various sorts in writing this introduction.</p>

-

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<h3>BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE</h3>

-

-

-<p class="center">The text of this facsimile of <i>Hypochondriasis</i> is reproduced from a

-copy in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, London.</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/title.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h1>HYPOCHONDRIASIS.</h1>

-<h2>A</h2>

-<h2>PRACTICAL TREATISE, &amp;c.</h2>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/title.png" alt="" /></div>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect1.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h2>HYPOCHONDRIASIS.</h2>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h3>SECT. I.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Nature</span> of the <span class="smcap">Disorder</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">To</span> call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and cruel. It

-is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by thickened

-and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver, and other

-parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick scarce knows

-one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>The blood is a mixture of many fluids, which, in a state of health, are

-so combined, that the whole passes freely through its appointed vessels;

-but if by the loss of the thinner parts, the rest becomes too gross to

-be thus carried through, it will stop where the circulation has least

-power; and having thus stopped it will accumulate; heaping by degrees

-obstruction on obstruction.</p>

-

-<p>Health and chearfulness, and the quiet exercise of mind, depend upon a

-perfect circulation: is it a wonder then, when this becomes impeded the

-body looses of its health, and the temper of its sprightliness? to be

-otherwise would be the miracle; and he inhumanly insults the afflicted,

-who calls all this a voluntary frowardness. Its slightest state brings

-with it sickness, anguish and oppression; and innumerable ills follow

-its advancing steps, unless prevented by timely care; till life itself

-grows burthensome.</p>

-

-<p>The disease was common in antient Greece; and her physicians understood

-it, better than those perhaps of later times, in any other country; who

-though happy in many advantages these fathers of the science could not

-have, yet want the great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> assistance of frequent watching it in all its

-stages.</p>

-

-<p>Those venerable writers have delivered its nature, and its cure: in the

-first every thing now shews they were right; and what they have said as

-to the latter will be found equally true and certain. This, so far as

-present experience has confirmed it, and no farther, will be here laid

-before the afflicted in a few plain words.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect2.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. II.</h3>

-

-<h3>Persons Subject to it.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Fatigue</span> of mind, and great exertion of its powers often give birth to

-this disease; and always tend to encrease it. The finer spirits are

-wasted by the labour of the brain: the Philosopher rises from his study

-more exhausted than the Peasant leaves his drudgery; without the benefit

-that he has from exercise. Greatness of mind, and steady virtue;

-determined resolution, and manly firmness, when put in action, and

-intent upon their object, all also lead to it: perhaps whatever tends to

-the ennobling of the soul has equal share in bringing on this weakness

-of the body.</p>

-

-<p>From this we may learn easily who are the men most subject to it; the

-grave and studious, those of a sedate temper and enlarged understanding,

-the learned and wise,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> the virtuous and the valiant: those whom it were

-the interest of the world to wish were free from this and every other

-illness; and who perhaps, except for this alloy, would have too large a

-portion of human happiness.</p>

-

-<p>Though these are most, it is not these alone, who are subject to it.

-There are countries where it is endemial, and in other places some have

-the seeds of it in their constitution; and in some it takes rise from

-accidents. In these last it is the easiest of cure; and in the first

-most difficult.</p>

-

-<p>Beside the Greeks already named, the Jews of old time were heavily

-afflicted with this disease; and in their descendants to this day it is

-often constitutional: the Spaniards have it almost to a man; and so have

-the American Indians. Perhaps the character of these several nations may

-be connected with it. The steady honour, and firm valour of the

-Spaniard, very like that of the ancient Doric nation, who followed the

-flute not the trumpet to the field; and met the enemy, not with shouts

-and fury, but with a determined virtue: it is the temper of the

-Hypochondriac to be slow, but unmoveably resolved: the Jew has shewn

-this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> mistakenly, but almost miraculously; and the poor Indian, untaught

-as he is, faces all peril with composure, and sings his death-song with

-an unalter'd countenance.</p>

-

-<p>Among particular persons the most inquiring and contemplative are those

-who suffer oftenest by this disease; and of all degrees of men I think

-the clergy. I do not mean the hunting, shooting, drinking clergy, who

-bear the tables of the great; but the retir'd and conscientious; such as

-attend in midnight silence to their duty; and seek in their own cool

-breasts, or wheresoever else they may be found, new admonitions for an

-age plunged in new vices. To this disease we owe the irreparable loss of

-Dr. <span class="smcap">Young</span>; and the present danger of many other the best and most

-improved amongst us. May what is here to be proposed assist in their

-preservation!</p>

-

-<p>The Geometrician or the learned Philosopher of whatever denomination,

-whose course of study fixes his eye for ever on one object, his mind

-intensely and continually employed upon one thought, should be warned

-also that he is in danger; or if he find himself already afflicted, he

-should be told that the same course of life, which brought it on,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> will,

-without due care, encrease it to the most dreaded violence.</p>

-

-<p>The middle period of life is that in which there is the greatest danger

-of an attack from this disease; and the latter end of autumn, when the

-summer heats have a little time been over, is the season when in our

-climate its first assaults are most to be expected. The same time of the

-year always increases the disorder in those who have been before

-afflicted with it; and it is a truth must be confessed, that from its

-first attack the patient grows continually, though slowly, worse; unless

-a careful regimen prevent it.</p>

-

-<p>The constitutions most liable to this obstruction are the lean, and dark

-complexioned; the grave and sedentary. Let such watch the first

-symptoms; and obviate, (as they may with ease) that which it will be

-much more difficult to remove.</p>

-

-<p>It is happy a disease, wherein the patient must do a great deal for

-himself, falls, for the most part, upon those who have the powers of

-reason strongest. Let them only be aware of this, that the distemper

-naturally disposes them to inactivity; and reason will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> have no use

-unless accompanied with resolution to enforce it.</p>

-

-<p>Though the physician can do something toward the cure, much more depends

-upon the patient; and here his constancy of mind will be employed most

-happily. No one is better qualified to judge on a fair hearing what

-course is the most fit; and having made that choice, he must with

-patience wait its good effects. Diseases that come on slowly must have

-time for curing; an attention to the first appearances of the disorder

-will be always happiest; because when least established it is easiest

-overthrown: but when that happy period has been neglected, he must wait

-the effects of such a course as will dilute and melt the obstructing

-matter gradually; for till that be done it is not only vain, but

-sometimes dangerous, to attempt its expulsion from the body.</p>

-

-<p>The blood easily separates itself into the grosser and the thinner

-parts: we see this in bleeding; and from the toughness of the red cake

-may guess how very difficult it will be to dissolve a substance of like

-firmness in the vessels of the body. That it can thus become thickened

-within the body, a Pleurisy shews us too evidently: in that case it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> is

-brought on suddenly, and with inflammation; in this other, slowly and

-without; and here, even before it forms the obstruction, can bring on

-many mischiefs. Various causes can produce the same effect, but that in

-all cases operates most durably, which operates most slowly. The watery

-part of the blood is its mild part; in the remaining gross matter of it,

-are acrid salts and burning oils, and these, when destitute of that

-happy dilution nature gives them in a healthy body, are capable of doing

-great mischief to the tender vessels in which they are kept stagnant.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect3.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. III.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Symptoms</span> of the <span class="smcap">Disorder</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">The</span> first and lightest of the signs that shew this illness are a lowness

-of spirits, and inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love

-of solitude and a habit of thinking, even on trifling subjects, with too

-much steadiness. A very little help may combat these: but if that

-indolence which is indeed a part of the disorder, will neglect them;

-worse must be expected soon to follow.</p>

-

-<p>Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness, weight, and oppression in the body,

-a want of appetite, or, what is worse, an appetite without digestion;

-for these are the conditions of different states of the disease, a

-fullness and a difficulty of breathing after meals, a straitness of the

-breast, pains and flatulencies in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> bowels, and an unaptness to

-discharge their contents.</p>

-

-<p>The pulse becomes low, weak, and unequal; and there are frequent

-palpitations of the heart, a little dark-coloured urine is voided at

-some times; and a flood of colourless and insipid at others; relieving

-for a moment, but increasing the distemper: there is in some cases also

-a continual teazing cough, with a choaking stoppage in the throat at

-times; then heartburn, sickness, hardness of the belly, and a costive

-habit, or a tormenting and vain irritation.</p>

-

-<p>The lips turn pale, the eyes loose their brightness and by degrees the

-white grows as it were greenish, the gums want their due firmness, with

-their proper colour; and an unpleasing foulness grows upon the teeth:

-the inside of the mouth is pale and furred, and the throat dry and

-husky: the colour of the skin is pale (though there are periods when the

-face is florid) and as the obstruction gathers ground, and more affects

-the liver, the whole body becomes yellow, tawny, greenish, and at length

-of that deep and dusky hue, to which men of swift imagination have given

-the name of blackness.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>These symptoms do not all appear in any one period of the disease, or in

-one case, but at one time or other all of them, as well as those which

-follow: the flesh becomes cold to the touch, though the patient does not

-himself perceive it; the limbs grow numbed and torpid, the breathing

-dull and slow, and the voice hollow; and usually the appetite in this

-period declines, and comes almost to nothing: night sweats come on,

-black swellings appear on the veins, the flesh wastes and the breast

-becomes flat and hollow: the mouth is full of a thin spittle, the head

-is dizzy and confus'd, and sometimes there is an unconquerable numbness

-in the organs of speech.</p>

-

-<p>I have known the temporary silence that follows upon this last <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'sympton'">symptom</ins>

-become a jest to the common herd; and the unhappy patient, instead of

-compassion and assistance, receive the reproof of sullenness, from those

-who should have known and acted better.</p>

-

-<p>About twenty years ago I met on a visit at Catthorpe in Leicestershire a

-young gentleman of distinguished learning and abilities, who at certain

-times was speechless. The vulgar thought it a pretence: and a jocose

-lady, where he was at tea with company,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> putting him as she said to a

-trial, poured out a dish very strong and without sugar. He drank it and

-returned the cup with a bow of great reserve, and his eye bent on the

-ground: she then filled the cup with sugar, and pouring weak tea on it,

-sent it him: he drank that too, looked at her steadily, and blushed for

-her. The lady declared the man was dumb; the rest thought him perverse,

-and obstinate; but a constant and steady perseverance in an easy method

-cured him.</p>

-

-<p>All these are miseries which the disease, while it retains its natural

-form, can bring upon the patient; and thus he will in time be worn out,

-and led miserably, though slowly, to the grave. Let him not indulge his

-inactivity so far as to give way to this, because it is represented as

-far off; the disease may suddenly and frightfully change its nature; and

-swifter evils follow.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect4.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. IV.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Danger</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">We</span> have done with the obstruction considered in itself; but this, though

-often unsurmountable by art, at least by the methods now in use, will be

-sometimes broken through at once by nature, or by accidents; and bring

-on fatal evils. These are strictly different diseases, and are no

-otherway concerned here, than as the consequences of that of which we

-are treating.</p>

-

-<p>The thick and glutinous blood which has so long stagnated in the spleen,

-will have in that time altered its nature, and acquired a very great

-degree of acrimony: while it lies dormant, this does no more mischiefs,

-than those named already; but when violent exercise, a fit of outrageous

-anger, or any thing else that suddenly shocks and disturbs the frame,

-puts it in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> motion, it melts at once into a kind of liquid putrefaction.

-Being now thin, it mixes itself readily with the blood again, and brings

-on putrid fevers; destroys the substance of the spleen itself, or being

-thrown upon some other of the viscera, corrodes them, and leads on this

-way a swift and miserable death. If it fall upon the liver, its tender

-pulpy substance is soon destroyed, jaundices beyond the help of art

-first follow, then dropsies and all their train of misery; if on lungs,

-consumptions; if on the brain, convulsions, epilepsy, palsy, apoplexy;

-if on the surface, leprosy.</p>

-

-<p>The intention of cure is to melt this coagulation softly, not to break

-it violently; and then to give it a very gentle passage through the

-bowels. There is no safe way for it to take but that; and even that when

-urged too far may bring on fatal dysenteries.</p>

-

-<p>Let none wonder at the sudden devastation which sometimes arises from

-this long stagnant matter, when liquified too hastily: how long, how

-many years the impacted matter will continue quiet in a schirrous tumour

-of the breast; but being once put in motion, whether from accident, or

-in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> course of nature, what can describe; or what can stop its

-havock!</p>

-

-<p>Instances of the other are too frequent. A nobleman the other day died

-paralytick: dissection shewed a spleen consumed by an abscess, formed

-from the dissolved matter of such an obstruction: and 'tis scarce longer

-since, a learned gentleman, who had been several years lost to his

-friends, by the extreams of a Hypochondriacal disorder, seem'd gradually

-without assistance to recover: but the lungs suffered while the spleen

-was freed; and he died very soon of what is called a galloping

-consumption.</p>

-

-<p>When the obstruction is great and of long continuance, if it be thus

-hastily moved, the consequence is, equally, a sudden and a miserable

-death, whether, like the matter of a cancer, it remains in its place; or

-like that of a bad small pox, be thrown upon some other vital part.</p>

-

-<p>Let not the patient be too much alarmed; this is laid down to caution,

-not to terrify him: it is fit he should know his danger, and attend to

-it; for the prevention is easy; and the cure, even of the most advanced<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>

-stages, when undertaken by gentle means, is not at all impracticable: to

-assist the physician, let him look into himself, and recollect the

-source of his complaint. This he may judge of from the following

-notices.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect5_1.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. V.</h3>

-

-<h3>The Causes of the <span class="smcap">Hypochondriasis</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">The</span> obstruction which forms this disease, may take its origin from

-different accidents: a fever ill cured has often caused it; or the

-piles, which had been used to discharge largely, ceasing; a marshy soil,

-poisoned with stagnant water, has given it to some persons; and altho'

-indolence and inactivity are oftenest at the root, yet it has arisen

-from too great exercise.</p>

-

-<p>Real grief has often brought it on; and even love, for sometimes that is

-real. Study and fixed attention of the mind have been accused before;

-and add to these the stooping posture of the body, which most men use,

-though none should use it, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> writing and in reading. This has

-contributed too much to it; but of all other things night studies are

-the most destructive. The steady stillness, and dusky habit of all

-nature in those hours, enforce, encourage, and support that settled

-gloom, which rises from fixt thought; and sinks the body to the grave;

-even while it carries up the mind to heaven. He who would have his lamp</p>

-

-<div class="poem">

-<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>At midnight hour</i></span><br />

-<i>Be seen in some high lonely tower,</i><small><a name="f18.1" id="f18.1" href="#f18">[18]</a></small></div>

-

-<p>will waste the flame of this unheeded life: and while he labours to

-unsphere the spirit of Plato<small><a href="#f18">[18]</a></small> will let loose his own.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect5_2.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. V.</h3>

-

-<h3>The Cure of the <span class="smcap">Hypochondriasis</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Let</span> him who would escape the mischiefs of an obstructed spleen, avoid

-the things here named: and let him who suffers from the malady,

-endeavour to remember to which of them it has been owing; for half the

-hope depends upon that knowledge.</p>

-

-<p>Nature has sometimes made a cure herself, and we should watch her ways;

-for art never is so right as when it imitates her: sometimes the

-patient's own resolution has set him free. This is always in his power,

-and at all times will do wonders.</p>

-

-<p>The bleeding of the piles, from nature's single efforts, has at once

-cured a miserable man; where their cessation was the cause<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> of the

-disorder. A leprosy has appeared upon the skin, and all the symptoms of

-the former sickness vanished. This among the Jews happened often: both

-diseases we know were common among them: and I have here seen something

-very like it: Water-Dock has thrown out scorbutic eruptions, and all the

-former <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'symptons'">symptoms</ins> of an Hypochondriacal disorder have disappeared:

-returning indeed when these were unadvisedly struck in; but keeping off

-entirely when they were better treated. A natural purging unsuppressed

-has sometimes done the same good office: but this is hazardous.</p>

-

-<p>It is easy to be directed from such instances; only let us take the

-whole along with us. Bleeding would have answered nature's purpose, if

-she could not have opened of herself the h&aelig;morrhoidal vessels; but he

-who should give medicines for that purpose, might destroy his patient by

-too great disturbance. If a natural looseness may perform the cure, so

-may an artificial; when the original source of the disorder points that

-way. But these are helps that take place only in particular cases.</p>

-

-<p>The general and universal method of cure must be by some mild and gently

-resolving<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> medicine, under the influence of which the obstructing matter

-may be voided that, or some other way with safety. The best season to

-undertake this is the autumn, but even here there must be caution.</p>

-

-<p>In the first place, no strong evacuating remedy must be given; for that,

-by carrying off the thinner parts of the juices, will tend to thicken

-the remainder; and certainly encrease the distemper. No acrid medicine

-must be directed, for that may act too hastily, dissolve the impacted

-matter at once, and let it loose, to the destruction of the sufferer; no

-antimonial, no mercurial, no martial preparation must be taken; in

-short, no chymistry: nature is the shop that heaven has set before us,

-and we must seek our medicine there. The venerable ancients, who knew

-not this new art, will lead us in the search; and (faithful relators as

-they are of truth) will tell us whence we may deduce our hope; and what

-we are to fear.</p>

-

-<p>But prior to the course of any medicine, and as an essential to any good

-hope from it, the patient must prescribe himself a proper course of

-life, and a well chosen diet: let us assist him in his choice; and speak

-of this first, as it comes first in order.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect6.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. VI.</h3>

-

-<h3>Rules of Life for Hypochondriac Persons.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Air</span> and exercise, as they are the best preservers of health, and

-greatest assistants in the cure of all long continued diseases, will

-have their full effect in this; but there requires some caution in the

-choice, and management of them. It is common to think the air of high

-grounds best; but experience near home shews otherwise: the

-Hypochondriac patient is always worse at Highgate even than in London.</p>

-

-<p>The air he breathes should be temperate; not exposed to the utmost

-violences of heat and cold, and the swift changes from one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> to the

-other; which are most felt on those high grounds. The side of a hill is

-the best place for him: and though wet grounds are hurtful; yet let

-there be the shade of trees, to tempt him often to a walk; and soften by

-their exhalation the over dryness of the air.</p>

-

-<p>The exercise he takes should be frequent; but not violent. Motion

-preserves the firmness of the parts, and elasticity of the vessels; it

-prevents that aggregation of thick humours which he is most to fear. A

-sedentary life always produces weakness, and that mischief always

-follows: weak eyes are gummy, weak lungs are clogged with phlegm, and

-weak bowels waste themselves in vapid diarrh&oelig;as.</p>

-

-<p>Let him invite himself abroad, and let his friends invite him by every

-innocent inducement. For me, I should advise above all other things the

-study of nature. Let him begin with plants: he will here find a

-continual pleasure, and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful

-things; even of the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to

-walk; and every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket,

-will afford him some new ob<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>ject. He will be tempted to be continually

-in the air, and continually to change the nature and quality of the air,

-by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the lawn, the

-heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be abroad; and the

-unceasing variety of the subjects of his observation, will prevent his

-walking hastily: he will pursue his studies in the air; and that

-contemplative turn of mind, which in his closet threatened his

-destruction, will thus become the great means of his recovery.</p>

-

-<p>If the mind tire upon this, from the repeated use, another of nature's

-kingdoms opens itself at once upon him; the plant he is weary of

-observing, feeds some insect he may examine; nor is there a stone that

-lies before his foot, but may afford instruction and amusement.</p>

-

-<p>Even what the vulgar call the most abject things will shew a wonderful

-utility; and lead the mind, in pious contemplation higher than the

-stars. The poorest moss that is trampled under foot, has its important

-uses: is it at the bottom of a wood we find it? why there it shelters

-the fallen seeds; hides them from birds, and covers them from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> frost;

-and thus becomes the foster father of another forest! creeps it along

-the surface of a rock? even there its good is infinite! its small roots

-run into the stone, and the rains make their way after them; the moss

-having lived its time dies; it rots and with the mouldered fragments of

-the stone forms earth; wherein, after a few successions, useful plants

-may grow, and feed more useful cattle!<small><a name="f19.1" id="f19.1" href="#f19">[19]</a></small></p>

-

-<p>Is there a weed more humble in its aspect, more trampled on, or more

-despised than knot grass! no art can get the better of its growth, no

-labour can destroy it; 'twere pity if they could, for the thing lives

-where nothing would of use to us; and its large and most wonderfully

-abundant seeds, feed in hard winters, half the birds of Heaven.</p>

-

-<p>What the weak moss performs upon the rock the loathed toadstool brings

-about in timber: is an oak dead where man's eye will not find it? this

-fungus roots itself upon the bark, and rots the wood beneath it; hither

-the beetle creeps for shelter, and for sustenance; him the woodpecker

-follows as his prey; and while he tears the tree in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> search of him, he

-scatters it about the ground; which it manures.</p>

-

-<p>Nor is it the beetle alone that thus insinuates itself into the

-substance of the vegetable tribe: the tender aphide<small><a name="f20.1" id="f20.1" href="#f20">[20]</a></small>, whom a touch

-destroys, burrows between the two skins of a leaf, for shelter from his

-winged enemies; tracing, with more than Dedal&aelig;an art, his various

-meanders; and veining the green surface with these white lines more

-beautifully than the best &AElig;gyptian marble.</p>

-

-<p>'Twere endless to proceed; nor is it needful: one object will not fail

-to lead on to another, and every where the goodness of his God will

-shine before him even in what are thought the vilest things; his

-greatness in the lead of them.</p>

-

-<p>Let him pursue these thoughts, and seek abroad the objects and the

-instigations to them: but let him in these and all other excursions

-avoid equally the dews of early morning, and of evening.</p>

-

-<p>The more than usual exercise of this prescription will dispose him to

-more than custo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>mary sleep, let him indulge it freely; so far from

-hurting, it will help his cure.</p>

-

-<p>Let him avoid all excesses: drink need scarce be named, for we are

-writing to men of better and of nobler minds, than can be tempted to

-that humiliating vice. Those who in this disorder have too great an

-appetite, must not indulge it; much eaten was never well digested: but

-of all excesses the most fatal in this case is that of venery. It is the

-excess we speak of.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect7.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. VII.</h3>

-

-<h3>The proper <span class="smcap">Diet</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">In</span> the first place acids must be avoided carefully; and all things that

-are in a state of fermentation, for they will breed acidity. Provisions

-hardened by salting never should be tasted; much less those cured by

-smoaking, and by salting. Bacon is indigestible in an Hypochondriac

-stomach; and hams, impregnated as is now the custom, with acid fumes

-from the wood fires over which they are hung, have that additional

-mischief.</p>

-

-<p>Milk ought to be a great article in the diet: and even in this there

-should be choice. The milk of grass-fed cows has its true quality: no

-other. There are a multitude of ways in which this may be made a part

-both of our foods and drinks, and they should all be used.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>The great and general caution is that the diet be at all times of a kind

-loosening and gently stimulating; light but not acrid. Veal, lamb,

-fowls, lobsters, crabs, craw-fish, fresh water fish and mutton broth,

-with plenty of boiled vegetables, are always right; and give enough variety.</p>

-

-<p>Raw vegetables are all bad: sour wines, old cheese, and bottled beer are

-things never to be once tasted. Indeed much wine is wrong, be it of what

-kind soever. It is the first of cordials; and as such I would have it

-taken in this disease when it is wanted: plainly as a medicine, rather

-than a part of diet. Malt liquor carefully chosen is certainly the best

-drink. This must be neither new, nor tending to sourness; perfectly

-clear, and of a moderate strength: it is the native liquor of our

-country, and the most healthful.</p>

-

-<p>Too much tea weakens; and even sugar is in this disorder hurtful: but

-honey may supply its place in most things; and this is not only harmless

-but medicinal; a very powerful dissolvent of impacted humours, and a

-great deobstruent.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>What wine is drank should be of some of the sweet kinds. Old Hock has

-been found on enquiry to yield more than ten times the acid of the sweet

-wines; and in red Port, at least in what we are content to call so,

-there is an astringent quality, that is most mischievous in these cases:

-it is said there is often alum in it: how pregnant with mischief that

-must be to persons whose bowels require to be kept open, is most

-evident. Summer fruits perfectly ripe are not only harmless but

-medicinal; but if eaten unripe they will be very prejudicial. A light

-supper, which will leave an appetite for a milk breakfast, is always

-right; this will not let the stomach be ravenous for dinner, as it is

-apt to be in those who make that their only meal.</p>

-

-<p>One caution more must be given, and it may seem a strange one: it is

-that the patient attend regularly to his hours of eating. We have to do

-with men for the most part whose soul is the great object of their

-regard; but let them not forget they have a body.</p>

-

-<p>The late Dr. <span class="smcap">Stukely</span> has told me, that one day by appointment visiting

-Sir <span class="smcap">Isaac<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></span> <span class="smcap">Newton</span>, the

-servant told him, he was in his study. No one was

-permitted to disturb him there; but as it was near dinner time, the

-visitor sat down to wait for him. After a time dinner was brought in; a

-boil'd chicken under a cover. An hour pass'd, and Sir <span class="smcap">Isaac</span> did not

-appear. The doctor eat the fowl, and covering up the empty dish, bad

-them dress their master another. Before that was ready, the great man

-came down; he apologiz'd for his delay, and added, "give me but leave to

-take my short dinner, and I shall be at your service; I am fatigued and

-faint." Saying this, he lifted up the cover; and without any emotion,

-turned about to <span class="smcap">Stukely</span> with a smile; "See says he, what we studious

-people are, I forgot I had din'd."</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect8.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. VIII.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Medicine</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">'Tis</span> the ill fate of this disease, more than of all others to be

-misunderstood at first, and thence neglected; till the physician shakes

-his head at a few first questions. None steals so fatally upon the

-sufferer: its advances are by very slow degrees; but every day it grows

-more difficult of cure.</p>

-

-<p>That this obstruction in the spleen is the true malady, the cases

-related by the antients, present observation, and the unerring

-testimonies of dissections leave no room to doubt. Being understood, the

-path is open where to seek a remedy: and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> our best guides in this, as in

-the former instance, will be those venerable Greeks; who saw a thousand

-of these cases, where we see one; and with less than half our theory,

-cured twice as many patients.</p>

-

-<p>One established doctrine holds place in all these writers; that whatever

-by a hasty fermentation dissolves the impacted matter of the

-obstruction, and sends it in that state into the blood, does incredible

-mischief: but that whatever medicine softens it by slow degrees, and, as

-it melts, delivers it to the bowels without disturbance; will cure with

-equal certainty and safety.</p>

-

-<p>For this good purpose, they knew and tried a multitude of herbs; but in

-the end they fixed on one: and on their repeated trials of this, they

-banished all the rest. This stood alone for the cure of the disease; and

-from its virtue received the name of <span class="smcap">Spleen-wort</span><small><a name="f21.1" id="f21.1" href="#f21">[21]</a></small>. O wise and happy

-Greeks! authors of knowledge and perpetuators of it! With them the very

-name they gave a plant declared its virtues: with us, a writer calls a

-plant from some friend; that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> the good gardener who receives the honour,

-may call another by his name who gave it. We now add the term <i>smooth</i>

-to this herb, to distinguish it from another, called by the same general

-term, though not much resembling it.</p>

-

-<p>The virtues of this smooth Spleen-wort have flood the test of ages; and

-the plant every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbalists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it;

-and all the miserable symptoms vanish; thought Spleen-wort not enough

-expressive of its excellence; but stamp'd on it the name of <span class="smcap">Milt-waste</span>.</p>

-

-<p>In the Greek Islands now, the use of it is known to every one; and even

-the lazy monks who take it, are no longer splenetic. In the west of

-England, the rocks are stripped of it with diligence; and every old woman

-tells you how charming that leaf is for bookish men: in Russia they use

-a plant of this kind in their malt liquor: it came into fashion there

-for the cure of this disease; which from its constant use is scarce<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>

-known any longer; and they suppose 'tis added to their liquor for a

-flavour.</p>

-

-<p>The antients held it in a kind of veneration; and used what has been

-called a superstition in the gathering it. It was to be taken up with a

-sharp knife, without violence, and laid upon the clean linen: no time

-but the still darkness of the night was proper, and even the moon was

-not to shine upon it<small><a name="f22.1" id="f22.1" href="#f22">[22]</a></small>. I know they have been ridiculed for this; for

-nothing is so vain as learned ignorance: but let me be permitted once to

-vindicate them.</p>

-

-<p>The plant has leaves that can close in their sides; and their under part

-is covered thick with a yellow powder, consisting of the seeds, and seed

-vessels: in these they knew the virtue most resided: this was the golden

-dust<small><a name="f23.1" id="f23.1" href="#f23">[23]</a></small> they held so valuable; and this they knew they could not be too

-cautious to preserve. They were not ignorant of the sleep of plants; a

-matter lately spoken of by some, as if a new discovery; and being

-sensible that light, a dry air, an expanded leaf, and a tempestuous

-season, were the means of losing this fine dust; and knowing also that

-darkness alone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> brought on that closing of the leaf which thence has

-been called sleep; and which helped to defend and to secure it, they

-therefore took such time, and used such means as could best preserve the

-plant entire; and even save what might be scattered from it.&mdash;And now

-where is their superstition?</p>

-

-<p>From this plant thus collected they prepared a medicine, which in a

-course of forty days scarce ever failed to make a perfect cure.</p>

-

-<p>We have the plant wild with us; and till the fashion of rough chemical

-preparations took off our attention from these gentler remedies, it was

-in frequent use and great repute. I trust it will be so again: and many

-thank me for restoring it to notice.</p>

-

-<p>Spleen-wort gives out its virtues freely in a tincture; and a small dose

-of this, mixing readily with the blood and juices, gradually dissolves

-the obstruction; and by a little at a time delivers its contents to be

-thrown off without pain, from the bowels. Let this be done while the

-viscera are yet sound<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> and the cure is perfect. More than the forty days

-of the Greek method is scarce ever required; much oftener two thirds of

-that time suffice; and every day, from the first dose of it, the patient

-feels the happy change that is growing in his constitution. His food no

-more turns putrid on his stomach, but yields its healthful nourishment.

-The swelling after meals therefore vanishes; and with that goes the

-lowness, and anxiety, the difficult breath, and the distracting cholick:

-he can bear the approach of rainy weather without pain; he finds himself

-more apt for motion, and ready to take that exercise which is to be

-assistant in his cure; life seems no longer burthensome. His bowels get

-into the natural condition of health, and perform their office once at

-least a day; better if a little more: the dull and dead colour of his

-skin goes off, his lips grow red again, and every sign of health

-returns.</p>

-

-<p>Let him who takes the medicine, say whether any thing here be

-exaggerated. Let him, if he pleases to give himself the trouble, talk

-over with me, or write to me, this gradual decrease of his complaints,

-as he proceeds in his cure. My uncertain state <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>of health does not

-permit me to practise physic in the usual way, but I am very desirous to

-do what good I can, and shall never refuse my advice, such as it may be,

-to any person rich or poor, in whatever manner he may apply for it. I

-shall refer him to no apothecary, whose bills require he should be

-drenched with potions; but tell him, in this as in all other cases,

-where to find some simple herb; which he may if he please prepare

-himself; or if he had rather spare that trouble, may have it so prepared

-from me.</p>

-

-<p>With regard to Spleen-wort, no method of using it is more effectual than

-simply taking it in powder; the only advantage of a tincture, is that a

-proper dose may be given, and yet the stomach not be loaded with so

-large a quantity: it is an easier and pleasanter method, and nothing

-more.</p>

-

-<p>If any person choose to take it in the other way, I should still wish

-him once at least to apply to me; that he may be assured what he is

-about to take is the right plant. Abuses in medicines are at this time

-very great, and in no instance worse than what relates to herbs. The

-best of our physicians have complained upon this head with warmth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> but

-without redress: they know the virtues and the value of many of our

-native plants, but dread to prescribe them; lest some wrong thing should

-be administered in their place; perhaps inefficacious, perhaps

-mischievous, nay it may be fatal. The few simple things I direct are

-always before me; and it will at all times be a pleasure to me, in this

-and any other instance, to see whether what any person is about to take

-be right. I have great obligations to the public, and this is the best

-return that I know how to make.</p>

-

-<p>To see the need of such a caution, hear a transaction but of yesterday!

-An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right. Such is the chance of

-health in those hands through which the best means of it usually pass;

-even in the most regular course of application.</p>

-

-<p>I would not be understood to limit the little services I may this way be

-able to render<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> the afflicted, to this single instance; much less to

-propose to myself any advantages from it. Whoever pleases will be

-welcome to me, upon any such occasion; and whatever be the herb on which

-he places a dependance, he shall be shewn it growing. I once recommended

-a garden to be established for this use, at the public expence: one

-great person has put it in my power to answer all its purposes.</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p class="center"><b><span class="spacer">F</span><span class="spacer">I</span><span class="spacer">N</span><span class="spacer">I</span><span class="spacer">S.</span></b></p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<hr style="width: 30%;" />

-<p><span class="u">Footnotes:</span></p>

-

-<p><a name="f18" id="f18" href="#f18.1">[18]</a> Milton's Penseroso.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f19" id="f19" href="#f19.1">[19]</a> Biberg.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f20" id="f20" href="#f20.1">[20]</a> Reaumur.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f21" id="f21" href="#f21.1">[21]</a> &#945;&#963;&#960;&#955;&#949;&#957;&#959;&#957;</p>

-

-<p><a name="f22" id="f22" href="#f22.1">[22]</a> Silente Luna.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f23" id="f23" href="#f23.1">[23]</a> Pulvis Aureus.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>

-

-<h3>WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK</h3>

-<h3>MEMORIAL LIBRARY</h3>

-<h3>UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES</h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h4>PUBLICATIONS IN PRINT</h4>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/emblem.png" alt="" /></div>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-<h4>1948-1949</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>16. Henry Nevil Payne, <i>The Fatal Jealousie</i> (1673).</p>

-<p class="hang">18. Anonymous, "Of Genius," in <i>The Occasional Paper</i>, Vol. III, No. 10 (1719), and Aaron Hill, Preface to <i>The Creation</i> (1720).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1949-1950</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>19. Susanna Centlivre, <i>The Busie Body</i> (1709).</p>

-<p>20. Lewis Theobald, <i>Preface to the Works of Shakespeare</i> (1734).</p>

-<p class="hang">22. Samuel Johnson, <i>The Vanity of Human Wishes</i> (1749), and two <i>Rambler</i> papers (1750).</p>

-<p>23. John Dryden, <i>His Majesties Declaration Defended</i> (1681).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1951-1952</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p class="hang">31. Thomas Gray, <i>An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard</i> (1751), and <i>The Eton College Manuscript</i>.</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1952-1953</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>41. Bernard Mandeville, <i>A Letter to Dion</i> (1732).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1963-1964</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p class="hang">104. Thomas D'Urfey, <i>Wonders in the Sun; or, The Kingdom of the Birds</i> (1706).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1964-1965</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>110. John Tutchin, <i>Selected Poems</i> (1685-1700).</p>

-<p>111. Anonymous, <i>Political Justice</i> (1736).</p>

-<p>112. Robert Dodsley, <i>An Essay on Fable</i> (1764).</p>

-<p>113. T. R., <i>An Essay Concerning Critical and Curious Learning</i> (1698).</p>

-<p class="hang">114. <i>Two Poems Against Pope</i>: Leonard Welsted, <i>One Epistle to Mr. A. Pope</i> (1730), and Anonymous, <i>The Blatant Beast</i> (1742).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1965-1966</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>115. Daniel Defoe and others, <i>Accounts of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal</i>.</p>

-<p>116. Charles Macklin, <i>The Covent Garden Theatre</i> (1752).</p>

-<p>117. Sir George L'Estrange, <i>Citt and Bumpkin</i> (1680).</p>

-<p>118. Henry More, <i>Enthusiasmus Triumphatus</i> (1662).</p>

-<p class="hang">119. Thomas Traherne, <i>Meditations on the Six Days of the Creation</i> (1717).</p>

-<p class="hang">120. Bernard Mandeville, <i>Aesop Dress'd or a Collection of Fables</i> (1704).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1966-1967</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p class="hang">123. Edmond Malone, <i>Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Mr. Thomas Rowley</i> (1782).</p>

-<p>124. Anonymous, <i>The Female Wits</i> (1704).</p>

-<p class="hang">125. Anonymous, <i>The Scribleriad</i> (1742). Lord Hervey, <i>The Difference Between Verbal and Practical Virtue</i> (1742).</p>

-<p class="hang">126. <i>Le Lutrin: an Heroick Poem, Written Originally in French by Monsieur Boileau: Made English by N. O.</i> (1682).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1967-1968</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>127-</p>

-<p class="hang">128. Charles Macklin, <i>A Will and No Will, or a Bone for the Lawyers</i> (1746). <i>The New Play Criticiz'd, or The Plague of Envy</i> (1747).</p>

-<p class="hang">129. Lawrence Echard, Prefaces to <i>Terence's Comedies</i> (1694) and <i>Plautus's Comedies</i> (1694).</p>

-<p>130. Henry More, <i>Democritus Platonissans</i> (1646).</p>

-<p class="hang">131. John Evelyn, <i>The History of Sabatai Sevi, The Suppos'd Messiah of the Jews</i> (1669).</p>

-<p class="hang">132. Walter Harte, <i>An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad</i> (1730).</p></div>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)

-are available in paperbound units of six issues at $16.00 per unit, from

-the Kraus Reprint Company, 16 East 46th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.</p>

-

-<p>Publications in print are available at the regular membership rate of

-$5.00 yearly. Prices of single issues may be obtained upon request.

-Subsequent publications may be checked in the annual prospectus.</p>

-

-

-<hr style="width: 35%;" />

-<h4>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library: University of California, Los Angeles</h4>

-

-<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>

-

-<h5>2520 CIMARRON STREET, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90018</h5>

-

-<p class="center"><i>General Editors:</i> William E. Conway, William Andrews Clark Memorial

-Library; George Robert Guffey, University of California, Los Angeles;

-Maximillian E. Novak, University of California, Los Angeles</p>

-

-<p class="center"><i>Corresponding Secretary:</i> Mrs. Edna C. Davis, William Andrews Clark

-Memorial Library</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>The Society's purpose is to publish rare Restoration and

-eighteenth-century works (usually as facsimile reproductions). All

-income of the Society is devoted to defraying costs of publication and

-mailing.</p>

-

-<p>Correspondence concerning memberships in the United States and Canada

-should be addressed to the Corresponding Secretary at the William

-Andrews Clark Memorial Library, 2520 Cimarron Street, Los Angeles,

-California. Correspondence concerning editorial matters may be addressed

-to the General Editors at the same address. Manuscripts of introductions

-should conform to the recommendations of the MLA <i>Style Sheet</i>. The

-membership fee is $5.00 a year in the United States and Canada and

-&pound;1.16.6 in Great Britain and Europe. British and European prospective

-members should address B. H. Blackwell, Broad Street, Oxford, England.

-Copies of back issues in print may be obtained from the Corresponding

-Secretary.</p>

-

-<p>Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)

-are available in paperbound units of six issues at $16.00 per unit, from

-the Kraus Reprint Company, 16 East 46th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.</p>

-

-<h5>Make check or money order payable to <span class="smcap">The Regents of the University of California</span></h5>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h5>REGULAR PUBLICATIONS FOR 1968-1969</h5>

-

-<p class="hang">133. John Courtenay, <i>A Poetical Review of the Literary and Moral

-Character of the Late Samuel Johnson</i> (1786). Introduction by Robert E.

-Kelley.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">134. John Downes, <i>Roscius Anglicanus</i> (1708). Introduction by John

-Loftis.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">135. Sir John Hill, <i>Hypochondriasis, a Practical Treatise on the Nature

-and Cure of that Disorder Call'd the Hyp or Hypo</i> (1766). Introduction

-by G. S. Rousseau.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">136. Thomas Sheridan, <i>Discourse ... Being Introductory to His Course of

-Lectures on Elocution and the English Language</i> (1759). Introduction by

-G. P. Mohrman.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">137. Arthur Murphy, <i>The Englishman From Paris</i> (1756). Introduction by

-Simon Trefman. Previously unpublished manuscript.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">138. [Catherine Trotter], <i>Olinda's Adventures</i> (1718). Introduction by

-Robert Adams Day.</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h5>SPECIAL PUBLICATION FOR 1968-1969</h5>

-

-<p><i>After <big>THE TEMPEST</big></i>. Introduction by George Robert Guffey.</p>

-

-<p>Next in the continuing series of special publications by the Society

-will be <i>After THE TEMPEST</i>, a volume including the Dryden-Davenant

-version of <i>The Tempest</i> (1670); the "operatic" <i>Tempest</i> (1674); Thomas

-Duffet's <i>Mock-Tempest</i> (1675); and the "Garrick" <i>Tempest</i> (1756), with

-an Introduction by George Robert Guffey.</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>Already published in this series are:</p>

-

-<p class="hang">1. John Ogilby, <i>The Fables of Aesop Paraphras'd in Verse</i> (1668), with

-an Introduction by Earl Miner.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">2. John Gay, <i>Fables</i> (1727, 1738), with an Introduction by Vinton A.

-Dearing.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">3. Elkanah Settle, <i>The Empress of Morocco</i> (1673) with five plates;

-<i>Notes and Observations on the Empress of Morocco</i> (1674) by John

-Dryden, John Crowne and Thomas Shadwell; <i>Notes and Observations on the

-Empress of Morocco Revised</i> (1674) by Elkanah Settle; and <i>The Empress

-of Morocco. A Farce</i> (1674) by Thomas Duffet; with an Introduction by

-Maximillian E. Novak.</p>

-

-<p>Price to members of the Society, $2.50 for the first copy of each title,

-and $3.25 for additional copies. Price to non-members, $4.00. Standing

-orders for this continuing series of Special Publications will be

-accepted. British and European orders should be addressed to B. H.

-Blackwell, Broad Street, Oxford, England.</p>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<p><span class="u">Transcriber's Notes:</span></p>

-

-<p>Long "s" has been modernized.</p>

-<p>Printer's inconsistencies have been retained.</p>

-<p>The original text contains two sections labeled "Sect. V."</p>

-<p>Additional spacing after some of the quotes is intentional to indicate

-both the end of a quotation and the beginning of a new paragraph as presented in the original text.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***</div>

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+<body>
+<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***</div>
+<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Hypochondriasis, by John Hill</h1>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h2>JOHN HILL</h2>
+<h1>HYPOCHONDRIASIS</h1>
+<h3>A PRACTICAL TREATISE.</h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h3>(1766)</h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4><i>Introduction by</i><br />
+<span class="smcap">G. S. Rousseau</span></h4>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4>PUBLICATION NUMBER 135<br />
+WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY<br />
+<span class="smcap">University of California, Los Angeles</span><br />
+1969</h4>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="editors">
+<tr>
+<td align="center">
+<b>GENERAL EDITORS</b><br />
+William E. Conway, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />
+George Robert Guffey, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />
+Maximillian E. Novak, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<b>ASSOCIATE EDITOR</b><br />
+David S. Rodes, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<b>ADVISORY EDITORS</b><br />
+Richard C. Boys, <i>University of Michigan</i><br />
+James L. Clifford, <i>Columbia University</i><br />
+Ralph Cohen, <i>University of Virginia</i><br />
+Vinton A. Dearing, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />
+Arthur Friedman, <i>University of Chicago</i><br />
+Louis A. Landa, <i>Princeton University</i><br />
+Earl Miner, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />
+Samuel H. Monk, <i>University of Minnesota</i><br />
+Everett T. Moore, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />
+Lawrence Clark Powell, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />
+James Sutherland, <i>University College, London</i><br />
+H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />
+Robert Vosper, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<b>CORRESPONDING SECRETARY</b><br />
+Edna C. Davis, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />
+<br />
+<br />
+<b>EDITORIAL ASSISTANT</b><br />
+Mary Kerbret, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i></td></tr></table>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[Pg i]</a></span></p>
+<h3>INTRODUCTION</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"When I first dabbled in this art, the old distemper call'd
+<i>Melancholy</i> was exchang'd for <i>Vapours</i>, and afterwards for the
+<i>Hypp</i>, and at last took up the now current appellation of the
+<i>Spleen</i>, which it still retains, tho' a learned doctor of the
+west, in a little tract he hath written, divides the <i>Spleen</i> and
+<i>Vapours</i>, not only into the <i>Hypp</i>, the <i>Hyppos</i>, and the
+Hyppocons; but subdivides these divisions into the <i>Markambles</i>,
+the <i>Moonpalls</i>, the <i>Strong-Fiacs</i>, and the <i>Hockogrokles</i>."</p>
+
+<p class="right">Nicholas Robinson, <i>A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and
+Hypochondriack Melancholy</i> (London, 1729)</p></div>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>Treatises on hypochondriasis&mdash;the seventeenth-century medical term for a
+wide range of nervous diseases&mdash;were old when "Sir" John Hill, the
+eccentric English scientist, physician, apothecary, and hack writer,
+published his <i>Hypochondriasis</i> in 1766.<small><a name="f1.1" id="f1.1" href="#f1">[1]</a></small> For at least a century and a
+half medical writers as well as lay authors had been writing literature
+of all types (treatises, pamphlets, poems, sermons, epigrams) on this
+most fashionable of English maladies under the variant names of
+"melancholy," "the spleen," "black melancholy," "hysteria," "nervous
+debility," "the hyp." Despite the plethora of <i>materia scripta</i> on the
+subject it makes sense to reprint Hill's <i>Hypochondriasis</i>, because it
+is indeed a "practical treatise" and because it offers the modern
+student of neoclassical literature a clear summary of the best thoughts
+that had been put forth on the subject, as well as an explanation of the
+causes, symptoms, and cures of this commonplace malady.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[Pg ii]</a></span>No reader of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English literature
+needs to be reminded of the interest of writers of the period in the
+condition&mdash;"disease" is too confining a term&mdash;hypochondriasis.<small><a name="f2.1" id="f2.1" href="#f2">[2]</a></small> Their
+concern is apparent in both the poetry and prose of two centuries. From
+Robert Burton's Brobdingnagian exposition in <i>The Anatomy of Melancholy</i>
+(1621) to Tobias Smollett's depiction of the misanthropic and ailing
+Matthew Bramble in <i>Humphry Clinker</i> (1771), and, of course, well into
+the nineteenth century, afflicted heroes and weeping heroines populate
+the pages of England's literature. There is scarcely a decade in the
+period 1600-1800 that does not contribute to the literature of
+melancholy; so considerable in number are the works that could be placed
+under this heading that it actually makes sense to speak of the
+"literature of melancholy." A kaleidoscopic survey of this literature
+(exclusive of treatises written on the subject) would include mention of
+Milton's "Il Penseroso" and "L'Allegro," the meditative Puritan and
+nervous Anglican thinkers of the Restoration (many of whose narrators,
+such as Richard Baxter, author of the <i>Reliquiae Baxterianae</i>,<small><a name="f3.1" id="f3.1" href="#f3">[3]</a></small> are
+afflicted), Swift's "School of Spleen" in <i>A Tale of a Tub</i>, Pope's
+hysterical Belinda in the "Cave of Spleen," the melancholic "I" of
+Samuel Richardson's correspondence, Gray's leucocholy, the
+psychosomatically ailing characters of <i>The Vicar of Wakefield</i> and
+<i>Tristram Shandy</i>, Boswell's <i>Hypochondriack Papers</i> (1777-1783)
+contributed to the <i>London Magazine</i>, and such "sensible" and
+"sensitive" women as Mrs. Bennett and Miss Bates in the novels of Jane
+Austen. So great in bulk is this literature in the mid eighteenth
+century, that C. A. Moore has written, "statistically, this deserves to
+be called the Age of Melancholy."<small><a name="f4.1" id="f4.1" href="#f4">[4]</a></small> The vastness of this literature is
+sufficient to justify the reprinting of an unavailable practical
+handbook on the subject by a prolific author all too little known.<small><a name="f5.1" id="f5.1" href="#f5">[5]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>The medical background of Hill's pamphlet extends further back than the
+seventeenth century and Burton's <i>Anatomy</i>. The ancient Greeks had
+theorized about hypochondria: &#8016;&#960;&#959;&#967;&#972;&#957;&#948;&#961;&#953;&#945;&#963;&#953;&#962; signified a
+disorder beneath (&#8016;&#960;&#972;) the gristle (&#967;&#972;&#957;&#948;&#961;&#953;&#945;) and the
+disease was discussed principally in physiological terms. The belief
+that hypochondriasis was a somatic condition persisted until<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span> the second
+half of the seventeenth century at which time an innovation was made by
+Dr. Thomas Sydenham. In addition to showing that hypochondriasis and
+hysteria (thought previously by Sydenham to afflict women only) were the
+same disease, Sydenham noted that the external cause of both was a
+mental disturbance and not a physiological one. He also had a theory
+that the internal and immediate cause was a disorder of the animal
+spirits arising from a clot and resulting in pain, spasms, and bodily
+disorders. By attributing the onset of the malady to mental phenomena
+and not to obstructions of the spleen or viscera, Sydenham was moving
+towards a psychosomatic theory of hypochondriasis, one that was to be
+debated in the next century in England, Holland, and France.<small><a name="f6.1" id="f6.1" href="#f6">[6]</a></small>
+Sydenham's influence on the physicians of the eighteenth century was
+profound: Cheyne in England, Boerhaave in Holland, La Mettrie in France.
+Once the theory of the nervous origins of hypochondria gained
+ground&mdash;here I merely note coincidence, not historical cause and
+effect&mdash;the disease became increasingly fashionable in England,
+particularly among the polite, the aristocratic, and the refined.
+Students of the drama will recall Scrub's denial in <i>The Beaux'
+Stratagem</i> (1707) of the possibility that Archer has the spleen and Mrs.
+Sullen's interjection, "I thought that distemper had been only proper to
+people of quality."</p>
+
+<p>Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, hypochondria was so
+prevalent in people's minds and mouths that it soon assumed the
+abbreviated name "the hyp." Entire poems like William Somervile's <i>The
+Hyp: a Burlesque Poem in Five Canto's</i> (1731) and Tim Scrubb's <i>A Rod
+for the Hyp-Doctor</i> (1731) were devoted to this strain; others, like
+Malcom Flemyng's epic poem, <i>Neuropathia: sive de morbis hypochondriacis
+et hystericis, libri tres, poema medicum</i> (1740), were more technical
+and scientific. Professor Donald Davie has written that he has often
+"heard old fashioned and provincial persons [in England and Scotland]
+even in [my] own lifetime say, 'Oh, you give me the hyp,' where we
+should say 'You give me a pain in the neck'"<small><a name="f7.1" id="f7.1" href="#f7">[7]</a></small>; and I myself have heard
+the expression, "You give me the pip," where "pip" may be a corruption
+of "hyp." As used in the early eighteenth century, the term "hyp" was
+perhaps not far from what our century has learned to call <i>Angst</i>. It
+was also used as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span> synonym for "lunacy," as the anonymous author of
+<i>Anti-Siris</i> (1744), one of the tracts in the tar-water controversy,
+informs us that "Berkeley tells his Countrymen, they are all mad, or
+<i>Hypochondriac</i>, which is but a fashionable name for Madness." Bernard
+Mandeville, the Dutch physician and author of <i>The Fable of the Bees</i>,
+seems to have understood perfectly well that hypochondriasis is a
+condition encompassing any number of diseases and not a specific and
+readily definable ailment; a condition, moreover, that hovers
+precariously and bafflingly in limbo between mind and body, and he
+stressed this as the theme of his <i>Treatise of the Hypochondriack and
+Hysteric Passions, Vulgarly Call'd the Hypo in Men and Vapours in Women</i>
+(1711). The mental causes are noted as well in an anonymous pamphlet in
+the British Museum, <i>A Treatise on the Dismal Effects of
+Low-Spiritedness</i> (1750) and are echoed in many similar early and
+mid-eighteenth century works. Some medical writers of the age, like
+Nicholas Robinson, had reservations about the external mental bases of
+the hyp and preferred to discuss the condition in terms of internal
+physiological causes:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>...of that Disorder we call the Vapours, or <i>Hypochondria</i>; for
+they have no material distinctive Characters, but what arise from
+the same Disease affecting different Sexes, and the Vapours in
+Women are term'd the <i>Hypochondria</i> in Men, and they proceed from
+the Contraction of the Vessels being depress'd a little beneath the
+Balance of Nature, and the Relaxation of the Nerves at the same
+Time, which creates that Uneasiness and Melancholy that naturally
+attends Vapours, and which generally is an Intemperature of the
+whole Body, proceeding from a Depression of the Solids beneath the
+Balance of Nature; but the Intemperature of the Parts is that
+Peculiar Disposition whereby they favour any Disease.<small><a name="f8.1" id="f8.1" href="#f8">[8]</a></small></p></div>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>But the majority of medical thinkers had been persuaded that the
+condition was psychosomatic, and this belief was supported by research
+on nerves by important physicians in the 1740's and 1750's: the Monro
+brothers in London, Robert Whytt in Edinburgh, Albrecht von Haller in
+Leipzig. By mid century the condition known<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span> as the hyp was believed to
+be a real, not an imaginary ailment, common, peculiar in its
+manifestations, and indefinable, almost impossible to cure, producing
+very real symptoms of physical illness, and said to originate sometimes
+in depression and idleness. It was summed up by Robert James in his
+<i>Medicinal Dictionary</i> (London, 1743-45):</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>If we thoroughly consider its Nature, it will be found to be a
+spasmodico-flatulent Disorder of the <i>Primae Viae</i>, that is, of the
+Stomach and Intestines, arising from an Inversion or Perversion of
+their peristaltic Motion, and, by the mutual consent of the Parts,
+throwing the whole nervous System into irregular Motions, and
+disturbing the whole Oeconomy of the Functions.... no part or
+Function of the Body escapes the Influence of this tedious and long
+protracted Disease, whose Symptoms are so violent and numerous,
+that it is no easy Task either to enumerate or account for them....
+No disease is more troublesome, either to the Patient or Physician,
+than hypochondriac Disorders; and it often happens, that, thro' the
+Fault of both, the Cure is either unnecessarily protracted, or
+totally frustrated; for the Patients are so delighted, not only
+with a Variety of Medicines, but also of Physicians.... On the
+contrary, few physicians are sufficiently acquainted with the true
+Genius and Nature of this perplexing Disorder; for which Reason
+they boldly prescribe almost everything contained in the Shops, not
+without an irreparable Injury to the Patient (article on
+"Hypochondriacus Morbis").</p></div>
+
+<p>This is a more technical description than Hill gives anywhere in his
+handbook, but it serves well to summarize the background of <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'the the'">the</ins> condition
+about which Sir John wrote.</p>
+
+<p>Hill's <i>Hypochondriasis</i> adds little that is new to the theory of the
+disease. It incorporates much of the thinking set forth by the writings
+mentioned above, particularly those of George Cheyne, whose medical
+works <i>The English Malady</i> (1733) and <i>The Natural Method of Cureing the
+Diseases of the Body, and the Disorders of the Mind Depending on the
+Body</i> (1742) Hill knew. He is also con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span>versant with some Continental
+writers on the subject, two of whom&mdash;Isaac Biberg, author of The
+<i>Oeconomy of Nature</i> (1751), and Ren&eacute; R&eacute;aumur who had written a history
+of insects (1722)<small><a name="f9.1" id="f9.1" href="#f9">[9]</a></small>&mdash;he mentions explicitly, and with William
+Stukeley's <i>Of the Spleen</i> (1723). Internal evidence indicates that Hill
+had read or was familiar with the ideas propounded in Richard
+Blackmore's <i>Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours</i> (1725) and Nicholas
+Robinson's <i>A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and Hypochondriack
+Melancholy</i> (1729).</p>
+
+<p>Hill's arrangement of sections is logical: he first defines the
+condition (<a href="#Page_3">I</a>), then proceeds to discuss persons most susceptible to it
+(<a href="#Page_6">II</a>), its major symptoms (<a href="#Page_12">III</a>), consequences (<a href="#Page_16">IV</a>), causes (<a href="#Page_20">V</a>), and cures
+(<a href="#Page_22">VI-VIII</a>). In the first four sections almost every statement is
+commonplace and requires no commentary (for example, Hill's opening
+remark: "To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and
+cruel. It is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by
+thickened and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver,
+and other parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick
+scarce knows one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.") His
+belief that the condition afflicts sedentary persons, particularly
+students, philosophers, theologians, and that it is not restricted to
+women alone&mdash;as some contemporary thinkers still maintained&mdash;is also
+impossible to trace to a single source, as is his description (p. <a href="#Page_12">12</a>) of
+the most prevalent physiological <i>symptoms</i> ("lowness of spirits, and
+inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love of solitude....
+Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness") and <i>causes</i> (the poor and damp
+English climate and the resultant clotting of blood in the spleen) of
+the illness.</p>
+
+<p>Sections <a href="#Page_20">V-VIII</a>, dealing with causes and cures, are less commonplace and
+display some of Hill's eccentricities as a writer and thinker. He uses
+the section entitled "Cures" as a means to peddle his newly discovered
+cure-all, water dock,<small><a name="f10.1" id="f10.1" href="#f10">[10]</a></small> which Smollett satirized through the mouth of
+Tabitha Bramble in <i>Humphry Clinker</i> (1771). Hill also rebelled against
+contemporary apothecaries and physicians who prescribed popular
+medicines&mdash;such as Berkeley's tar-water, Dover's mercury powders, and
+James's fever-powders<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span>&mdash;as universal panaceas for the cure of the hyp.
+"No acrid medicine must be directed, for that may act too hastily,
+dissolve the impacted matter at once, and let it loose, to the
+destruction of the sufferer; no antimonial, no mercurial, no martial
+preparation must be taken; in short, no chymistry: nature is the shop
+that heaven has set before us, and we must seek our medicine there"
+(p. <a href="#Page_24">24</a>). However scientifically correct Hill may have been in minimizing
+the efficacy of current pills and potions advertised as remedies for the
+hyp, he was unusual for his time in objecting so strongly to them. Less
+eccentric was his allegiance to the "Ancients" rather than to the
+"Moderns" so far as chemical treatment (i.e., restoration of the humours
+by chemical rearrangement) of hypochondriasis is concerned.<small><a name="f11.1" id="f11.1" href="#f11">[11]</a></small> "The
+venerable ancients," Hill writes, "who knew not this new art, will lead
+us in the search; and (faithful relators as they are of truth) will tell
+us whence we may deduce our hope; and what we are to fear" (p. <a href="#Page_24">24</a>).</p>
+
+<p>Still more idiosyncratic, perhaps, is Hill's contention (p. <a href="#Page_25">25</a>) that the
+air of dry, high grounds worsens the condition of the patient. Virtually
+every writer I have read on the subject believed that onset of the hyp
+was caused by one of the six non-naturals&mdash;air, diet, lack of sufficient
+sleep, too little or too much exercise, defective evacuation, the
+passions of the mind; and although some medical writers emphasized the
+last of these,<small><a name="f12.1" id="f12.1" href="#f12">[12]</a></small> few would have concurred with Hill that the fetid air
+of London was less harmful than the clearer air at Highgate. All readers
+of the novel of the period will recall the hypochondriacal Matt
+Bramble's tirade against the stench of London air. Beliefs of the
+variety here mentioned cause me to question Hill's importance in the
+history of medicine; there can be no question about his contributions to
+the advancement of the science of botany through popularization of
+Linnaeus' system of bisexual classification, but Hill's medical
+importance is summarized best as that of a compiler. His recommendation
+of the study of botany as a cure for melancholics is sensible but verges
+on becoming "a digression in praise of the author," a poetic <i>apologia
+pro vita sua</i> in Augustan fashion:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[Pg viii]</a></span>For me, I should advise above all other things the study of nature.
+Let him begin with plants: he will here find a continual pleasure,
+and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful things; even of
+the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to walk; and
+every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket, will
+afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually in
+the air; and continually to change the nature and quality of the
+air, by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the
+lawn, the heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be
+abroad; and the unceasing variety of the subjects of his
+observation, will prevent his walking hastily: he will pursue his
+studies in the air; and that contemplative turn of mind, which in
+his closet threatened his destruction, will thus become the great
+means of his recovery (pp. <a href="#Page_26">26-27</a>).</p></div>
+
+<p>Hill was forever extolling the claims of a life devoted to the study of
+nature, as we see in a late work, <i>The Virtues of British Herbs</i> (1770).
+Judicious as is the logic of this recommendation, one cannot help but
+feel that the emphasis here is less on diversion as a cure and more on
+the botanic attractions of "every hedge and hillock, every foot-path
+side, and thicket."</p>
+
+<p>While Hill's rules and regulations regarding proper diet (<a href="#Page_31">Section VII</a>)
+are standard, several taken almost <i>verbatim et literatim</i> from Cheyne's
+list in <i>The English Malady</i> (1733), his recommendation (<a href="#Page_35">Section VIII</a>)
+of "Spleen-Wort" as the best medicine for the hypochondriac patient is
+not. Since Hill devotes so much space to the virtues of this herb and
+concludes his work extolling this plant, a word should be said about it.
+Throughout his life he was an active botanist. Apothecary, physician,
+and writer though he was, it was ultimately botany that was his ruling
+passion, as is made abundantly clear in his correspondence.<small><a name="f13.1" id="f13.1" href="#f13">[13]</a></small> Wherever
+he lived&mdash;whether in the small house in St. James's Street or in the
+larger one on the Bayswater Road&mdash;he cultivated an herb garden that
+flattered his knowledge and ability. Connoisseurs raved about its
+species and considered it one of the showpieces of London. His arrogant
+personality alone prevented him from becoming the first Keeper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span> of the
+Apothecary's Garden in Chelsea, although he was for a time
+superintendent to the Dowager Princess of Wales's gardens at Kensington
+Palace and at Kew. His interest in cultivation of herbs nevertheless
+continued; over the years Hill produced more than thirty botanical
+works, many of them devoted to the medical virtues of rare herbs such as
+"Spleen-Wort." Among these are <i>The British Herbal</i> (1756), <i>On the
+Virtues of Sage in Lengthening Human Life</i> (1763), <i>Centaury, the Great
+Stomachic</i> (1765), <i>Polypody</i> (1768), <i>A Method of Curing Jaundice</i>
+(1768), <i>Instances of the Virtue of Petasite Root</i> (1771), and <i>Twenty
+Five New Plants</i> (1773).<small><a name="f14.1" id="f14.1" href="#f14">[14]</a></small> It is therefore not surprising that he
+should believe a specific herb to be the best remedy for a complicated
+medical condition. Nor is his reference to the Ancients as authority for
+the herbal pacification of an inflamed spleen surprising in the light of
+his researches: he was convinced that every illness could be cured by
+taking an appropriate herb or combination of herbs. Whereas a few
+nonmedical writers&mdash;such as John Wesley in <i>Primitive Physick</i>
+(1747)&mdash;had advocated the taking of one or two herbs in moderate dosage
+as anti-hysterics (the eighteenth-century term for all cures of the
+hyp), no medical writer of the century ever promoted the use of herbs to
+the extent that Hill did. In fairness to him, it is important to note
+that his herbal remedies were harmless and that many found their way
+into the official <i>London Pharmacopeia</i>. "The virtues of this smooth
+Spleen-wort," he insists, "have stood the test of ages; and the plant
+every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good
+herbarists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and
+hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it"
+(p. <a href="#Page_37">37</a>).<small><a name="f15.1" id="f15.1" href="#f15">[15]</a></small> The greatest portion of Hill's concluding section combines
+advertisement for the powder medicine he was himself manufacturing at a
+handsome profit together with a protest against competing apothecaries:
+"An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in
+the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was
+written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and
+almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but
+what is very striking, not one of them the right" (p. <a href="#Page_42">42</a>).</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[Pg x]</a></span>Treatises on hypochondriasis did not cease to be printed after Hill's in
+1766, but continued to issue from the presses into the nineteenth
+century. A good example of this is the tome by John Reid, physician to
+the Finsbury Dispensary in London, <i>Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis
+and Other Nervous Affections</i> (1816), which summarizes theories of the
+malady.<small><a name="f16.1" id="f16.1" href="#f16">[16]</a></small> A bibliographical study of such works would probably reveal
+a larger number of titles in the nineteenth century than in the previous
+one, but by this time the nature and definition of hypochondria had
+changed significantly.</p>
+
+<p>If John Hill's volume is not an important contribution in the history of
+medicine, it is a lucid and brief exposition of many of the best ideas
+that had been thought and written on the hyp, with the exception of his
+uninhibited prescribing of herbal medicines as cure-alls. An
+understanding of this disease is essential for readers of neoclassical
+English literature, especially when we reflect upon the fact that some
+of the best literature of the period was composed by writers whom it
+afflicted. It is perhaps not without significance that the greatest poet
+of the Augustan age, Alexander Pope, thought it necessary as he lay on
+his deathbed in May 1744 to exclaim with his last breath, "I never was
+hippish in my whole life."<small><a name="f17.1" id="f17.1" href="#f17">[17]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>University of California,<br />
+Los Angeles<br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span></p>
+<h3>NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION</h3>
+
+<p><a name="f1" id="f1" href="#f1.1">[1]</a> The text here reproduced is that of the copy in the Library of the
+Royal Society of Medicine, London. Title pages of different copies of
+the first edition of 1766 vary. For example, the title page of the copy
+in the British Museum reads, <i>Hypochondriasis; a Practical Treatise On
+the Nature and Cure of that Disorder, Commonly called the Hyp and the
+Hypo</i>. The copy in the Royal Society of Medicine contains, among other
+additions, the words "by Sir John Hill" in pencil, and "8<sup>vo</sup> Lond.
+1766," written in ink and probably a later addition.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f2" id="f2" href="#f2.1">[2]</a> Melancholy, hypochondriasis, and the spleen were considered in the
+seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to be one complex condition, a
+malady rather than a malaise, which is but a symptom. Distinctions among
+these, of interest primarily to medical historians, cannot be treated
+here. As good a definition as any is found in Dr. Johnson's <i>Dictionary</i>
+(1755): "Hypochondriacal.... 1. Melancholy; disordered in the
+imagination.... 2. Producing melancholy...." The literature of
+melancholy has been surveyed in part by C. A. Moore, "The English
+Malady," <i>Backgrounds of English Literature 1700-1760</i> (Minneapolis,
+1953), pp. 179-235. In medical parlance, "hypochondria" means the soft
+parts of the body below the costal cartilages, and the singular form of
+the word, "hypochondrium," means the viscera situated in the
+hypochondria, i.e., the liver, gall bladder, and spleen.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f3" id="f3" href="#f3.1">[3]</a> See Samuel Clifford's <i>The Signs and Causes of Melancholy, with
+directions suited to the case of those who are afflicted with it.
+Collected out of the works of Mr. Richard Baxter</i> (London, 1716) in the British Museum.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f4" id="f4" href="#f4.1">[4]</a> <i>Backgrounds of English Literature</i>, p. 179.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f5" id="f5" href="#f5.1">[5]</a> See my forthcoming biography, _The Literary Quack: A Life of 'Sir'
+John Hill of London_, and John Kennedy's <i>Some Remarks on the Life and
+Writings of Dr. J&mdash;&mdash; H&mdash;&mdash;, Inspector General of Great Britain</i> (London, 1752).</p>
+
+<p><a name="f6" id="f6" href="#f6.1">[6]</a> For some of this background see L. J. Rather, <i>Mind and Body in
+Eighteenth Century Medicine: A Study Based on Jerome Gaub's De Regimine Mentis</i> (London, 1965), pp. 135-90 <i>passim</i>.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f7" id="f7" href="#f7.1">[7]</a> <i>Science and Literature 1700-1740</i> (London, 1964), pp. 50-51.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f8" id="f8" href="#f8.1">[8]</a> <i>A New Theory of Physick</i> (London, 1725), p. 56.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f9" id="f9" href="#f9.1">[9]</a> Biberg was a Swedish naturalist and had studied botany under
+Linnaeus in Uppsala; Réaumur, a French botanist, had contributed papers
+to the <i>Philosophical Transactions</i> of the Royal Society in London.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f10" id="f10" href="#f10.1">[10]</a> <i>The Power of Water-Dock against the Scurvy whether in the Plain
+Root or Essence....</i> (London, 1765), had been published six months
+earlier than <i>Hypochondriasis</i> and had earned Hill a handsome profit.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f11" id="f11" href="#f11.1">[11]</a> I have treated aspects of this subject in my article, "Matt Bramble
+and The Sulphur Controversy in the XVIIIth Century: Medical Background
+of <i>Humphry Clinker</i>," <i>JHI</i>, XXVIII (1967), 577-90.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f12" id="f12" href="#f12.1">[12]</a> See, for example, Jeremiah Waineright, <i>A Mechanical Account of the
+Non-Naturals</i> (1707); John Arbuthnot, <i>An Essay Concerning the Effects
+of Air on Human Bodies</i> (1733); Frank Nichols, <i>De Anima Medica</i> (1750).</p>
+
+<p><a name="f13" id="f13" href="#f13.1">[13]</a> Hill's correspondence is not published but shall be printed as an appendix to my forthcoming biography.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f14" id="f14" href="#f14.1">[14]</a> I have discussed some of these works in connection with the medical
+background of John Wesley's <i>Primitive Physick</i> (1747). See G. S.
+Rousseau, <i>Harvard Library Bulletin</i>, XVI (1968), 242-56.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f15" id="f15" href="#f15.1">[15]</a> It is difficult to know with certainty when Hill first became
+interested in the herb. He mentions it in passing in <i>The British
+Herbal</i> (1756), I, 526 and may have sold it as early as 1742 when he opened an apothecary shop.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f16" id="f16" href="#f16.1">[16]</a> Reid's dissertation at Edinburgh, entitled <i>De Insania</i> (1798),
+contains materials on the relationship of the imagination to all forms
+of mental disturbance. Secondary literature on hypochondria is
+plentiful. Works include: R. H. Gillespie, <i>Hypochondria</i> (London,
+1928), William K. Richmond, <i>The English Disease</i> (London, 1958),
+Charles Chenevix Trench, <i>The Royal Malady</i> (New York, 1964), and Ilza
+Vieth, <i>Hysteria: The History of a Disease</i> (Chicago, 1965), and "On
+Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Afflictions," <i>Bulletin of the History of Medicine</i>, XXX (1956), 233-40.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f17" id="f17" href="#f17.1">[17]</a> Joseph Spence, <i>Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books
+and Men</i>, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, 264.</p>
+
+<p>I am indebted to A. D. Morris, M.D., F.R.S.M., for help of various sorts in writing this introduction.</p>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3>BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE</h3>
+
+
+<p class="center">The text of this facsimile of <i>Hypochondriasis</i> is reproduced from a
+copy in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, London.</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/title.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h1>HYPOCHONDRIASIS.</h1>
+<h2>A</h2>
+<h2>PRACTICAL TREATISE, &amp;c.</h2>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/title.png" alt="" /></div>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect1.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h2>HYPOCHONDRIASIS.</h2>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h3>SECT. I.</h3>
+
+<h3>The <span class="smcap">Nature</span> of the <span class="smcap">Disorder</span>.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">To</span> call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and cruel. It
+is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by thickened
+and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver, and other
+parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick scarce knows
+one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>The blood is a mixture of many fluids, which, in a state of health, are
+so combined, that the whole passes freely through its appointed vessels;
+but if by the loss of the thinner parts, the rest becomes too gross to
+be thus carried through, it will stop where the circulation has least
+power; and having thus stopped it will accumulate; heaping by degrees
+obstruction on obstruction.</p>
+
+<p>Health and chearfulness, and the quiet exercise of mind, depend upon a
+perfect circulation: is it a wonder then, when this becomes impeded the
+body looses of its health, and the temper of its sprightliness? to be
+otherwise would be the miracle; and he inhumanly insults the afflicted,
+who calls all this a voluntary frowardness. Its slightest state brings
+with it sickness, anguish and oppression; and innumerable ills follow
+its advancing steps, unless prevented by timely care; till life itself
+grows burthensome.</p>
+
+<p>The disease was common in antient Greece; and her physicians understood
+it, better than those perhaps of later times, in any other country; who
+though happy in many advantages these fathers of the science could not
+have, yet want the great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> assistance of frequent watching it in all its
+stages.</p>
+
+<p>Those venerable writers have delivered its nature, and its cure: in the
+first every thing now shews they were right; and what they have said as
+to the latter will be found equally true and certain. This, so far as
+present experience has confirmed it, and no farther, will be here laid
+before the afflicted in a few plain words.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect2.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. II.</h3>
+
+<h3>Persons Subject to it.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Fatigue</span> of mind, and great exertion of its powers often give birth to
+this disease; and always tend to encrease it. The finer spirits are
+wasted by the labour of the brain: the Philosopher rises from his study
+more exhausted than the Peasant leaves his drudgery; without the benefit
+that he has from exercise. Greatness of mind, and steady virtue;
+determined resolution, and manly firmness, when put in action, and
+intent upon their object, all also lead to it: perhaps whatever tends to
+the ennobling of the soul has equal share in bringing on this weakness
+of the body.</p>
+
+<p>From this we may learn easily who are the men most subject to it; the
+grave and studious, those of a sedate temper and enlarged understanding,
+the learned and wise,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> the virtuous and the valiant: those whom it were
+the interest of the world to wish were free from this and every other
+illness; and who perhaps, except for this alloy, would have too large a
+portion of human happiness.</p>
+
+<p>Though these are most, it is not these alone, who are subject to it.
+There are countries where it is endemial, and in other places some have
+the seeds of it in their constitution; and in some it takes rise from
+accidents. In these last it is the easiest of cure; and in the first
+most difficult.</p>
+
+<p>Beside the Greeks already named, the Jews of old time were heavily
+afflicted with this disease; and in their descendants to this day it is
+often constitutional: the Spaniards have it almost to a man; and so have
+the American Indians. Perhaps the character of these several nations may
+be connected with it. The steady honour, and firm valour of the
+Spaniard, very like that of the ancient Doric nation, who followed the
+flute not the trumpet to the field; and met the enemy, not with shouts
+and fury, but with a determined virtue: it is the temper of the
+Hypochondriac to be slow, but unmoveably resolved: the Jew has shewn
+this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> mistakenly, but almost miraculously; and the poor Indian, untaught
+as he is, faces all peril with composure, and sings his death-song with
+an unalter'd countenance.</p>
+
+<p>Among particular persons the most inquiring and contemplative are those
+who suffer oftenest by this disease; and of all degrees of men I think
+the clergy. I do not mean the hunting, shooting, drinking clergy, who
+bear the tables of the great; but the retir'd and conscientious; such as
+attend in midnight silence to their duty; and seek in their own cool
+breasts, or wheresoever else they may be found, new admonitions for an
+age plunged in new vices. To this disease we owe the irreparable loss of
+Dr. <span class="smcap">Young</span>; and the present danger of many other the best and most
+improved amongst us. May what is here to be proposed assist in their
+preservation!</p>
+
+<p>The Geometrician or the learned Philosopher of whatever denomination,
+whose course of study fixes his eye for ever on one object, his mind
+intensely and continually employed upon one thought, should be warned
+also that he is in danger; or if he find himself already afflicted, he
+should be told that the same course of life, which brought it on,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> will,
+without due care, encrease it to the most dreaded violence.</p>
+
+<p>The middle period of life is that in which there is the greatest danger
+of an attack from this disease; and the latter end of autumn, when the
+summer heats have a little time been over, is the season when in our
+climate its first assaults are most to be expected. The same time of the
+year always increases the disorder in those who have been before
+afflicted with it; and it is a truth must be confessed, that from its
+first attack the patient grows continually, though slowly, worse; unless
+a careful regimen prevent it.</p>
+
+<p>The constitutions most liable to this obstruction are the lean, and dark
+complexioned; the grave and sedentary. Let such watch the first
+symptoms; and obviate, (as they may with ease) that which it will be
+much more difficult to remove.</p>
+
+<p>It is happy a disease, wherein the patient must do a great deal for
+himself, falls, for the most part, upon those who have the powers of
+reason strongest. Let them only be aware of this, that the distemper
+naturally disposes them to inactivity; and reason will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> have no use
+unless accompanied with resolution to enforce it.</p>
+
+<p>Though the physician can do something toward the cure, much more depends
+upon the patient; and here his constancy of mind will be employed most
+happily. No one is better qualified to judge on a fair hearing what
+course is the most fit; and having made that choice, he must with
+patience wait its good effects. Diseases that come on slowly must have
+time for curing; an attention to the first appearances of the disorder
+will be always happiest; because when least established it is easiest
+overthrown: but when that happy period has been neglected, he must wait
+the effects of such a course as will dilute and melt the obstructing
+matter gradually; for till that be done it is not only vain, but
+sometimes dangerous, to attempt its expulsion from the body.</p>
+
+<p>The blood easily separates itself into the grosser and the thinner
+parts: we see this in bleeding; and from the toughness of the red cake
+may guess how very difficult it will be to dissolve a substance of like
+firmness in the vessels of the body. That it can thus become thickened
+within the body, a Pleurisy shews us too evidently: in that case it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> is
+brought on suddenly, and with inflammation; in this other, slowly and
+without; and here, even before it forms the obstruction, can bring on
+many mischiefs. Various causes can produce the same effect, but that in
+all cases operates most durably, which operates most slowly. The watery
+part of the blood is its mild part; in the remaining gross matter of it,
+are acrid salts and burning oils, and these, when destitute of that
+happy dilution nature gives them in a healthy body, are capable of doing
+great mischief to the tender vessels in which they are kept stagnant.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect3.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. III.</h3>
+
+<h3>The <span class="smcap">Symptoms</span> of the <span class="smcap">Disorder</span>.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">The</span> first and lightest of the signs that shew this illness are a lowness
+of spirits, and inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love
+of solitude and a habit of thinking, even on trifling subjects, with too
+much steadiness. A very little help may combat these: but if that
+indolence which is indeed a part of the disorder, will neglect them;
+worse must be expected soon to follow.</p>
+
+<p>Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness, weight, and oppression in the body,
+a want of appetite, or, what is worse, an appetite without digestion;
+for these are the conditions of different states of the disease, a
+fullness and a difficulty of breathing after meals, a straitness of the
+breast, pains and flatulencies in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> bowels, and an unaptness to
+discharge their contents.</p>
+
+<p>The pulse becomes low, weak, and unequal; and there are frequent
+palpitations of the heart, a little dark-coloured urine is voided at
+some times; and a flood of colourless and insipid at others; relieving
+for a moment, but increasing the distemper: there is in some cases also
+a continual teazing cough, with a choaking stoppage in the throat at
+times; then heartburn, sickness, hardness of the belly, and a costive
+habit, or a tormenting and vain irritation.</p>
+
+<p>The lips turn pale, the eyes loose their brightness and by degrees the
+white grows as it were greenish, the gums want their due firmness, with
+their proper colour; and an unpleasing foulness grows upon the teeth:
+the inside of the mouth is pale and furred, and the throat dry and
+husky: the colour of the skin is pale (though there are periods when the
+face is florid) and as the obstruction gathers ground, and more affects
+the liver, the whole body becomes yellow, tawny, greenish, and at length
+of that deep and dusky hue, to which men of swift imagination have given
+the name of blackness.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>These symptoms do not all appear in any one period of the disease, or in
+one case, but at one time or other all of them, as well as those which
+follow: the flesh becomes cold to the touch, though the patient does not
+himself perceive it; the limbs grow numbed and torpid, the breathing
+dull and slow, and the voice hollow; and usually the appetite in this
+period declines, and comes almost to nothing: night sweats come on,
+black swellings appear on the veins, the flesh wastes and the breast
+becomes flat and hollow: the mouth is full of a thin spittle, the head
+is dizzy and confus'd, and sometimes there is an unconquerable numbness
+in the organs of speech.</p>
+
+<p>I have known the temporary silence that follows upon this last <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'sympton'">symptom</ins>
+become a jest to the common herd; and the unhappy patient, instead of
+compassion and assistance, receive the reproof of sullenness, from those
+who should have known and acted better.</p>
+
+<p>About twenty years ago I met on a visit at Catthorpe in Leicestershire a
+young gentleman of distinguished learning and abilities, who at certain
+times was speechless. The vulgar thought it a pretence: and a jocose
+lady, where he was at tea with company,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> putting him as she said to a
+trial, poured out a dish very strong and without sugar. He drank it and
+returned the cup with a bow of great reserve, and his eye bent on the
+ground: she then filled the cup with sugar, and pouring weak tea on it,
+sent it him: he drank that too, looked at her steadily, and blushed for
+her. The lady declared the man was dumb; the rest thought him perverse,
+and obstinate; but a constant and steady perseverance in an easy method
+cured him.</p>
+
+<p>All these are miseries which the disease, while it retains its natural
+form, can bring upon the patient; and thus he will in time be worn out,
+and led miserably, though slowly, to the grave. Let him not indulge his
+inactivity so far as to give way to this, because it is represented as
+far off; the disease may suddenly and frightfully change its nature; and
+swifter evils follow.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect4.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. IV.</h3>
+
+<h3>The <span class="smcap">Danger</span>.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">We</span> have done with the obstruction considered in itself; but this, though
+often unsurmountable by art, at least by the methods now in use, will be
+sometimes broken through at once by nature, or by accidents; and bring
+on fatal evils. These are strictly different diseases, and are no
+otherway concerned here, than as the consequences of that of which we
+are treating.</p>
+
+<p>The thick and glutinous blood which has so long stagnated in the spleen,
+will have in that time altered its nature, and acquired a very great
+degree of acrimony: while it lies dormant, this does no more mischiefs,
+than those named already; but when violent exercise, a fit of outrageous
+anger, or any thing else that suddenly shocks and disturbs the frame,
+puts it in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> motion, it melts at once into a kind of liquid putrefaction.
+Being now thin, it mixes itself readily with the blood again, and brings
+on putrid fevers; destroys the substance of the spleen itself, or being
+thrown upon some other of the viscera, corrodes them, and leads on this
+way a swift and miserable death. If it fall upon the liver, its tender
+pulpy substance is soon destroyed, jaundices beyond the help of art
+first follow, then dropsies and all their train of misery; if on lungs,
+consumptions; if on the brain, convulsions, epilepsy, palsy, apoplexy;
+if on the surface, leprosy.</p>
+
+<p>The intention of cure is to melt this coagulation softly, not to break
+it violently; and then to give it a very gentle passage through the
+bowels. There is no safe way for it to take but that; and even that when
+urged too far may bring on fatal dysenteries.</p>
+
+<p>Let none wonder at the sudden devastation which sometimes arises from
+this long stagnant matter, when liquified too hastily: how long, how
+many years the impacted matter will continue quiet in a schirrous tumour
+of the breast; but being once put in motion, whether from accident, or
+in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> course of nature, what can describe; or what can stop its
+havock!</p>
+
+<p>Instances of the other are too frequent. A nobleman the other day died
+paralytick: dissection shewed a spleen consumed by an abscess, formed
+from the dissolved matter of such an obstruction: and 'tis scarce longer
+since, a learned gentleman, who had been several years lost to his
+friends, by the extreams of a Hypochondriacal disorder, seem'd gradually
+without assistance to recover: but the lungs suffered while the spleen
+was freed; and he died very soon of what is called a galloping
+consumption.</p>
+
+<p>When the obstruction is great and of long continuance, if it be thus
+hastily moved, the consequence is, equally, a sudden and a miserable
+death, whether, like the matter of a cancer, it remains in its place; or
+like that of a bad small pox, be thrown upon some other vital part.</p>
+
+<p>Let not the patient be too much alarmed; this is laid down to caution,
+not to terrify him: it is fit he should know his danger, and attend to
+it; for the prevention is easy; and the cure, even of the most advanced<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>
+stages, when undertaken by gentle means, is not at all impracticable: to
+assist the physician, let him look into himself, and recollect the
+source of his complaint. This he may judge of from the following
+notices.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect5_1.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. V.</h3>
+
+<h3>The Causes of the <span class="smcap">Hypochondriasis</span>.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">The</span> obstruction which forms this disease, may take its origin from
+different accidents: a fever ill cured has often caused it; or the
+piles, which had been used to discharge largely, ceasing; a marshy soil,
+poisoned with stagnant water, has given it to some persons; and altho'
+indolence and inactivity are oftenest at the root, yet it has arisen
+from too great exercise.</p>
+
+<p>Real grief has often brought it on; and even love, for sometimes that is
+real. Study and fixed attention of the mind have been accused before;
+and add to these the stooping posture of the body, which most men use,
+though none should use it, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> writing and in reading. This has
+contributed too much to it; but of all other things night studies are
+the most destructive. The steady stillness, and dusky habit of all
+nature in those hours, enforce, encourage, and support that settled
+gloom, which rises from fixt thought; and sinks the body to the grave;
+even while it carries up the mind to heaven. He who would have his lamp</p>
+
+<div class="poem">
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>At midnight hour</i></span><br />
+<i>Be seen in some high lonely tower,</i><small><a name="f18.1" id="f18.1" href="#f18">[18]</a></small></div>
+
+<p>will waste the flame of this unheeded life: and while he labours to
+unsphere the spirit of Plato<small><a href="#f18">[18]</a></small> will let loose his own.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect5_2.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. V.</h3>
+
+<h3>The Cure of the <span class="smcap">Hypochondriasis</span>.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Let</span> him who would escape the mischiefs of an obstructed spleen, avoid
+the things here named: and let him who suffers from the malady,
+endeavour to remember to which of them it has been owing; for half the
+hope depends upon that knowledge.</p>
+
+<p>Nature has sometimes made a cure herself, and we should watch her ways;
+for art never is so right as when it imitates her: sometimes the
+patient's own resolution has set him free. This is always in his power,
+and at all times will do wonders.</p>
+
+<p>The bleeding of the piles, from nature's single efforts, has at once
+cured a miserable man; where their cessation was the cause<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> of the
+disorder. A leprosy has appeared upon the skin, and all the symptoms of
+the former sickness vanished. This among the Jews happened often: both
+diseases we know were common among them: and I have here seen something
+very like it: Water-Dock has thrown out scorbutic eruptions, and all the
+former <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'symptons'">symptoms</ins> of an Hypochondriacal disorder have disappeared:
+returning indeed when these were unadvisedly struck in; but keeping off
+entirely when they were better treated. A natural purging unsuppressed
+has sometimes done the same good office: but this is hazardous.</p>
+
+<p>It is easy to be directed from such instances; only let us take the
+whole along with us. Bleeding would have answered nature's purpose, if
+she could not have opened of herself the h&aelig;morrhoidal vessels; but he
+who should give medicines for that purpose, might destroy his patient by
+too great disturbance. If a natural looseness may perform the cure, so
+may an artificial; when the original source of the disorder points that
+way. But these are helps that take place only in particular cases.</p>
+
+<p>The general and universal method of cure must be by some mild and gently
+resolving<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> medicine, under the influence of which the obstructing matter
+may be voided that, or some other way with safety. The best season to
+undertake this is the autumn, but even here there must be caution.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, no strong evacuating remedy must be given; for that,
+by carrying off the thinner parts of the juices, will tend to thicken
+the remainder; and certainly encrease the distemper. No acrid medicine
+must be directed, for that may act too hastily, dissolve the impacted
+matter at once, and let it loose, to the destruction of the sufferer; no
+antimonial, no mercurial, no martial preparation must be taken; in
+short, no chymistry: nature is the shop that heaven has set before us,
+and we must seek our medicine there. The venerable ancients, who knew
+not this new art, will lead us in the search; and (faithful relators as
+they are of truth) will tell us whence we may deduce our hope; and what
+we are to fear.</p>
+
+<p>But prior to the course of any medicine, and as an essential to any good
+hope from it, the patient must prescribe himself a proper course of
+life, and a well chosen diet: let us assist him in his choice; and speak
+of this first, as it comes first in order.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect6.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. VI.</h3>
+
+<h3>Rules of Life for Hypochondriac Persons.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Air</span> and exercise, as they are the best preservers of health, and
+greatest assistants in the cure of all long continued diseases, will
+have their full effect in this; but there requires some caution in the
+choice, and management of them. It is common to think the air of high
+grounds best; but experience near home shews otherwise: the
+Hypochondriac patient is always worse at Highgate even than in London.</p>
+
+<p>The air he breathes should be temperate; not exposed to the utmost
+violences of heat and cold, and the swift changes from one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> to the
+other; which are most felt on those high grounds. The side of a hill is
+the best place for him: and though wet grounds are hurtful; yet let
+there be the shade of trees, to tempt him often to a walk; and soften by
+their exhalation the over dryness of the air.</p>
+
+<p>The exercise he takes should be frequent; but not violent. Motion
+preserves the firmness of the parts, and elasticity of the vessels; it
+prevents that aggregation of thick humours which he is most to fear. A
+sedentary life always produces weakness, and that mischief always
+follows: weak eyes are gummy, weak lungs are clogged with phlegm, and
+weak bowels waste themselves in vapid diarrh&oelig;as.</p>
+
+<p>Let him invite himself abroad, and let his friends invite him by every
+innocent inducement. For me, I should advise above all other things the
+study of nature. Let him begin with plants: he will here find a
+continual pleasure, and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful
+things; even of the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to
+walk; and every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket,
+will afford him some new ob<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>ject. He will be tempted to be continually
+in the air, and continually to change the nature and quality of the air,
+by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the lawn, the
+heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be abroad; and the
+unceasing variety of the subjects of his observation, will prevent his
+walking hastily: he will pursue his studies in the air; and that
+contemplative turn of mind, which in his closet threatened his
+destruction, will thus become the great means of his recovery.</p>
+
+<p>If the mind tire upon this, from the repeated use, another of nature's
+kingdoms opens itself at once upon him; the plant he is weary of
+observing, feeds some insect he may examine; nor is there a stone that
+lies before his foot, but may afford instruction and amusement.</p>
+
+<p>Even what the vulgar call the most abject things will shew a wonderful
+utility; and lead the mind, in pious contemplation higher than the
+stars. The poorest moss that is trampled under foot, has its important
+uses: is it at the bottom of a wood we find it? why there it shelters
+the fallen seeds; hides them from birds, and covers them from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> frost;
+and thus becomes the foster father of another forest! creeps it along
+the surface of a rock? even there its good is infinite! its small roots
+run into the stone, and the rains make their way after them; the moss
+having lived its time dies; it rots and with the mouldered fragments of
+the stone forms earth; wherein, after a few successions, useful plants
+may grow, and feed more useful cattle!<small><a name="f19.1" id="f19.1" href="#f19">[19]</a></small></p>
+
+<p>Is there a weed more humble in its aspect, more trampled on, or more
+despised than knot grass! no art can get the better of its growth, no
+labour can destroy it; 'twere pity if they could, for the thing lives
+where nothing would of use to us; and its large and most wonderfully
+abundant seeds, feed in hard winters, half the birds of Heaven.</p>
+
+<p>What the weak moss performs upon the rock the loathed toadstool brings
+about in timber: is an oak dead where man's eye will not find it? this
+fungus roots itself upon the bark, and rots the wood beneath it; hither
+the beetle creeps for shelter, and for sustenance; him the woodpecker
+follows as his prey; and while he tears the tree in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> search of him, he
+scatters it about the ground; which it manures.</p>
+
+<p>Nor is it the beetle alone that thus insinuates itself into the
+substance of the vegetable tribe: the tender aphide<small><a name="f20.1" id="f20.1" href="#f20">[20]</a></small>, whom a touch
+destroys, burrows between the two skins of a leaf, for shelter from his
+winged enemies; tracing, with more than Dedal&aelig;an art, his various
+meanders; and veining the green surface with these white lines more
+beautifully than the best &AElig;gyptian marble.</p>
+
+<p>'Twere endless to proceed; nor is it needful: one object will not fail
+to lead on to another, and every where the goodness of his God will
+shine before him even in what are thought the vilest things; his
+greatness in the lead of them.</p>
+
+<p>Let him pursue these thoughts, and seek abroad the objects and the
+instigations to them: but let him in these and all other excursions
+avoid equally the dews of early morning, and of evening.</p>
+
+<p>The more than usual exercise of this prescription will dispose him to
+more than custo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>mary sleep, let him indulge it freely; so far from
+hurting, it will help his cure.</p>
+
+<p>Let him avoid all excesses: drink need scarce be named, for we are
+writing to men of better and of nobler minds, than can be tempted to
+that humiliating vice. Those who in this disorder have too great an
+appetite, must not indulge it; much eaten was never well digested: but
+of all excesses the most fatal in this case is that of venery. It is the
+excess we speak of.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect7.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. VII.</h3>
+
+<h3>The proper <span class="smcap">Diet</span>.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">In</span> the first place acids must be avoided carefully; and all things that
+are in a state of fermentation, for they will breed acidity. Provisions
+hardened by salting never should be tasted; much less those cured by
+smoaking, and by salting. Bacon is indigestible in an Hypochondriac
+stomach; and hams, impregnated as is now the custom, with acid fumes
+from the wood fires over which they are hung, have that additional
+mischief.</p>
+
+<p>Milk ought to be a great article in the diet: and even in this there
+should be choice. The milk of grass-fed cows has its true quality: no
+other. There are a multitude of ways in which this may be made a part
+both of our foods and drinks, and they should all be used.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>The great and general caution is that the diet be at all times of a kind
+loosening and gently stimulating; light but not acrid. Veal, lamb,
+fowls, lobsters, crabs, craw-fish, fresh water fish and mutton broth,
+with plenty of boiled vegetables, are always right; and give enough variety.</p>
+
+<p>Raw vegetables are all bad: sour wines, old cheese, and bottled beer are
+things never to be once tasted. Indeed much wine is wrong, be it of what
+kind soever. It is the first of cordials; and as such I would have it
+taken in this disease when it is wanted: plainly as a medicine, rather
+than a part of diet. Malt liquor carefully chosen is certainly the best
+drink. This must be neither new, nor tending to sourness; perfectly
+clear, and of a moderate strength: it is the native liquor of our
+country, and the most healthful.</p>
+
+<p>Too much tea weakens; and even sugar is in this disorder hurtful: but
+honey may supply its place in most things; and this is not only harmless
+but medicinal; a very powerful dissolvent of impacted humours, and a
+great deobstruent.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>What wine is drank should be of some of the sweet kinds. Old Hock has
+been found on enquiry to yield more than ten times the acid of the sweet
+wines; and in red Port, at least in what we are content to call so,
+there is an astringent quality, that is most mischievous in these cases:
+it is said there is often alum in it: how pregnant with mischief that
+must be to persons whose bowels require to be kept open, is most
+evident. Summer fruits perfectly ripe are not only harmless but
+medicinal; but if eaten unripe they will be very prejudicial. A light
+supper, which will leave an appetite for a milk breakfast, is always
+right; this will not let the stomach be ravenous for dinner, as it is
+apt to be in those who make that their only meal.</p>
+
+<p>One caution more must be given, and it may seem a strange one: it is
+that the patient attend regularly to his hours of eating. We have to do
+with men for the most part whose soul is the great object of their
+regard; but let them not forget they have a body.</p>
+
+<p>The late Dr. <span class="smcap">Stukely</span> has told me, that one day by appointment visiting
+Sir <span class="smcap">Isaac<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></span> <span class="smcap">Newton</span>, the
+servant told him, he was in his study. No one was
+permitted to disturb him there; but as it was near dinner time, the
+visitor sat down to wait for him. After a time dinner was brought in; a
+boil'd chicken under a cover. An hour pass'd, and Sir <span class="smcap">Isaac</span> did not
+appear. The doctor eat the fowl, and covering up the empty dish, bad
+them dress their master another. Before that was ready, the great man
+came down; he apologiz'd for his delay, and added, "give me but leave to
+take my short dinner, and I shall be at your service; I am fatigued and
+faint." Saying this, he lifted up the cover; and without any emotion,
+turned about to <span class="smcap">Stukely</span> with a smile; "See says he, what we studious
+people are, I forgot I had din'd."</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span></p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect8.png" alt="" /></div>
+<h3>SECT. VIII.</h3>
+
+<h3>The <span class="smcap">Medicine</span>.</h3>
+
+
+<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">'Tis</span> the ill fate of this disease, more than of all others to be
+misunderstood at first, and thence neglected; till the physician shakes
+his head at a few first questions. None steals so fatally upon the
+sufferer: its advances are by very slow degrees; but every day it grows
+more difficult of cure.</p>
+
+<p>That this obstruction in the spleen is the true malady, the cases
+related by the antients, present observation, and the unerring
+testimonies of dissections leave no room to doubt. Being understood, the
+path is open where to seek a remedy: and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> our best guides in this, as in
+the former instance, will be those venerable Greeks; who saw a thousand
+of these cases, where we see one; and with less than half our theory,
+cured twice as many patients.</p>
+
+<p>One established doctrine holds place in all these writers; that whatever
+by a hasty fermentation dissolves the impacted matter of the
+obstruction, and sends it in that state into the blood, does incredible
+mischief: but that whatever medicine softens it by slow degrees, and, as
+it melts, delivers it to the bowels without disturbance; will cure with
+equal certainty and safety.</p>
+
+<p>For this good purpose, they knew and tried a multitude of herbs; but in
+the end they fixed on one: and on their repeated trials of this, they
+banished all the rest. This stood alone for the cure of the disease; and
+from its virtue received the name of <span class="smcap">Spleen-wort</span><small><a name="f21.1" id="f21.1" href="#f21">[21]</a></small>. O wise and happy
+Greeks! authors of knowledge and perpetuators of it! With them the very
+name they gave a plant declared its virtues: with us, a writer calls a
+plant from some friend; that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> the good gardener who receives the honour,
+may call another by his name who gave it. We now add the term <i>smooth</i>
+to this herb, to distinguish it from another, called by the same general
+term, though not much resembling it.</p>
+
+<p>The virtues of this smooth Spleen-wort have flood the test of ages; and
+the plant every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good
+herbalists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and
+hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it;
+and all the miserable symptoms vanish; thought Spleen-wort not enough
+expressive of its excellence; but stamp'd on it the name of <span class="smcap">Milt-waste</span>.</p>
+
+<p>In the Greek Islands now, the use of it is known to every one; and even
+the lazy monks who take it, are no longer splenetic. In the west of
+England, the rocks are stripped of it with diligence; and every old woman
+tells you how charming that leaf is for bookish men: in Russia they use
+a plant of this kind in their malt liquor: it came into fashion there
+for the cure of this disease; which from its constant use is scarce<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>
+known any longer; and they suppose 'tis added to their liquor for a
+flavour.</p>
+
+<p>The antients held it in a kind of veneration; and used what has been
+called a superstition in the gathering it. It was to be taken up with a
+sharp knife, without violence, and laid upon the clean linen: no time
+but the still darkness of the night was proper, and even the moon was
+not to shine upon it<small><a name="f22.1" id="f22.1" href="#f22">[22]</a></small>. I know they have been ridiculed for this; for
+nothing is so vain as learned ignorance: but let me be permitted once to
+vindicate them.</p>
+
+<p>The plant has leaves that can close in their sides; and their under part
+is covered thick with a yellow powder, consisting of the seeds, and seed
+vessels: in these they knew the virtue most resided: this was the golden
+dust<small><a name="f23.1" id="f23.1" href="#f23">[23]</a></small> they held so valuable; and this they knew they could not be too
+cautious to preserve. They were not ignorant of the sleep of plants; a
+matter lately spoken of by some, as if a new discovery; and being
+sensible that light, a dry air, an expanded leaf, and a tempestuous
+season, were the means of losing this fine dust; and knowing also that
+darkness alone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> brought on that closing of the leaf which thence has
+been called sleep; and which helped to defend and to secure it, they
+therefore took such time, and used such means as could best preserve the
+plant entire; and even save what might be scattered from it.&mdash;And now
+where is their superstition?</p>
+
+<p>From this plant thus collected they prepared a medicine, which in a
+course of forty days scarce ever failed to make a perfect cure.</p>
+
+<p>We have the plant wild with us; and till the fashion of rough chemical
+preparations took off our attention from these gentler remedies, it was
+in frequent use and great repute. I trust it will be so again: and many
+thank me for restoring it to notice.</p>
+
+<p>Spleen-wort gives out its virtues freely in a tincture; and a small dose
+of this, mixing readily with the blood and juices, gradually dissolves
+the obstruction; and by a little at a time delivers its contents to be
+thrown off without pain, from the bowels. Let this be done while the
+viscera are yet sound<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> and the cure is perfect. More than the forty days
+of the Greek method is scarce ever required; much oftener two thirds of
+that time suffice; and every day, from the first dose of it, the patient
+feels the happy change that is growing in his constitution. His food no
+more turns putrid on his stomach, but yields its healthful nourishment.
+The swelling after meals therefore vanishes; and with that goes the
+lowness, and anxiety, the difficult breath, and the distracting cholick:
+he can bear the approach of rainy weather without pain; he finds himself
+more apt for motion, and ready to take that exercise which is to be
+assistant in his cure; life seems no longer burthensome. His bowels get
+into the natural condition of health, and perform their office once at
+least a day; better if a little more: the dull and dead colour of his
+skin goes off, his lips grow red again, and every sign of health
+returns.</p>
+
+<p>Let him who takes the medicine, say whether any thing here be
+exaggerated. Let him, if he pleases to give himself the trouble, talk
+over with me, or write to me, this gradual decrease of his complaints,
+as he proceeds in his cure. My uncertain state <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>of health does not
+permit me to practise physic in the usual way, but I am very desirous to
+do what good I can, and shall never refuse my advice, such as it may be,
+to any person rich or poor, in whatever manner he may apply for it. I
+shall refer him to no apothecary, whose bills require he should be
+drenched with potions; but tell him, in this as in all other cases,
+where to find some simple herb; which he may if he please prepare
+himself; or if he had rather spare that trouble, may have it so prepared
+from me.</p>
+
+<p>With regard to Spleen-wort, no method of using it is more effectual than
+simply taking it in powder; the only advantage of a tincture, is that a
+proper dose may be given, and yet the stomach not be loaded with so
+large a quantity: it is an easier and pleasanter method, and nothing
+more.</p>
+
+<p>If any person choose to take it in the other way, I should still wish
+him once at least to apply to me; that he may be assured what he is
+about to take is the right plant. Abuses in medicines are at this time
+very great, and in no instance worse than what relates to herbs. The
+best of our physicians have complained upon this head with warmth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> but
+without redress: they know the virtues and the value of many of our
+native plants, but dread to prescribe them; lest some wrong thing should
+be administered in their place; perhaps inefficacious, perhaps
+mischievous, nay it may be fatal. The few simple things I direct are
+always before me; and it will at all times be a pleasure to me, in this
+and any other instance, to see whether what any person is about to take
+be right. I have great obligations to the public, and this is the best
+return that I know how to make.</p>
+
+<p>To see the need of such a caution, hear a transaction but of yesterday!
+An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in
+the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was
+written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and
+almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but
+what is very striking, not one of them the right. Such is the chance of
+health in those hands through which the best means of it usually pass;
+even in the most regular course of application.</p>
+
+<p>I would not be understood to limit the little services I may this way be
+able to render<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> the afflicted, to this single instance; much less to
+propose to myself any advantages from it. Whoever pleases will be
+welcome to me, upon any such occasion; and whatever be the herb on which
+he places a dependance, he shall be shewn it growing. I once recommended
+a garden to be established for this use, at the public expence: one
+great person has put it in my power to answer all its purposes.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p class="center"><b><span class="spacer">F</span><span class="spacer">I</span><span class="spacer">N</span><span class="spacer">I</span><span class="spacer">S.</span></b></p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 30%;" />
+<p><span class="u">Footnotes:</span></p>
+
+<p><a name="f18" id="f18" href="#f18.1">[18]</a> Milton's Penseroso.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f19" id="f19" href="#f19.1">[19]</a> Biberg.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f20" id="f20" href="#f20.1">[20]</a> Reaumur.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f21" id="f21" href="#f21.1">[21]</a> &#945;&#963;&#960;&#955;&#949;&#957;&#959;&#957;</p>
+
+<p><a name="f22" id="f22" href="#f22.1">[22]</a> Silente Luna.</p>
+
+<p><a name="f23" id="f23" href="#f23.1">[23]</a> Pulvis Aureus.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>
+
+<h3>WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK</h3>
+<h3>MEMORIAL LIBRARY</h3>
+<h3>UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES</h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h4>PUBLICATIONS IN PRINT</h4>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/emblem.png" alt="" /></div>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h4>1948-1949</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p>16. Henry Nevil Payne, <i>The Fatal Jealousie</i> (1673).</p>
+<p class="hang">18. Anonymous, "Of Genius," in <i>The Occasional Paper</i>, Vol. III, No. 10 (1719), and Aaron Hill, Preface to <i>The Creation</i> (1720).</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1949-1950</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p>19. Susanna Centlivre, <i>The Busie Body</i> (1709).</p>
+<p>20. Lewis Theobald, <i>Preface to the Works of Shakespeare</i> (1734).</p>
+<p class="hang">22. Samuel Johnson, <i>The Vanity of Human Wishes</i> (1749), and two <i>Rambler</i> papers (1750).</p>
+<p>23. John Dryden, <i>His Majesties Declaration Defended</i> (1681).</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1951-1952</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p class="hang">31. Thomas Gray, <i>An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard</i> (1751), and <i>The Eton College Manuscript</i>.</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1952-1953</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p>41. Bernard Mandeville, <i>A Letter to Dion</i> (1732).</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1963-1964</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p class="hang">104. Thomas D'Urfey, <i>Wonders in the Sun; or, The Kingdom of the Birds</i> (1706).</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1964-1965</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p>110. John Tutchin, <i>Selected Poems</i> (1685-1700).</p>
+<p>111. Anonymous, <i>Political Justice</i> (1736).</p>
+<p>112. Robert Dodsley, <i>An Essay on Fable</i> (1764).</p>
+<p>113. T. R., <i>An Essay Concerning Critical and Curious Learning</i> (1698).</p>
+<p class="hang">114. <i>Two Poems Against Pope</i>: Leonard Welsted, <i>One Epistle to Mr. A. Pope</i> (1730), and Anonymous, <i>The Blatant Beast</i> (1742).</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1965-1966</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p>115. Daniel Defoe and others, <i>Accounts of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal</i>.</p>
+<p>116. Charles Macklin, <i>The Covent Garden Theatre</i> (1752).</p>
+<p>117. Sir George L'Estrange, <i>Citt and Bumpkin</i> (1680).</p>
+<p>118. Henry More, <i>Enthusiasmus Triumphatus</i> (1662).</p>
+<p class="hang">119. Thomas Traherne, <i>Meditations on the Six Days of the Creation</i> (1717).</p>
+<p class="hang">120. Bernard Mandeville, <i>Aesop Dress'd or a Collection of Fables</i> (1704).</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1966-1967</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p class="hang">123. Edmond Malone, <i>Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Mr. Thomas Rowley</i> (1782).</p>
+<p>124. Anonymous, <i>The Female Wits</i> (1704).</p>
+<p class="hang">125. Anonymous, <i>The Scribleriad</i> (1742). Lord Hervey, <i>The Difference Between Verbal and Practical Virtue</i> (1742).</p>
+<p class="hang">126. <i>Le Lutrin: an Heroick Poem, Written Originally in French by Monsieur Boileau: Made English by N. O.</i> (1682).</p></div>
+
+
+<h4>1967-1968</h4>
+<div class="ads">
+<p>127-</p>
+<p class="hang">128. Charles Macklin, <i>A Will and No Will, or a Bone for the Lawyers</i> (1746). <i>The New Play Criticiz'd, or The Plague of Envy</i> (1747).</p>
+<p class="hang">129. Lawrence Echard, Prefaces to <i>Terence's Comedies</i> (1694) and <i>Plautus's Comedies</i> (1694).</p>
+<p>130. Henry More, <i>Democritus Platonissans</i> (1646).</p>
+<p class="hang">131. John Evelyn, <i>The History of Sabatai Sevi, The Suppos'd Messiah of the Jews</i> (1669).</p>
+<p class="hang">132. Walter Harte, <i>An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad</i> (1730).</p></div>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)
+are available in paperbound units of six issues at $16.00 per unit, from
+the Kraus Reprint Company, 16 East 46th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.</p>
+
+<p>Publications in print are available at the regular membership rate of
+$5.00 yearly. Prices of single issues may be obtained upon request.
+Subsequent publications may be checked in the annual prospectus.</p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 35%;" />
+<h4>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library: University of California, Los Angeles</h4>
+
+<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>
+
+<h5>2520 CIMARRON STREET, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90018</h5>
+
+<p class="center"><i>General Editors:</i> William E. Conway, William Andrews Clark Memorial
+Library; George Robert Guffey, University of California, Los Angeles;
+Maximillian E. Novak, University of California, Los Angeles</p>
+
+<p class="center"><i>Corresponding Secretary:</i> Mrs. Edna C. Davis, William Andrews Clark
+Memorial Library</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>The Society's purpose is to publish rare Restoration and
+eighteenth-century works (usually as facsimile reproductions). All
+income of the Society is devoted to defraying costs of publication and
+mailing.</p>
+
+<p>Correspondence concerning memberships in the United States and Canada
+should be addressed to the Corresponding Secretary at the William
+Andrews Clark Memorial Library, 2520 Cimarron Street, Los Angeles,
+California. Correspondence concerning editorial matters may be addressed
+to the General Editors at the same address. Manuscripts of introductions
+should conform to the recommendations of the MLA <i>Style Sheet</i>. The
+membership fee is $5.00 a year in the United States and Canada and
+&pound;1.16.6 in Great Britain and Europe. British and European prospective
+members should address B. H. Blackwell, Broad Street, Oxford, England.
+Copies of back issues in print may be obtained from the Corresponding
+Secretary.</p>
+
+<p>Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)
+are available in paperbound units of six issues at $16.00 per unit, from
+the Kraus Reprint Company, 16 East 46th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.</p>
+
+<h5>Make check or money order payable to <span class="smcap">The Regents of the University of California</span></h5>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h5>REGULAR PUBLICATIONS FOR 1968-1969</h5>
+
+<p class="hang">133. John Courtenay, <i>A Poetical Review of the Literary and Moral
+Character of the Late Samuel Johnson</i> (1786). Introduction by Robert E.
+Kelley.</p>
+
+<p class="hang">134. John Downes, <i>Roscius Anglicanus</i> (1708). Introduction by John
+Loftis.</p>
+
+<p class="hang">135. Sir John Hill, <i>Hypochondriasis, a Practical Treatise on the Nature
+and Cure of that Disorder Call'd the Hyp or Hypo</i> (1766). Introduction
+by G. S. Rousseau.</p>
+
+<p class="hang">136. Thomas Sheridan, <i>Discourse ... Being Introductory to His Course of
+Lectures on Elocution and the English Language</i> (1759). Introduction by
+G. P. Mohrman.</p>
+
+<p class="hang">137. Arthur Murphy, <i>The Englishman From Paris</i> (1756). Introduction by
+Simon Trefman. Previously unpublished manuscript.</p>
+
+<p class="hang">138. [Catherine Trotter], <i>Olinda's Adventures</i> (1718). Introduction by
+Robert Adams Day.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h5>SPECIAL PUBLICATION FOR 1968-1969</h5>
+
+<p><i>After <big>THE TEMPEST</big></i>. Introduction by George Robert Guffey.</p>
+
+<p>Next in the continuing series of special publications by the Society
+will be <i>After THE TEMPEST</i>, a volume including the Dryden-Davenant
+version of <i>The Tempest</i> (1670); the "operatic" <i>Tempest</i> (1674); Thomas
+Duffet's <i>Mock-Tempest</i> (1675); and the "Garrick" <i>Tempest</i> (1756), with
+an Introduction by George Robert Guffey.</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>Already published in this series are:</p>
+
+<p class="hang">1. John Ogilby, <i>The Fables of Aesop Paraphras'd in Verse</i> (1668), with
+an Introduction by Earl Miner.</p>
+
+<p class="hang">2. John Gay, <i>Fables</i> (1727, 1738), with an Introduction by Vinton A.
+Dearing.</p>
+
+<p class="hang">3. Elkanah Settle, <i>The Empress of Morocco</i> (1673) with five plates;
+<i>Notes and Observations on the Empress of Morocco</i> (1674) by John
+Dryden, John Crowne and Thomas Shadwell; <i>Notes and Observations on the
+Empress of Morocco Revised</i> (1674) by Elkanah Settle; and <i>The Empress
+of Morocco. A Farce</i> (1674) by Thomas Duffet; with an Introduction by
+Maximillian E. Novak.</p>
+
+<p>Price to members of the Society, $2.50 for the first copy of each title,
+and $3.25 for additional copies. Price to non-members, $4.00. Standing
+orders for this continuing series of Special Publications will be
+accepted. British and European orders should be addressed to B. H.
+Blackwell, Broad Street, Oxford, England.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<p><span class="u">Transcriber's Notes:</span></p>
+
+<p>Long "s" has been modernized.</p>
+<p>Printer's inconsistencies have been retained.</p>
+<p>The original text contains two sections labeled "Sect. V."</p>
+<p>Additional spacing after some of the quotes is intentional to indicate
+both the end of a quotation and the beginning of a new paragraph as presented in the original text.</p>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 30099 ***</div>
+</body>
+</html>
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+
+No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in
+jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize
+this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright
+status under the laws that apply to them.
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #30099 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30099)
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-The Project Gutenberg eBook, Hypochondriasis, by John Hill

-

-

-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

-almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or

-re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

-with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

-

-

-

-

-

-Title: Hypochondriasis

-       A Practical Treatise (1766)

-

-

-Author: John Hill

-

-

-

-Release Date: September 27, 2009  [eBook #30099]

-

-Language: English

-

-Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

-

-

-***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HYPOCHONDRIASIS***

-

-

-E-text prepared by Tor Martin Kristiansen, Joseph Cooper, Stephanie Eason,

-and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team

-(http://www.pgdp.net)

-

-

-

-The Augustan Reprint Society

-

-JOHN HILL

-

-HYPOCHONDRIASIS

-

-A Practical Treatise.

-

-(1766)

-

-Introduction by

-

-G. S. ROUSSEAU

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-Publication Number 135

-William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

-University Of California, Los Angeles

-1969

-

-

-

-

-GENERAL EDITORS

-

-  William E. Conway, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-  George Robert Guffey, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Maximillian E. Novak, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-

-

-ASSOCIATE EDITOR

-

-  David S. Rodes, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-

-

-ADVISORY EDITORS

-

-  Richard C. Boys, _University of Michigan_

-  James L. Clifford, _Columbia University_

-  Ralph Cohen, _University of Virginia_

-  Vinton A. Dearing, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Arthur Friedman, _University of Chicago_

-  Louis A. Landa, _Princeton University_

-  Earl Miner, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Samuel H. Monk, _University of Minnesota_

-  Everett T. Moore, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Lawrence Clark Powell, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-  James Sutherland, _University College, London_

-  H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Robert Vosper, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-CORRESPONDING SECRETARY

-

-  Edna C. Davis, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-EDITORIAL ASSISTANT

-

-  Mary Kerbret, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-

-

-INTRODUCTION

-

-     "When I first dabbled in this art, the old distemper call'd

-     _Melancholy_ was exchang'd for _Vapours_, and afterwards for the

-     _Hypp_, and at last took up the now current appellation of the

-     _Spleen_, which it still retains, tho' a learned doctor of the

-     west, in a little tract he hath written, divides the _Spleen_ and

-     _Vapours_, not only into the _Hypp_, the _Hyppos_, and the

-     Hyppocons; but subdivides these divisions into the _Markambles_,

-     the _Moonpalls_, the _Strong-Fiacs_, and the _Hockogrokles_."

-

-

-     Nicholas Robinson, _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and

-     Hypochondriack Melancholy_ (London, 1729)

-

-

-Treatises on hypochondriasis--the seventeenth-century medical term for a

-wide range of nervous diseases--were old when "Sir" John Hill, the

-eccentric English scientist, physician, apothecary, and hack writer,

-published his _Hypochondriasis_ in 1766.[1] For at least a century and a

-half medical writers as well as lay authors had been writing literature

-of all types (treatises, pamphlets, poems, sermons, epigrams) on this

-most fashionable of English maladies under the variant names of

-"melancholy," "the spleen," "black melancholy," "hysteria," "nervous

-debility," "the hyp." Despite the plethora of _materia scripta_ on the

-subject it makes sense to reprint Hill's _Hypochondriasis_, because it

-is indeed a "practical treatise" and because it offers the modern

-student of neoclassical literature a clear summary of the best thoughts

-that had been put forth on the subject, as well as an explanation of the

-causes, symptoms, and cures of this commonplace malady.

-

-No reader of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English literature

-needs to be reminded of the interest of writers of the period in the

-condition--"disease" is too confining a term--hypochondriasis.[2] Their

-concern is apparent in both the poetry and prose of two centuries. From

-Robert Burton's Brobdingnagian exposition in _The Anatomy of Melancholy_

-(1621) to Tobias Smollett's depiction of the misanthropic and ailing

-Matthew Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771), and, of course, well into

-the nineteenth century, afflicted heroes and weeping heroines populate

-the pages of England's literature. There is scarcely a decade in the

-period 1600-1800 that does not contribute to the literature of

-melancholy; so considerable in number are the works that could be placed

-under this heading that it actually makes sense to speak of the

-"literature of melancholy." A kaleidoscopic survey of this literature

-(exclusive of treatises written on the subject) would include mention of

-Milton's "Il Penseroso" and "L'Allegro," the meditative Puritan and

-nervous Anglican thinkers of the Restoration (many of whose narrators,

-such as Richard Baxter, author of the _Reliquiae Baxterianae_,[3] are

-afflicted), Swift's "School of Spleen" in _A Tale of a Tub_, Pope's

-hysterical Belinda in the "Cave of Spleen," the melancholic "I" of

-Samuel Richardson's correspondence, Gray's leucocholy, the

-psychosomatically ailing characters of _The Vicar of Wakefield_ and

-_Tristram Shandy_, Boswell's _Hypochondriack Papers_ (1777-1783)

-contributed to the _London Magazine_, and such "sensible" and

-"sensitive" women as Mrs. Bennett and Miss Bates in the novels of Jane

-Austen. So great in bulk is this literature in the mid eighteenth

-century, that C. A. Moore has written, "statistically, this deserves to

-be called the Age of Melancholy."[4] The vastness of this literature is

-sufficient to justify the reprinting of an unavailable practical

-handbook on the subject by a prolific author all too little known.[5]

-

-The medical background of Hill's pamphlet extends further back than the

-seventeenth century and Burton's _Anatomy_. The ancient Greeks had

-theorized about hypochondria: hypochondriasis signified a disorder

-beneath (hypo) the gristle (chondria) and the disease was discussed

-principally in physiological terms. The belief that hypochondriasis was

-a somatic condition persisted until the second half of the seventeenth

-century at which time an innovation was made by Dr. Thomas Sydenham. In

-addition to showing that hypochondriasis and hysteria (thought previously

-by Sydenham to afflict women only) were the same disease, Sydenham noted

-that the external cause of both was a mental disturbance and not a

-physiological one. He also had a theory that the internal and immediate

-cause was a disorder of the animal spirits arising from a clot and

-resulting in pain, spasms, and bodily disorders. By attributing the

-onset of the malady to mental phenomena and not to obstructions of the

-spleen or viscera, Sydenham was moving towards a psychosomatic theory of

-hypochondriasis, one that was to be debated in the next century in

-England, Holland, and France.[6] Sydenham's influence on the physicians

-of the eighteenth century was profound: Cheyne in England, Boerhaave in

-Holland, La Mettrie in France. Once the theory of the nervous origins of

-hypochondria gained ground--here I merely note coincidence, not historical

-cause and effect--the disease became increasingly fashionable in England,

-particularly among the polite, the aristocratic, and the refined. Students

-of the drama will recall Scrub's denial in _The Beaux' Stratagem_ (1707)

-of the possibility that Archer has the spleen and Mrs. Sullen's

-interjection, "I thought that distemper had been only proper to people of

-quality."

-

-Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, hypochondria was so

-prevalent in people's minds and mouths that it soon assumed the

-abbreviated name "the hyp." Entire poems like William Somervile's _The

-Hyp: a Burlesque Poem in Five Canto's_ (1731) and Tim Scrubb's _A Rod

-for the Hyp-Doctor_ (1731) were devoted to this strain; others, like

-Malcom Flemyng's epic poem, _Neuropathia: sive de morbis hypochondriacis

-et hystericis, libri tres, poema medicum_ (1740), were more technical

-and scientific. Professor Donald Davie has written that he has often

-"heard old fashioned and provincial persons [in England and Scotland]

-even in [my] own lifetime say, 'Oh, you give me the hyp,' where we

-should say 'You give me a pain in the neck'"[7]; and I myself have heard

-the expression, "You give me the pip," where "pip" may be a corruption

-of "hyp." As used in the early eighteenth century, the term "hyp" was

-perhaps not far from what our century has learned to call _Angst_. It

-was also used as a synonym for "lunacy," as the anonymous author of

-_Anti-Siris_ (1744), one of the tracts in the tar-water controversy,

-informs us that "Berkeley tells his Countrymen, they are all mad, or

-_Hypochondriac_, which is but a fashionable name for Madness." Bernard

-Mandeville, the Dutch physician and author of _The Fable of the Bees_,

-seems to have understood perfectly well that hypochondriasis is a

-condition encompassing any number of diseases and not a specific and

-readily definable ailment; a condition, moreover, that hovers

-precariously and bafflingly in limbo between mind and body, and he

-stressed this as the theme of his _Treatise of the Hypochondriack and

-Hysteric Passions, Vulgarly Call'd the Hypo in Men and Vapours in Women_

-(1711). The mental causes are noted as well in an anonymous pamphlet in

-the British Museum, _A Treatise on the Dismal Effects of

-Low-Spiritedness_ (1750) and are echoed in many similar early and

-mid-eighteenth century works. Some medical writers of the age, like

-Nicholas Robinson, had reservations about the external mental bases of

-the hyp and preferred to discuss the condition in terms of internal

-physiological causes:

-

-     ...of that Disorder we call the Vapours, or _Hypochondria_; for

-     they have no material distinctive Characters, but what arise from

-     the same Disease affecting different Sexes, and the Vapours in

-     Women are term'd the _Hypochondria_ in Men, and they proceed from

-     the Contraction of the Vessels being depress'd a little beneath the

-     Balance of Nature, and the Relaxation of the Nerves at the same

-     Time, which creates that Uneasiness and Melancholy that naturally

-     attends Vapours, and which generally is an Intemperature of the

-     whole Body, proceeding from a Depression of the Solids beneath the

-     Balance of Nature; but the Intemperature of the Parts is that

-     Peculiar Disposition whereby they favour any Disease.[8]

-

-

-But the majority of medical thinkers had been persuaded that the

-condition was psychosomatic, and this belief was supported by research

-on nerves by important physicians in the 1740's and 1750's: the Monro

-brothers in London, Robert Whytt in Edinburgh, Albrecht von Haller in

-Leipzig. By mid century the condition known as the hyp was believed to

-be a real, not an imaginary ailment, common, peculiar in its

-manifestations, and indefinable, almost impossible to cure, producing

-very real symptoms of physical illness, and said to originate sometimes

-in depression and idleness. It was summed up by Robert James in his

-_Medicinal Dictionary_ (London, 1743-45):

-

-     If we thoroughly consider its Nature, it will be found to be a

-     spasmodico-flatulent Disorder of the _Primae Viae_, that is, of the

-     Stomach and Intestines, arising from an Inversion or Perversion of

-     their peristaltic Motion, and, by the mutual consent of the Parts,

-     throwing the whole nervous System into irregular Motions, and

-     disturbing the whole Oeconomy of the Functions.... no part or

-     Function of the Body escapes the Influence of this tedious and long

-     protracted Disease, whose Symptoms are so violent and numerous,

-     that it is no easy Task either to enumerate or account for them....

-     No disease is more troublesome, either to the Patient or Physician,

-     than hypochondriac Disorders; and it often happens, that, thro' the

-     Fault of both, the Cure is either unnecessarily protracted, or

-     totally frustrated; for the Patients are so delighted, not only

-     with a Variety of Medicines, but also of Physicians.... On the

-     contrary, few physicians are sufficiently acquainted with the true

-     Genius and Nature of this perplexing Disorder; for which Reason

-     they boldly prescribe almost everything contained in the Shops, not

-     without an irreparable Injury to the Patient (article on

-     "Hypochondriacus Morbis").

-

-This is a more technical description than Hill gives anywhere in his

-handbook, but it serves well to summarize the background of the condition

-about which Sir John wrote.

-

-Hill's _Hypochondriasis_ adds little that is new to the theory of the

-disease. It incorporates much of the thinking set forth by the writings

-mentioned above, particularly those of George Cheyne, whose medical

-works _The English Malady_ (1733) and _The Natural Method of Cureing the

-Diseases of the Body, and the Disorders of the Mind Depending on the

-Body_ (1742) Hill knew. He is also conversant with some Continental

-writers on the subject, two of whom--Isaac Biberg, author of The

-_Oeconomy of Nature_ (1751), and René Réaumur who had written a history

-of insects (1722)[9]--he mentions explicitly, and with William

-Stukeley's _Of the Spleen_ (1723). Internal evidence indicates that Hill

-had read or was familiar with the ideas propounded in Richard

-Blackmore's _Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours_ (1725) and Nicholas

-Robinson's _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and Hypochondriack

-Melancholy_ (1729).

-

-Hill's arrangement of sections is logical: he first defines the

-condition (I), then proceeds to discuss persons most susceptible to it

-(II), its major symptoms (III), consequences (IV), causes (V), and cures

-(VI-VIII). In the first four sections almost every statement is

-commonplace and requires no commentary (for example, Hill's opening

-remark: "To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and

-cruel. It is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by

-thickened and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver,

-and other parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick

-scarce knows one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.") His

-belief that the condition afflicts sedentary persons, particularly

-students, philosophers, theologians, and that it is not restricted to

-women alone--as some contemporary thinkers still maintained--is also

-impossible to trace to a single source, as is his description (p. 12) of

-the most prevalent physiological _symptoms_ ("lowness of spirits, and

-inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love of solitude....

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness") and _causes_ (the poor and damp

-English climate and the resultant clotting of blood in the spleen) of

-the illness.

-

-Sections V-VIII, dealing with causes and cures, are less commonplace and

-display some of Hill's eccentricities as a writer and thinker. He uses

-the section entitled "Cures" as a means to peddle his newly discovered

-cure-all, water dock,[10] which Smollett satirized through the mouth of

-Tabitha Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771). Hill also rebelled against

-contemporary apothecaries and physicians who prescribed popular

-medicines--such as Berkeley's tar-water, Dover's mercury powders, and

-James's fever-powders--as universal panaceas for the cure of the hyp.

-"No acrid medicine must be directed, for that may act too hastily,

-dissolve the impacted matter at once, and let it loose, to the

-destruction of the sufferer; no antimonial, no mercurial, no martial

-preparation must be taken; in short, no chymistry: nature is the shop

-that heaven has set before us, and we must seek our medicine there"

-(p. 24). However scientifically correct Hill may have been in minimizing

-the efficacy of current pills and potions advertised as remedies for the

-hyp, he was unusual for his time in objecting so strongly to them. Less

-eccentric was his allegiance to the "Ancients" rather than to the

-"Moderns" so far as chemical treatment (i.e., restoration of the humours

-by chemical rearrangement) of hypochondriasis is concerned.[11] "The

-venerable ancients," Hill writes, "who knew not this new art, will lead

-us in the search; and (faithful relators as they are of truth) will tell

-us whence we may deduce our hope; and what we are to fear" (p. 24).

-

-Still more idiosyncratic, perhaps, is Hill's contention (p. 25) that the

-air of dry, high grounds worsens the condition of the patient. Virtually

-every writer I have read on the subject believed that onset of the hyp

-was caused by one of the six non-naturals--air, diet, lack of sufficient

-sleep, too little or too much exercise, defective evacuation, the

-passions of the mind; and although some medical writers emphasized the

-last of these,[12] few would have concurred with Hill that the fetid air

-of London was less harmful than the clearer air at Highgate. All readers

-of the novel of the period will recall the hypochondriacal Matt

-Bramble's tirade against the stench of London air. Beliefs of the

-variety here mentioned cause me to question Hill's importance in the

-history of medicine; there can be no question about his contributions to

-the advancement of the science of botany through popularization of

-Linnaeus' system of bisexual classification, but Hill's medical

-importance is summarized best as that of a compiler. His recommendation

-of the study of botany as a cure for melancholics is sensible but verges

-on becoming "a digression in praise of the author," a poetic _apologia

-pro vita sua_ in Augustan fashion:

-

-     For me, I should advise above all other things the study of nature.

-     Let him begin with plants: he will here find a continual pleasure,

-     and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful things; even of

-     the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to walk; and

-     every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket, will

-     afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually in

-     the air; and continually to change the nature and quality of the

-     air, by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the

-     lawn, the heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be

-     abroad; and the unceasing variety of the subjects of his

-     observation, will prevent his walking hastily: he will pursue his

-     studies in the air; and that contemplative turn of mind, which in

-     his closet threatened his destruction, will thus become the great

-     means of his recovery (pp. 26-27).

-

-Hill was forever extolling the claims of a life devoted to the study of

-nature, as we see in a late work, _The Virtues of British Herbs_ (1770).

-Judicious as is the logic of this recommendation, one cannot help but

-feel that the emphasis here is less on diversion as a cure and more on

-the botanic attractions of "every hedge and hillock, every foot-path

-side, and thicket."

-

-While Hill's rules and regulations regarding proper diet (Section VII)

-are standard, several taken almost _verbatim et literatim_ from Cheyne's

-list in _The English Malady_ (1733), his recommendation (Section VIII)

-of "Spleen-Wort" as the best medicine for the hypochondriac patient is

-not. Since Hill devotes so much space to the virtues of this herb and

-concludes his work extolling this plant, a word should be said about it.

-Throughout his life he was an active botanist. Apothecary, physician,

-and writer though he was, it was ultimately botany that was his ruling

-passion, as is made abundantly clear in his correspondence.[13] Wherever

-he lived--whether in the small house in St. James's Street or in the

-larger one on the Bayswater Road--he cultivated an herb garden that

-flattered his knowledge and ability. Connoisseurs raved about its

-species and considered it one of the showpieces of London. His arrogant

-personality alone prevented him from becoming the first Keeper of the

-Apothecary's Garden in Chelsea, although he was for a time

-superintendent to the Dowager Princess of Wales's gardens at Kensington

-Palace and at Kew. His interest in cultivation of herbs nevertheless

-continued; over the years Hill produced more than thirty botanical

-works, many of them devoted to the medical virtues of rare herbs such as

-"Spleen-Wort." Among these are _The British Herbal_ (1756), _On the

-Virtues of Sage in Lengthening Human Life_ (1763), _Centaury, the Great

-Stomachic_ (1765), _Polypody_ (1768), _A Method of Curing Jaundice_

-(1768), _Instances of the Virtue of Petasite Root_ (1771), and _Twenty

-Five New Plants_ (1773).[14] It is therefore not surprising that he

-should believe a specific herb to be the best remedy for a complicated

-medical condition. Nor is his reference to the Ancients as authority for

-the herbal pacification of an inflamed spleen surprising in the light of

-his researches: he was convinced that every illness could be cured by

-taking an appropriate herb or combination of herbs. Whereas a few

-nonmedical writers--such as John Wesley in _Primitive Physick_

-(1747)--had advocated the taking of one or two herbs in moderate dosage

-as anti-hysterics (the eighteenth-century term for all cures of the

-hyp), no medical writer of the century ever promoted the use of herbs to

-the extent that Hill did. In fairness to him, it is important to note

-that his herbal remedies were harmless and that many found their way

-into the official _London Pharmacopeia_. "The virtues of this smooth

-Spleen-wort," he insists, "have stood the test of ages; and the plant

-every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbarists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it"

-(p. 37).[15] The greatest portion of Hill's concluding section combines

-advertisement for the powder medicine he was himself manufacturing at a

-handsome profit together with a protest against competing apothecaries:

-"An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right" (p. 42).

-

-Treatises on hypochondriasis did not cease to be printed after Hill's in

-1766, but continued to issue from the presses into the nineteenth

-century. A good example of this is the tome by John Reid, physician to

-the Finsbury Dispensary in London, _Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis

-and Other Nervous Affections_ (1816), which summarizes theories of the

-malady.[16] A bibliographical study of such works would probably reveal

-a larger number of titles in the nineteenth century than in the previous

-one, but by this time the nature and definition of hypochondria had

-changed significantly.

-

-If John Hill's volume is not an important contribution in the history of

-medicine, it is a lucid and brief exposition of many of the best ideas

-that had been thought and written on the hyp, with the exception of his

-uninhibited prescribing of herbal medicines as cure-alls. An

-understanding of this disease is essential for readers of neoclassical

-English literature, especially when we reflect upon the fact that some

-of the best literature of the period was composed by writers whom it

-afflicted. It is perhaps not without significance that the greatest poet

-of the Augustan age, Alexander Pope, thought it necessary as he lay on

-his deathbed in May 1744 to exclaim with his last breath, "I never was

-hippish in my whole life."[17]

-

-  University of California,

-  Los Angeles

-

-

-

-

-NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION

-

-

-[1] The text here reproduced is that of the copy in the Library of the

-Royal Society of Medicine, London. Title pages of different copies of

-the first edition of 1766 vary. For example, the title page of the copy

-in the British Museum reads, _Hypochondriasis; a Practical Treatise On

-the Nature and Cure of that Disorder, Commonly called the Hyp and the

-Hypo_. The copy in the Royal Society of Medicine contains, among other

-additions, the words "by Sir John Hill" in pencil, and "8vo Lond.

-1766," written in ink and probably a later addition.

-

-[2] Melancholy, hypochondriasis, and the spleen were considered in the

-seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to be one complex condition, a

-malady rather than a malaise, which is but a symptom. Distinctions among

-these, of interest primarily to medical historians, cannot be treated

-here. As good a definition as any is found in Dr. Johnson's _Dictionary_

-(1755): "Hypochondriacal.... 1. Melancholy; disordered in the

-imagination.... 2. Producing melancholy...." The literature of

-melancholy has been surveyed in part by C. A. Moore, "The English

-Malady," _Backgrounds of English Literature 1700-1760_ (Minneapolis,

-1953), pp. 179-235. In medical parlance, "hypochondria" means the soft

-parts of the body below the costal cartilages, and the singular form of

-the word, "hypochondrium," means the viscera situated in the

-hypochondria, i.e., the liver, gall bladder, and spleen.

-

-[3] See Samuel Clifford's _The Signs and Causes of Melancholy, with

-directions suited to the case of those who are afflicted with it.

-Collected out of the works of Mr. Richard Baxter_ (London, 1716) in the

-British Museum.

-

-[4] _Backgrounds of English Literature_, p. 179.

-

-[5] See my forthcoming biography, _The Literary Quack: A Life of 'Sir'

-John Hill of London_, and John Kennedy's _Some Remarks on the Life and

-Writings of Dr. J---- H----, Inspector General of Great Britain_

-(London, 1752).

-

-[6] For some of this background see L. J. Rather, _Mind and Body in

-Eighteenth Century Medicine: A Study Based on Jerome Gaub's De Regimine

-Mentis_ (London, 1965), pp. 135-90 _passim_.

-

-[7] _Science and Literature 1700-1740_ (London, 1964), pp. 50-51.

-

-[8] _A New Theory of Physick_ (London, 1725), p. 56.

-

-[9] Biberg was a Swedish naturalist and had studied botany under

-Linnaeus in Uppsala; Réaumur, a French botanist, had contributed papers

-to the _Philosophical Transactions_ of the Royal Society in London.

-

-[10] _The Power of Water-Dock against the Scurvy whether in the Plain

-Root or Essence...._ (London, 1765), had been published six months

-earlier than _Hypochondriasis_ and had earned Hill a handsome profit.

-

-[11] I have treated aspects of this subject in my article, "Matt Bramble

-and The Sulphur Controversy in the XVIIIth Century: Medical Background

-of _Humphry Clinker_," _JHI_, XXVIII (1967), 577-90.

-

-[12] See, for example, Jeremiah Waineright, _A Mechanical Account of the

-Non-Naturals_ (1707); John Arbuthnot, _An Essay Concerning the Effects

-of Air on Human Bodies_ (1733); Frank Nichols, _De Anima Medica_ (1750).

-

-[13] Hill's correspondence is not published but shall be printed as an

-appendix to my forthcoming biography.

-

-[14] I have discussed some of these works in connection with the medical

-background of John Wesley's _Primitive Physick_ (1747). See G. S.

-Rousseau, _Harvard Library Bulletin_, XVI (1968), 242-56.

-

-[15] It is difficult to know with certainty when Hill first became

-interested in the herb. He mentions it in passing in _The British

-Herbal_ (1756), I, 526 and may have sold it as early as 1742 when he

-opened an apothecary shop.

-

-[16] Reid's dissertation at Edinburgh, entitled _De Insania_ (1798),

-contains materials on the relationship of the imagination to all forms

-of mental disturbance. Secondary literature on hypochondria is

-plentiful. Works include: R. H. Gillespie, _Hypochondria_ (London,

-1928), William K. Richmond, _The English Disease_ (London, 1958),

-Charles Chenevix Trench, _The Royal Malady_ (New York, 1964), and Ilza

-Vieth, _Hysteria: The History of a Disease_ (Chicago, 1965), and "On

-Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Afflictions," _Bulletin of the History of

-Medicine_, XXX (1956), 233-40.

-

-[17] Joseph Spence, _Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books

-and Men_, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, 264.

-

-I am indebted to A. D. Morris, M.D., F.R.S.M., for help of various sorts

-in writing this introduction.

-

-

-

-

-BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

-

-The text of this facsimile of _Hypochondriasis_ is reproduced from a

-copy in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, London.

-

-

-

-

-     HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-            A

-

-  PRACTICAL TREATISE, &c.

-

-

-

-HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-SECT. I.

-

-The NATURE of the DISORDER.

-

-

-To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and cruel. It

-is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by thickened

-and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver, and other

-parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick scarce knows

-one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.

-

-The blood is a mixture of many fluids, which, in a state of health, are

-so combined, that the whole passes freely through its appointed vessels;

-but if by the loss of the thinner parts, the rest becomes too gross to

-be thus carried through, it will stop where the circulation has least

-power; and having thus stopped it will accumulate; heaping by degrees

-obstruction on obstruction.

-

-Health and chearfulness, and the quiet exercise of mind, depend upon a

-perfect circulation: is it a wonder then, when this becomes impeded the

-body looses of its health, and the temper of its sprightliness? to be

-otherwise would be the miracle; and he inhumanly insults the afflicted,

-who calls all this a voluntary frowardness. Its slightest state brings

-with it sickness, anguish and oppression; and innumerable ills follow

-its advancing steps, unless prevented by timely care; till life itself

-grows burthensome.

-

-The disease was common in antient Greece; and her physicians understood

-it, better than those perhaps of later times, in any other country; who

-though happy in many advantages these fathers of the science could not

-have, yet want the great assistance of frequent watching it in all its

-stages.

-

-Those venerable writers have delivered its nature, and its cure: in the

-first every thing now shews they were right; and what they have said as

-to the latter will be found equally true and certain. This, so far as

-present experience has confirmed it, and no farther, will be here laid

-before the afflicted in a few plain words.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. II.

-

-Persons Subject to it.

-

-

-Fatigue of mind, and great exertion of its powers often give birth to

-this disease; and always tend to encrease it. The finer spirits are

-wasted by the labour of the brain: the Philosopher rises from his study

-more exhausted than the Peasant leaves his drudgery; without the benefit

-that he has from exercise. Greatness of mind, and steady virtue;

-determined resolution, and manly firmness, when put in action, and

-intent upon their object, all also lead to it: perhaps whatever tends to

-the ennobling of the soul has equal share in bringing on this weakness

-of the body.

-

-From this we may learn easily who are the men most subject to it; the

-grave and studious, those of a sedate temper and enlarged understanding,

-the learned and wise, the virtuous and the valiant: those whom it were

-the interest of the world to wish were free from this and every other

-illness; and who perhaps, except for this alloy, would have too large a

-portion of human happiness.

-

-Though these are most, it is not these alone, who are subject to it.

-There are countries where it is endemial, and in other places some have

-the seeds of it in their constitution; and in some it takes rise from

-accidents. In these last it is the easiest of cure; and in the first

-most difficult.

-

-Beside the Greeks already named, the Jews of old time were heavily

-afflicted with this disease; and in their descendants to this day it is

-often constitutional: the Spaniards have it almost to a man; and so have

-the American Indians. Perhaps the character of these several nations may

-be connected with it. The steady honour, and firm valour of the

-Spaniard, very like that of the ancient Doric nation, who followed the

-flute not the trumpet to the field; and met the enemy, not with shouts

-and fury, but with a determined virtue: it is the temper of the

-Hypochondriac to be slow, but unmoveably resolved: the Jew has shewn

-this mistakenly, but almost miraculously; and the poor Indian, untaught

-as he is, faces all peril with composure, and sings his death-song with

-an unalter'd countenance.

-

-Among particular persons the most inquiring and contemplative are those

-who suffer oftenest by this disease; and of all degrees of men I think

-the clergy. I do not mean the hunting, shooting, drinking clergy, who

-bear the tables of the great; but the retir'd and conscientious; such as

-attend in midnight silence to their duty; and seek in their own cool

-breasts, or wheresoever else they may be found, new admonitions for an

-age plunged in new vices. To this disease we owe the irreparable loss of

-Dr. YOUNG; and the present danger of many other the best and most

-improved amongst us. May what is here to be proposed assist in their

-preservation!

-

-The Geometrician or the learned Philosopher of whatever denomination,

-whose course of study fixes his eye for ever on one object, his mind

-intensely and continually employed upon one thought, should be warned

-also that he is in danger; or if he find himself already afflicted, he

-should be told that the same course of life, which brought it on, will,

-without due care, encrease it to the most dreaded violence.

-

-The middle period of life is that in which there is the greatest danger

-of an attack from this disease; and the latter end of autumn, when the

-summer heats have a little time been over, is the season when in our

-climate its first assaults are most to be expected. The same time of the

-year always increases the disorder in those who have been before

-afflicted with it; and it is a truth must be confessed, that from its

-first attack the patient grows continually, though slowly, worse; unless

-a careful regimen prevent it.

-

-The constitutions most liable to this obstruction are the lean, and dark

-complexioned; the grave and sedentary. Let such watch the first

-symptoms; and obviate, (as they may with ease) that which it will be

-much more difficult to remove.

-

-It is happy a disease, wherein the patient must do a great deal for

-himself, falls, for the most part, upon those who have the powers of

-reason strongest. Let them only be aware of this, that the distemper

-naturally disposes them to inactivity; and reason will have no use

-unless accompanied with resolution to enforce it.

-

-Though the physician can do something toward the cure, much more depends

-upon the patient; and here his constancy of mind will be employed most

-happily. No one is better qualified to judge on a fair hearing what

-course is the most fit; and having made that choice, he must with

-patience wait its good effects. Diseases that come on slowly must have

-time for curing; an attention to the first appearances of the disorder

-will be always happiest; because when least established it is easiest

-overthrown: but when that happy period has been neglected, he must wait

-the effects of such a course as will dilute and melt the obstructing

-matter gradually; for till that be done it is not only vain, but

-sometimes dangerous, to attempt its expulsion from the body.

-

-The blood easily separates itself into the grosser and the thinner

-parts: we see this in bleeding; and from the toughness of the red cake

-may guess how very difficult it will be to dissolve a substance of like

-firmness in the vessels of the body. That it can thus become thickened

-within the body, a Pleurisy shews us too evidently: in that case it is

-brought on suddenly, and with inflammation; in this other, slowly and

-without; and here, even before it forms the obstruction, can bring on

-many mischiefs. Various causes can produce the same effect, but that in

-all cases operates most durably, which operates most slowly. The watery

-part of the blood is its mild part; in the remaining gross matter of it,

-are acrid salts and burning oils, and these, when destitute of that

-happy dilution nature gives them in a healthy body, are capable of doing

-great mischief to the tender vessels in which they are kept stagnant.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. III.

-

-The SYMPTOMS of the DISORDER.

-

-

-The first and lightest of the signs that shew this illness are a lowness

-of spirits, and inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love

-of solitude and a habit of thinking, even on trifling subjects, with too

-much steadiness. A very little help may combat these: but if that

-indolence which is indeed a part of the disorder, will neglect them;

-worse must be expected soon to follow.

-

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness, weight, and oppression in the body,

-a want of appetite, or, what is worse, an appetite without digestion;

-for these are the conditions of different states of the disease, a

-fullness and a difficulty of breathing after meals, a straitness of the

-breast, pains and flatulencies in the bowels, and an unaptness to

-discharge their contents.

-

-The pulse becomes low, weak, and unequal; and there are frequent

-palpitations of the heart, a little dark-coloured urine is voided at

-some times; and a flood of colourless and insipid at others; relieving

-for a moment, but increasing the distemper: there is in some cases also

-a continual teazing cough, with a choaking stoppage in the throat at

-times; then heartburn, sickness, hardness of the belly, and a costive

-habit, or a tormenting and vain irritation.

-

-The lips turn pale, the eyes loose their brightness and by degrees the

-white grows as it were greenish, the gums want their due firmness, with

-their proper colour; and an unpleasing foulness grows upon the teeth:

-the inside of the mouth is pale and furred, and the throat dry and

-husky: the colour of the skin is pale (though there are periods when the

-face is florid) and as the obstruction gathers ground, and more affects

-the liver, the whole body becomes yellow, tawny, greenish, and at length

-of that deep and dusky hue, to which men of swift imagination have given

-the name of blackness.

-

-These symptoms do not all appear in any one period of the disease, or in

-one case, but at one time or other all of them, as well as those which

-follow: the flesh becomes cold to the touch, though the patient does not

-himself perceive it; the limbs grow numbed and torpid, the breathing

-dull and slow, and the voice hollow; and usually the appetite in this

-period declines, and comes almost to nothing: night sweats come on,

-black swellings appear on the veins, the flesh wastes and the breast

-becomes flat and hollow: the mouth is full of a thin spittle, the head

-is dizzy and confus'd, and sometimes there is an unconquerable numbness

-in the organs of speech.

-

-I have known the temporary silence that follows upon this last symptom

-become a jest to the common herd; and the unhappy patient, instead of

-compassion and assistance, receive the reproof of sullenness, from those

-who should have known and acted better.

-

-About twenty years ago I met on a visit at Catthorpe in Leicestershire a

-young gentleman of distinguished learning and abilities, who at certain

-times was speechless. The vulgar thought it a pretence: and a jocose

-lady, where he was at tea with company, putting him as she said to a

-trial, poured out a dish very strong and without sugar. He drank it and

-returned the cup with a bow of great reserve, and his eye bent on the

-ground: she then filled the cup with sugar, and pouring weak tea on it,

-sent it him: he drank that too, looked at her steadily, and blushed for

-her. The lady declared the man was dumb; the rest thought him perverse,

-and obstinate; but a constant and steady perseverance in an easy method

-cured him.

-

-All these are miseries which the disease, while it retains its natural

-form, can bring upon the patient; and thus he will in time be worn out,

-and led miserably, though slowly, to the grave. Let him not indulge his

-inactivity so far as to give way to this, because it is represented as

-far off; the disease may suddenly and frightfully change its nature; and

-swifter evils follow.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. IV.

-

-The DANGER.

-

-

-We have done with the obstruction considered in itself; but this, though

-often unsurmountable by art, at least by the methods now in use, will be

-sometimes broken through at once by nature, or by accidents; and bring

-on fatal evils. These are strictly different diseases, and are no

-otherway concerned here, than as the consequences of that of which we

-are treating.

-

-The thick and glutinous blood which has so long stagnated in the spleen,

-will have in that time altered its nature, and acquired a very great

-degree of acrimony: while it lies dormant, this does no more mischiefs,

-than those named already; but when violent exercise, a fit of outrageous

-anger, or any thing else that suddenly shocks and disturbs the frame,

-puts it in motion, it melts at once into a kind of liquid putrefaction.

-Being now thin, it mixes itself readily with the blood again, and brings

-on putrid fevers; destroys the substance of the spleen itself, or being

-thrown upon some other of the viscera, corrodes them, and leads on this

-way a swift and miserable death. If it fall upon the liver, its tender

-pulpy substance is soon destroyed, jaundices beyond the help of art

-first follow, then dropsies and all their train of misery; if on lungs,

-consumptions; if on the brain, convulsions, epilepsy, palsy, apoplexy;

-if on the surface, leprosy.

-

-The intention of cure is to melt this coagulation softly, not to break

-it violently; and then to give it a very gentle passage through the

-bowels. There is no safe way for it to take but that; and even that when

-urged too far may bring on fatal dysenteries.

-

-Let none wonder at the sudden devastation which sometimes arises from

-this long stagnant matter, when liquified too hastily: how long, how

-many years the impacted matter will continue quiet in a schirrous tumour

-of the breast; but being once put in motion, whether from accident, or

-in the course of nature, what can describe; or what can stop its

-havock!

-

-Instances of the other are too frequent. A nobleman the other day died

-paralytick: dissection shewed a spleen consumed by an abscess, formed

-from the dissolved matter of such an obstruction: and 'tis scarce longer

-since, a learned gentleman, who had been several years lost to his

-friends, by the extreams of a Hypochondriacal disorder, seem'd gradually

-without assistance to recover: but the lungs suffered while the spleen

-was freed; and he died very soon of what is called a galloping

-consumption.

-

-When the obstruction is great and of long continuance, if it be thus

-hastily moved, the consequence is, equally, a sudden and a miserable

-death, whether, like the matter of a cancer, it remains in its place; or

-like that of a bad small pox, be thrown upon some other vital part.

-

-Let not the patient be too much alarmed; this is laid down to caution,

-not to terrify him: it is fit he should know his danger, and attend to

-it; for the prevention is easy; and the cure, even of the most advanced

-stages, when undertaken by gentle means, is not at all impracticable: to

-assist the physician, let him look into himself, and recollect the

-source of his complaint. This he may judge of from the following

-notices.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. V.

-

-The Causes of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-The obstruction which forms this disease, may take its origin from

-different accidents: a fever ill cured has often caused it; or the

-piles, which had been used to discharge largely, ceasing; a marshy soil,

-poisoned with stagnant water, has given it to some persons; and altho'

-indolence and inactivity are oftenest at the root, yet it has arisen

-from too great exercise.

-

-Real grief has often brought it on; and even love, for sometimes that is

-real. Study and fixed attention of the mind have been accused before;

-and add to these the stooping posture of the body, which most men use,

-though none should use it, in writing and in reading. This has

-contributed too much to it; but of all other things night studies are

-the most destructive. The steady stillness, and dusky habit of all

-nature in those hours, enforce, encourage, and support that settled

-gloom, which rises from fixt thought; and sinks the body to the grave;

-even while it carries up the mind to heaven. He who would have his lamp

-

-        _At midnight hour

-  Be seen in some high lonely tower,_[18]

-

-will waste the flame of this unheeded life: and while he labours to

-unsphere the spirit of Plato[18] will let loose his own.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VI.

-

-The Cure of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-Let him who would escape the mischiefs of an obstructed spleen, avoid

-the things here named: and let him who suffers from the malady,

-endeavour to remember to which of them it has been owing; for half the

-hope depends upon that knowledge.

-

-Nature has sometimes made a cure herself, and we should watch her ways;

-for art never is so right as when it imitates her: sometimes the

-patient's own resolution has set him free. This is always in his power,

-and at all times will do wonders.

-

-The bleeding of the piles, from nature's single efforts, has at once

-cured a miserable man; where their cessation was the cause of the

-disorder. A leprosy has appeared upon the skin, and all the symptoms of

-the former sickness vanished. This among the Jews happened often: both

-diseases we know were common among them: and I have here seen something

-very like it: Water-Dock has thrown out scorbutic eruptions, and all the

-former symptoms of an Hypochondriacal disorder have disappeared:

-returning indeed when these were unadvisedly struck in; but keeping off

-entirely when they were better treated. A natural purging unsuppressed

-has sometimes done the same good office: but this is hazardous.

-

-It is easy to be directed from such instances; only let us take the

-whole along with us. Bleeding would have answered nature's purpose, if

-she could not have opened of herself the hæmorrhoidal vessels; but he

-who should give medicines for that purpose, might destroy his patient by

-too great disturbance. If a natural looseness may perform the cure, so

-may an artificial; when the original source of the disorder points that

-way. But these are helps that take place only in particular cases.

-

-The general and universal method of cure must be by some mild and gently

-resolving medicine, under the influence of which the obstructing matter

-may be voided that, or some other way with safety. The best season to

-undertake this is the autumn, but even here there must be caution.

-

-In the first place, no strong evacuating remedy must be given; for that,

-by carrying off the thinner parts of the juices, will tend to thicken

-the remainder; and certainly encrease the distemper. No acrid medicine

-must be directed, for that may act too hastily, dissolve the impacted

-matter at once, and let it loose, to the destruction of the sufferer; no

-antimonial, no mercurial, no martial preparation must be taken; in

-short, no chymistry: nature is the shop that heaven has set before us,

-and we must seek our medicine there. The venerable ancients, who knew

-not this new art, will lead us in the search; and (faithful relators as

-they are of truth) will tell us whence we may deduce our hope; and what

-we are to fear.

-

-But prior to the course of any medicine, and as an essential to any good

-hope from it, the patient must prescribe himself a proper course of

-life, and a well chosen diet: let us assist him in his choice; and speak

-of this first, as it comes first in order.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VI.

-

-Rules of Life for Hypochondriac Persons.

-

-

-Air and exercise, as they are the best preservers of health, and

-greatest assistants in the cure of all long continued diseases, will

-have their full effect in this; but there requires some caution in the

-choice, and management of them. It is common to think the air of high

-grounds best; but experience near home shews otherwise: the

-Hypochondriac patient is always worse at Highgate even than in London.

-

-The air he breathes should be temperate; not exposed to the utmost

-violences of heat and cold, and the swift changes from one to the

-other; which are most felt on those high grounds. The side of a hill is

-the best place for him: and though wet grounds are hurtful; yet let

-there be the shade of trees, to tempt him often to a walk; and soften by

-their exhalation the over dryness of the air.

-

-The exercise he takes should be frequent; but not violent. Motion

-preserves the firmness of the parts, and elasticity of the vessels; it

-prevents that aggregation of thick humours which he is most to fear. A

-sedentary life always produces weakness, and that mischief always

-follows: weak eyes are gummy, weak lungs are clogged with phlegm, and

-weak bowels waste themselves in vapid diarrhoeas.

-

-Let him invite himself abroad, and let his friends invite him by every

-innocent inducement. For me, I should advise above all other things the

-study of nature. Let him begin with plants: he will here find a

-continual pleasure, and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful

-things; even of the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to

-walk; and every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket,

-will afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually

-in the air, and continually to change the nature and quality of the air,

-by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the lawn, the

-heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be abroad; and the

-unceasing variety of the subjects of his observation, will prevent his

-walking hastily: he will pursue his studies in the air; and that

-contemplative turn of mind, which in his closet threatened his

-destruction, will thus become the great means of his recovery.

-

-If the mind tire upon this, from the repeated use, another of nature's

-kingdoms opens itself at once upon him; the plant he is weary of

-observing, feeds some insect he may examine; nor is there a stone that

-lies before his foot, but may afford instruction and amusement.

-

-Even what the vulgar call the most abject things will shew a wonderful

-utility; and lead the mind, in pious contemplation higher than the

-stars. The poorest moss that is trampled under foot, has its important

-uses: is it at the bottom of a wood we find it? why there it shelters

-the fallen seeds; hides them from birds, and covers them from frost;

-and thus becomes the foster father of another forest! creeps it along

-the surface of a rock? even there its good is infinite! its small roots

-run into the stone, and the rains make their way after them; the moss

-having lived its time dies; it rots and with the mouldered fragments of

-the stone forms earth; wherein, after a few successions, useful plants

-may grow, and feed more useful cattle![19]

-

-Is there a weed more humble in its aspect, more trampled on, or more

-despised than knot grass! no art can get the better of its growth, no

-labour can destroy it; 'twere pity if they could, for the thing lives

-where nothing would of use to us; and its large and most wonderfully

-abundant seeds, feed in hard winters, half the birds of Heaven.

-

-What the weak moss performs upon the rock the loathed toadstool brings

-about in timber: is an oak dead where man's eye will not find it? this

-fungus roots itself upon the bark, and rots the wood beneath it; hither

-the beetle creeps for shelter, and for sustenance; him the woodpecker

-follows as his prey; and while he tears the tree in search of him, he

-scatters it about the ground; which it manures.

-

-Nor is it the beetle alone that thus insinuates itself into the

-substance of the vegetable tribe: the tender aphide[20], whom a touch

-destroys, burrows between the two skins of a leaf, for shelter from his

-winged enemies; tracing, with more than Dedalæan art, his various

-meanders; and veining the green surface with these white lines more

-beautifully than the best Ægyptian marble.

-

-'Twere endless to proceed; nor is it needful: one object will not fail

-to lead on to another, and every where the goodness of his God will

-shine before him even in what are thought the vilest things; his

-greatness in the lead of them.

-

-Let him pursue these thoughts, and seek abroad the objects and the

-instigations to them: but let him in these and all other excursions

-avoid equally the dews of early morning, and of evening.

-

-The more than usual exercise of this prescription will dispose him to

-more than customary sleep, let him indulge it freely; so far from

-hurting, it will help his cure.

-

-Let him avoid all excesses: drink need scarce be named, for we are

-writing to men of better and of nobler minds, than can be tempted to

-that humiliating vice. Those who in this disorder have too great an

-appetite, must not indulge it; much eaten was never well digested: but

-of all excesses the most fatal in this case is that of venery. It is the

-excess we speak of.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VII.

-

-The proper DIET.

-

-

-In the first place acids must be avoided carefully; and all things that

-are in a state of fermentation, for they will breed acidity. Provisions

-hardened by salting never should be tasted; much less those cured by

-smoaking, and by salting. Bacon is indigestible in an Hypochondriac

-stomach; and hams, impregnated as is now the custom, with acid fumes

-from the wood fires over which they are hung, have that additional

-mischief.

-

-Milk ought to be a great article in the diet: and even in this there

-should be choice. The milk of grass-fed cows has its true quality: no

-other. There are a multitude of ways in which this may be made a part

-both of our foods and drinks, and they should all be used.

-

-The great and general caution is that the diet be at all times of a kind

-loosening and gently stimulating; light but not acrid. Veal, lamb,

-fowls, lobsters, crabs, craw-fish, fresh water fish and mutton broth,

-with plenty of boiled vegetables, are always right; and give enough

-variety.

-

-Raw vegetables are all bad: sour wines, old cheese, and bottled beer are

-things never to be once tasted. Indeed much wine is wrong, be it of what

-kind soever. It is the first of cordials; and as such I would have it

-taken in this disease when it is wanted: plainly as a medicine, rather

-than a part of diet. Malt liquor carefully chosen is certainly the best

-drink. This must be neither new, nor tending to sourness; perfectly

-clear, and of a moderate strength: it is the native liquor of our

-country, and the most healthful.

-

-Too much tea weakens; and even sugar is in this disorder hurtful: but

-honey may supply its place in most things; and this is not only harmless

-but medicinal; a very powerful dissolvent of impacted humours, and a

-great deobstruent.

-

-What wine is drank should be of some of the sweet kinds. Old Hock has

-been found on enquiry to yield more than ten times the acid of the sweet

-wines; and in red Port, at least in what we are content to call so,

-there is an astringent quality, that is most mischievous in these cases:

-it is said there is often alum in it: how pregnant with mischief that

-must be to persons whose bowels require to be kept open, is most

-evident. Summer fruits perfectly ripe are not only harmless but

-medicinal; but if eaten unripe they will be very prejudicial. A light

-supper, which will leave an appetite for a milk breakfast, is always

-right; this will not let the stomach be ravenous for dinner, as it is

-apt to be in those who make that their only meal.

-

-One caution more must be given, and it may seem a strange one: it is

-that the patient attend regularly to his hours of eating. We have to do

-with men for the most part whose soul is the great object of their

-regard; but let them not forget they have a body.

-

-The late Dr. STUKELY has told me, that one day by appointment visiting

-Sir ISAAC NEWTON, the servant told him, he was in his study. No one was

-permitted to disturb him there; but as it was near dinner time, the

-visitor sat down to wait for him. After a time dinner was brought in; a

-boil'd chicken under a cover. An hour pass'd, and Sir ISAAC did not

-appear. The doctor eat the fowl, and covering up the empty dish, bad

-them dress their master another. Before that was ready, the great man

-came down; he apologiz'd for his delay, and added, "give me but leave to

-take my short dinner, and I shall be at your service; I am fatigued and

-faint." Saying this, he lifted up the cover; and without any emotion,

-turned about to STUKELY with a smile; "See says he, what we studious

-people are, I forgot I had din'd."

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VIII.

-

-The MEDICINE.

-

-

-'Tis the ill fate of this disease, more than of all others to be

-misunderstood at first, and thence neglected; till the physician shakes

-his head at a few first questions. None steals so fatally upon the

-sufferer: its advances are by very slow degrees; but every day it grows

-more difficult of cure.

-

-That this obstruction in the spleen is the true malady, the cases

-related by the antients, present observation, and the unerring

-testimonies of dissections leave no room to doubt. Being understood, the

-path is open where to seek a remedy: and our best guides in this, as in

-the former instance, will be those venerable Greeks; who saw a thousand

-of these cases, where we see one; and with less than half our theory,

-cured twice as many patients.

-

-One established doctrine holds place in all these writers; that whatever

-by a hasty fermentation dissolves the impacted matter of the

-obstruction, and sends it in that state into the blood, does incredible

-mischief: but that whatever medicine softens it by slow degrees, and, as

-it melts, delivers it to the bowels without disturbance; will cure with

-equal certainty and safety.

-

-For this good purpose, they knew and tried a multitude of herbs; but in

-the end they fixed on one: and on their repeated trials of this, they

-banished all the rest. This stood alone for the cure of the disease; and

-from its virtue received the name of SPLEEN-WORT[21]. O wise and happy

-Greeks! authors of knowledge and perpetuators of it! With them the very

-name they gave a plant declared its virtues: with us, a writer calls a

-plant from some friend; that the good gardener who receives the honour,

-may call another by his name who gave it. We now add the term _smooth_

-to this herb, to distinguish it from another, called by the same general

-term, though not much resembling it.

-

-The virtues of this smooth Spleen-wort have flood the test of ages; and

-the plant every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbalists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it;

-and all the miserable symptoms vanish; thought Spleen-wort not enough

-expressive of its excellence; but stamp'd on it the name of MILT-WASTE.

-

-In the Greek Islands now, the use of it is known to every one; and even

-the lazy monks who take it, are no longer splenetic. In the west of

-England, the rocks are stripped of it with diligence; and every old woman

-tells you how charming that leaf is for bookish men: in Russia they use

-a plant of this kind in their malt liquor: it came into fashion there

-for the cure of this disease; which from its constant use is scarce

-known any longer; and they suppose 'tis added to their liquor for a

-flavour.

-

-The ancients held it in a kind of veneration; and used what has been

-called a superstition in the gathering it. It was to be taken up with a

-sharp knife, without violence, and laid upon the clean linen: no time

-but the still darkness of the night was proper, and even the moon was

-not to shine upon it[22]. I know they have been ridiculed for this; for

-nothing is so vain as learned ignorance: but let me be permitted once to

-vindicate them.

-

-The plant has leaves that can close in their sides; and their under part

-is covered thick with a yellow powder, consisting of the seeds, and seed

-vessels: in these they knew the virtue most resided: this was the golden

-dust[23] they held so valuable; and this they knew they could not be too

-cautious to preserve. They were not ignorant of the sleep of plants; a

-matter lately spoken of by some, as if a new discovery; and being

-sensible that light, a dry air, an expanded leaf, and a tempestuous

-season, were the means of losing this fine dust; and knowing also that

-darkness alone brought on that closing of the leaf which thence has

-been called sleep; and which helped to defend and to secure it, they

-therefore took such time, and used such means as could best preserve the

-plant entire; and even save what might be scattered from it.--And now

-where is their superstition?

-

-From this plant thus collected they prepared a medicine, which in a

-course of forty days scarce ever failed to make a perfect cure.

-

-We have the plant wild with us; and till the fashion of rough chemical

-preparations took off our attention from these gentler remedies, it was

-in frequent use and great repute. I trust it will be so again: and many

-thank me for restoring it to notice.

-

-Spleen-wort gives out its virtues freely in a tincture; and a small dose

-of this, mixing readily with the blood and juices, gradually dissolves

-the obstruction; and by a little at a time delivers its contents to be

-thrown off without pain, from the bowels. Let this be done while the

-viscera are yet sound and the cure is perfect. More than the forty days

-of the Greek method is scarce ever required; much oftener two thirds of

-that time suffice; and every day, from the first dose of it, the patient

-feels the happy change that is growing in his constitution. His food no

-more turns putrid on his stomach, but yields its healthful nourishment.

-The swelling after meals therefore vanishes; and with that goes the

-lowness, and anxiety, the difficult breath, and the distracting cholick:

-he can bear the approach of rainy weather without pain; he finds himself

-more apt for motion, and ready to take that exercise which is to be

-assistant in his cure; life seems no longer burthensome. His bowels get

-into the natural condition of health, and perform their office once at

-least a day; better if a little more: the dull and dead colour of his

-skin goes off, his lips grow red again, and every sign of health

-returns.

-

-Let him who takes the medicine, say whether any thing here be

-exaggerated. Let him, if he pleases to give himself the trouble, talk

-over with me, or write to me, this gradual decrease of his complaints,

-as he proceeds in his cure. My uncertain state of health does not

-permit me to practise physic in the usual way, but I am very desirous to

-do what good I can, and shall never refuse my advice, such as it may be,

-to any person rich or poor, in whatever manner he may apply for it. I

-shall refer him to no apothecary, whose bills require he should be

-drenched with potions; but tell him, in this as in all other cases,

-where to find some simple herb; which he may if he please prepare

-himself; or if he had rather spare that trouble, may have it so prepared

-from me.

-

-With regard to Spleen-wort, no method of using it is more effectual than

-simply taking it in powder; the only advantage of a tincture, is that a

-proper dose may be given, and yet the stomach not be loaded with so

-large a quantity: it is an easier and pleasanter method, and nothing

-more.

-

-If any person choose to take it in the other way, I should still wish

-him once at least to apply to me; that he may be assured what he is

-about to take is the right plant. Abuses in medicines are at this time

-very great, and in no instance worse than what relates to herbs. The

-best of our physicians have complained upon this head with warmth, but

-without redress: they know the virtues and the value of many of our

-native plants, but dread to prescribe them; lest some wrong thing should

-be administered in their place; perhaps inefficacious, perhaps

-mischievous, nay it may be fatal. The few simple things I direct are

-always before me; and it will at all times be a pleasure to me, in this

-and any other instance, to see whether what any person is about to take

-be right. I have great obligations to the public, and this is the best

-return that I know how to make.

-

-To see the need of such a caution, hear a transaction but of yesterday!

-An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right. Such is the chance of

-health in those hands through which the best means of it usually pass;

-even in the most regular course of application.

-

-I would not be understood to limit the little services I may this way be

-able to render the afflicted, to this single instance; much less to

-propose to myself any advantages from it. Whoever pleases will be

-welcome to me, upon any such occasion; and whatever be the herb on which

-he places a dependance, he shall be shewn it growing. I once recommended

-a garden to be established for this use, at the public expence: one

-great person has put it in my power to answer all its purposes.

-

-

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-1948-1949

-

-16. Henry Nevil Payne, _The Fatal Jealousie_ (1673).

-

-18. Anonymous, "Of Genius," in _The Occasional Paper_, Vol. III, No. 10

-(1719), and Aaron Hill, Preface to _The Creation_ (1720).

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-1949-1950

-

-19. Susanna Centlivre, _The Busie Body_ (1709).

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-20. Lewis Theobald, _Preface to the Works of Shakespeare_ (1734).

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-22. Samuel Johnson, _The Vanity of Human Wishes_ (1749), and two

-_Rambler_ papers (1750).

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-23. John Dryden, _His Majesties Declaration Defended_ (1681).

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-1951-1952

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-31. Thomas Gray, _An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard_ (1751), and

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-41. Bernard Mandeville, _A Letter to Dion_ (1732).

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-104. Thomas D'Urfey, _Wonders in the Sun; or, The Kingdom of the Birds_

-(1706).

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-110. John Tutchin, _Selected Poems_ (1685-1700).

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-111. Anonymous, _Political Justice_ (1736).

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-112. Robert Dodsley, _An Essay on Fable_ (1764).

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-113. T. R., _An Essay Concerning Critical and Curious Learning_ (1698).

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-Thomas Rowley_ (1782).

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-124. Anonymous, _The Female Wits_ (1704).

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-125. Anonymous, _The Scribleriad_ (1742). Lord Hervey, _The Difference

-Between Verbal and Practical Virtue_ (1742).

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-126. _Le Lutrin: an Heroick Poem, Written Originally in French by

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-127-

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-128. Charles Macklin, _A Will and No Will, or a Bone for the Lawyers_

-(1746). _The New Play Criticiz'd, or The Plague of Envy_ (1747).

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-129. Lawrence Echard, Prefaces to _Terence's Comedies_ (1694) and

-_Plautus's Comedies_ (1694).

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-130. Henry More, _Democritus Platonissans_ (1646).

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-131. John Evelyn, _The History of Sabatai Sevi, The Suppos'd Messiah of

-the Jews_ (1669).

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-132. Walter Harte, _An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad_

-(1730).

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-REGULAR PUBLICATIONS FOR 1968-1969

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-133. John Courtenay, _A Poetical Review of the Literary and Moral

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-Footnotes:

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-[18] Milton's Penseroso.

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-[19] Biberg.

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-[20] Reaumur.

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-[21] asplenon

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-[22] Silente Luna.

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-[23] Pulvis Aureus.

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-

-

-

-      *      *      *      *      *

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-Transcriber's Notes:

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-<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, Hypochondriasis, by John Hill</h1>

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-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

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-<p>Title: Hypochondriasis</p>

-<p>       A Practical Treatise (1766)</p>

-<p>Author: John Hill</p>

-<p>Release Date: September 27, 2009  [eBook #30099]</p>

-<p>Language: English</p>

-<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>

-<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HYPOCHONDRIASIS***</p>

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-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h2>JOHN HILL</h2>

-<h1>HYPOCHONDRIASIS</h1>

-<h3>A PRACTICAL TREATISE.</h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h3>(1766)</h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h4><i>Introduction by</i><br />

-<span class="smcap">G. S. Rousseau</span></h4>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h4>PUBLICATION NUMBER 135<br />

-WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY<br />

-<span class="smcap">University of California, Los Angeles</span><br />

-1969</h4>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="editors">

-<tr>

-<td align="center">

-<b>GENERAL EDITORS</b><br />

-William E. Conway, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-George Robert Guffey, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Maximillian E. Novak, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>ASSOCIATE EDITOR</b><br />

-David S. Rodes, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>ADVISORY EDITORS</b><br />

-Richard C. Boys, <i>University of Michigan</i><br />

-James L. Clifford, <i>Columbia University</i><br />

-Ralph Cohen, <i>University of Virginia</i><br />

-Vinton A. Dearing, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Arthur Friedman, <i>University of Chicago</i><br />

-Louis A. Landa, <i>Princeton University</i><br />

-Earl Miner, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Samuel H. Monk, <i>University of Minnesota</i><br />

-Everett T. Moore, <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Lawrence Clark Powell, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-James Sutherland, <i>University College, London</i><br />

-H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., <i>University of California, Los Angeles</i><br />

-Robert Vosper, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>CORRESPONDING SECRETARY</b><br />

-Edna C. Davis, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i><br />

-<br />

-<br />

-<b>EDITORIAL ASSISTANT</b><br />

-Mary Kerbret, <i>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library</i></td></tr></table>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[Pg i]</a></span></p>

-<h3>INTRODUCTION</h3>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p>"When I first dabbled in this art, the old distemper call'd

-<i>Melancholy</i> was exchang'd for <i>Vapours</i>, and afterwards for the

-<i>Hypp</i>, and at last took up the now current appellation of the

-<i>Spleen</i>, which it still retains, tho' a learned doctor of the

-west, in a little tract he hath written, divides the <i>Spleen</i> and

-<i>Vapours</i>, not only into the <i>Hypp</i>, the <i>Hyppos</i>, and the

-Hyppocons; but subdivides these divisions into the <i>Markambles</i>,

-the <i>Moonpalls</i>, the <i>Strong-Fiacs</i>, and the <i>Hockogrokles</i>."</p>

-

-<p class="right">Nicholas Robinson, <i>A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and

-Hypochondriack Melancholy</i> (London, 1729)</p></div>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>Treatises on hypochondriasis&mdash;the seventeenth-century medical term for a

-wide range of nervous diseases&mdash;were old when "Sir" John Hill, the

-eccentric English scientist, physician, apothecary, and hack writer,

-published his <i>Hypochondriasis</i> in 1766.<small><a name="f1.1" id="f1.1" href="#f1">[1]</a></small> For at least a century and a

-half medical writers as well as lay authors had been writing literature

-of all types (treatises, pamphlets, poems, sermons, epigrams) on this

-most fashionable of English maladies under the variant names of

-"melancholy," "the spleen," "black melancholy," "hysteria," "nervous

-debility," "the hyp." Despite the plethora of <i>materia scripta</i> on the

-subject it makes sense to reprint Hill's <i>Hypochondriasis</i>, because it

-is indeed a "practical treatise" and because it offers the modern

-student of neoclassical literature a clear summary of the best thoughts

-that had been put forth on the subject, as well as an explanation of the

-causes, symptoms, and cures of this commonplace malady.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[Pg ii]</a></span>No reader of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English literature

-needs to be reminded of the interest of writers of the period in the

-condition&mdash;"disease" is too confining a term&mdash;hypochondriasis.<small><a name="f2.1" id="f2.1" href="#f2">[2]</a></small> Their

-concern is apparent in both the poetry and prose of two centuries. From

-Robert Burton's Brobdingnagian exposition in <i>The Anatomy of Melancholy</i>

-(1621) to Tobias Smollett's depiction of the misanthropic and ailing

-Matthew Bramble in <i>Humphry Clinker</i> (1771), and, of course, well into

-the nineteenth century, afflicted heroes and weeping heroines populate

-the pages of England's literature. There is scarcely a decade in the

-period 1600-1800 that does not contribute to the literature of

-melancholy; so considerable in number are the works that could be placed

-under this heading that it actually makes sense to speak of the

-"literature of melancholy." A kaleidoscopic survey of this literature

-(exclusive of treatises written on the subject) would include mention of

-Milton's "Il Penseroso" and "L'Allegro," the meditative Puritan and

-nervous Anglican thinkers of the Restoration (many of whose narrators,

-such as Richard Baxter, author of the <i>Reliquiae Baxterianae</i>,<small><a name="f3.1" id="f3.1" href="#f3">[3]</a></small> are

-afflicted), Swift's "School of Spleen" in <i>A Tale of a Tub</i>, Pope's

-hysterical Belinda in the "Cave of Spleen," the melancholic "I" of

-Samuel Richardson's correspondence, Gray's leucocholy, the

-psychosomatically ailing characters of <i>The Vicar of Wakefield</i> and

-<i>Tristram Shandy</i>, Boswell's <i>Hypochondriack Papers</i> (1777-1783)

-contributed to the <i>London Magazine</i>, and such "sensible" and

-"sensitive" women as Mrs. Bennett and Miss Bates in the novels of Jane

-Austen. So great in bulk is this literature in the mid eighteenth

-century, that C. A. Moore has written, "statistically, this deserves to

-be called the Age of Melancholy."<small><a name="f4.1" id="f4.1" href="#f4">[4]</a></small> The vastness of this literature is

-sufficient to justify the reprinting of an unavailable practical

-handbook on the subject by a prolific author all too little known.<small><a name="f5.1" id="f5.1" href="#f5">[5]</a></small></p>

-

-<p>The medical background of Hill's pamphlet extends further back than the

-seventeenth century and Burton's <i>Anatomy</i>. The ancient Greeks had

-theorized about hypochondria: &#8016;&#960;&#959;&#967;&#972;&#957;&#948;&#961;&#953;&#945;&#963;&#953;&#962; signified a

-disorder beneath (&#8016;&#960;&#972;) the gristle (&#967;&#972;&#957;&#948;&#961;&#953;&#945;) and the

-disease was discussed principally in physiological terms. The belief

-that hypochondriasis was a somatic condition persisted until<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span> the second

-half of the seventeenth century at which time an innovation was made by

-Dr. Thomas Sydenham. In addition to showing that hypochondriasis and

-hysteria (thought previously by Sydenham to afflict women only) were the

-same disease, Sydenham noted that the external cause of both was a

-mental disturbance and not a physiological one. He also had a theory

-that the internal and immediate cause was a disorder of the animal

-spirits arising from a clot and resulting in pain, spasms, and bodily

-disorders. By attributing the onset of the malady to mental phenomena

-and not to obstructions of the spleen or viscera, Sydenham was moving

-towards a psychosomatic theory of hypochondriasis, one that was to be

-debated in the next century in England, Holland, and France.<small><a name="f6.1" id="f6.1" href="#f6">[6]</a></small>

-Sydenham's influence on the physicians of the eighteenth century was

-profound: Cheyne in England, Boerhaave in Holland, La Mettrie in France.

-Once the theory of the nervous origins of hypochondria gained

-ground&mdash;here I merely note coincidence, not historical cause and

-effect&mdash;the disease became increasingly fashionable in England,

-particularly among the polite, the aristocratic, and the refined.

-Students of the drama will recall Scrub's denial in <i>The Beaux'

-Stratagem</i> (1707) of the possibility that Archer has the spleen and Mrs.

-Sullen's interjection, "I thought that distemper had been only proper to

-people of quality."</p>

-

-<p>Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, hypochondria was so

-prevalent in people's minds and mouths that it soon assumed the

-abbreviated name "the hyp." Entire poems like William Somervile's <i>The

-Hyp: a Burlesque Poem in Five Canto's</i> (1731) and Tim Scrubb's <i>A Rod

-for the Hyp-Doctor</i> (1731) were devoted to this strain; others, like

-Malcom Flemyng's epic poem, <i>Neuropathia: sive de morbis hypochondriacis

-et hystericis, libri tres, poema medicum</i> (1740), were more technical

-and scientific. Professor Donald Davie has written that he has often

-"heard old fashioned and provincial persons [in England and Scotland]

-even in [my] own lifetime say, 'Oh, you give me the hyp,' where we

-should say 'You give me a pain in the neck'"<small><a name="f7.1" id="f7.1" href="#f7">[7]</a></small>; and I myself have heard

-the expression, "You give me the pip," where "pip" may be a corruption

-of "hyp." As used in the early eighteenth century, the term "hyp" was

-perhaps not far from what our century has learned to call <i>Angst</i>. It

-was also used as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span> synonym for "lunacy," as the anonymous author of

-<i>Anti-Siris</i> (1744), one of the tracts in the tar-water controversy,

-informs us that "Berkeley tells his Countrymen, they are all mad, or

-<i>Hypochondriac</i>, which is but a fashionable name for Madness." Bernard

-Mandeville, the Dutch physician and author of <i>The Fable of the Bees</i>,

-seems to have understood perfectly well that hypochondriasis is a

-condition encompassing any number of diseases and not a specific and

-readily definable ailment; a condition, moreover, that hovers

-precariously and bafflingly in limbo between mind and body, and he

-stressed this as the theme of his <i>Treatise of the Hypochondriack and

-Hysteric Passions, Vulgarly Call'd the Hypo in Men and Vapours in Women</i>

-(1711). The mental causes are noted as well in an anonymous pamphlet in

-the British Museum, <i>A Treatise on the Dismal Effects of

-Low-Spiritedness</i> (1750) and are echoed in many similar early and

-mid-eighteenth century works. Some medical writers of the age, like

-Nicholas Robinson, had reservations about the external mental bases of

-the hyp and preferred to discuss the condition in terms of internal

-physiological causes:</p>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p>...of that Disorder we call the Vapours, or <i>Hypochondria</i>; for

-they have no material distinctive Characters, but what arise from

-the same Disease affecting different Sexes, and the Vapours in

-Women are term'd the <i>Hypochondria</i> in Men, and they proceed from

-the Contraction of the Vessels being depress'd a little beneath the

-Balance of Nature, and the Relaxation of the Nerves at the same

-Time, which creates that Uneasiness and Melancholy that naturally

-attends Vapours, and which generally is an Intemperature of the

-whole Body, proceeding from a Depression of the Solids beneath the

-Balance of Nature; but the Intemperature of the Parts is that

-Peculiar Disposition whereby they favour any Disease.<small><a name="f8.1" id="f8.1" href="#f8">[8]</a></small></p></div>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>But the majority of medical thinkers had been persuaded that the

-condition was psychosomatic, and this belief was supported by research

-on nerves by important physicians in the 1740's and 1750's: the Monro

-brothers in London, Robert Whytt in Edinburgh, Albrecht von Haller in

-Leipzig. By mid century the condition known<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span> as the hyp was believed to

-be a real, not an imaginary ailment, common, peculiar in its

-manifestations, and indefinable, almost impossible to cure, producing

-very real symptoms of physical illness, and said to originate sometimes

-in depression and idleness. It was summed up by Robert James in his

-<i>Medicinal Dictionary</i> (London, 1743-45):</p>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p>If we thoroughly consider its Nature, it will be found to be a

-spasmodico-flatulent Disorder of the <i>Primae Viae</i>, that is, of the

-Stomach and Intestines, arising from an Inversion or Perversion of

-their peristaltic Motion, and, by the mutual consent of the Parts,

-throwing the whole nervous System into irregular Motions, and

-disturbing the whole Oeconomy of the Functions.... no part or

-Function of the Body escapes the Influence of this tedious and long

-protracted Disease, whose Symptoms are so violent and numerous,

-that it is no easy Task either to enumerate or account for them....

-No disease is more troublesome, either to the Patient or Physician,

-than hypochondriac Disorders; and it often happens, that, thro' the

-Fault of both, the Cure is either unnecessarily protracted, or

-totally frustrated; for the Patients are so delighted, not only

-with a Variety of Medicines, but also of Physicians.... On the

-contrary, few physicians are sufficiently acquainted with the true

-Genius and Nature of this perplexing Disorder; for which Reason

-they boldly prescribe almost everything contained in the Shops, not

-without an irreparable Injury to the Patient (article on

-"Hypochondriacus Morbis").</p></div>

-

-<p>This is a more technical description than Hill gives anywhere in his

-handbook, but it serves well to summarize the background of <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'the the'">the</ins> condition

-about which Sir John wrote.</p>

-

-<p>Hill's <i>Hypochondriasis</i> adds little that is new to the theory of the

-disease. It incorporates much of the thinking set forth by the writings

-mentioned above, particularly those of George Cheyne, whose medical

-works <i>The English Malady</i> (1733) and <i>The Natural Method of Cureing the

-Diseases of the Body, and the Disorders of the Mind Depending on the

-Body</i> (1742) Hill knew. He is also con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span>versant with some Continental

-writers on the subject, two of whom&mdash;Isaac Biberg, author of The

-<i>Oeconomy of Nature</i> (1751), and Ren&eacute; R&eacute;aumur who had written a history

-of insects (1722)<small><a name="f9.1" id="f9.1" href="#f9">[9]</a></small>&mdash;he mentions explicitly, and with William

-Stukeley's <i>Of the Spleen</i> (1723). Internal evidence indicates that Hill

-had read or was familiar with the ideas propounded in Richard

-Blackmore's <i>Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours</i> (1725) and Nicholas

-Robinson's <i>A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and Hypochondriack

-Melancholy</i> (1729).</p>

-

-<p>Hill's arrangement of sections is logical: he first defines the

-condition (<a href="#Page_3">I</a>), then proceeds to discuss persons most susceptible to it

-(<a href="#Page_6">II</a>), its major symptoms (<a href="#Page_12">III</a>), consequences (<a href="#Page_16">IV</a>), causes (<a href="#Page_20">V</a>), and cures

-(<a href="#Page_22">VI-VIII</a>). In the first four sections almost every statement is

-commonplace and requires no commentary (for example, Hill's opening

-remark: "To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and

-cruel. It is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by

-thickened and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver,

-and other parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick

-scarce knows one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.") His

-belief that the condition afflicts sedentary persons, particularly

-students, philosophers, theologians, and that it is not restricted to

-women alone&mdash;as some contemporary thinkers still maintained&mdash;is also

-impossible to trace to a single source, as is his description (p. <a href="#Page_12">12</a>) of

-the most prevalent physiological <i>symptoms</i> ("lowness of spirits, and

-inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love of solitude....

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness") and <i>causes</i> (the poor and damp

-English climate and the resultant clotting of blood in the spleen) of

-the illness.</p>

-

-<p>Sections <a href="#Page_20">V-VIII</a>, dealing with causes and cures, are less commonplace and

-display some of Hill's eccentricities as a writer and thinker. He uses

-the section entitled "Cures" as a means to peddle his newly discovered

-cure-all, water dock,<small><a name="f10.1" id="f10.1" href="#f10">[10]</a></small> which Smollett satirized through the mouth of

-Tabitha Bramble in <i>Humphry Clinker</i> (1771). Hill also rebelled against

-contemporary apothecaries and physicians who prescribed popular

-medicines&mdash;such as Berkeley's tar-water, Dover's mercury powders, and

-James's fever-powders<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span>&mdash;as universal panaceas for the cure of the hyp.

-"No acrid medicine must be directed, for that may act too hastily,

-dissolve the impacted matter at once, and let it loose, to the

-destruction of the sufferer; no antimonial, no mercurial, no martial

-preparation must be taken; in short, no chymistry: nature is the shop

-that heaven has set before us, and we must seek our medicine there"

-(p. <a href="#Page_24">24</a>). However scientifically correct Hill may have been in minimizing

-the efficacy of current pills and potions advertised as remedies for the

-hyp, he was unusual for his time in objecting so strongly to them. Less

-eccentric was his allegiance to the "Ancients" rather than to the

-"Moderns" so far as chemical treatment (i.e., restoration of the humours

-by chemical rearrangement) of hypochondriasis is concerned.<small><a name="f11.1" id="f11.1" href="#f11">[11]</a></small> "The

-venerable ancients," Hill writes, "who knew not this new art, will lead

-us in the search; and (faithful relators as they are of truth) will tell

-us whence we may deduce our hope; and what we are to fear" (p. <a href="#Page_24">24</a>).</p>

-

-<p>Still more idiosyncratic, perhaps, is Hill's contention (p. <a href="#Page_25">25</a>) that the

-air of dry, high grounds worsens the condition of the patient. Virtually

-every writer I have read on the subject believed that onset of the hyp

-was caused by one of the six non-naturals&mdash;air, diet, lack of sufficient

-sleep, too little or too much exercise, defective evacuation, the

-passions of the mind; and although some medical writers emphasized the

-last of these,<small><a name="f12.1" id="f12.1" href="#f12">[12]</a></small> few would have concurred with Hill that the fetid air

-of London was less harmful than the clearer air at Highgate. All readers

-of the novel of the period will recall the hypochondriacal Matt

-Bramble's tirade against the stench of London air. Beliefs of the

-variety here mentioned cause me to question Hill's importance in the

-history of medicine; there can be no question about his contributions to

-the advancement of the science of botany through popularization of

-Linnaeus' system of bisexual classification, but Hill's medical

-importance is summarized best as that of a compiler. His recommendation

-of the study of botany as a cure for melancholics is sensible but verges

-on becoming "a digression in praise of the author," a poetic <i>apologia

-pro vita sua</i> in Augustan fashion:</p>

-

-<div class="blockquot"><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[Pg viii]</a></span>For me, I should advise above all other things the study of nature.

-Let him begin with plants: he will here find a continual pleasure,

-and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful things; even of

-the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to walk; and

-every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket, will

-afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually in

-the air; and continually to change the nature and quality of the

-air, by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the

-lawn, the heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be

-abroad; and the unceasing variety of the subjects of his

-observation, will prevent his walking hastily: he will pursue his

-studies in the air; and that contemplative turn of mind, which in

-his closet threatened his destruction, will thus become the great

-means of his recovery (pp. <a href="#Page_26">26-27</a>).</p></div>

-

-<p>Hill was forever extolling the claims of a life devoted to the study of

-nature, as we see in a late work, <i>The Virtues of British Herbs</i> (1770).

-Judicious as is the logic of this recommendation, one cannot help but

-feel that the emphasis here is less on diversion as a cure and more on

-the botanic attractions of "every hedge and hillock, every foot-path

-side, and thicket."</p>

-

-<p>While Hill's rules and regulations regarding proper diet (<a href="#Page_31">Section VII</a>)

-are standard, several taken almost <i>verbatim et literatim</i> from Cheyne's

-list in <i>The English Malady</i> (1733), his recommendation (<a href="#Page_35">Section VIII</a>)

-of "Spleen-Wort" as the best medicine for the hypochondriac patient is

-not. Since Hill devotes so much space to the virtues of this herb and

-concludes his work extolling this plant, a word should be said about it.

-Throughout his life he was an active botanist. Apothecary, physician,

-and writer though he was, it was ultimately botany that was his ruling

-passion, as is made abundantly clear in his correspondence.<small><a name="f13.1" id="f13.1" href="#f13">[13]</a></small> Wherever

-he lived&mdash;whether in the small house in St. James's Street or in the

-larger one on the Bayswater Road&mdash;he cultivated an herb garden that

-flattered his knowledge and ability. Connoisseurs raved about its

-species and considered it one of the showpieces of London. His arrogant

-personality alone prevented him from becoming the first Keeper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span> of the

-Apothecary's Garden in Chelsea, although he was for a time

-superintendent to the Dowager Princess of Wales's gardens at Kensington

-Palace and at Kew. His interest in cultivation of herbs nevertheless

-continued; over the years Hill produced more than thirty botanical

-works, many of them devoted to the medical virtues of rare herbs such as

-"Spleen-Wort." Among these are <i>The British Herbal</i> (1756), <i>On the

-Virtues of Sage in Lengthening Human Life</i> (1763), <i>Centaury, the Great

-Stomachic</i> (1765), <i>Polypody</i> (1768), <i>A Method of Curing Jaundice</i>

-(1768), <i>Instances of the Virtue of Petasite Root</i> (1771), and <i>Twenty

-Five New Plants</i> (1773).<small><a name="f14.1" id="f14.1" href="#f14">[14]</a></small> It is therefore not surprising that he

-should believe a specific herb to be the best remedy for a complicated

-medical condition. Nor is his reference to the Ancients as authority for

-the herbal pacification of an inflamed spleen surprising in the light of

-his researches: he was convinced that every illness could be cured by

-taking an appropriate herb or combination of herbs. Whereas a few

-nonmedical writers&mdash;such as John Wesley in <i>Primitive Physick</i>

-(1747)&mdash;had advocated the taking of one or two herbs in moderate dosage

-as anti-hysterics (the eighteenth-century term for all cures of the

-hyp), no medical writer of the century ever promoted the use of herbs to

-the extent that Hill did. In fairness to him, it is important to note

-that his herbal remedies were harmless and that many found their way

-into the official <i>London Pharmacopeia</i>. "The virtues of this smooth

-Spleen-wort," he insists, "have stood the test of ages; and the plant

-every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbarists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it"

-(p. <a href="#Page_37">37</a>).<small><a name="f15.1" id="f15.1" href="#f15">[15]</a></small> The greatest portion of Hill's concluding section combines

-advertisement for the powder medicine he was himself manufacturing at a

-handsome profit together with a protest against competing apothecaries:

-"An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right" (p. <a href="#Page_42">42</a>).</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[Pg x]</a></span>Treatises on hypochondriasis did not cease to be printed after Hill's in

-1766, but continued to issue from the presses into the nineteenth

-century. A good example of this is the tome by John Reid, physician to

-the Finsbury Dispensary in London, <i>Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis

-and Other Nervous Affections</i> (1816), which summarizes theories of the

-malady.<small><a name="f16.1" id="f16.1" href="#f16">[16]</a></small> A bibliographical study of such works would probably reveal

-a larger number of titles in the nineteenth century than in the previous

-one, but by this time the nature and definition of hypochondria had

-changed significantly.</p>

-

-<p>If John Hill's volume is not an important contribution in the history of

-medicine, it is a lucid and brief exposition of many of the best ideas

-that had been thought and written on the hyp, with the exception of his

-uninhibited prescribing of herbal medicines as cure-alls. An

-understanding of this disease is essential for readers of neoclassical

-English literature, especially when we reflect upon the fact that some

-of the best literature of the period was composed by writers whom it

-afflicted. It is perhaps not without significance that the greatest poet

-of the Augustan age, Alexander Pope, thought it necessary as he lay on

-his deathbed in May 1744 to exclaim with his last breath, "I never was

-hippish in my whole life."<small><a name="f17.1" id="f17.1" href="#f17">[17]</a></small></p>

-

-<p>University of California,<br />

-Los Angeles<br />

-</p>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span></p>

-<h3>NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION</h3>

-

-<p><a name="f1" id="f1" href="#f1.1">[1]</a> The text here reproduced is that of the copy in the Library of the

-Royal Society of Medicine, London. Title pages of different copies of

-the first edition of 1766 vary. For example, the title page of the copy

-in the British Museum reads, <i>Hypochondriasis; a Practical Treatise On

-the Nature and Cure of that Disorder, Commonly called the Hyp and the

-Hypo</i>. The copy in the Royal Society of Medicine contains, among other

-additions, the words "by Sir John Hill" in pencil, and "8<sup>vo</sup> Lond.

-1766," written in ink and probably a later addition.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f2" id="f2" href="#f2.1">[2]</a> Melancholy, hypochondriasis, and the spleen were considered in the

-seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to be one complex condition, a

-malady rather than a malaise, which is but a symptom. Distinctions among

-these, of interest primarily to medical historians, cannot be treated

-here. As good a definition as any is found in Dr. Johnson's <i>Dictionary</i>

-(1755): "Hypochondriacal.... 1. Melancholy; disordered in the

-imagination.... 2. Producing melancholy...." The literature of

-melancholy has been surveyed in part by C. A. Moore, "The English

-Malady," <i>Backgrounds of English Literature 1700-1760</i> (Minneapolis,

-1953), pp. 179-235. In medical parlance, "hypochondria" means the soft

-parts of the body below the costal cartilages, and the singular form of

-the word, "hypochondrium," means the viscera situated in the

-hypochondria, i.e., the liver, gall bladder, and spleen.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f3" id="f3" href="#f3.1">[3]</a> See Samuel Clifford's <i>The Signs and Causes of Melancholy, with

-directions suited to the case of those who are afflicted with it.

-Collected out of the works of Mr. Richard Baxter</i> (London, 1716) in the British Museum.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f4" id="f4" href="#f4.1">[4]</a> <i>Backgrounds of English Literature</i>, p. 179.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f5" id="f5" href="#f5.1">[5]</a> See my forthcoming biography, _The Literary Quack: A Life of 'Sir'

-John Hill of London_, and John Kennedy's <i>Some Remarks on the Life and

-Writings of Dr. J&mdash;&mdash; H&mdash;&mdash;, Inspector General of Great Britain</i> (London, 1752).</p>

-

-<p><a name="f6" id="f6" href="#f6.1">[6]</a> For some of this background see L. J. Rather, <i>Mind and Body in

-Eighteenth Century Medicine: A Study Based on Jerome Gaub's De Regimine Mentis</i> (London, 1965), pp. 135-90 <i>passim</i>.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f7" id="f7" href="#f7.1">[7]</a> <i>Science and Literature 1700-1740</i> (London, 1964), pp. 50-51.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f8" id="f8" href="#f8.1">[8]</a> <i>A New Theory of Physick</i> (London, 1725), p. 56.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f9" id="f9" href="#f9.1">[9]</a> Biberg was a Swedish naturalist and had studied botany under

-Linnaeus in Uppsala; Réaumur, a French botanist, had contributed papers

-to the <i>Philosophical Transactions</i> of the Royal Society in London.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f10" id="f10" href="#f10.1">[10]</a> <i>The Power of Water-Dock against the Scurvy whether in the Plain

-Root or Essence....</i> (London, 1765), had been published six months

-earlier than <i>Hypochondriasis</i> and had earned Hill a handsome profit.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f11" id="f11" href="#f11.1">[11]</a> I have treated aspects of this subject in my article, "Matt Bramble

-and The Sulphur Controversy in the XVIIIth Century: Medical Background

-of <i>Humphry Clinker</i>," <i>JHI</i>, XXVIII (1967), 577-90.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f12" id="f12" href="#f12.1">[12]</a> See, for example, Jeremiah Waineright, <i>A Mechanical Account of the

-Non-Naturals</i> (1707); John Arbuthnot, <i>An Essay Concerning the Effects

-of Air on Human Bodies</i> (1733); Frank Nichols, <i>De Anima Medica</i> (1750).</p>

-

-<p><a name="f13" id="f13" href="#f13.1">[13]</a> Hill's correspondence is not published but shall be printed as an appendix to my forthcoming biography.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f14" id="f14" href="#f14.1">[14]</a> I have discussed some of these works in connection with the medical

-background of John Wesley's <i>Primitive Physick</i> (1747). See G. S.

-Rousseau, <i>Harvard Library Bulletin</i>, XVI (1968), 242-56.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f15" id="f15" href="#f15.1">[15]</a> It is difficult to know with certainty when Hill first became

-interested in the herb. He mentions it in passing in <i>The British

-Herbal</i> (1756), I, 526 and may have sold it as early as 1742 when he opened an apothecary shop.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f16" id="f16" href="#f16.1">[16]</a> Reid's dissertation at Edinburgh, entitled <i>De Insania</i> (1798),

-contains materials on the relationship of the imagination to all forms

-of mental disturbance. Secondary literature on hypochondria is

-plentiful. Works include: R. H. Gillespie, <i>Hypochondria</i> (London,

-1928), William K. Richmond, <i>The English Disease</i> (London, 1958),

-Charles Chenevix Trench, <i>The Royal Malady</i> (New York, 1964), and Ilza

-Vieth, <i>Hysteria: The History of a Disease</i> (Chicago, 1965), and "On

-Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Afflictions," <i>Bulletin of the History of Medicine</i>, XXX (1956), 233-40.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f17" id="f17" href="#f17.1">[17]</a> Joseph Spence, <i>Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books

-and Men</i>, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, 264.</p>

-

-<p>I am indebted to A. D. Morris, M.D., F.R.S.M., for help of various sorts in writing this introduction.</p>

-

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<h3>BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE</h3>

-

-

-<p class="center">The text of this facsimile of <i>Hypochondriasis</i> is reproduced from a

-copy in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, London.</p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/title.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h1>HYPOCHONDRIASIS.</h1>

-<h2>A</h2>

-<h2>PRACTICAL TREATISE, &amp;c.</h2>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/title.png" alt="" /></div>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span></p>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect1.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h2>HYPOCHONDRIASIS.</h2>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h3>SECT. I.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Nature</span> of the <span class="smcap">Disorder</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">To</span> call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and cruel. It

-is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by thickened

-and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver, and other

-parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick scarce knows

-one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>The blood is a mixture of many fluids, which, in a state of health, are

-so combined, that the whole passes freely through its appointed vessels;

-but if by the loss of the thinner parts, the rest becomes too gross to

-be thus carried through, it will stop where the circulation has least

-power; and having thus stopped it will accumulate; heaping by degrees

-obstruction on obstruction.</p>

-

-<p>Health and chearfulness, and the quiet exercise of mind, depend upon a

-perfect circulation: is it a wonder then, when this becomes impeded the

-body looses of its health, and the temper of its sprightliness? to be

-otherwise would be the miracle; and he inhumanly insults the afflicted,

-who calls all this a voluntary frowardness. Its slightest state brings

-with it sickness, anguish and oppression; and innumerable ills follow

-its advancing steps, unless prevented by timely care; till life itself

-grows burthensome.</p>

-

-<p>The disease was common in antient Greece; and her physicians understood

-it, better than those perhaps of later times, in any other country; who

-though happy in many advantages these fathers of the science could not

-have, yet want the great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> assistance of frequent watching it in all its

-stages.</p>

-

-<p>Those venerable writers have delivered its nature, and its cure: in the

-first every thing now shews they were right; and what they have said as

-to the latter will be found equally true and certain. This, so far as

-present experience has confirmed it, and no farther, will be here laid

-before the afflicted in a few plain words.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect2.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. II.</h3>

-

-<h3>Persons Subject to it.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Fatigue</span> of mind, and great exertion of its powers often give birth to

-this disease; and always tend to encrease it. The finer spirits are

-wasted by the labour of the brain: the Philosopher rises from his study

-more exhausted than the Peasant leaves his drudgery; without the benefit

-that he has from exercise. Greatness of mind, and steady virtue;

-determined resolution, and manly firmness, when put in action, and

-intent upon their object, all also lead to it: perhaps whatever tends to

-the ennobling of the soul has equal share in bringing on this weakness

-of the body.</p>

-

-<p>From this we may learn easily who are the men most subject to it; the

-grave and studious, those of a sedate temper and enlarged understanding,

-the learned and wise,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> the virtuous and the valiant: those whom it were

-the interest of the world to wish were free from this and every other

-illness; and who perhaps, except for this alloy, would have too large a

-portion of human happiness.</p>

-

-<p>Though these are most, it is not these alone, who are subject to it.

-There are countries where it is endemial, and in other places some have

-the seeds of it in their constitution; and in some it takes rise from

-accidents. In these last it is the easiest of cure; and in the first

-most difficult.</p>

-

-<p>Beside the Greeks already named, the Jews of old time were heavily

-afflicted with this disease; and in their descendants to this day it is

-often constitutional: the Spaniards have it almost to a man; and so have

-the American Indians. Perhaps the character of these several nations may

-be connected with it. The steady honour, and firm valour of the

-Spaniard, very like that of the ancient Doric nation, who followed the

-flute not the trumpet to the field; and met the enemy, not with shouts

-and fury, but with a determined virtue: it is the temper of the

-Hypochondriac to be slow, but unmoveably resolved: the Jew has shewn

-this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> mistakenly, but almost miraculously; and the poor Indian, untaught

-as he is, faces all peril with composure, and sings his death-song with

-an unalter'd countenance.</p>

-

-<p>Among particular persons the most inquiring and contemplative are those

-who suffer oftenest by this disease; and of all degrees of men I think

-the clergy. I do not mean the hunting, shooting, drinking clergy, who

-bear the tables of the great; but the retir'd and conscientious; such as

-attend in midnight silence to their duty; and seek in their own cool

-breasts, or wheresoever else they may be found, new admonitions for an

-age plunged in new vices. To this disease we owe the irreparable loss of

-Dr. <span class="smcap">Young</span>; and the present danger of many other the best and most

-improved amongst us. May what is here to be proposed assist in their

-preservation!</p>

-

-<p>The Geometrician or the learned Philosopher of whatever denomination,

-whose course of study fixes his eye for ever on one object, his mind

-intensely and continually employed upon one thought, should be warned

-also that he is in danger; or if he find himself already afflicted, he

-should be told that the same course of life, which brought it on,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> will,

-without due care, encrease it to the most dreaded violence.</p>

-

-<p>The middle period of life is that in which there is the greatest danger

-of an attack from this disease; and the latter end of autumn, when the

-summer heats have a little time been over, is the season when in our

-climate its first assaults are most to be expected. The same time of the

-year always increases the disorder in those who have been before

-afflicted with it; and it is a truth must be confessed, that from its

-first attack the patient grows continually, though slowly, worse; unless

-a careful regimen prevent it.</p>

-

-<p>The constitutions most liable to this obstruction are the lean, and dark

-complexioned; the grave and sedentary. Let such watch the first

-symptoms; and obviate, (as they may with ease) that which it will be

-much more difficult to remove.</p>

-

-<p>It is happy a disease, wherein the patient must do a great deal for

-himself, falls, for the most part, upon those who have the powers of

-reason strongest. Let them only be aware of this, that the distemper

-naturally disposes them to inactivity; and reason will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> have no use

-unless accompanied with resolution to enforce it.</p>

-

-<p>Though the physician can do something toward the cure, much more depends

-upon the patient; and here his constancy of mind will be employed most

-happily. No one is better qualified to judge on a fair hearing what

-course is the most fit; and having made that choice, he must with

-patience wait its good effects. Diseases that come on slowly must have

-time for curing; an attention to the first appearances of the disorder

-will be always happiest; because when least established it is easiest

-overthrown: but when that happy period has been neglected, he must wait

-the effects of such a course as will dilute and melt the obstructing

-matter gradually; for till that be done it is not only vain, but

-sometimes dangerous, to attempt its expulsion from the body.</p>

-

-<p>The blood easily separates itself into the grosser and the thinner

-parts: we see this in bleeding; and from the toughness of the red cake

-may guess how very difficult it will be to dissolve a substance of like

-firmness in the vessels of the body. That it can thus become thickened

-within the body, a Pleurisy shews us too evidently: in that case it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> is

-brought on suddenly, and with inflammation; in this other, slowly and

-without; and here, even before it forms the obstruction, can bring on

-many mischiefs. Various causes can produce the same effect, but that in

-all cases operates most durably, which operates most slowly. The watery

-part of the blood is its mild part; in the remaining gross matter of it,

-are acrid salts and burning oils, and these, when destitute of that

-happy dilution nature gives them in a healthy body, are capable of doing

-great mischief to the tender vessels in which they are kept stagnant.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect3.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. III.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Symptoms</span> of the <span class="smcap">Disorder</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">The</span> first and lightest of the signs that shew this illness are a lowness

-of spirits, and inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love

-of solitude and a habit of thinking, even on trifling subjects, with too

-much steadiness. A very little help may combat these: but if that

-indolence which is indeed a part of the disorder, will neglect them;

-worse must be expected soon to follow.</p>

-

-<p>Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness, weight, and oppression in the body,

-a want of appetite, or, what is worse, an appetite without digestion;

-for these are the conditions of different states of the disease, a

-fullness and a difficulty of breathing after meals, a straitness of the

-breast, pains and flatulencies in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> bowels, and an unaptness to

-discharge their contents.</p>

-

-<p>The pulse becomes low, weak, and unequal; and there are frequent

-palpitations of the heart, a little dark-coloured urine is voided at

-some times; and a flood of colourless and insipid at others; relieving

-for a moment, but increasing the distemper: there is in some cases also

-a continual teazing cough, with a choaking stoppage in the throat at

-times; then heartburn, sickness, hardness of the belly, and a costive

-habit, or a tormenting and vain irritation.</p>

-

-<p>The lips turn pale, the eyes loose their brightness and by degrees the

-white grows as it were greenish, the gums want their due firmness, with

-their proper colour; and an unpleasing foulness grows upon the teeth:

-the inside of the mouth is pale and furred, and the throat dry and

-husky: the colour of the skin is pale (though there are periods when the

-face is florid) and as the obstruction gathers ground, and more affects

-the liver, the whole body becomes yellow, tawny, greenish, and at length

-of that deep and dusky hue, to which men of swift imagination have given

-the name of blackness.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>These symptoms do not all appear in any one period of the disease, or in

-one case, but at one time or other all of them, as well as those which

-follow: the flesh becomes cold to the touch, though the patient does not

-himself perceive it; the limbs grow numbed and torpid, the breathing

-dull and slow, and the voice hollow; and usually the appetite in this

-period declines, and comes almost to nothing: night sweats come on,

-black swellings appear on the veins, the flesh wastes and the breast

-becomes flat and hollow: the mouth is full of a thin spittle, the head

-is dizzy and confus'd, and sometimes there is an unconquerable numbness

-in the organs of speech.</p>

-

-<p>I have known the temporary silence that follows upon this last <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'sympton'">symptom</ins>

-become a jest to the common herd; and the unhappy patient, instead of

-compassion and assistance, receive the reproof of sullenness, from those

-who should have known and acted better.</p>

-

-<p>About twenty years ago I met on a visit at Catthorpe in Leicestershire a

-young gentleman of distinguished learning and abilities, who at certain

-times was speechless. The vulgar thought it a pretence: and a jocose

-lady, where he was at tea with company,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> putting him as she said to a

-trial, poured out a dish very strong and without sugar. He drank it and

-returned the cup with a bow of great reserve, and his eye bent on the

-ground: she then filled the cup with sugar, and pouring weak tea on it,

-sent it him: he drank that too, looked at her steadily, and blushed for

-her. The lady declared the man was dumb; the rest thought him perverse,

-and obstinate; but a constant and steady perseverance in an easy method

-cured him.</p>

-

-<p>All these are miseries which the disease, while it retains its natural

-form, can bring upon the patient; and thus he will in time be worn out,

-and led miserably, though slowly, to the grave. Let him not indulge his

-inactivity so far as to give way to this, because it is represented as

-far off; the disease may suddenly and frightfully change its nature; and

-swifter evils follow.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect4.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. IV.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Danger</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">We</span> have done with the obstruction considered in itself; but this, though

-often unsurmountable by art, at least by the methods now in use, will be

-sometimes broken through at once by nature, or by accidents; and bring

-on fatal evils. These are strictly different diseases, and are no

-otherway concerned here, than as the consequences of that of which we

-are treating.</p>

-

-<p>The thick and glutinous blood which has so long stagnated in the spleen,

-will have in that time altered its nature, and acquired a very great

-degree of acrimony: while it lies dormant, this does no more mischiefs,

-than those named already; but when violent exercise, a fit of outrageous

-anger, or any thing else that suddenly shocks and disturbs the frame,

-puts it in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> motion, it melts at once into a kind of liquid putrefaction.

-Being now thin, it mixes itself readily with the blood again, and brings

-on putrid fevers; destroys the substance of the spleen itself, or being

-thrown upon some other of the viscera, corrodes them, and leads on this

-way a swift and miserable death. If it fall upon the liver, its tender

-pulpy substance is soon destroyed, jaundices beyond the help of art

-first follow, then dropsies and all their train of misery; if on lungs,

-consumptions; if on the brain, convulsions, epilepsy, palsy, apoplexy;

-if on the surface, leprosy.</p>

-

-<p>The intention of cure is to melt this coagulation softly, not to break

-it violently; and then to give it a very gentle passage through the

-bowels. There is no safe way for it to take but that; and even that when

-urged too far may bring on fatal dysenteries.</p>

-

-<p>Let none wonder at the sudden devastation which sometimes arises from

-this long stagnant matter, when liquified too hastily: how long, how

-many years the impacted matter will continue quiet in a schirrous tumour

-of the breast; but being once put in motion, whether from accident, or

-in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> course of nature, what can describe; or what can stop its

-havock!</p>

-

-<p>Instances of the other are too frequent. A nobleman the other day died

-paralytick: dissection shewed a spleen consumed by an abscess, formed

-from the dissolved matter of such an obstruction: and 'tis scarce longer

-since, a learned gentleman, who had been several years lost to his

-friends, by the extreams of a Hypochondriacal disorder, seem'd gradually

-without assistance to recover: but the lungs suffered while the spleen

-was freed; and he died very soon of what is called a galloping

-consumption.</p>

-

-<p>When the obstruction is great and of long continuance, if it be thus

-hastily moved, the consequence is, equally, a sudden and a miserable

-death, whether, like the matter of a cancer, it remains in its place; or

-like that of a bad small pox, be thrown upon some other vital part.</p>

-

-<p>Let not the patient be too much alarmed; this is laid down to caution,

-not to terrify him: it is fit he should know his danger, and attend to

-it; for the prevention is easy; and the cure, even of the most advanced<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>

-stages, when undertaken by gentle means, is not at all impracticable: to

-assist the physician, let him look into himself, and recollect the

-source of his complaint. This he may judge of from the following

-notices.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect5_1.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. V.</h3>

-

-<h3>The Causes of the <span class="smcap">Hypochondriasis</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">The</span> obstruction which forms this disease, may take its origin from

-different accidents: a fever ill cured has often caused it; or the

-piles, which had been used to discharge largely, ceasing; a marshy soil,

-poisoned with stagnant water, has given it to some persons; and altho'

-indolence and inactivity are oftenest at the root, yet it has arisen

-from too great exercise.</p>

-

-<p>Real grief has often brought it on; and even love, for sometimes that is

-real. Study and fixed attention of the mind have been accused before;

-and add to these the stooping posture of the body, which most men use,

-though none should use it, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> writing and in reading. This has

-contributed too much to it; but of all other things night studies are

-the most destructive. The steady stillness, and dusky habit of all

-nature in those hours, enforce, encourage, and support that settled

-gloom, which rises from fixt thought; and sinks the body to the grave;

-even while it carries up the mind to heaven. He who would have his lamp</p>

-

-<div class="poem">

-<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>At midnight hour</i></span><br />

-<i>Be seen in some high lonely tower,</i><small><a name="f18.1" id="f18.1" href="#f18">[18]</a></small></div>

-

-<p>will waste the flame of this unheeded life: and while he labours to

-unsphere the spirit of Plato<small><a href="#f18">[18]</a></small> will let loose his own.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect5_2.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. V.</h3>

-

-<h3>The Cure of the <span class="smcap">Hypochondriasis</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Let</span> him who would escape the mischiefs of an obstructed spleen, avoid

-the things here named: and let him who suffers from the malady,

-endeavour to remember to which of them it has been owing; for half the

-hope depends upon that knowledge.</p>

-

-<p>Nature has sometimes made a cure herself, and we should watch her ways;

-for art never is so right as when it imitates her: sometimes the

-patient's own resolution has set him free. This is always in his power,

-and at all times will do wonders.</p>

-

-<p>The bleeding of the piles, from nature's single efforts, has at once

-cured a miserable man; where their cessation was the cause<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> of the

-disorder. A leprosy has appeared upon the skin, and all the symptoms of

-the former sickness vanished. This among the Jews happened often: both

-diseases we know were common among them: and I have here seen something

-very like it: Water-Dock has thrown out scorbutic eruptions, and all the

-former <ins class="correction" title="original reads 'symptons'">symptoms</ins> of an Hypochondriacal disorder have disappeared:

-returning indeed when these were unadvisedly struck in; but keeping off

-entirely when they were better treated. A natural purging unsuppressed

-has sometimes done the same good office: but this is hazardous.</p>

-

-<p>It is easy to be directed from such instances; only let us take the

-whole along with us. Bleeding would have answered nature's purpose, if

-she could not have opened of herself the h&aelig;morrhoidal vessels; but he

-who should give medicines for that purpose, might destroy his patient by

-too great disturbance. If a natural looseness may perform the cure, so

-may an artificial; when the original source of the disorder points that

-way. But these are helps that take place only in particular cases.</p>

-

-<p>The general and universal method of cure must be by some mild and gently

-resolving<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> medicine, under the influence of which the obstructing matter

-may be voided that, or some other way with safety. The best season to

-undertake this is the autumn, but even here there must be caution.</p>

-

-<p>In the first place, no strong evacuating remedy must be given; for that,

-by carrying off the thinner parts of the juices, will tend to thicken

-the remainder; and certainly encrease the distemper. No acrid medicine

-must be directed, for that may act too hastily, dissolve the impacted

-matter at once, and let it loose, to the destruction of the sufferer; no

-antimonial, no mercurial, no martial preparation must be taken; in

-short, no chymistry: nature is the shop that heaven has set before us,

-and we must seek our medicine there. The venerable ancients, who knew

-not this new art, will lead us in the search; and (faithful relators as

-they are of truth) will tell us whence we may deduce our hope; and what

-we are to fear.</p>

-

-<p>But prior to the course of any medicine, and as an essential to any good

-hope from it, the patient must prescribe himself a proper course of

-life, and a well chosen diet: let us assist him in his choice; and speak

-of this first, as it comes first in order.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect6.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. VI.</h3>

-

-<h3>Rules of Life for Hypochondriac Persons.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">Air</span> and exercise, as they are the best preservers of health, and

-greatest assistants in the cure of all long continued diseases, will

-have their full effect in this; but there requires some caution in the

-choice, and management of them. It is common to think the air of high

-grounds best; but experience near home shews otherwise: the

-Hypochondriac patient is always worse at Highgate even than in London.</p>

-

-<p>The air he breathes should be temperate; not exposed to the utmost

-violences of heat and cold, and the swift changes from one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> to the

-other; which are most felt on those high grounds. The side of a hill is

-the best place for him: and though wet grounds are hurtful; yet let

-there be the shade of trees, to tempt him often to a walk; and soften by

-their exhalation the over dryness of the air.</p>

-

-<p>The exercise he takes should be frequent; but not violent. Motion

-preserves the firmness of the parts, and elasticity of the vessels; it

-prevents that aggregation of thick humours which he is most to fear. A

-sedentary life always produces weakness, and that mischief always

-follows: weak eyes are gummy, weak lungs are clogged with phlegm, and

-weak bowels waste themselves in vapid diarrh&oelig;as.</p>

-

-<p>Let him invite himself abroad, and let his friends invite him by every

-innocent inducement. For me, I should advise above all other things the

-study of nature. Let him begin with plants: he will here find a

-continual pleasure, and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful

-things; even of the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to

-walk; and every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket,

-will afford him some new ob<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>ject. He will be tempted to be continually

-in the air, and continually to change the nature and quality of the air,

-by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the lawn, the

-heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be abroad; and the

-unceasing variety of the subjects of his observation, will prevent his

-walking hastily: he will pursue his studies in the air; and that

-contemplative turn of mind, which in his closet threatened his

-destruction, will thus become the great means of his recovery.</p>

-

-<p>If the mind tire upon this, from the repeated use, another of nature's

-kingdoms opens itself at once upon him; the plant he is weary of

-observing, feeds some insect he may examine; nor is there a stone that

-lies before his foot, but may afford instruction and amusement.</p>

-

-<p>Even what the vulgar call the most abject things will shew a wonderful

-utility; and lead the mind, in pious contemplation higher than the

-stars. The poorest moss that is trampled under foot, has its important

-uses: is it at the bottom of a wood we find it? why there it shelters

-the fallen seeds; hides them from birds, and covers them from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> frost;

-and thus becomes the foster father of another forest! creeps it along

-the surface of a rock? even there its good is infinite! its small roots

-run into the stone, and the rains make their way after them; the moss

-having lived its time dies; it rots and with the mouldered fragments of

-the stone forms earth; wherein, after a few successions, useful plants

-may grow, and feed more useful cattle!<small><a name="f19.1" id="f19.1" href="#f19">[19]</a></small></p>

-

-<p>Is there a weed more humble in its aspect, more trampled on, or more

-despised than knot grass! no art can get the better of its growth, no

-labour can destroy it; 'twere pity if they could, for the thing lives

-where nothing would of use to us; and its large and most wonderfully

-abundant seeds, feed in hard winters, half the birds of Heaven.</p>

-

-<p>What the weak moss performs upon the rock the loathed toadstool brings

-about in timber: is an oak dead where man's eye will not find it? this

-fungus roots itself upon the bark, and rots the wood beneath it; hither

-the beetle creeps for shelter, and for sustenance; him the woodpecker

-follows as his prey; and while he tears the tree in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> search of him, he

-scatters it about the ground; which it manures.</p>

-

-<p>Nor is it the beetle alone that thus insinuates itself into the

-substance of the vegetable tribe: the tender aphide<small><a name="f20.1" id="f20.1" href="#f20">[20]</a></small>, whom a touch

-destroys, burrows between the two skins of a leaf, for shelter from his

-winged enemies; tracing, with more than Dedal&aelig;an art, his various

-meanders; and veining the green surface with these white lines more

-beautifully than the best &AElig;gyptian marble.</p>

-

-<p>'Twere endless to proceed; nor is it needful: one object will not fail

-to lead on to another, and every where the goodness of his God will

-shine before him even in what are thought the vilest things; his

-greatness in the lead of them.</p>

-

-<p>Let him pursue these thoughts, and seek abroad the objects and the

-instigations to them: but let him in these and all other excursions

-avoid equally the dews of early morning, and of evening.</p>

-

-<p>The more than usual exercise of this prescription will dispose him to

-more than custo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>mary sleep, let him indulge it freely; so far from

-hurting, it will help his cure.</p>

-

-<p>Let him avoid all excesses: drink need scarce be named, for we are

-writing to men of better and of nobler minds, than can be tempted to

-that humiliating vice. Those who in this disorder have too great an

-appetite, must not indulge it; much eaten was never well digested: but

-of all excesses the most fatal in this case is that of venery. It is the

-excess we speak of.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect7.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. VII.</h3>

-

-<h3>The proper <span class="smcap">Diet</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">In</span> the first place acids must be avoided carefully; and all things that

-are in a state of fermentation, for they will breed acidity. Provisions

-hardened by salting never should be tasted; much less those cured by

-smoaking, and by salting. Bacon is indigestible in an Hypochondriac

-stomach; and hams, impregnated as is now the custom, with acid fumes

-from the wood fires over which they are hung, have that additional

-mischief.</p>

-

-<p>Milk ought to be a great article in the diet: and even in this there

-should be choice. The milk of grass-fed cows has its true quality: no

-other. There are a multitude of ways in which this may be made a part

-both of our foods and drinks, and they should all be used.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>The great and general caution is that the diet be at all times of a kind

-loosening and gently stimulating; light but not acrid. Veal, lamb,

-fowls, lobsters, crabs, craw-fish, fresh water fish and mutton broth,

-with plenty of boiled vegetables, are always right; and give enough variety.</p>

-

-<p>Raw vegetables are all bad: sour wines, old cheese, and bottled beer are

-things never to be once tasted. Indeed much wine is wrong, be it of what

-kind soever. It is the first of cordials; and as such I would have it

-taken in this disease when it is wanted: plainly as a medicine, rather

-than a part of diet. Malt liquor carefully chosen is certainly the best

-drink. This must be neither new, nor tending to sourness; perfectly

-clear, and of a moderate strength: it is the native liquor of our

-country, and the most healthful.</p>

-

-<p>Too much tea weakens; and even sugar is in this disorder hurtful: but

-honey may supply its place in most things; and this is not only harmless

-but medicinal; a very powerful dissolvent of impacted humours, and a

-great deobstruent.</p>

-

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>What wine is drank should be of some of the sweet kinds. Old Hock has

-been found on enquiry to yield more than ten times the acid of the sweet

-wines; and in red Port, at least in what we are content to call so,

-there is an astringent quality, that is most mischievous in these cases:

-it is said there is often alum in it: how pregnant with mischief that

-must be to persons whose bowels require to be kept open, is most

-evident. Summer fruits perfectly ripe are not only harmless but

-medicinal; but if eaten unripe they will be very prejudicial. A light

-supper, which will leave an appetite for a milk breakfast, is always

-right; this will not let the stomach be ravenous for dinner, as it is

-apt to be in those who make that their only meal.</p>

-

-<p>One caution more must be given, and it may seem a strange one: it is

-that the patient attend regularly to his hours of eating. We have to do

-with men for the most part whose soul is the great object of their

-regard; but let them not forget they have a body.</p>

-

-<p>The late Dr. <span class="smcap">Stukely</span> has told me, that one day by appointment visiting

-Sir <span class="smcap">Isaac<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></span> <span class="smcap">Newton</span>, the

-servant told him, he was in his study. No one was

-permitted to disturb him there; but as it was near dinner time, the

-visitor sat down to wait for him. After a time dinner was brought in; a

-boil'd chicken under a cover. An hour pass'd, and Sir <span class="smcap">Isaac</span> did not

-appear. The doctor eat the fowl, and covering up the empty dish, bad

-them dress their master another. Before that was ready, the great man

-came down; he apologiz'd for his delay, and added, "give me but leave to

-take my short dinner, and I shall be at your service; I am fatigued and

-faint." Saying this, he lifted up the cover; and without any emotion,

-turned about to <span class="smcap">Stukely</span> with a smile; "See says he, what we studious

-people are, I forgot I had din'd."</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span></p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/sect8.png" alt="" /></div>

-<h3>SECT. VIII.</h3>

-

-<h3>The <span class="smcap">Medicine</span>.</h3>

-

-

-<p class='dropcap'><span class="caps">'Tis</span> the ill fate of this disease, more than of all others to be

-misunderstood at first, and thence neglected; till the physician shakes

-his head at a few first questions. None steals so fatally upon the

-sufferer: its advances are by very slow degrees; but every day it grows

-more difficult of cure.</p>

-

-<p>That this obstruction in the spleen is the true malady, the cases

-related by the antients, present observation, and the unerring

-testimonies of dissections leave no room to doubt. Being understood, the

-path is open where to seek a remedy: and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> our best guides in this, as in

-the former instance, will be those venerable Greeks; who saw a thousand

-of these cases, where we see one; and with less than half our theory,

-cured twice as many patients.</p>

-

-<p>One established doctrine holds place in all these writers; that whatever

-by a hasty fermentation dissolves the impacted matter of the

-obstruction, and sends it in that state into the blood, does incredible

-mischief: but that whatever medicine softens it by slow degrees, and, as

-it melts, delivers it to the bowels without disturbance; will cure with

-equal certainty and safety.</p>

-

-<p>For this good purpose, they knew and tried a multitude of herbs; but in

-the end they fixed on one: and on their repeated trials of this, they

-banished all the rest. This stood alone for the cure of the disease; and

-from its virtue received the name of <span class="smcap">Spleen-wort</span><small><a name="f21.1" id="f21.1" href="#f21">[21]</a></small>. O wise and happy

-Greeks! authors of knowledge and perpetuators of it! With them the very

-name they gave a plant declared its virtues: with us, a writer calls a

-plant from some friend; that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> the good gardener who receives the honour,

-may call another by his name who gave it. We now add the term <i>smooth</i>

-to this herb, to distinguish it from another, called by the same general

-term, though not much resembling it.</p>

-

-<p>The virtues of this smooth Spleen-wort have flood the test of ages; and

-the plant every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbalists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it;

-and all the miserable symptoms vanish; thought Spleen-wort not enough

-expressive of its excellence; but stamp'd on it the name of <span class="smcap">Milt-waste</span>.</p>

-

-<p>In the Greek Islands now, the use of it is known to every one; and even

-the lazy monks who take it, are no longer splenetic. In the west of

-England, the rocks are stripped of it with diligence; and every old woman

-tells you how charming that leaf is for bookish men: in Russia they use

-a plant of this kind in their malt liquor: it came into fashion there

-for the cure of this disease; which from its constant use is scarce<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>

-known any longer; and they suppose 'tis added to their liquor for a

-flavour.</p>

-

-<p>The antients held it in a kind of veneration; and used what has been

-called a superstition in the gathering it. It was to be taken up with a

-sharp knife, without violence, and laid upon the clean linen: no time

-but the still darkness of the night was proper, and even the moon was

-not to shine upon it<small><a name="f22.1" id="f22.1" href="#f22">[22]</a></small>. I know they have been ridiculed for this; for

-nothing is so vain as learned ignorance: but let me be permitted once to

-vindicate them.</p>

-

-<p>The plant has leaves that can close in their sides; and their under part

-is covered thick with a yellow powder, consisting of the seeds, and seed

-vessels: in these they knew the virtue most resided: this was the golden

-dust<small><a name="f23.1" id="f23.1" href="#f23">[23]</a></small> they held so valuable; and this they knew they could not be too

-cautious to preserve. They were not ignorant of the sleep of plants; a

-matter lately spoken of by some, as if a new discovery; and being

-sensible that light, a dry air, an expanded leaf, and a tempestuous

-season, were the means of losing this fine dust; and knowing also that

-darkness alone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> brought on that closing of the leaf which thence has

-been called sleep; and which helped to defend and to secure it, they

-therefore took such time, and used such means as could best preserve the

-plant entire; and even save what might be scattered from it.&mdash;And now

-where is their superstition?</p>

-

-<p>From this plant thus collected they prepared a medicine, which in a

-course of forty days scarce ever failed to make a perfect cure.</p>

-

-<p>We have the plant wild with us; and till the fashion of rough chemical

-preparations took off our attention from these gentler remedies, it was

-in frequent use and great repute. I trust it will be so again: and many

-thank me for restoring it to notice.</p>

-

-<p>Spleen-wort gives out its virtues freely in a tincture; and a small dose

-of this, mixing readily with the blood and juices, gradually dissolves

-the obstruction; and by a little at a time delivers its contents to be

-thrown off without pain, from the bowels. Let this be done while the

-viscera are yet sound<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> and the cure is perfect. More than the forty days

-of the Greek method is scarce ever required; much oftener two thirds of

-that time suffice; and every day, from the first dose of it, the patient

-feels the happy change that is growing in his constitution. His food no

-more turns putrid on his stomach, but yields its healthful nourishment.

-The swelling after meals therefore vanishes; and with that goes the

-lowness, and anxiety, the difficult breath, and the distracting cholick:

-he can bear the approach of rainy weather without pain; he finds himself

-more apt for motion, and ready to take that exercise which is to be

-assistant in his cure; life seems no longer burthensome. His bowels get

-into the natural condition of health, and perform their office once at

-least a day; better if a little more: the dull and dead colour of his

-skin goes off, his lips grow red again, and every sign of health

-returns.</p>

-

-<p>Let him who takes the medicine, say whether any thing here be

-exaggerated. Let him, if he pleases to give himself the trouble, talk

-over with me, or write to me, this gradual decrease of his complaints,

-as he proceeds in his cure. My uncertain state <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>of health does not

-permit me to practise physic in the usual way, but I am very desirous to

-do what good I can, and shall never refuse my advice, such as it may be,

-to any person rich or poor, in whatever manner he may apply for it. I

-shall refer him to no apothecary, whose bills require he should be

-drenched with potions; but tell him, in this as in all other cases,

-where to find some simple herb; which he may if he please prepare

-himself; or if he had rather spare that trouble, may have it so prepared

-from me.</p>

-

-<p>With regard to Spleen-wort, no method of using it is more effectual than

-simply taking it in powder; the only advantage of a tincture, is that a

-proper dose may be given, and yet the stomach not be loaded with so

-large a quantity: it is an easier and pleasanter method, and nothing

-more.</p>

-

-<p>If any person choose to take it in the other way, I should still wish

-him once at least to apply to me; that he may be assured what he is

-about to take is the right plant. Abuses in medicines are at this time

-very great, and in no instance worse than what relates to herbs. The

-best of our physicians have complained upon this head with warmth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> but

-without redress: they know the virtues and the value of many of our

-native plants, but dread to prescribe them; lest some wrong thing should

-be administered in their place; perhaps inefficacious, perhaps

-mischievous, nay it may be fatal. The few simple things I direct are

-always before me; and it will at all times be a pleasure to me, in this

-and any other instance, to see whether what any person is about to take

-be right. I have great obligations to the public, and this is the best

-return that I know how to make.</p>

-

-<p>To see the need of such a caution, hear a transaction but of yesterday!

-An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right. Such is the chance of

-health in those hands through which the best means of it usually pass;

-even in the most regular course of application.</p>

-

-<p>I would not be understood to limit the little services I may this way be

-able to render<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> the afflicted, to this single instance; much less to

-propose to myself any advantages from it. Whoever pleases will be

-welcome to me, upon any such occasion; and whatever be the herb on which

-he places a dependance, he shall be shewn it growing. I once recommended

-a garden to be established for this use, at the public expence: one

-great person has put it in my power to answer all its purposes.</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p class="center"><b><span class="spacer">F</span><span class="spacer">I</span><span class="spacer">N</span><span class="spacer">I</span><span class="spacer">S.</span></b></p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<hr style="width: 30%;" />

-<p><span class="u">Footnotes:</span></p>

-

-<p><a name="f18" id="f18" href="#f18.1">[18]</a> Milton's Penseroso.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f19" id="f19" href="#f19.1">[19]</a> Biberg.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f20" id="f20" href="#f20.1">[20]</a> Reaumur.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f21" id="f21" href="#f21.1">[21]</a> &#945;&#963;&#960;&#955;&#949;&#957;&#959;&#957;</p>

-

-<p><a name="f22" id="f22" href="#f22.1">[22]</a> Silente Luna.</p>

-

-<p><a name="f23" id="f23" href="#f23.1">[23]</a> Pulvis Aureus.</p>

-

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>

-

-<h3>WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK</h3>

-<h3>MEMORIAL LIBRARY</h3>

-<h3>UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES</h3>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h4>PUBLICATIONS IN PRINT</h4>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<div class="figcenter"><img src="images/emblem.png" alt="" /></div>

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-

-<h4>1948-1949</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>16. Henry Nevil Payne, <i>The Fatal Jealousie</i> (1673).</p>

-<p class="hang">18. Anonymous, "Of Genius," in <i>The Occasional Paper</i>, Vol. III, No. 10 (1719), and Aaron Hill, Preface to <i>The Creation</i> (1720).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1949-1950</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>19. Susanna Centlivre, <i>The Busie Body</i> (1709).</p>

-<p>20. Lewis Theobald, <i>Preface to the Works of Shakespeare</i> (1734).</p>

-<p class="hang">22. Samuel Johnson, <i>The Vanity of Human Wishes</i> (1749), and two <i>Rambler</i> papers (1750).</p>

-<p>23. John Dryden, <i>His Majesties Declaration Defended</i> (1681).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1951-1952</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p class="hang">31. Thomas Gray, <i>An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard</i> (1751), and <i>The Eton College Manuscript</i>.</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1952-1953</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>41. Bernard Mandeville, <i>A Letter to Dion</i> (1732).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1963-1964</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p class="hang">104. Thomas D'Urfey, <i>Wonders in the Sun; or, The Kingdom of the Birds</i> (1706).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1964-1965</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>110. John Tutchin, <i>Selected Poems</i> (1685-1700).</p>

-<p>111. Anonymous, <i>Political Justice</i> (1736).</p>

-<p>112. Robert Dodsley, <i>An Essay on Fable</i> (1764).</p>

-<p>113. T. R., <i>An Essay Concerning Critical and Curious Learning</i> (1698).</p>

-<p class="hang">114. <i>Two Poems Against Pope</i>: Leonard Welsted, <i>One Epistle to Mr. A. Pope</i> (1730), and Anonymous, <i>The Blatant Beast</i> (1742).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1965-1966</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>115. Daniel Defoe and others, <i>Accounts of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal</i>.</p>

-<p>116. Charles Macklin, <i>The Covent Garden Theatre</i> (1752).</p>

-<p>117. Sir George L'Estrange, <i>Citt and Bumpkin</i> (1680).</p>

-<p>118. Henry More, <i>Enthusiasmus Triumphatus</i> (1662).</p>

-<p class="hang">119. Thomas Traherne, <i>Meditations on the Six Days of the Creation</i> (1717).</p>

-<p class="hang">120. Bernard Mandeville, <i>Aesop Dress'd or a Collection of Fables</i> (1704).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1966-1967</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p class="hang">123. Edmond Malone, <i>Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Mr. Thomas Rowley</i> (1782).</p>

-<p>124. Anonymous, <i>The Female Wits</i> (1704).</p>

-<p class="hang">125. Anonymous, <i>The Scribleriad</i> (1742). Lord Hervey, <i>The Difference Between Verbal and Practical Virtue</i> (1742).</p>

-<p class="hang">126. <i>Le Lutrin: an Heroick Poem, Written Originally in French by Monsieur Boileau: Made English by N. O.</i> (1682).</p></div>

-

-

-<h4>1967-1968</h4>

-<div class="ads">

-<p>127-</p>

-<p class="hang">128. Charles Macklin, <i>A Will and No Will, or a Bone for the Lawyers</i> (1746). <i>The New Play Criticiz'd, or The Plague of Envy</i> (1747).</p>

-<p class="hang">129. Lawrence Echard, Prefaces to <i>Terence's Comedies</i> (1694) and <i>Plautus's Comedies</i> (1694).</p>

-<p>130. Henry More, <i>Democritus Platonissans</i> (1646).</p>

-<p class="hang">131. John Evelyn, <i>The History of Sabatai Sevi, The Suppos'd Messiah of the Jews</i> (1669).</p>

-<p class="hang">132. Walter Harte, <i>An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad</i> (1730).</p></div>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)

-are available in paperbound units of six issues at $16.00 per unit, from

-the Kraus Reprint Company, 16 East 46th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.</p>

-

-<p>Publications in print are available at the regular membership rate of

-$5.00 yearly. Prices of single issues may be obtained upon request.

-Subsequent publications may be checked in the annual prospectus.</p>

-

-

-<hr style="width: 35%;" />

-<h4>William Andrews Clark Memorial Library: University of California, Los Angeles</h4>

-

-<h3><span class="smcap">The Augustan Reprint Society</span></h3>

-

-<h5>2520 CIMARRON STREET, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90018</h5>

-

-<p class="center"><i>General Editors:</i> William E. Conway, William Andrews Clark Memorial

-Library; George Robert Guffey, University of California, Los Angeles;

-Maximillian E. Novak, University of California, Los Angeles</p>

-

-<p class="center"><i>Corresponding Secretary:</i> Mrs. Edna C. Davis, William Andrews Clark

-Memorial Library</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>The Society's purpose is to publish rare Restoration and

-eighteenth-century works (usually as facsimile reproductions). All

-income of the Society is devoted to defraying costs of publication and

-mailing.</p>

-

-<p>Correspondence concerning memberships in the United States and Canada

-should be addressed to the Corresponding Secretary at the William

-Andrews Clark Memorial Library, 2520 Cimarron Street, Los Angeles,

-California. Correspondence concerning editorial matters may be addressed

-to the General Editors at the same address. Manuscripts of introductions

-should conform to the recommendations of the MLA <i>Style Sheet</i>. The

-membership fee is $5.00 a year in the United States and Canada and

-&pound;1.16.6 in Great Britain and Europe. British and European prospective

-members should address B. H. Blackwell, Broad Street, Oxford, England.

-Copies of back issues in print may be obtained from the Corresponding

-Secretary.</p>

-

-<p>Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)

-are available in paperbound units of six issues at $16.00 per unit, from

-the Kraus Reprint Company, 16 East 46th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.</p>

-

-<h5>Make check or money order payable to <span class="smcap">The Regents of the University of California</span></h5>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h5>REGULAR PUBLICATIONS FOR 1968-1969</h5>

-

-<p class="hang">133. John Courtenay, <i>A Poetical Review of the Literary and Moral

-Character of the Late Samuel Johnson</i> (1786). Introduction by Robert E.

-Kelley.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">134. John Downes, <i>Roscius Anglicanus</i> (1708). Introduction by John

-Loftis.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">135. Sir John Hill, <i>Hypochondriasis, a Practical Treatise on the Nature

-and Cure of that Disorder Call'd the Hyp or Hypo</i> (1766). Introduction

-by G. S. Rousseau.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">136. Thomas Sheridan, <i>Discourse ... Being Introductory to His Course of

-Lectures on Elocution and the English Language</i> (1759). Introduction by

-G. P. Mohrman.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">137. Arthur Murphy, <i>The Englishman From Paris</i> (1756). Introduction by

-Simon Trefman. Previously unpublished manuscript.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">138. [Catherine Trotter], <i>Olinda's Adventures</i> (1718). Introduction by

-Robert Adams Day.</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

-<h5>SPECIAL PUBLICATION FOR 1968-1969</h5>

-

-<p><i>After <big>THE TEMPEST</big></i>. Introduction by George Robert Guffey.</p>

-

-<p>Next in the continuing series of special publications by the Society

-will be <i>After THE TEMPEST</i>, a volume including the Dryden-Davenant

-version of <i>The Tempest</i> (1670); the "operatic" <i>Tempest</i> (1674); Thomas

-Duffet's <i>Mock-Tempest</i> (1675); and the "Garrick" <i>Tempest</i> (1756), with

-an Introduction by George Robert Guffey.</p>

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

-<p>Already published in this series are:</p>

-

-<p class="hang">1. John Ogilby, <i>The Fables of Aesop Paraphras'd in Verse</i> (1668), with

-an Introduction by Earl Miner.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">2. John Gay, <i>Fables</i> (1727, 1738), with an Introduction by Vinton A.

-Dearing.</p>

-

-<p class="hang">3. Elkanah Settle, <i>The Empress of Morocco</i> (1673) with five plates;

-<i>Notes and Observations on the Empress of Morocco</i> (1674) by John

-Dryden, John Crowne and Thomas Shadwell; <i>Notes and Observations on the

-Empress of Morocco Revised</i> (1674) by Elkanah Settle; and <i>The Empress

-of Morocco. A Farce</i> (1674) by Thomas Duffet; with an Introduction by

-Maximillian E. Novak.</p>

-

-<p>Price to members of the Society, $2.50 for the first copy of each title,

-and $3.25 for additional copies. Price to non-members, $4.00. Standing

-orders for this continuing series of Special Publications will be

-accepted. British and European orders should be addressed to B. H.

-Blackwell, Broad Street, Oxford, England.</p>

-

-

-

-<hr style="width: 65%;" />

-<p><span class="u">Transcriber's Notes:</span></p>

-

-<p>Long "s" has been modernized.</p>

-<p>Printer's inconsistencies have been retained.</p>

-<p>The original text contains two sections labeled "Sect. V."</p>

-<p>Additional spacing after some of the quotes is intentional to indicate

-both the end of a quotation and the beginning of a new paragraph as presented in the original text.</p>

-

-

-<p>&nbsp;</p>

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-The Project Gutenberg eBook, Hypochondriasis, by John Hill

-

-

-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

-almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or

-re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

-with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

-

-

-

-

-

-Title: Hypochondriasis

-       A Practical Treatise (1766)

-

-

-Author: John Hill

-

-

-

-Release Date: September 27, 2009  [eBook #30099]

-

-Language: English

-

-Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

-

-

-***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HYPOCHONDRIASIS***

-

-

-E-text prepared by Tor Martin Kristiansen, Joseph Cooper, Stephanie Eason,

-and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team

-(http://www.pgdp.net)

-

-

-

-The Augustan Reprint Society

-

-JOHN HILL

-

-HYPOCHONDRIASIS

-

-A Practical Treatise.

-

-(1766)

-

-Introduction by

-

-G. S. ROUSSEAU

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-Publication Number 135

-William Andrews Clark Memorial Library

-University Of California, Los Angeles

-1969

-

-

-

-

-GENERAL EDITORS

-

-  William E. Conway, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-  George Robert Guffey, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Maximillian E. Novak, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-

-

-ASSOCIATE EDITOR

-

-  David S. Rodes, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-

-

-ADVISORY EDITORS

-

-  Richard C. Boys, _University of Michigan_

-  James L. Clifford, _Columbia University_

-  Ralph Cohen, _University of Virginia_

-  Vinton A. Dearing, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Arthur Friedman, _University of Chicago_

-  Louis A. Landa, _Princeton University_

-  Earl Miner, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Samuel H. Monk, _University of Minnesota_

-  Everett T. Moore, _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Lawrence Clark Powell, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-  James Sutherland, _University College, London_

-  H. T. Swedenberg, Jr., _University of California, Los Angeles_

-  Robert Vosper, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-CORRESPONDING SECRETARY

-

-  Edna C. Davis, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-EDITORIAL ASSISTANT

-

-  Mary Kerbret, _William Andrews Clark Memorial Library_

-

-

-

-

-INTRODUCTION

-

-     "When I first dabbled in this art, the old distemper call'd

-     _Melancholy_ was exchang'd for _Vapours_, and afterwards for the

-     _Hypp_, and at last took up the now current appellation of the

-     _Spleen_, which it still retains, tho' a learned doctor of the

-     west, in a little tract he hath written, divides the _Spleen_ and

-     _Vapours_, not only into the _Hypp_, the _Hyppos_, and the

-     Hyppocons; but subdivides these divisions into the _Markambles_,

-     the _Moonpalls_, the _Strong-Fiacs_, and the _Hockogrokles_."

-

-

-     Nicholas Robinson, _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and

-     Hypochondriack Melancholy_ (London, 1729)

-

-

-Treatises on hypochondriasis--the seventeenth-century medical term for a

-wide range of nervous diseases--were old when "Sir" John Hill, the

-eccentric English scientist, physician, apothecary, and hack writer,

-published his _Hypochondriasis_ in 1766.[1] For at least a century and a

-half medical writers as well as lay authors had been writing literature

-of all types (treatises, pamphlets, poems, sermons, epigrams) on this

-most fashionable of English maladies under the variant names of

-"melancholy," "the spleen," "black melancholy," "hysteria," "nervous

-debility," "the hyp." Despite the plethora of _materia scripta_ on the

-subject it makes sense to reprint Hill's _Hypochondriasis_, because it

-is indeed a "practical treatise" and because it offers the modern

-student of neoclassical literature a clear summary of the best thoughts

-that had been put forth on the subject, as well as an explanation of the

-causes, symptoms, and cures of this commonplace malady.

-

-No reader of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English literature

-needs to be reminded of the interest of writers of the period in the

-condition--"disease" is too confining a term--hypochondriasis.[2] Their

-concern is apparent in both the poetry and prose of two centuries. From

-Robert Burton's Brobdingnagian exposition in _The Anatomy of Melancholy_

-(1621) to Tobias Smollett's depiction of the misanthropic and ailing

-Matthew Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771), and, of course, well into

-the nineteenth century, afflicted heroes and weeping heroines populate

-the pages of England's literature. There is scarcely a decade in the

-period 1600-1800 that does not contribute to the literature of

-melancholy; so considerable in number are the works that could be placed

-under this heading that it actually makes sense to speak of the

-"literature of melancholy." A kaleidoscopic survey of this literature

-(exclusive of treatises written on the subject) would include mention of

-Milton's "Il Penseroso" and "L'Allegro," the meditative Puritan and

-nervous Anglican thinkers of the Restoration (many of whose narrators,

-such as Richard Baxter, author of the _Reliquiae Baxterianae_,[3] are

-afflicted), Swift's "School of Spleen" in _A Tale of a Tub_, Pope's

-hysterical Belinda in the "Cave of Spleen," the melancholic "I" of

-Samuel Richardson's correspondence, Gray's leucocholy, the

-psychosomatically ailing characters of _The Vicar of Wakefield_ and

-_Tristram Shandy_, Boswell's _Hypochondriack Papers_ (1777-1783)

-contributed to the _London Magazine_, and such "sensible" and

-"sensitive" women as Mrs. Bennett and Miss Bates in the novels of Jane

-Austen. So great in bulk is this literature in the mid eighteenth

-century, that C. A. Moore has written, "statistically, this deserves to

-be called the Age of Melancholy."[4] The vastness of this literature is

-sufficient to justify the reprinting of an unavailable practical

-handbook on the subject by a prolific author all too little known.[5]

-

-The medical background of Hill's pamphlet extends further back than the

-seventeenth century and Burton's _Anatomy_. The ancient Greeks had

-theorized about hypochondria: hypochondriasis signified a disorder

-beneath (hypo) the gristle (chondria) and the disease was discussed

-principally in physiological terms. The belief that hypochondriasis was

-a somatic condition persisted until the second half of the seventeenth

-century at which time an innovation was made by Dr. Thomas Sydenham. In

-addition to showing that hypochondriasis and hysteria (thought previously

-by Sydenham to afflict women only) were the same disease, Sydenham noted

-that the external cause of both was a mental disturbance and not a

-physiological one. He also had a theory that the internal and immediate

-cause was a disorder of the animal spirits arising from a clot and

-resulting in pain, spasms, and bodily disorders. By attributing the

-onset of the malady to mental phenomena and not to obstructions of the

-spleen or viscera, Sydenham was moving towards a psychosomatic theory of

-hypochondriasis, one that was to be debated in the next century in

-England, Holland, and France.[6] Sydenham's influence on the physicians

-of the eighteenth century was profound: Cheyne in England, Boerhaave in

-Holland, La Mettrie in France. Once the theory of the nervous origins of

-hypochondria gained ground--here I merely note coincidence, not historical

-cause and effect--the disease became increasingly fashionable in England,

-particularly among the polite, the aristocratic, and the refined. Students

-of the drama will recall Scrub's denial in _The Beaux' Stratagem_ (1707)

-of the possibility that Archer has the spleen and Mrs. Sullen's

-interjection, "I thought that distemper had been only proper to people of

-quality."

-

-Toward the middle of the eighteenth century, hypochondria was so

-prevalent in people's minds and mouths that it soon assumed the

-abbreviated name "the hyp." Entire poems like William Somervile's _The

-Hyp: a Burlesque Poem in Five Canto's_ (1731) and Tim Scrubb's _A Rod

-for the Hyp-Doctor_ (1731) were devoted to this strain; others, like

-Malcom Flemyng's epic poem, _Neuropathia: sive de morbis hypochondriacis

-et hystericis, libri tres, poema medicum_ (1740), were more technical

-and scientific. Professor Donald Davie has written that he has often

-"heard old fashioned and provincial persons [in England and Scotland]

-even in [my] own lifetime say, 'Oh, you give me the hyp,' where we

-should say 'You give me a pain in the neck'"[7]; and I myself have heard

-the expression, "You give me the pip," where "pip" may be a corruption

-of "hyp." As used in the early eighteenth century, the term "hyp" was

-perhaps not far from what our century has learned to call _Angst_. It

-was also used as a synonym for "lunacy," as the anonymous author of

-_Anti-Siris_ (1744), one of the tracts in the tar-water controversy,

-informs us that "Berkeley tells his Countrymen, they are all mad, or

-_Hypochondriac_, which is but a fashionable name for Madness." Bernard

-Mandeville, the Dutch physician and author of _The Fable of the Bees_,

-seems to have understood perfectly well that hypochondriasis is a

-condition encompassing any number of diseases and not a specific and

-readily definable ailment; a condition, moreover, that hovers

-precariously and bafflingly in limbo between mind and body, and he

-stressed this as the theme of his _Treatise of the Hypochondriack and

-Hysteric Passions, Vulgarly Call'd the Hypo in Men and Vapours in Women_

-(1711). The mental causes are noted as well in an anonymous pamphlet in

-the British Museum, _A Treatise on the Dismal Effects of

-Low-Spiritedness_ (1750) and are echoed in many similar early and

-mid-eighteenth century works. Some medical writers of the age, like

-Nicholas Robinson, had reservations about the external mental bases of

-the hyp and preferred to discuss the condition in terms of internal

-physiological causes:

-

-     ...of that Disorder we call the Vapours, or _Hypochondria_; for

-     they have no material distinctive Characters, but what arise from

-     the same Disease affecting different Sexes, and the Vapours in

-     Women are term'd the _Hypochondria_ in Men, and they proceed from

-     the Contraction of the Vessels being depress'd a little beneath the

-     Balance of Nature, and the Relaxation of the Nerves at the same

-     Time, which creates that Uneasiness and Melancholy that naturally

-     attends Vapours, and which generally is an Intemperature of the

-     whole Body, proceeding from a Depression of the Solids beneath the

-     Balance of Nature; but the Intemperature of the Parts is that

-     Peculiar Disposition whereby they favour any Disease.[8]

-

-

-But the majority of medical thinkers had been persuaded that the

-condition was psychosomatic, and this belief was supported by research

-on nerves by important physicians in the 1740's and 1750's: the Monro

-brothers in London, Robert Whytt in Edinburgh, Albrecht von Haller in

-Leipzig. By mid century the condition known as the hyp was believed to

-be a real, not an imaginary ailment, common, peculiar in its

-manifestations, and indefinable, almost impossible to cure, producing

-very real symptoms of physical illness, and said to originate sometimes

-in depression and idleness. It was summed up by Robert James in his

-_Medicinal Dictionary_ (London, 1743-45):

-

-     If we thoroughly consider its Nature, it will be found to be a

-     spasmodico-flatulent Disorder of the _Primae Viae_, that is, of the

-     Stomach and Intestines, arising from an Inversion or Perversion of

-     their peristaltic Motion, and, by the mutual consent of the Parts,

-     throwing the whole nervous System into irregular Motions, and

-     disturbing the whole Oeconomy of the Functions.... no part or

-     Function of the Body escapes the Influence of this tedious and long

-     protracted Disease, whose Symptoms are so violent and numerous,

-     that it is no easy Task either to enumerate or account for them....

-     No disease is more troublesome, either to the Patient or Physician,

-     than hypochondriac Disorders; and it often happens, that, thro' the

-     Fault of both, the Cure is either unnecessarily protracted, or

-     totally frustrated; for the Patients are so delighted, not only

-     with a Variety of Medicines, but also of Physicians.... On the

-     contrary, few physicians are sufficiently acquainted with the true

-     Genius and Nature of this perplexing Disorder; for which Reason

-     they boldly prescribe almost everything contained in the Shops, not

-     without an irreparable Injury to the Patient (article on

-     "Hypochondriacus Morbis").

-

-This is a more technical description than Hill gives anywhere in his

-handbook, but it serves well to summarize the background of the condition

-about which Sir John wrote.

-

-Hill's _Hypochondriasis_ adds little that is new to the theory of the

-disease. It incorporates much of the thinking set forth by the writings

-mentioned above, particularly those of George Cheyne, whose medical

-works _The English Malady_ (1733) and _The Natural Method of Cureing the

-Diseases of the Body, and the Disorders of the Mind Depending on the

-Body_ (1742) Hill knew. He is also conversant with some Continental

-writers on the subject, two of whom--Isaac Biberg, author of The

-_Oeconomy of Nature_ (1751), and Rene Reaumur who had written a history

-of insects (1722)[9]--he mentions explicitly, and with William

-Stukeley's _Of the Spleen_ (1723). Internal evidence indicates that Hill

-had read or was familiar with the ideas propounded in Richard

-Blackmore's _Treatise of the Spleen and Vapours_ (1725) and Nicholas

-Robinson's _A New System of the Spleen, Vapours, and Hypochondriack

-Melancholy_ (1729).

-

-Hill's arrangement of sections is logical: he first defines the

-condition (I), then proceeds to discuss persons most susceptible to it

-(II), its major symptoms (III), consequences (IV), causes (V), and cures

-(VI-VIII). In the first four sections almost every statement is

-commonplace and requires no commentary (for example, Hill's opening

-remark: "To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and

-cruel. It is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by

-thickened and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver,

-and other parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick

-scarce knows one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.") His

-belief that the condition afflicts sedentary persons, particularly

-students, philosophers, theologians, and that it is not restricted to

-women alone--as some contemporary thinkers still maintained--is also

-impossible to trace to a single source, as is his description (p. 12) of

-the most prevalent physiological _symptoms_ ("lowness of spirits, and

-inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love of solitude....

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness") and _causes_ (the poor and damp

-English climate and the resultant clotting of blood in the spleen) of

-the illness.

-

-Sections V-VIII, dealing with causes and cures, are less commonplace and

-display some of Hill's eccentricities as a writer and thinker. He uses

-the section entitled "Cures" as a means to peddle his newly discovered

-cure-all, water dock,[10] which Smollett satirized through the mouth of

-Tabitha Bramble in _Humphry Clinker_ (1771). Hill also rebelled against

-contemporary apothecaries and physicians who prescribed popular

-medicines--such as Berkeley's tar-water, Dover's mercury powders, and

-James's fever-powders--as universal panaceas for the cure of the hyp.

-"No acrid medicine must be directed, for that may act too hastily,

-dissolve the impacted matter at once, and let it loose, to the

-destruction of the sufferer; no antimonial, no mercurial, no martial

-preparation must be taken; in short, no chymistry: nature is the shop

-that heaven has set before us, and we must seek our medicine there"

-(p. 24). However scientifically correct Hill may have been in minimizing

-the efficacy of current pills and potions advertised as remedies for the

-hyp, he was unusual for his time in objecting so strongly to them. Less

-eccentric was his allegiance to the "Ancients" rather than to the

-"Moderns" so far as chemical treatment (i.e., restoration of the humours

-by chemical rearrangement) of hypochondriasis is concerned.[11] "The

-venerable ancients," Hill writes, "who knew not this new art, will lead

-us in the search; and (faithful relators as they are of truth) will tell

-us whence we may deduce our hope; and what we are to fear" (p. 24).

-

-Still more idiosyncratic, perhaps, is Hill's contention (p. 25) that the

-air of dry, high grounds worsens the condition of the patient. Virtually

-every writer I have read on the subject believed that onset of the hyp

-was caused by one of the six non-naturals--air, diet, lack of sufficient

-sleep, too little or too much exercise, defective evacuation, the

-passions of the mind; and although some medical writers emphasized the

-last of these,[12] few would have concurred with Hill that the fetid air

-of London was less harmful than the clearer air at Highgate. All readers

-of the novel of the period will recall the hypochondriacal Matt

-Bramble's tirade against the stench of London air. Beliefs of the

-variety here mentioned cause me to question Hill's importance in the

-history of medicine; there can be no question about his contributions to

-the advancement of the science of botany through popularization of

-Linnaeus' system of bisexual classification, but Hill's medical

-importance is summarized best as that of a compiler. His recommendation

-of the study of botany as a cure for melancholics is sensible but verges

-on becoming "a digression in praise of the author," a poetic _apologia

-pro vita sua_ in Augustan fashion:

-

-     For me, I should advise above all other things the study of nature.

-     Let him begin with plants: he will here find a continual pleasure,

-     and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful things; even of

-     the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to walk; and

-     every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket, will

-     afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually in

-     the air; and continually to change the nature and quality of the

-     air, by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the

-     lawn, the heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be

-     abroad; and the unceasing variety of the subjects of his

-     observation, will prevent his walking hastily: he will pursue his

-     studies in the air; and that contemplative turn of mind, which in

-     his closet threatened his destruction, will thus become the great

-     means of his recovery (pp. 26-27).

-

-Hill was forever extolling the claims of a life devoted to the study of

-nature, as we see in a late work, _The Virtues of British Herbs_ (1770).

-Judicious as is the logic of this recommendation, one cannot help but

-feel that the emphasis here is less on diversion as a cure and more on

-the botanic attractions of "every hedge and hillock, every foot-path

-side, and thicket."

-

-While Hill's rules and regulations regarding proper diet (Section VII)

-are standard, several taken almost _verbatim et literatim_ from Cheyne's

-list in _The English Malady_ (1733), his recommendation (Section VIII)

-of "Spleen-Wort" as the best medicine for the hypochondriac patient is

-not. Since Hill devotes so much space to the virtues of this herb and

-concludes his work extolling this plant, a word should be said about it.

-Throughout his life he was an active botanist. Apothecary, physician,

-and writer though he was, it was ultimately botany that was his ruling

-passion, as is made abundantly clear in his correspondence.[13] Wherever

-he lived--whether in the small house in St. James's Street or in the

-larger one on the Bayswater Road--he cultivated an herb garden that

-flattered his knowledge and ability. Connoisseurs raved about its

-species and considered it one of the showpieces of London. His arrogant

-personality alone prevented him from becoming the first Keeper of the

-Apothecary's Garden in Chelsea, although he was for a time

-superintendent to the Dowager Princess of Wales's gardens at Kensington

-Palace and at Kew. His interest in cultivation of herbs nevertheless

-continued; over the years Hill produced more than thirty botanical

-works, many of them devoted to the medical virtues of rare herbs such as

-"Spleen-Wort." Among these are _The British Herbal_ (1756), _On the

-Virtues of Sage in Lengthening Human Life_ (1763), _Centaury, the Great

-Stomachic_ (1765), _Polypody_ (1768), _A Method of Curing Jaundice_

-(1768), _Instances of the Virtue of Petasite Root_ (1771), and _Twenty

-Five New Plants_ (1773).[14] It is therefore not surprising that he

-should believe a specific herb to be the best remedy for a complicated

-medical condition. Nor is his reference to the Ancients as authority for

-the herbal pacification of an inflamed spleen surprising in the light of

-his researches: he was convinced that every illness could be cured by

-taking an appropriate herb or combination of herbs. Whereas a few

-nonmedical writers--such as John Wesley in _Primitive Physick_

-(1747)--had advocated the taking of one or two herbs in moderate dosage

-as anti-hysterics (the eighteenth-century term for all cures of the

-hyp), no medical writer of the century ever promoted the use of herbs to

-the extent that Hill did. In fairness to him, it is important to note

-that his herbal remedies were harmless and that many found their way

-into the official _London Pharmacopeia_. "The virtues of this smooth

-Spleen-wort," he insists, "have stood the test of ages; and the plant

-every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbarists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it"

-(p. 37).[15] The greatest portion of Hill's concluding section combines

-advertisement for the powder medicine he was himself manufacturing at a

-handsome profit together with a protest against competing apothecaries:

-"An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right" (p. 42).

-

-Treatises on hypochondriasis did not cease to be printed after Hill's in

-1766, but continued to issue from the presses into the nineteenth

-century. A good example of this is the tome by John Reid, physician to

-the Finsbury Dispensary in London, _Essays on Insanity, Hypochondriasis

-and Other Nervous Affections_ (1816), which summarizes theories of the

-malady.[16] A bibliographical study of such works would probably reveal

-a larger number of titles in the nineteenth century than in the previous

-one, but by this time the nature and definition of hypochondria had

-changed significantly.

-

-If John Hill's volume is not an important contribution in the history of

-medicine, it is a lucid and brief exposition of many of the best ideas

-that had been thought and written on the hyp, with the exception of his

-uninhibited prescribing of herbal medicines as cure-alls. An

-understanding of this disease is essential for readers of neoclassical

-English literature, especially when we reflect upon the fact that some

-of the best literature of the period was composed by writers whom it

-afflicted. It is perhaps not without significance that the greatest poet

-of the Augustan age, Alexander Pope, thought it necessary as he lay on

-his deathbed in May 1744 to exclaim with his last breath, "I never was

-hippish in my whole life."[17]

-

-  University of California,

-  Los Angeles

-

-

-

-

-NOTES TO THE INTRODUCTION

-

-

-[1] The text here reproduced is that of the copy in the Library of the

-Royal Society of Medicine, London. Title pages of different copies of

-the first edition of 1766 vary. For example, the title page of the copy

-in the British Museum reads, _Hypochondriasis; a Practical Treatise On

-the Nature and Cure of that Disorder, Commonly called the Hyp and the

-Hypo_. The copy in the Royal Society of Medicine contains, among other

-additions, the words "by Sir John Hill" in pencil, and "8vo Lond.

-1766," written in ink and probably a later addition.

-

-[2] Melancholy, hypochondriasis, and the spleen were considered in the

-seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to be one complex condition, a

-malady rather than a malaise, which is but a symptom. Distinctions among

-these, of interest primarily to medical historians, cannot be treated

-here. As good a definition as any is found in Dr. Johnson's _Dictionary_

-(1755): "Hypochondriacal.... 1. Melancholy; disordered in the

-imagination.... 2. Producing melancholy...." The literature of

-melancholy has been surveyed in part by C. A. Moore, "The English

-Malady," _Backgrounds of English Literature 1700-1760_ (Minneapolis,

-1953), pp. 179-235. In medical parlance, "hypochondria" means the soft

-parts of the body below the costal cartilages, and the singular form of

-the word, "hypochondrium," means the viscera situated in the

-hypochondria, i.e., the liver, gall bladder, and spleen.

-

-[3] See Samuel Clifford's _The Signs and Causes of Melancholy, with

-directions suited to the case of those who are afflicted with it.

-Collected out of the works of Mr. Richard Baxter_ (London, 1716) in the

-British Museum.

-

-[4] _Backgrounds of English Literature_, p. 179.

-

-[5] See my forthcoming biography, _The Literary Quack: A Life of 'Sir'

-John Hill of London_, and John Kennedy's _Some Remarks on the Life and

-Writings of Dr. J---- H----, Inspector General of Great Britain_

-(London, 1752).

-

-[6] For some of this background see L. J. Rather, _Mind and Body in

-Eighteenth Century Medicine: A Study Based on Jerome Gaub's De Regimine

-Mentis_ (London, 1965), pp. 135-90 _passim_.

-

-[7] _Science and Literature 1700-1740_ (London, 1964), pp. 50-51.

-

-[8] _A New Theory of Physick_ (London, 1725), p. 56.

-

-[9] Biberg was a Swedish naturalist and had studied botany under

-Linnaeus in Uppsala; Reaumur, a French botanist, had contributed papers

-to the _Philosophical Transactions_ of the Royal Society in London.

-

-[10] _The Power of Water-Dock against the Scurvy whether in the Plain

-Root or Essence...._ (London, 1765), had been published six months

-earlier than _Hypochondriasis_ and had earned Hill a handsome profit.

-

-[11] I have treated aspects of this subject in my article, "Matt Bramble

-and The Sulphur Controversy in the XVIIIth Century: Medical Background

-of _Humphry Clinker_," _JHI_, XXVIII (1967), 577-90.

-

-[12] See, for example, Jeremiah Waineright, _A Mechanical Account of the

-Non-Naturals_ (1707); John Arbuthnot, _An Essay Concerning the Effects

-of Air on Human Bodies_ (1733); Frank Nichols, _De Anima Medica_ (1750).

-

-[13] Hill's correspondence is not published but shall be printed as an

-appendix to my forthcoming biography.

-

-[14] I have discussed some of these works in connection with the medical

-background of John Wesley's _Primitive Physick_ (1747). See G. S.

-Rousseau, _Harvard Library Bulletin_, XVI (1968), 242-56.

-

-[15] It is difficult to know with certainty when Hill first became

-interested in the herb. He mentions it in passing in _The British

-Herbal_ (1756), I, 526 and may have sold it as early as 1742 when he

-opened an apothecary shop.

-

-[16] Reid's dissertation at Edinburgh, entitled _De Insania_ (1798),

-contains materials on the relationship of the imagination to all forms

-of mental disturbance. Secondary literature on hypochondria is

-plentiful. Works include: R. H. Gillespie, _Hypochondria_ (London,

-1928), William K. Richmond, _The English Disease_ (London, 1958),

-Charles Chenevix Trench, _The Royal Malady_ (New York, 1964), and Ilza

-Vieth, _Hysteria: The History of a Disease_ (Chicago, 1965), and "On

-Hysterical and Hypochondriacal Afflictions," _Bulletin of the History of

-Medicine_, XXX (1956), 233-40.

-

-[17] Joseph Spence, _Observations, Anecdotes, and Characters of Books

-and Men_, ed. James M. Osborn (Oxford, 1966), I, 264.

-

-I am indebted to A. D. Morris, M.D., F.R.S.M., for help of various sorts

-in writing this introduction.

-

-

-

-

-BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

-

-The text of this facsimile of _Hypochondriasis_ is reproduced from a

-copy in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, London.

-

-

-

-

-     HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-            A

-

-  PRACTICAL TREATISE, &c.

-

-

-

-HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-SECT. I.

-

-The NATURE of the DISORDER.

-

-

-To call the Hypochondriasis a fanciful malady, is ignorant and cruel. It

-is a real, and a sad disease: an obstruction of the spleen by thickened

-and distempered blood; extending itself often to the liver, and other

-parts; and unhappily is in England very frequent: physick scarce knows

-one more fertile in ill; or more difficult of cure.

-

-The blood is a mixture of many fluids, which, in a state of health, are

-so combined, that the whole passes freely through its appointed vessels;

-but if by the loss of the thinner parts, the rest becomes too gross to

-be thus carried through, it will stop where the circulation has least

-power; and having thus stopped it will accumulate; heaping by degrees

-obstruction on obstruction.

-

-Health and chearfulness, and the quiet exercise of mind, depend upon a

-perfect circulation: is it a wonder then, when this becomes impeded the

-body looses of its health, and the temper of its sprightliness? to be

-otherwise would be the miracle; and he inhumanly insults the afflicted,

-who calls all this a voluntary frowardness. Its slightest state brings

-with it sickness, anguish and oppression; and innumerable ills follow

-its advancing steps, unless prevented by timely care; till life itself

-grows burthensome.

-

-The disease was common in antient Greece; and her physicians understood

-it, better than those perhaps of later times, in any other country; who

-though happy in many advantages these fathers of the science could not

-have, yet want the great assistance of frequent watching it in all its

-stages.

-

-Those venerable writers have delivered its nature, and its cure: in the

-first every thing now shews they were right; and what they have said as

-to the latter will be found equally true and certain. This, so far as

-present experience has confirmed it, and no farther, will be here laid

-before the afflicted in a few plain words.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. II.

-

-Persons Subject to it.

-

-

-Fatigue of mind, and great exertion of its powers often give birth to

-this disease; and always tend to encrease it. The finer spirits are

-wasted by the labour of the brain: the Philosopher rises from his study

-more exhausted than the Peasant leaves his drudgery; without the benefit

-that he has from exercise. Greatness of mind, and steady virtue;

-determined resolution, and manly firmness, when put in action, and

-intent upon their object, all also lead to it: perhaps whatever tends to

-the ennobling of the soul has equal share in bringing on this weakness

-of the body.

-

-From this we may learn easily who are the men most subject to it; the

-grave and studious, those of a sedate temper and enlarged understanding,

-the learned and wise, the virtuous and the valiant: those whom it were

-the interest of the world to wish were free from this and every other

-illness; and who perhaps, except for this alloy, would have too large a

-portion of human happiness.

-

-Though these are most, it is not these alone, who are subject to it.

-There are countries where it is endemial, and in other places some have

-the seeds of it in their constitution; and in some it takes rise from

-accidents. In these last it is the easiest of cure; and in the first

-most difficult.

-

-Beside the Greeks already named, the Jews of old time were heavily

-afflicted with this disease; and in their descendants to this day it is

-often constitutional: the Spaniards have it almost to a man; and so have

-the American Indians. Perhaps the character of these several nations may

-be connected with it. The steady honour, and firm valour of the

-Spaniard, very like that of the ancient Doric nation, who followed the

-flute not the trumpet to the field; and met the enemy, not with shouts

-and fury, but with a determined virtue: it is the temper of the

-Hypochondriac to be slow, but unmoveably resolved: the Jew has shewn

-this mistakenly, but almost miraculously; and the poor Indian, untaught

-as he is, faces all peril with composure, and sings his death-song with

-an unalter'd countenance.

-

-Among particular persons the most inquiring and contemplative are those

-who suffer oftenest by this disease; and of all degrees of men I think

-the clergy. I do not mean the hunting, shooting, drinking clergy, who

-bear the tables of the great; but the retir'd and conscientious; such as

-attend in midnight silence to their duty; and seek in their own cool

-breasts, or wheresoever else they may be found, new admonitions for an

-age plunged in new vices. To this disease we owe the irreparable loss of

-Dr. YOUNG; and the present danger of many other the best and most

-improved amongst us. May what is here to be proposed assist in their

-preservation!

-

-The Geometrician or the learned Philosopher of whatever denomination,

-whose course of study fixes his eye for ever on one object, his mind

-intensely and continually employed upon one thought, should be warned

-also that he is in danger; or if he find himself already afflicted, he

-should be told that the same course of life, which brought it on, will,

-without due care, encrease it to the most dreaded violence.

-

-The middle period of life is that in which there is the greatest danger

-of an attack from this disease; and the latter end of autumn, when the

-summer heats have a little time been over, is the season when in our

-climate its first assaults are most to be expected. The same time of the

-year always increases the disorder in those who have been before

-afflicted with it; and it is a truth must be confessed, that from its

-first attack the patient grows continually, though slowly, worse; unless

-a careful regimen prevent it.

-

-The constitutions most liable to this obstruction are the lean, and dark

-complexioned; the grave and sedentary. Let such watch the first

-symptoms; and obviate, (as they may with ease) that which it will be

-much more difficult to remove.

-

-It is happy a disease, wherein the patient must do a great deal for

-himself, falls, for the most part, upon those who have the powers of

-reason strongest. Let them only be aware of this, that the distemper

-naturally disposes them to inactivity; and reason will have no use

-unless accompanied with resolution to enforce it.

-

-Though the physician can do something toward the cure, much more depends

-upon the patient; and here his constancy of mind will be employed most

-happily. No one is better qualified to judge on a fair hearing what

-course is the most fit; and having made that choice, he must with

-patience wait its good effects. Diseases that come on slowly must have

-time for curing; an attention to the first appearances of the disorder

-will be always happiest; because when least established it is easiest

-overthrown: but when that happy period has been neglected, he must wait

-the effects of such a course as will dilute and melt the obstructing

-matter gradually; for till that be done it is not only vain, but

-sometimes dangerous, to attempt its expulsion from the body.

-

-The blood easily separates itself into the grosser and the thinner

-parts: we see this in bleeding; and from the toughness of the red cake

-may guess how very difficult it will be to dissolve a substance of like

-firmness in the vessels of the body. That it can thus become thickened

-within the body, a Pleurisy shews us too evidently: in that case it is

-brought on suddenly, and with inflammation; in this other, slowly and

-without; and here, even before it forms the obstruction, can bring on

-many mischiefs. Various causes can produce the same effect, but that in

-all cases operates most durably, which operates most slowly. The watery

-part of the blood is its mild part; in the remaining gross matter of it,

-are acrid salts and burning oils, and these, when destitute of that

-happy dilution nature gives them in a healthy body, are capable of doing

-great mischief to the tender vessels in which they are kept stagnant.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. III.

-

-The SYMPTOMS of the DISORDER.

-

-

-The first and lightest of the signs that shew this illness are a lowness

-of spirits, and inaptitude to motion; a disrelish of amusements, a love

-of solitude and a habit of thinking, even on trifling subjects, with too

-much steadiness. A very little help may combat these: but if that

-indolence which is indeed a part of the disorder, will neglect them;

-worse must be expected soon to follow.

-

-Wild thoughts; a sense of fullness, weight, and oppression in the body,

-a want of appetite, or, what is worse, an appetite without digestion;

-for these are the conditions of different states of the disease, a

-fullness and a difficulty of breathing after meals, a straitness of the

-breast, pains and flatulencies in the bowels, and an unaptness to

-discharge their contents.

-

-The pulse becomes low, weak, and unequal; and there are frequent

-palpitations of the heart, a little dark-coloured urine is voided at

-some times; and a flood of colourless and insipid at others; relieving

-for a moment, but increasing the distemper: there is in some cases also

-a continual teazing cough, with a choaking stoppage in the throat at

-times; then heartburn, sickness, hardness of the belly, and a costive

-habit, or a tormenting and vain irritation.

-

-The lips turn pale, the eyes loose their brightness and by degrees the

-white grows as it were greenish, the gums want their due firmness, with

-their proper colour; and an unpleasing foulness grows upon the teeth:

-the inside of the mouth is pale and furred, and the throat dry and

-husky: the colour of the skin is pale (though there are periods when the

-face is florid) and as the obstruction gathers ground, and more affects

-the liver, the whole body becomes yellow, tawny, greenish, and at length

-of that deep and dusky hue, to which men of swift imagination have given

-the name of blackness.

-

-These symptoms do not all appear in any one period of the disease, or in

-one case, but at one time or other all of them, as well as those which

-follow: the flesh becomes cold to the touch, though the patient does not

-himself perceive it; the limbs grow numbed and torpid, the breathing

-dull and slow, and the voice hollow; and usually the appetite in this

-period declines, and comes almost to nothing: night sweats come on,

-black swellings appear on the veins, the flesh wastes and the breast

-becomes flat and hollow: the mouth is full of a thin spittle, the head

-is dizzy and confus'd, and sometimes there is an unconquerable numbness

-in the organs of speech.

-

-I have known the temporary silence that follows upon this last symptom

-become a jest to the common herd; and the unhappy patient, instead of

-compassion and assistance, receive the reproof of sullenness, from those

-who should have known and acted better.

-

-About twenty years ago I met on a visit at Catthorpe in Leicestershire a

-young gentleman of distinguished learning and abilities, who at certain

-times was speechless. The vulgar thought it a pretence: and a jocose

-lady, where he was at tea with company, putting him as she said to a

-trial, poured out a dish very strong and without sugar. He drank it and

-returned the cup with a bow of great reserve, and his eye bent on the

-ground: she then filled the cup with sugar, and pouring weak tea on it,

-sent it him: he drank that too, looked at her steadily, and blushed for

-her. The lady declared the man was dumb; the rest thought him perverse,

-and obstinate; but a constant and steady perseverance in an easy method

-cured him.

-

-All these are miseries which the disease, while it retains its natural

-form, can bring upon the patient; and thus he will in time be worn out,

-and led miserably, though slowly, to the grave. Let him not indulge his

-inactivity so far as to give way to this, because it is represented as

-far off; the disease may suddenly and frightfully change its nature; and

-swifter evils follow.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. IV.

-

-The DANGER.

-

-

-We have done with the obstruction considered in itself; but this, though

-often unsurmountable by art, at least by the methods now in use, will be

-sometimes broken through at once by nature, or by accidents; and bring

-on fatal evils. These are strictly different diseases, and are no

-otherway concerned here, than as the consequences of that of which we

-are treating.

-

-The thick and glutinous blood which has so long stagnated in the spleen,

-will have in that time altered its nature, and acquired a very great

-degree of acrimony: while it lies dormant, this does no more mischiefs,

-than those named already; but when violent exercise, a fit of outrageous

-anger, or any thing else that suddenly shocks and disturbs the frame,

-puts it in motion, it melts at once into a kind of liquid putrefaction.

-Being now thin, it mixes itself readily with the blood again, and brings

-on putrid fevers; destroys the substance of the spleen itself, or being

-thrown upon some other of the viscera, corrodes them, and leads on this

-way a swift and miserable death. If it fall upon the liver, its tender

-pulpy substance is soon destroyed, jaundices beyond the help of art

-first follow, then dropsies and all their train of misery; if on lungs,

-consumptions; if on the brain, convulsions, epilepsy, palsy, apoplexy;

-if on the surface, leprosy.

-

-The intention of cure is to melt this coagulation softly, not to break

-it violently; and then to give it a very gentle passage through the

-bowels. There is no safe way for it to take but that; and even that when

-urged too far may bring on fatal dysenteries.

-

-Let none wonder at the sudden devastation which sometimes arises from

-this long stagnant matter, when liquified too hastily: how long, how

-many years the impacted matter will continue quiet in a schirrous tumour

-of the breast; but being once put in motion, whether from accident, or

-in the course of nature, what can describe; or what can stop its

-havock!

-

-Instances of the other are too frequent. A nobleman the other day died

-paralytick: dissection shewed a spleen consumed by an abscess, formed

-from the dissolved matter of such an obstruction: and 'tis scarce longer

-since, a learned gentleman, who had been several years lost to his

-friends, by the extreams of a Hypochondriacal disorder, seem'd gradually

-without assistance to recover: but the lungs suffered while the spleen

-was freed; and he died very soon of what is called a galloping

-consumption.

-

-When the obstruction is great and of long continuance, if it be thus

-hastily moved, the consequence is, equally, a sudden and a miserable

-death, whether, like the matter of a cancer, it remains in its place; or

-like that of a bad small pox, be thrown upon some other vital part.

-

-Let not the patient be too much alarmed; this is laid down to caution,

-not to terrify him: it is fit he should know his danger, and attend to

-it; for the prevention is easy; and the cure, even of the most advanced

-stages, when undertaken by gentle means, is not at all impracticable: to

-assist the physician, let him look into himself, and recollect the

-source of his complaint. This he may judge of from the following

-notices.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. V.

-

-The Causes of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-The obstruction which forms this disease, may take its origin from

-different accidents: a fever ill cured has often caused it; or the

-piles, which had been used to discharge largely, ceasing; a marshy soil,

-poisoned with stagnant water, has given it to some persons; and altho'

-indolence and inactivity are oftenest at the root, yet it has arisen

-from too great exercise.

-

-Real grief has often brought it on; and even love, for sometimes that is

-real. Study and fixed attention of the mind have been accused before;

-and add to these the stooping posture of the body, which most men use,

-though none should use it, in writing and in reading. This has

-contributed too much to it; but of all other things night studies are

-the most destructive. The steady stillness, and dusky habit of all

-nature in those hours, enforce, encourage, and support that settled

-gloom, which rises from fixt thought; and sinks the body to the grave;

-even while it carries up the mind to heaven. He who would have his lamp

-

-        _At midnight hour

-  Be seen in some high lonely tower,_[18]

-

-will waste the flame of this unheeded life: and while he labours to

-unsphere the spirit of Plato[18] will let loose his own.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VI.

-

-The Cure of the HYPOCHONDRIASIS.

-

-

-Let him who would escape the mischiefs of an obstructed spleen, avoid

-the things here named: and let him who suffers from the malady,

-endeavour to remember to which of them it has been owing; for half the

-hope depends upon that knowledge.

-

-Nature has sometimes made a cure herself, and we should watch her ways;

-for art never is so right as when it imitates her: sometimes the

-patient's own resolution has set him free. This is always in his power,

-and at all times will do wonders.

-

-The bleeding of the piles, from nature's single efforts, has at once

-cured a miserable man; where their cessation was the cause of the

-disorder. A leprosy has appeared upon the skin, and all the symptoms of

-the former sickness vanished. This among the Jews happened often: both

-diseases we know were common among them: and I have here seen something

-very like it: Water-Dock has thrown out scorbutic eruptions, and all the

-former symptoms of an Hypochondriacal disorder have disappeared:

-returning indeed when these were unadvisedly struck in; but keeping off

-entirely when they were better treated. A natural purging unsuppressed

-has sometimes done the same good office: but this is hazardous.

-

-It is easy to be directed from such instances; only let us take the

-whole along with us. Bleeding would have answered nature's purpose, if

-she could not have opened of herself the haemorrhoidal vessels; but he

-who should give medicines for that purpose, might destroy his patient by

-too great disturbance. If a natural looseness may perform the cure, so

-may an artificial; when the original source of the disorder points that

-way. But these are helps that take place only in particular cases.

-

-The general and universal method of cure must be by some mild and gently

-resolving medicine, under the influence of which the obstructing matter

-may be voided that, or some other way with safety. The best season to

-undertake this is the autumn, but even here there must be caution.

-

-In the first place, no strong evacuating remedy must be given; for that,

-by carrying off the thinner parts of the juices, will tend to thicken

-the remainder; and certainly encrease the distemper. No acrid medicine

-must be directed, for that may act too hastily, dissolve the impacted

-matter at once, and let it loose, to the destruction of the sufferer; no

-antimonial, no mercurial, no martial preparation must be taken; in

-short, no chymistry: nature is the shop that heaven has set before us,

-and we must seek our medicine there. The venerable ancients, who knew

-not this new art, will lead us in the search; and (faithful relators as

-they are of truth) will tell us whence we may deduce our hope; and what

-we are to fear.

-

-But prior to the course of any medicine, and as an essential to any good

-hope from it, the patient must prescribe himself a proper course of

-life, and a well chosen diet: let us assist him in his choice; and speak

-of this first, as it comes first in order.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VI.

-

-Rules of Life for Hypochondriac Persons.

-

-

-Air and exercise, as they are the best preservers of health, and

-greatest assistants in the cure of all long continued diseases, will

-have their full effect in this; but there requires some caution in the

-choice, and management of them. It is common to think the air of high

-grounds best; but experience near home shews otherwise: the

-Hypochondriac patient is always worse at Highgate even than in London.

-

-The air he breathes should be temperate; not exposed to the utmost

-violences of heat and cold, and the swift changes from one to the

-other; which are most felt on those high grounds. The side of a hill is

-the best place for him: and though wet grounds are hurtful; yet let

-there be the shade of trees, to tempt him often to a walk; and soften by

-their exhalation the over dryness of the air.

-

-The exercise he takes should be frequent; but not violent. Motion

-preserves the firmness of the parts, and elasticity of the vessels; it

-prevents that aggregation of thick humours which he is most to fear. A

-sedentary life always produces weakness, and that mischief always

-follows: weak eyes are gummy, weak lungs are clogged with phlegm, and

-weak bowels waste themselves in vapid diarrhoeas.

-

-Let him invite himself abroad, and let his friends invite him by every

-innocent inducement. For me, I should advise above all other things the

-study of nature. Let him begin with plants: he will here find a

-continual pleasure, and continual change; fertile of a thousand useful

-things; even of the utility we are seeking here. This will induce him to

-walk; and every hedge and hillock, every foot-path side, and thicket,

-will afford him some new object. He will be tempted to be continually

-in the air, and continually to change the nature and quality of the air,

-by visiting in succession the high lands and the low, the lawn, the

-heath, the forest. He will never want inducement to be abroad; and the

-unceasing variety of the subjects of his observation, will prevent his

-walking hastily: he will pursue his studies in the air; and that

-contemplative turn of mind, which in his closet threatened his

-destruction, will thus become the great means of his recovery.

-

-If the mind tire upon this, from the repeated use, another of nature's

-kingdoms opens itself at once upon him; the plant he is weary of

-observing, feeds some insect he may examine; nor is there a stone that

-lies before his foot, but may afford instruction and amusement.

-

-Even what the vulgar call the most abject things will shew a wonderful

-utility; and lead the mind, in pious contemplation higher than the

-stars. The poorest moss that is trampled under foot, has its important

-uses: is it at the bottom of a wood we find it? why there it shelters

-the fallen seeds; hides them from birds, and covers them from frost;

-and thus becomes the foster father of another forest! creeps it along

-the surface of a rock? even there its good is infinite! its small roots

-run into the stone, and the rains make their way after them; the moss

-having lived its time dies; it rots and with the mouldered fragments of

-the stone forms earth; wherein, after a few successions, useful plants

-may grow, and feed more useful cattle![19]

-

-Is there a weed more humble in its aspect, more trampled on, or more

-despised than knot grass! no art can get the better of its growth, no

-labour can destroy it; 'twere pity if they could, for the thing lives

-where nothing would of use to us; and its large and most wonderfully

-abundant seeds, feed in hard winters, half the birds of Heaven.

-

-What the weak moss performs upon the rock the loathed toadstool brings

-about in timber: is an oak dead where man's eye will not find it? this

-fungus roots itself upon the bark, and rots the wood beneath it; hither

-the beetle creeps for shelter, and for sustenance; him the woodpecker

-follows as his prey; and while he tears the tree in search of him, he

-scatters it about the ground; which it manures.

-

-Nor is it the beetle alone that thus insinuates itself into the

-substance of the vegetable tribe: the tender aphide[20], whom a touch

-destroys, burrows between the two skins of a leaf, for shelter from his

-winged enemies; tracing, with more than Dedalaean art, his various

-meanders; and veining the green surface with these white lines more

-beautifully than the best Aegyptian marble.

-

-'Twere endless to proceed; nor is it needful: one object will not fail

-to lead on to another, and every where the goodness of his God will

-shine before him even in what are thought the vilest things; his

-greatness in the lead of them.

-

-Let him pursue these thoughts, and seek abroad the objects and the

-instigations to them: but let him in these and all other excursions

-avoid equally the dews of early morning, and of evening.

-

-The more than usual exercise of this prescription will dispose him to

-more than customary sleep, let him indulge it freely; so far from

-hurting, it will help his cure.

-

-Let him avoid all excesses: drink need scarce be named, for we are

-writing to men of better and of nobler minds, than can be tempted to

-that humiliating vice. Those who in this disorder have too great an

-appetite, must not indulge it; much eaten was never well digested: but

-of all excesses the most fatal in this case is that of venery. It is the

-excess we speak of.

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VII.

-

-The proper DIET.

-

-

-In the first place acids must be avoided carefully; and all things that

-are in a state of fermentation, for they will breed acidity. Provisions

-hardened by salting never should be tasted; much less those cured by

-smoaking, and by salting. Bacon is indigestible in an Hypochondriac

-stomach; and hams, impregnated as is now the custom, with acid fumes

-from the wood fires over which they are hung, have that additional

-mischief.

-

-Milk ought to be a great article in the diet: and even in this there

-should be choice. The milk of grass-fed cows has its true quality: no

-other. There are a multitude of ways in which this may be made a part

-both of our foods and drinks, and they should all be used.

-

-The great and general caution is that the diet be at all times of a kind

-loosening and gently stimulating; light but not acrid. Veal, lamb,

-fowls, lobsters, crabs, craw-fish, fresh water fish and mutton broth,

-with plenty of boiled vegetables, are always right; and give enough

-variety.

-

-Raw vegetables are all bad: sour wines, old cheese, and bottled beer are

-things never to be once tasted. Indeed much wine is wrong, be it of what

-kind soever. It is the first of cordials; and as such I would have it

-taken in this disease when it is wanted: plainly as a medicine, rather

-than a part of diet. Malt liquor carefully chosen is certainly the best

-drink. This must be neither new, nor tending to sourness; perfectly

-clear, and of a moderate strength: it is the native liquor of our

-country, and the most healthful.

-

-Too much tea weakens; and even sugar is in this disorder hurtful: but

-honey may supply its place in most things; and this is not only harmless

-but medicinal; a very powerful dissolvent of impacted humours, and a

-great deobstruent.

-

-What wine is drank should be of some of the sweet kinds. Old Hock has

-been found on enquiry to yield more than ten times the acid of the sweet

-wines; and in red Port, at least in what we are content to call so,

-there is an astringent quality, that is most mischievous in these cases:

-it is said there is often alum in it: how pregnant with mischief that

-must be to persons whose bowels require to be kept open, is most

-evident. Summer fruits perfectly ripe are not only harmless but

-medicinal; but if eaten unripe they will be very prejudicial. A light

-supper, which will leave an appetite for a milk breakfast, is always

-right; this will not let the stomach be ravenous for dinner, as it is

-apt to be in those who make that their only meal.

-

-One caution more must be given, and it may seem a strange one: it is

-that the patient attend regularly to his hours of eating. We have to do

-with men for the most part whose soul is the great object of their

-regard; but let them not forget they have a body.

-

-The late Dr. STUKELY has told me, that one day by appointment visiting

-Sir ISAAC NEWTON, the servant told him, he was in his study. No one was

-permitted to disturb him there; but as it was near dinner time, the

-visitor sat down to wait for him. After a time dinner was brought in; a

-boil'd chicken under a cover. An hour pass'd, and Sir ISAAC did not

-appear. The doctor eat the fowl, and covering up the empty dish, bad

-them dress their master another. Before that was ready, the great man

-came down; he apologiz'd for his delay, and added, "give me but leave to

-take my short dinner, and I shall be at your service; I am fatigued and

-faint." Saying this, he lifted up the cover; and without any emotion,

-turned about to STUKELY with a smile; "See says he, what we studious

-people are, I forgot I had din'd."

-

-

-

-

-SECT. VIII.

-

-The MEDICINE.

-

-

-'Tis the ill fate of this disease, more than of all others to be

-misunderstood at first, and thence neglected; till the physician shakes

-his head at a few first questions. None steals so fatally upon the

-sufferer: its advances are by very slow degrees; but every day it grows

-more difficult of cure.

-

-That this obstruction in the spleen is the true malady, the cases

-related by the antients, present observation, and the unerring

-testimonies of dissections leave no room to doubt. Being understood, the

-path is open where to seek a remedy: and our best guides in this, as in

-the former instance, will be those venerable Greeks; who saw a thousand

-of these cases, where we see one; and with less than half our theory,

-cured twice as many patients.

-

-One established doctrine holds place in all these writers; that whatever

-by a hasty fermentation dissolves the impacted matter of the

-obstruction, and sends it in that state into the blood, does incredible

-mischief: but that whatever medicine softens it by slow degrees, and, as

-it melts, delivers it to the bowels without disturbance; will cure with

-equal certainty and safety.

-

-For this good purpose, they knew and tried a multitude of herbs; but in

-the end they fixed on one: and on their repeated trials of this, they

-banished all the rest. This stood alone for the cure of the disease; and

-from its virtue received the name of SPLEEN-WORT[21]. O wise and happy

-Greeks! authors of knowledge and perpetuators of it! With them the very

-name they gave a plant declared its virtues: with us, a writer calls a

-plant from some friend; that the good gardener who receives the honour,

-may call another by his name who gave it. We now add the term _smooth_

-to this herb, to distinguish it from another, called by the same general

-term, though not much resembling it.

-

-The virtues of this smooth Spleen-wort have flood the test of ages; and

-the plant every where retained its name and credit: and one of our good

-herbalists, who had seen a wonderful case of a swoln spleen, so big, and

-hard as to be felt with terror, brought back to a state of nature by it;

-and all the miserable symptoms vanish; thought Spleen-wort not enough

-expressive of its excellence; but stamp'd on it the name of MILT-WASTE.

-

-In the Greek Islands now, the use of it is known to every one; and even

-the lazy monks who take it, are no longer splenetic. In the west of

-England, the rocks are stripped of it with diligence; and every old woman

-tells you how charming that leaf is for bookish men: in Russia they use

-a plant of this kind in their malt liquor: it came into fashion there

-for the cure of this disease; which from its constant use is scarce

-known any longer; and they suppose 'tis added to their liquor for a

-flavour.

-

-The ancients held it in a kind of veneration; and used what has been

-called a superstition in the gathering it. It was to be taken up with a

-sharp knife, without violence, and laid upon the clean linen: no time

-but the still darkness of the night was proper, and even the moon was

-not to shine upon it[22]. I know they have been ridiculed for this; for

-nothing is so vain as learned ignorance: but let me be permitted once to

-vindicate them.

-

-The plant has leaves that can close in their sides; and their under part

-is covered thick with a yellow powder, consisting of the seeds, and seed

-vessels: in these they knew the virtue most resided: this was the golden

-dust[23] they held so valuable; and this they knew they could not be too

-cautious to preserve. They were not ignorant of the sleep of plants; a

-matter lately spoken of by some, as if a new discovery; and being

-sensible that light, a dry air, an expanded leaf, and a tempestuous

-season, were the means of losing this fine dust; and knowing also that

-darkness alone brought on that closing of the leaf which thence has

-been called sleep; and which helped to defend and to secure it, they

-therefore took such time, and used such means as could best preserve the

-plant entire; and even save what might be scattered from it.--And now

-where is their superstition?

-

-From this plant thus collected they prepared a medicine, which in a

-course of forty days scarce ever failed to make a perfect cure.

-

-We have the plant wild with us; and till the fashion of rough chemical

-preparations took off our attention from these gentler remedies, it was

-in frequent use and great repute. I trust it will be so again: and many

-thank me for restoring it to notice.

-

-Spleen-wort gives out its virtues freely in a tincture; and a small dose

-of this, mixing readily with the blood and juices, gradually dissolves

-the obstruction; and by a little at a time delivers its contents to be

-thrown off without pain, from the bowels. Let this be done while the

-viscera are yet sound and the cure is perfect. More than the forty days

-of the Greek method is scarce ever required; much oftener two thirds of

-that time suffice; and every day, from the first dose of it, the patient

-feels the happy change that is growing in his constitution. His food no

-more turns putrid on his stomach, but yields its healthful nourishment.

-The swelling after meals therefore vanishes; and with that goes the

-lowness, and anxiety, the difficult breath, and the distracting cholick:

-he can bear the approach of rainy weather without pain; he finds himself

-more apt for motion, and ready to take that exercise which is to be

-assistant in his cure; life seems no longer burthensome. His bowels get

-into the natural condition of health, and perform their office once at

-least a day; better if a little more: the dull and dead colour of his

-skin goes off, his lips grow red again, and every sign of health

-returns.

-

-Let him who takes the medicine, say whether any thing here be

-exaggerated. Let him, if he pleases to give himself the trouble, talk

-over with me, or write to me, this gradual decrease of his complaints,

-as he proceeds in his cure. My uncertain state of health does not

-permit me to practise physic in the usual way, but I am very desirous to

-do what good I can, and shall never refuse my advice, such as it may be,

-to any person rich or poor, in whatever manner he may apply for it. I

-shall refer him to no apothecary, whose bills require he should be

-drenched with potions; but tell him, in this as in all other cases,

-where to find some simple herb; which he may if he please prepare

-himself; or if he had rather spare that trouble, may have it so prepared

-from me.

-

-With regard to Spleen-wort, no method of using it is more effectual than

-simply taking it in powder; the only advantage of a tincture, is that a

-proper dose may be given, and yet the stomach not be loaded with so

-large a quantity: it is an easier and pleasanter method, and nothing

-more.

-

-If any person choose to take it in the other way, I should still wish

-him once at least to apply to me; that he may be assured what he is

-about to take is the right plant. Abuses in medicines are at this time

-very great, and in no instance worse than what relates to herbs. The

-best of our physicians have complained upon this head with warmth, but

-without redress: they know the virtues and the value of many of our

-native plants, but dread to prescribe them; lest some wrong thing should

-be administered in their place; perhaps inefficacious, perhaps

-mischievous, nay it may be fatal. The few simple things I direct are

-always before me; and it will at all times be a pleasure to me, in this

-and any other instance, to see whether what any person is about to take

-be right. I have great obligations to the public, and this is the best

-return that I know how to make.

-

-To see the need of such a caution, hear a transaction but of yesterday!

-An intelligent person was directed to go to the medicinal herb shops in

-the several markets, and buy some of this Spleen-wort; the name was

-written, and shewn to every one; every shop received his money, and

-almost every one sold a different plant, under the name of this: but

-what is very striking, not one of them the right. Such is the chance of

-health in those hands through which the best means of it usually pass;

-even in the most regular course of application.

-

-I would not be understood to limit the little services I may this way be

-able to render the afflicted, to this single instance; much less to

-propose to myself any advantages from it. Whoever pleases will be

-welcome to me, upon any such occasion; and whatever be the herb on which

-he places a dependance, he shall be shewn it growing. I once recommended

-a garden to be established for this use, at the public expence: one

-great person has put it in my power to answer all its purposes.

-

-

-                        F  I  N  I  S.

-

-

-

-

-THE AUGUSTAN REPRINT SOCIETY

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-WILLIAM ANDREWS CLARK MEMORIAL LIBRARY

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-UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, LOS ANGELES

-

-PUBLICATIONS IN PRINT

-

-

-1948-1949

-

-16. Henry Nevil Payne, _The Fatal Jealousie_ (1673).

-

-18. Anonymous, "Of Genius," in _The Occasional Paper_, Vol. III, No. 10

-(1719), and Aaron Hill, Preface to _The Creation_ (1720).

-

-

-1949-1950

-

-19. Susanna Centlivre, _The Busie Body_ (1709).

-

-20. Lewis Theobald, _Preface to the Works of Shakespeare_ (1734).

-

-22. Samuel Johnson, _The Vanity of Human Wishes_ (1749), and two

-_Rambler_ papers (1750).

-

-23. John Dryden, _His Majesties Declaration Defended_ (1681).

-

-

-1951-1952

-

-31. Thomas Gray, _An Elegy Wrote in a Country Churchyard_ (1751), and

-_The Eton College Manuscript_.

-

-

-1952-1953

-

-41. Bernard Mandeville, _A Letter to Dion_ (1732).

-

-

-1963-1964

-

-104. Thomas D'Urfey, _Wonders in the Sun; or, The Kingdom of the Birds_

-(1706).

-

-

-1964-1965

-

-110. John Tutchin, _Selected Poems_ (1685-1700).

-

-111. Anonymous, _Political Justice_ (1736).

-

-112. Robert Dodsley, _An Essay on Fable_ (1764).

-

-113. T. R., _An Essay Concerning Critical and Curious Learning_ (1698).

-

-114. _Two Poems Against Pope_: Leonard Welsted, _One Epistle to Mr. A.

-Pope_ (1730), and Anonymous, _The Blatant Beast_ (1742).

-

-

-1965-1966

-

-115. Daniel Defoe and others, _Accounts of the Apparition of Mrs. Veal_.

-

-116. Charles Macklin, _The Covent Garden Theatre_ (1752).

-

-117. Sir George L'Estrange, _Citt and Bumpkin_ (1680).

-

-118. Henry More, _Enthusiasmus Triumphatus_ (1662).

-

-119. Thomas Traherne, _Meditations on the Six Days of the Creation_

-(1717).

-

-120. Bernard Mandeville, _Aesop Dress'd or a Collection of Fables_

-(1704).

-

-

-1966-1967

-

-123. Edmond Malone, _Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Mr.

-Thomas Rowley_ (1782).

-

-124. Anonymous, _The Female Wits_ (1704).

-

-125. Anonymous, _The Scribleriad_ (1742). Lord Hervey, _The Difference

-Between Verbal and Practical Virtue_ (1742).

-

-126. _Le Lutrin: an Heroick Poem, Written Originally in French by

-Monsieur Boileau: Made English by N. O._ (1682).

-

-

-1967-1968

-

-127-

-

-128. Charles Macklin, _A Will and No Will, or a Bone for the Lawyers_

-(1746). _The New Play Criticiz'd, or The Plague of Envy_ (1747).

-

-129. Lawrence Echard, Prefaces to _Terence's Comedies_ (1694) and

-_Plautus's Comedies_ (1694).

-

-130. Henry More, _Democritus Platonissans_ (1646).

-

-131. John Evelyn, _The History of Sabatai Sevi, The Suppos'd Messiah of

-the Jews_ (1669).

-

-132. Walter Harte, _An Essay on Satire, Particularly on the Dunciad_

-(1730).

-

-Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)

-are available in paperbound units of six issues at $16.00 per unit, from

-the Kraus Reprint Company, 16 East 46th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017.

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-Publications in print are available at the regular membership rate of

-$5.00 yearly. Prices of single issues may be obtained upon request.

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-The Society's purpose is to publish rare Restoration and

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-Publications of the first fifteen years of the Society (numbers 1-90)

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-Make check or money order payable to THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF

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-REGULAR PUBLICATIONS FOR 1968-1969

-

-133. John Courtenay, _A Poetical Review of the Literary and Moral

-Character of the Late Samuel Johnson_ (1786). Introduction by Robert E.

-Kelley.

-

-134. John Downes, _Roscius Anglicanus_ (1708). Introduction by John

-Loftis.

-

-135. Sir John Hill, _Hypochondriasis, a Practical Treatise on the Nature

-and Cure of that Disorder Call'd the Hyp or Hypo_ (1766). Introduction

-by G. S. Rousseau.

-

-136. Thomas Sheridan, _Discourse ... Being Introductory to His Course of

-Lectures on Elocution and the English Language_ (1759). Introduction by

-G. P. Mohrman.

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-137. Arthur Murphy, _The Englishman From Paris_ (1756). Introduction by

-Simon Trefman. Previously unpublished manuscript.

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-138. [Catherine Trotter], _Olinda's Adventures_ (1718). Introduction by

-Robert Adams Day.

-

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-SPECIAL PUBLICATION FOR 1968-1969

-

-_After THE TEMPEST_. Introduction by George Robert Guffey.

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-Next in the continuing series of special publications by the Society

-will be _After THE TEMPEST_, a volume including the Dryden-Davenant

-version of _The Tempest_ (1670); the "operatic" _Tempest_ (1674); Thomas

-Duffet's _Mock-Tempest_ (1675); and the "Garrick" _Tempest_ (1756), with

-an Introduction by George Robert Guffey.

-

-Already published in this series are:

-

-1. John Ogilby, _The Fables of Aesop Paraphras'd in Verse_ (1668), with

-an Introduction by Earl Miner.

-

-2. John Gay, _Fables_ (1727, 1738), with an Introduction by Vinton A.

-Dearing.

-

-3. Elkanah Settle, _The Empress of Morocco_ (1673) with five plates;

-_Notes and Observations on the Empress of Morocco_ (1674) by John

-Dryden, John Crowne and Thomas Shadwell; _Notes and Observations on the

-Empress of Morocco Revised_ (1674) by Elkanah Settle; and _The Empress

-of Morocco. A Farce_ (1674) by Thomas Duffet; with an Introduction by

-Maximillian E. Novak.

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-Price to members of the Society, $2.50 for the first copy of each title,

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-

-

-

-Footnotes:

-

-[18] Milton's Penseroso.

-

-[19] Biberg.

-

-[20] Reaumur.

-

-[21] asplenon

-

-[22] Silente Luna.

-

-[23] Pulvis Aureus.

-

-

-

-

-      *      *      *      *      *

-

-

-

-

-Transcriber's Notes:

-

-  Long "s" has been modernized.

-

-  Page 21 contains two markers referring to the same footnote.

-

-  The original text contains two sections labeled "Sect. V."

-

-  Passages in italics are indicated by _underscore_.

-

-  Additional spacing after some of the quotes is intentional to indicate

-  both the end of a quotation and the beginning of a new paragraph as

-  presented in the original text.

-

-  The original text includes Greek characters. For this text version these

-  letters have been replaced with transliterations.

-

-  The following misprints have been corrected:

-    "the the" corrected to "the" (page v)

-    "sympton" corrected to "symptom" (page 14)

-    "symptons" corrected to "symptoms" (page 23)

-

-  Other than the corrections listed above, printer's inconsistencies in

-  spelling, punctuation, hyphenation, and ligature usage have been

-  retained.

-

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