Johann Reuchlin (1455-1522) was the first great German humanist. His services to learning were chiefly in connection with the restoration of Hebrew and Greek letters in Germany. He worshipped truth as his god, was interested in philosophy, especially in that of the Cabala, in which he sought a theosophy which should reconcile science with religion. His sentiments brought him into conflict with the Inquisition, but by appeal to Rome, after a long and tedious process, the trial was quashed; the consequence being that the lovers of learning and progress banded themselves together against the opponents of learning, and assured the progress of the principles of the Renaissance in Germany. Reuchlin was the author of a celebrated work, entitled De Verbo Mirifico.
The Sweating Sickness.
The disease known as the sweating sickness first made its appearance in England in 1485, after the battle of Bosworth. It followed in the rear of Henry’s victorious army, and spread in a few weeks from Wales to the metropolis. It is described by Hecker[814] as being “a violent inflammatory fever, which, after a short rigor, prostrated the powers as with a blow; and amidst painful oppression at the stomach, headache, and lethargic stupor, suffused the whole body with a fetid perspiration.”
Holinshed[815] describes it thus: “Suddenlie a deadlie burning sweat so assailed their bodies and distempered their blood with a most ardent heat, that scarce one amongst an hundred that sickened did escape with life; for all in maner as soone as the sweat took them, or within a short time after, yeelded the ghost. Two lord mayors and six aldermen died within one week. Many who went to bed at night perfectly well were dead on the following morning; the victims, for the most part, were the robust and vigorous. One attack gave no security against a second; many were seized even a third time.” The whole of England was visited by this plague by the end of the year. When it reached Oxford, professors and students fled in all directions, and the University was entirely deserted for six weeks. Medicine afforded little or no relief. Even Thomas Linacre, the founder of the Royal College of Physicians in 1518, does not in his writings say a word about the disease. As the doctors failed to help the people, their common sense had to suffice them in their need. They decided to take no violent medicine, but to apply moderate heat; take little food and drink, and quietly wait for twenty-four hours—the crisis of the disorder. “Those who were attacked during the day, in order to avoid any chill, immediately went to bed in their clothes; and those who sickened by night did not rise from their beds in the morning; while all carefully avoided exposing to the air even a hand or foot.”[816]
The five years preceding the outbreak of this epidemic had been unusually wet, and inundations had been frequent. It is probable that this was one of the causes which contributed to the unhealthy condition of the atmosphere. The disease partook of the character of rheumatic fever, with great disorder of the nervous system.[817] In addition to the profuse and injurious perspiration, oppressed respiration, extreme anxiety, nausea, and vomiting, indicating that the functions of the eighth pair of nerves were disturbed, were the general symptoms of the malady. A stupor and profound lethargy indicated cerebral disturbance, possibly from a morbid condition of the blood.
Tarantism.
Tarantism was a disease somewhat akin to the dancing mania. Nicholas Perotti (1430-1480) first described it. It was believed to originate from the bite of the Apulian spider, called the tarantula, as it was named by the Romans. Those who were bitten, or who believed themselves to have been bitten, became melancholic and stupefied, but greatly sensible to the influence of music. As soon as they heard their favourite melodies, they sprang up and danced till they sank exhausted to the ground. Others became hysterical, and some even died in a paroxysm of tears or laughter. By the close of the fifteenth century Tarantism had spread beyond the boundaries of Apulia in which it originated, and many other cities and villages of Italy were afflicted with the mania. Thus when the spider made his appearance the merry notes of the Tarantella resounded as the only cure for its bite, or the mental poison received through the eye, and thus the Tarantali cure became established as a popular festival.[818]
Quarantine, according to William Brownrigg, who wrote in 1771 a book on the plague, was first established by the Venetians in 1484. Dr. Mead was probably the source of this information.[819]