MEDICINE
39
MEDICINE
alba, cassia, ladanum, ijalbamcm, frankincense, storax, nard, gum of various trees, musk, hlatta byzantina ; and these minerals — bitumen, natrum, borax, alum, clay, ai'tites, quicksilver, litharge, yellow arsenic. The fol- lowing preparations were also well known : Theriacas, an antidote prepared from serpents; various medicinal drinks, e. g. from the fruit-bearing rosemary ; decoction of ^vine with vegetables; mixture of wine, honey, and pepper; of oil, wine, and water; of asparagus and other roots steeped in wine; emetics, purging draughts, sopo- rifics, potions to produce abortion or fruitfulness ; and various salves, some used cosmetically, e. g. to remove hair; some for wounds and other injuries. The forms of medicaments were cataplasm, electuary, liniment, plaster (Isa. i, 6; Jer. viii, 22; xlvi, 11; li, 8; Josephus, War, i,33,5), powder, infusion, decoction, essence, syrup, mixture.
An occasional trace occurs of some chemical knowl- edge, e. g. the calcination of the gold by Moses; the ef- fect of "vinegar upon nitre" (Exod. xxxii, 20; Prov. XXV, 20; com p. Jer. ii, 22). The mention of " the apoth- ecary" (Exod. XXX, 35 ; Eccl. x, 1), and of the merchant in "powders" (Cant, iii, 6), shows that a distinct and important brancli of trade was set up in these wares, in which, as at a modern druggist's, articles of luxury, etc., are combined with the remedies of sickness (see further, "Wunderbar, Istes Heft, p. 73, ad fin.).
Among the most favorite of external remedies has always been the bath. As a preventive of numerous disorders its virtues were known to the Egyptians, and the scrupulous Levitical bathings prescribed by Moses would merely enjoin the continuance of a practice fa- miliar to the Jews, from the example especially of the priests in that country. Besides the significance of moral purity which it carried, the use of the bath check- ed tlie tendency to become unclean by violent perspira- tions from within and effluvia from without ; it kept the porous system in play, and stopped the outset of much disease. In order to make the sanction of health more solemn, most Oriental nations have enforced purificatory rites by religious mandates — and so the Jews. A treatise collecting all the dicta of ancient medicine on the use of the bath has been current ever since the revival of learning, under tlie title De Balneis. According to it, Hippocrates and Galen prescribe the bath medicinally in peripneumonia ratlier than in burning fever, as tend- ing to allay the pain of the sides, chest, and back, pro- moting various secretions, removing lassitude, and sup- pling joints. A hot bath is recommended for those suffering from lichen (De Bain. p. 464). Those, on the contrary, v.'ho have looseness of the bowels, who are languid, loathe their food, are troubled with nausea or bile, should not use it, as neither should the epileptic. After exhausting journeys in the sun, the bath is com- mended as the restorative of moisture to the frame (p. 45G-458). The four objects which ancient authorities chiefly proposed to attain by bathing are — 1, to warm and distil the elements of the body throughout the whole frame, to equalize whatever is abnormal, to rarefy the skin, and promote evacuations through it ; 2, to re- duce a dry to a moister habit; 3 (the cold bath), to cool the frame and brace it; 4 (the warm bath), a sudorific to expel cold. Exercise before bathing is recommend- ed, and in the season from April till November inclusive it is the most conducive to health ; if it be kept up in the other months, it should then be but once a week, and that fasting. Of natural waters some are nitrous, some saline, some aluminous, some sulphureous, some bituminous, some copperish, some ferruginous, and some compounded of these. Of all the natural waters the power is, on the whole, desiccant and calefacient, and they are peculiarly fitted for those of a humid and cold habit. Pliny (//. N. xxxi) gives the fullest extant ac- count of the thermal springs of the ancients {Paul. yEyiii. ed. Sydenh. Soc. i. 71). Avicenna gives precepts for salt and other mineral baths ; the former he recom- mends in case of scurvv and itching, as rarefving the
skin, and afterwards condensing it. Waters medicated with alum, natron, sulphur, naphtha, iron, litharge, vit- riol, and vinegar, are also specified by him. Friction and unction are prescribed, and a caution given against staying too long in the water (ibid. p. 338-340 ; comp. Aetius, De Bain, iv, 484). A sick bather should lie quiet,, and allow others to rub and anoint him, and use no strigil (the common instrument for scraping the skin), but a sponge (p. 456). Maimonides, chiefly following Galen, recommends the bath, especially for phthisis in the aged, as being a case of dryness with cold habit, and to a hectic-fever patient as being a case of dr\-ness with hot habit ; also in cases of ephemeral and tertian fevers, under certain restrictions, and in putrid fevers, with the caution not to incur shivering. Bathing is dangerous to those who feel pain in the liver after eating. He adds cautions regarding the kind of water, but these re- late chiefly to water for drinking {De Bain. p. 438, 439). The bath of oil was formed, according to Galen and Aetius, by adding the fifth part of heated oil to a water- bath. . Josephus speaks ( Wa?; i, 33, 5) as though oil had, in Herod's case, been used pure. There were spe- cial occasions on which the bath was ceremonially en- joined— after a leprous eruption healed, after the conju- gal act, or an involuntary emission, or any gonorrhceal discharge, after menstruation, childbed, or touching a corpse ; so f(jr the priests before and during their times of office such a duty was prescribed. The Pharisees and Essenes aimed at scrupulous strictness of all such rules (Matt, xv, 2; Mark vii, 5; Luke xi, 38). River- bathing was common, but houses soon began to include a bath-room (Lev. xv, 13 ; 2 Kings v, 10 ; 2 Sam. xi, 2 ; Susanna 15). Vapor-baths, as among the Romans, were latterly included in these, as well as hot and cold bath apparatus, and the use of perfumes and oils after quit- ting it was everywhere diffused (Wunderbar, 2tes Heft, vol. ii, B). The vapor was sometimes sought to be in- haled, though this was reputed mischievous to the teeth. It was deemed healthiest after a warm to take also a cold bath (Paul. ^-Egin. ed. Sydenh. Soc. i, 68). The Tal- mud has it — " Whoso takes a warm bath, and does not also drink thereupon some warm water, is like a stove hot only from without, but not heated also from within. Whoso bathes, and does not withal anoint, is like the liquor outside a vat. • AVhoso having had a warm bath does not also immediately pour cold water over him, is like an iron made to glow in the fire, but not thereafter hardened in the water." This succession of cold water to hot vapor is commonly practiced in Russian and Polish baths, and is said to contribute much to robust health (Wunderbar, ibid.). See Bathe.