The Works of Sir Thomas Browne, Volume 1Browne, Thomas, Sir
Religion
The Works of Sir Thomas Browne, Volume 1
Browne, Thomas, Sir
Christianity; Ethics; Religion and medicine
He deludeth us also by Philters, Ligatures, Charms, ungrounded Amulets,
Characters, and many superstitious ways in the cure of common diseases:
seconding herein the expectation of men with events of his own
contriving. Which while some unwilling to fall directly upon Magick,
impute unto the power of imagination, or the efficacy of hidden causes,
he obtains a bloody advantage: for thereby he begets not only a false
opinion, but such as leadeth the open way of destruction. In maladies
admitting natural reliefs, making men rely on remedies, neither of real
operation in themselves, nor more then seeming efficacy in his
concurrence. Which whensoever he pleaseth to withdraw, they stand naked
unto the mischief of their diseases: and revenge the contempt of the
medicines of the Earth which God hath created for them. And therefore
when neither miracle is expected, nor connection of cause unto effect
from natural grounds concluded; however it be sometime successful, it
cannot be safe to rely on such practises, and desert the known and
authentick provisions of God. In which rank of remedies, if nothing in
our knowledge or their proper power be able to relieve us, we must with
patience submit unto that restraint, and expect the will of the
Restrainer.
Now in these effects although he seems oft-times to imitate, yet doth he
concur unto their productions in a different way from that spirit which
sometime in natural means produceth effects above Nature. For whether he
worketh by causes which have relation or none unto the effect, he maketh
it out by secret and undiscerned ways of Nature. So when _Caius_ the
blind, in the reign of _Antoninus_, was commanded to pass from the right
side of the Altar unto the left, to lay five fingers of one hand
thereon, and five of the other upon his eys; although the cure succeeded
and all the people wondered, there was not any thing in the action which
did produce it, nor any thing in his power that could enable it
thereunto. So for the same infirmity, when _Aper_ was counselled by him
to make a Collyrium or ocular medicine with the blood of a white Cock
and Honey, and apply it to his eyes for three days: When _Julian_ for
his spitting of blood, was cured by Honey and Pine nuts taken from his
Altar: When _Lucius_ for the pain in his side, applied thereto the ashes
from his Altar with wine; although the remedies were somewhat rational,
and not without a natural vertue unto such intentions, yet need we not
believe that by their proper faculties they produced these effects.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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