Introduction - Uppsala Monitoring Centre

principles of the art of physick’ by Marchmount Nedham, London,
John Starkey, 1665. ‘The time and motion of a disease, one of so
great moments in the giving of physick, that the very same remedy
which saved a man’s life to-day may in the same disease, at a
different time, kill another to-morrow.’
White Hellebore: ’That if anyone be but pricked with a needle
infected with this juice he would be die within a few hours.’
Mercuries dulcis–calomeus: ‘giving of it to some bodies and
constitutions, been accompanied with very ill accidents.’
The first issue of ‘Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society’
appeared in March 1665 and it included some medical articles.
The Great Plague of London was treated with Mithridatium and
Galene.
1667 George Castle wrote ‘The chymical Galenist. A treatise, wherein the
practise of the ancients is reconcil’d to the new discoveries in the
theory of physick; shewing, that many of their rules, methods, and
medicines, are useful for the curing of diseases in this age, and in the
northern parts of the world. In which are some reflections upon a
book, intituled, Medela medicinæ;’ by George Castle, Dr. of physick,
lately fellow of All-souls Colledge in Oxon.’
This little book of 114 pages mentions interactions: ‘The mixing of
things which are harmless sometimes produces a poison. Thus out
of vitriol, salt, mercury, niter is made sublimate; of vitriol, niter and
alum, aqua for to which though made of innocent ingredients, are
mixtures most destructive to the body of man.’
Mercury: Mercurius dulcis-calomelous...’giving of it to some
bodies, constitutions, been acccompanied with very ill accident.’
White Hellebore: ‘That if anyone be but pricked with a needle
infected with this juice, he would die within a few hours.’ (Copied
from Nedham 1665).
1669 Mercury is ‘the hottest, the coldest, a true healer, a wicked murderer,
a precious medicine, and a deadly poison, a friend that can flatter
and lie.’ (Woodall, 1639).
1670 A French physician, Dr. Thuillier, put forth the concept that it
(ergotism) was not an infectious disease, but one that was due to the
consumption of rye infected with ergot that was responsible for the
outbreaks of ‘St. Anthony’s Fire’ (see 1725).
1671 ‘Person of quality. Westminster-drollery, or, a choice collection of the
newest songs & poems both at court and theaters by a person
of quality; with additions’ 1671. An anonymous work.