The Female Physician: Containing all the diseases incident to that sex, in virgins, wives, and widows; together with their causes and symptoms, their degrees of danger, and respective methods of prevention and cure: to which is added, the whole art of new improv'd midwifery; comprehending the necessary qualifications of a midwife, and particular directions for laying women, in all cases of difficult and preternatural births; together with the diet and regimen of both the mother and child.Maubray, John
Science
The Female Physician: Containing all the diseases incident to that sex, in virgins, wives, and widows; together with their causes and symptoms, their degrees of danger, and respective methods of prevention and cure: to which is added, the whole art of new improv'd midwifery; comprehending the necessary qualifications of a midwife, and particular directions for laying women, in all cases of difficult and preternatural births; together with the diet and regimen of both the mother and child.
Maubray, John
Midwifery -- Early works to 1800; Obstetrics -- Early works to 1800
I ingenuously acknowledge, when I first met with this _Author’s Works_,
not daring then to be too _Positive_ in this _Point_, I was put into
some _Suspence_ of Judgment; which made me not only consult with the
best of _Authors_ and _Professors_ of ANATOMY, but also induc’d me to
embrace every Opportunity of satisfying myself otherways to a full
_Conviction_.
WHEREFORE at all _Dissections_ of _pregnant Women_, where I have been
present, I carefully observed and took notice of this particular
_Point_; upon which I must needs affirm, that I always found the _WOMB_
(however _Big_ or _Little_) of its _natural Thickness_, and rather
_thicker_ than _thinner_: For tho’ _It_ is expanded by the _growing
Infant_, &c. yet _it_ may (most probably) be equally condensed, by the
Imbibition of the _fluent Humours_, which consolidate into _itself_ by
the _Pores_ of its _Plexus Body_. Nay, I have not only satisfy’d myself
in _dead_, but also in _living Bodies_, with respect to this Matter; for
by passing _One Hand_ into the _WOMB_ to take away the _Secundine_, when
the _Other_ laid upon the BELLY, I clearly discerned the _Truth_ by
SENSE, and have sometimes found the _WOMB_ not only incredibly _Thick_,
but also RIGID withal: And in this Matter, I have not been singular; for
I find the _ingenious Daventer_ writes to the same purpose, upon this
_Head_, in his Book of _Midwifery_. Having therefore thus, in short,
perceiv’d the _Thickness_ of the _WOMB_, both with my _Hands_ and
_Eyes_, I must trust my SENSES, and prefer my _Experience_ before any
_Man’s bare Conjecture_; for tho’ I often _see not_ those Things which I
_believe_, yet I must still _believe_ those Things which I _see_.
WHENCE I conclude, that the _WOMB_, tho’ of a different _Bigness_ from
the _Conception_ to the BIRTH, is always, at least, of one _Thickness_
with the _unconceiv’d_ WOMB: Which the _Divine Wisdom_ (no doubt) has so
ordered for the _Preservation_ of the MOTHER and INFANT; for if the
_WOMB_ in Time of _Pregnancy_ did grow _Thinner_, according to its
_Extension_, it must of Consequence grow _Weaker_, and, in that _Case_
the INFANT would be liable to perforate it with _Foot_ or _Hand_, which
would infallibly terminate in the _Loss_ of both their LIVES.
BUT besides, if the _WOMB_ was so _Thin_ and _Weak_ as Mr. _Mauriceau_
imagines; as the _Pregnant Woman_ would be liable to imminent _Danger_
every Moment _Before_, as well as _In Time_ of LABOUR; so the MIDWIFE
would be expos’d to the greatest of _Difficulties_: For who then durst,
without _Horror_, offer to turn the INFANT, so closely compress’d in
those _thin Membranes_ of the _WOMB_? Or who could have _Resolution_
enough to separate and pull away the AFTER-BIRTH?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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