Richard Blackmore
A Treatise upon the Small-Pox
Published by Good Press, 2021
EAN 4064066442026
Table of Contents
Of the several Sorts or Species of the Small-Pox .
Of the Method of Cure .
THE
PREFACE.
HE Colleges of Learning employed in enquiring into Nature, and searching after the Causes of Things, for many successive Ages, unhappily proceeded in such Ways and Methods, as rather obstructed than promoted the End they had in View: For they formed nothing but notional Systems, and Schemes of Speculation, falsly called Science, the trifling Play of Fancy, and the idle Labour of the Closet. These curious Subtleties, for want of firm and solid Foundations to rest upon, hung in their Brain, and floated in their Imaginations like fine-wrought Cobwebs, or the loose Threads, that in frosty Mornings are caught in Hedges, or hover in the Air; and for this Reason it is, that natural Science has received
so little Improvement and Augmentation since the Schools of Philosophers were first erected, even down to the last Age: For the Masters of the various Sells of Scholars having not unravelled the Principles of Nature, nor searched accurately into the Order and Connexion of Causes and Effects, it is no wonder that being unfurnished with Experiments and Observations they made no Advances, but to their great Dishonour, with much Sweat and Application, left to Posterity their lame and insignificant Plans: And all Progress and Improvement must have been denied to all useful Learning, and the succeeding Ages must have sat down satisfied with knowing no more than the dry and jejune Schemes of antient
Greece,
had not some of a more inquisitive Genius, and better Judgment in these later Times, plainly seen that the eldest Philosophers began at the wrong End in searching after Science; that they formed precarious and extravagant Systems, and built Castles of Philosophy in the Air, which had no Pillars, that is, no Observations and Tryals able to support them. These therefore took another and the right Method to come at the Knowledge of Nature, by entring into her secret Operations, and finding out the Coherence of
Causes and Effects, and making one Discovery confess another, while by the Aids of Chymistry, and innumerable Experiments, they endeavoured to learn the Properties and Energy of Things. This was certainly to act like Men of Reason and Reflection; for if any substantial and solid Scheme of natural Philosophy, that will abide the Test, and satisfy judicious Men, shall ever be produced by human Industry, it must be done this Way, by which the Compiler of it will have sufficient Observations and Experiments as Vouchers, to warrant and uphold all his Positions
.
And as the Knowledge of experimental Philosophy is greatly to be prefer’d to that of the Student, who deals in empty Speculations and scholastick Chimeras; so are the Acquisitions and Endowments of the experimental Physician, who has formed his Method of Practice upon sufficient Experience and Observations on the Nature, Progress, and various Symptoms of Diseases, as well as on the Operations and Force of Medicines, far more valuable than the abstruse and unsupported Notions of one, who owes all his Endowments to an active Imagination, and the contemplative Labour of the Closet. It is for this Reason that Dr. Sydenham, who built all his Maxims and Rules of Practice upon repeated Observations of the Nature and Properties of Diseases, and the Power of Remedies, has compiled so good a History of Distempers, and so prevalent a Method of Cure, by which he has improved and advanced the healing Art, much more than Dr. Willis, with all his curious Speculations and fanciful Hypotheses: For what can be expected but crude and unprofitable Conceptions, from Gentlemen, that imagine they have acquired great Attainments in the Art of Curing, and are accomplished Physicians, before they have had the Advantages of Experience and Observation? They may as well imagine they can learn to swim in their Parlours without going into the Water, as to become useful and able Physicians, without being verst in Business, and seeing the various Operations of various Medicines. Such Persons will rather receive great Prejudice from their Systems established only by Contemplation; for when they come from the College into the World, they will be very apt to practice in Conformity to their preconceived Opinions, and instead of erecting a Scheme of Physick upon mature Experience and long and just Observations, they will labour to compel their Experience and Observations to favour and take part with their antecedent Maxims, and settle a Method of Cure by the Influence of a byassed Judgment, and pre-notions of Things. It will be in vain to say, that these Persons, who have not seen much Business, have formed their unpractised Scheme upon the Experience and Observations which they have found in the Writings of many eminent Physicians; for those Authors themselves, at least the generality of them, were such as before they had entred on the Practice of Physick, had established their Maxims and Doctrines in the Schools and Colleges, and not entring upon Business with an unprejudiced and impartial Mind, they formed their Practice and governed their Observations to make them agree with their first Conceptions; and though according to Reason and the Nature of Things they ought in the first Place to have made their Tryals and Remarks, and upon such Vouchers and Authority to have raised a well-concerted Method of Practice; yet almost all Writers of Physick have communicated to us such Accounts of the Causes of Distempers and their Symptoms and Method of Cure, as were strained and wrested to serve an Hypothesis.
But it must be acknowledged that a great Number of Persons, that are designed for this useful Profession, for want of native Genius, Judgment, and Penetration, are uncapable of making just Observations, or drawing right and beneficial Conclusions from them. Their Heads, such is their Unhappiness, are so thick