wind, &c. After a purge, 3 or 4
grains of bezoar stone, and 3 grains of ambergris, drunk or taken in borage
or bugloss water, in which gold hot hath been quenched, will do much good,
and the purge shall diminish less (the heart so refreshed) of the strength
and substance of the body.

"[Symbol: Rx]. confect. Alkermes [Symbol: Ounce]ss lap. Bezor.
[Symbol: Scruple]j. Succini albi subtiliss. pulverisat. [Symbol:
Scruple]jj. cum Syrup, de cort. citri; fiat electuarium."

To bezoar stone most subscribe, Manardus, and [4328]many others; "it takes
away sadness, and makes him merry that useth it; I have seen some that have
been much diseased with faintness, swooning, and melancholy, that taking
the weight of three grains of this stone, in the water of oxtongue, have
been cured." Garcias ab Horto brags how many desperate cures he hath done
upon melancholy men by this alone, when all physicians had forsaken them.
But alkermes many except against; in some cases it may help, if it be good
and of the best, such as that of Montpelier in France, which [4329]Iodocus
Sincerus, _Itinerario Galliae_, so much magnifies, and would have no
traveller omit to see it made. But it is not so general a medicine as the
other. Fernelius, _consil. 49_, suspects alkermes, by reason of its heat,
[4330]"nothing" (saith he) "sooner exasperates this disease, than the use
of hot working meats and medicines, and would have them for that cause
warily taken." I conclude, therefore, of this and all other medicines, as
Thucydides of the plague at Athens, no remedy could be prescribed for it,
_Nam quod uni profuit, hoc aliis erat exitio_: there is no Catholic
medicine to be had: that which helps one, is pernicious to another.

_Diamargaritum frigidum, diambra, diaboraginatum, electuarium laetificans
Galeni et Rhasis, de gemmis, dianthos, diamoscum dulce et amarum,
electuarium conciliatoris, syrup. Cidoniorum de pomis_, conserves of roses,
violets, fumitory, enula campana, satyrion, lemons, orange-pills, condite,
&c., have their good use.

[4331] "[Symbol: Rx]. Diamoschi dulcis et amari ana [Symbol: Dram]jj.
Diabuglossati, Diaboraginati, sacchari violacei ana j. misce cum
syrupo de pomis."

Every physician is full of such receipts: one only I will add for the
rareness of it, which I find recorded by many learned authors, as an
approved medicine against dotage, head-melancholy, and such diseases of the
brain. Take a [43