And we are told by Dr. Edward Browne, that a person troubled with the falling-sickness, by happening to fall into a cold spring, (I suppose it was in the time of his fit) was freed from his distemper all his life after: And he saith, there is no need of preparing the body for it in this, as in some other cases. But the patient, when plunged into a cold bath, ought to continue in the bath each time about three or four minutes; for, in plunging over head and ears at his first entrance into a cold bath, the brain will be so sensibly affected, as to be relieved from the distemper, which is a kind of convulsion proceeding from an inflammation, or some other cause; but we want more experiments to confirm this notion: which notion may be worth noticing, that the thing may be tried in others, to see if it will succeed as it did in this person. For it is said by the ingenious Dr. Pitcairn, a Scotsman, sometime professor at Leyden, that there is no such thing as the art of curing, but only the practice; remedies were found out by chance, p. 264, of his works. For when remedies thus happen to be discovered, and prove often to be effectual, the remembering that remedy, to apply it in a like case of practice, brings reputation to the prescriber; but, if it fails, some other experiment must be tried, which, were physic an art, need not be done, because the rules of art are certain, and men depend upon them as such. [Sidenote: _Madness & melancholy._] It is also said by the same Dr. Browne, that madness and melancholy, with all their retinue, may find better effects from the use of bathing in cold water, than from other violent methods, with which people so afflicted are now treated; for, says he, that which will make a drunken man sober in a minute, will certainly go a great way towards the cure of a madman in a month. Now it is most certain, to my own knowledge, that, if a drunken man be plunged over head and ears in cold water, he will come out of it perfectly sober: And some I have known, that in such cases have been recovered by barely washing their heads in cold water. Which fore-mentioned opinion of Dr. Browne is confirmed by the practice of Dr. Blair, who, in a letter to Dr. Baynard, declares, that he cured a man raving mad, who being bound in a cart, stript off his clothes, and blindfolded, that the surprise might be the greater; he on a sudden had a great fall of water let down upon him from the height of twenty foot, under which he continued so long as his strength would permit: And, after his return home, he fell into a sleep, and slept twenty-nine hours, and awaked in as quiet a state of mind as ever, and so had continued to the time of writing that letter, which was twelve months. Distraction also in fevers, of which there are divers instances in the history of _Cold Baths_, has been cured by being plunged in cold water. _See p. 226._