Chemical and medical researches on kreosote : its preparation, properties, and use / by E. Miguet ; translated from the French by William Wetherill.

  • Miguet, E.
Date:
1835
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Chemical and medical researches on kreosote : its preparation, properties, and use / by E. Miguet ; translated from the French by William Wetherill. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    escaped the contagion; that it cleared the voice, made healthy the constitution, exhilarated the spirits in cases of melancholy, and cor- rected the acrimony of the blood. Following these arguments, at the same time earnest and logical, Boerhaave assures us that scurvy causes pleurisy, colic, malignant and putrid fevers, &c, and that the water of tar will cure the scurvy, consequently it would cure all the other diseases. Some authors believe that erysipelis and plague differ from each other only in de- gree, but I have seen this water cure erysipelis; it ought then to cure plague. The Bishop of Cloyne, in his enthusiastic praise of tar water, recommended it as very salutary for sailors and all seafaring men, frankly avowing that he thought it a panacea, and that in the hope of obtaining for the human race the adoption of a remedy by which he had cured thousands of individuals, he would willingly suffer all kinds of ridicule; and as the ancient philosopher who cried from the housetop to his fellow-citizens, mind and bring up your chil- dren well, I wish, said he, I was able to place myself sufficiently high, and had a voice strong enough to cry to all the infirm—Drink the water of tar! Who is not sensible, that whatever is ridiculous is equally enthu- siastic ? But in taking the part of exaggeration, and leaving the side of reason, it is more than singular that the Bishop of Cloyne, on the modus operandi of this substance, should not have overlook- ed the basis of these observations, but rejected it without previous examination. Is it not astonishing, that a medicine formerly of such great repute, should have fallen almost into complete disuse ? Doctor Caster avowed, that when reading the works of Berkley, he was so struck with the praises bestowed on the water of tar, he could not avoid thinking of the collection of cures almost miraculous. On this account, for two years previous to the discovery of Kreo- sote, he made use of it in a number of cases. He assures us this medicine is a great discovery, of which he has learned to appre- ciate the good effects, above all, in the convalescence from cholera. Berkley, however, was not the first who extolled the virtues of the water of tar. The ancients, among whom we will mention Aretus, Coelius Aurelianus, &c, assigned to it analogous properties: Jlstimaticas et purulentes adjuvat, said Galen, abstergendi vim habet, glutinendis vulneribus aptior. It is said that Hippocrates sent 3