I fent then in all hafte for Dr. Hough, a man of great reputation, and he differed fo much in opinion from Sharp, that he called an acid the chief enemy. It keeps up the luctus or struggle, and if not expelled very quickly, will certainly prove fatal. Our fheet-anchor then must be the teftacea, in vehicles of mineral-water, and accordingly. he ordered the absorbent powders to conflict with this acidity, the principal caufe of all difeafes. Pearl and coral, crab's eyes, and crab's claws, he prefcribed in divers forms; but they were of no ufe to the fick woman. She became worse every hour.

Dr. Pym was next called in, a great practitioner, and learned man. His notion of a fever was quite different from the opinions of Sharp and Hough. He maintained that a fever was a poisonous ferment or venom, which feized on the animal spirits: it breaks and fmites them; and unless by alexipharmics the fpirits can be enabled to gain a victory in a day or two, this ferment will bring on what the Greeks call a fynochus, that is, a continual fever. In that ftate, the venom holds faft the animal fpirits, will not let them expand, or difengage themfelves, and then they grow enraged, and tumultuating, are hurried into a ftate of explofion, and blow up the fabric. Hence the

inflammatory fever, according to the diverse indoles of the venom; and when the contagious miafms arrive at their highest degree, the malignant fever arifeth. The spirits are then knocked down, and the marks of the enemies weapons, the fpots, &c. appear. This (the Doctor continued) is the cafe of your lady, and, therefore the thing to be done is, to make the malignant tack about to the mild, and produce an extinction of the ferment, and relief of the symptoms. This I endeavour to do by alexipharmics and veficatories, and by fubduing the poifon by the bark and the warmer antidotes. Thus did my Doctor marihal his animal fpirits, fight them against the enemy venom, to great difadvantage. If his talk was not romance, it was plain his fpirits were routed, and venom was getting the day. His alexipharmics and warm antidotes, were good for nothing. The malady increased.

This being the cafe I fent again in hafte for a fourth doctor, a man of greater learning than the other three, and therefore, in opinion, oppofite, and against their management of the fever. This great man was Dr. Fraft. He was a mechanician, and affirmed that, the folid parts of the human body are fubjected to the rules of geometry, and the fluids to the hydrostatics; and there

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fore, to keep the machine in right order, that is, in a state of health, an equilibrium muft be maintained, or restored, if destroyed. The balance must not turr to one fide or the other. To reftore fanity in acute cafes, and in chronic too, our business is to prevent the veffels being elevated or depreft beyond the standard of nature: when either happens, the divifion of the blood is increased, the motion is augmented, and fo beget a fever. There cannot be an inordinate elevation of the oily or fiery parts of the blood, till the veffels vibrate above the ftandard of nature.

In a flight fever, the blood increases but little above the balance; but if more than one day, turns to a fynochus, which is but the fame fever augmented beyond the balance of nature. This turns to a putrid fynochus, and this to a caufus. This is the cafe of your lady. From an elevated contraction (the Doctor continued, to my amazement,) her blood obtains a greater force and motion; hence greater divifion, hence an increafe of quantity and fluidity: and thus from greater divifion, motion and quantity increased, arifes that heat and thirst, with the other concomitant fymptoms of her fever; for the blood dividing faster than it can be detached through the perspiratory

fpiratory emunctories of the fkin, is the immediate cause of the heart's preternatural beating: And this preternatural divifion of the blood arifes from the additional quantity of obftructed perfpirable matter, added to the natural quantity of the blood.

Things being fo, (the Doctor went on) and the fever rifing by the blood's dividing fafter than can be detached by the feveral emunctories; and this from an elevation of the folids above the balance, we must then ftrive to take off the tenfion of the folids, and fubtract the cause. This makes me begin in a manner quite contrary to the other phyficians, and I doubt not but I fhall foon get the better of the fury and orgafm, make an alteration in the black fcabrous tongue, and by according with the modus of nature, throw forth the matter of the difeafe. I will enable nature to extricate herfelf. I hope to disentangle her from the weight.

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Thus did this very learned man enlarge; and while he talked of doing wonders, the dry and parched skin, the black and brushy tongue, the crufty fur upon the teeth, and all the fignals of an incendium within, declared her diffolution very near. As the ferum diminished faft, and the intestine motion of the craffamentum increased, nature D 4

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was brought to her last struggles. All the difmal harbingers of a general wreck appeared, to give the by-ftanders notice of approaching death. She died the ninth day, by the ignorance of four learned Phyficians. Had thefe Gentlemen confidered the fever no otherwife than as a disease arif ing from fome unufual ferment, stirred up among the humours of the blood, disturbing both those natural motions and functions of the body, hindering perfpiration, and thereby giving quick and large acceffion to fuch parts of the aliment or liquors taken down, as are difpofed to ferment; and there is always a trong difpofition that way; for the blood has a three-fold motion,---fluidity, common to all liquors,---protrusive, from the impulfe of the heart and arteries,---and fermentative, that is, a motion throughout of all its parts, which quality is owing to the diffimilar parts of the blood; --- for being a compound of various particles, there muft be a colluctation when they occur, and of confequence, a continual fermentation: As this is just and moderatè, it is for the good of the animal, and purifies the blood: if it is too much, it tends to a fever ---if it ftill increases, it produces the burning caujus: Hard is the ftruggle then, and if nature cannot difpume, even helped by art, the patient has no hazard for life:

Hence