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.

by John Maubray

III. THE strict CONFINEMENT of its narrow Lodging; the Womb being now too little to accommodate and entertain the well-grown-Infant: Like to the Young of Birds or Fowls; which neither finding sufficient Aliment nor Room in the Egg, restlessly seek for Both, and in vain endeavour for Either, until at last they break the Pellicules: Which as soon as the Mother perceives, she scratches or pecks the Shell, and so brings out the oppressed indigent Chicken. Thus also in the Womb, it happens not unlike; for, when the Membranes break, the Humours and Blood flow plentifully; and upon this Occasion various Pains afflict the Woman: Which are always the greater and more severe in the First BIRTH; because of the Coarctation of the Passages, besides the Party’s being unaccustomed to such sorrowful Griefs, and penetrating Pains.

NOW the Reasons why Women only, are so much afflicted with dolorous Pains in BIRTH (the rest of the Creatures being in a great measure of Proportion exempted from them) ought, as some Divines would have us believe, to be ascribed only to the SIN of the First Woman; God resolving (for that Reason) to punish her whole Sex, by subjecting them to those Calamities mentioned in the holy Scripture[^[148]]: “I will greatly multiply thy Sorrow, and thy Conception; in Sorrow thou shalt bring forth Children, &c.”——

BUT besides this Doctrine, I conceive there are Four very considerable natural Causes that may be reasonably assign’d for it; viz.

I. THE DEBILITY of Human Nature, which in Time of Labour requires sometimes the whole Strength of the Woman, and sometimes that of the INFANT too; and that commonly above what Either can well afford.

II. THE dull Sedentary Life which Women generally lead and indulge themselves in; as appears plain from what I have often observed in Germany and Holland: For the Women of those Countries generally accustoming themselves to some sort of active Labour and industrious Exercise, have much easier BIRTHS than any Others that I know.

III. BUT one general and universal Reason of it is, that the Bone call’d Os Coccygis, which is loosely join’d to the inferiour Extremity of the Bone call’d Sacrum, bending outwards during the Time of Labour; as the CHILD advances, its Head presseth the Gut call’d Rectum hard against it; which causeth most severe, acute, and extreme PAINS.

IV. ANOTHER principal and universal Reason of it, is, the Bulk of the Head of the INFANT; which (according to Albertus Magnus) is equal in the time of BIRTH, to the rest of the Whole Man; causing a violent Dilatation of the Womb, that is very strait in comparison of this Bulk; and That being a very sensible Membranous Composition, This must (of Necessity) occasion most grievous and almost intolerable PAINS. Whence I come to

CHAP. XLI.
Of the CAUSES of a sooner, or later BIRTH.

MANY great Men have written and answer’d promiscuously on this Head, suggesting a vast Variety of Reasons for it: But as Every One is left to think and judge the Best he can for Himself, so I shall (in this place) only animadvert upon Those Causes, which I most entirely approve of; and as they are Fivefold, so I think, they either depend upon the Genital Seed; the Formative Faculty; the Temperature of the Womb; the Constitution of the Woman; or the Influence of Superiour Bodies.