The virtues of common water

by John Smith

What sweating most natural.

In short, he affirms, and that with great reason, that sweating in fevers, by drinking cold water, is more natural than to do it with hot sudorifics, which often do harm in the beginning of fevers, except good store of cooling moistning liquors are drank with them, they being more apt to inflame than cool and quench heat in the body; and for that reason sweating hath not been often advised by physicians, because they were ignorant of this way of sweating to cure fevers, by drinking cold water.

Which cure, he said, did succeed in one who was his relation, at the fifth day after his falling sick; to whom he gave a dose of water after he was in bed, and he sweated profusely for twenty-four hours, and thereby was cured. Half a pint, he saith, is enough for a grown child; a pint to a man or woman, tho’ if they drink a quart, it will be better. And in scarlet fevers, small pox, or measles, tho’ the water will not cause sweat, yet it will so quell and keep under the fever, that the eruptions will come out more kindly; which is a confirmation of what before was said about Dr. Bett’s prescribing two quarts of water, when the small pox did not come out kindly; the water afforded matter to fill them up, according to what the author observes of a certain person, in the history of Cold Bathing, p. 347., that he could give an hundred instances where people of all ages have been lost, by being denied drink in the small pox,——for it hinders the filling of the pustules.

Plague.

And Dr. Hancock sets down an account of the author of the Free-thinker, concerning a woman, who in the last great plague fell ill of that distemper, who got her husband to fetch her a pitcher of water from Lambs-conduit; she drank plentifully of it, but did not avoid the cold, and so did not sweat, however she was cured. And he gives us another relation of an Englishman, formerly resident at Morocco, that fell ill of the plague at that place, and, getting water to drink, fell into a violent sweat, and recovered: From whence the doctor concludes, that water is good in the plague; agreeable to what is related in Sir John Floyer’s book of Cold Baths, wherein it is said, that but two died of the plague who lived over the water upon London bridge, p. 223, the coolness of the air being supposed to contribute to their health who inhabited on the water in that manner, their blood being cooler than others: It is said also, the watermen escaped better than others.

I will here add to what the doctor hath said before, concerning the cure of fevers, that if the fever be accompanied in the beginning with any great illness at the stomach, nauseating or vomiting, it will be the surest and safest practice to clear the stomach first, by vomiting with warm water, as before directed; for I cannot believe it possible for the stomach to be cleared from foul humours by sweating. It may do, if no great sense of disorder is perceived there; but it will certainly be safest to cleanse the stomach first, which is the place where all diseases have their original; for then sweating with cold water afterwards may turn to good account. Indeed I have not made any trial of it since the doctor’s book was published, but I have a very good opinion of his accounts therein given concerning the benefit of water, having had so much experience thereof in my own practice for above forty years; for so long it is since I first began to collect those accounts, and make those experiments, which are herein made public for the benefit of all. I will only add, that in a book, intituled, Organum Salutis, p. 50. written by Judge Rumsey, he saith, he never found any thing more useful for the health of man, than to drink first in the morning half a pint of cold water; and this will contribute much to the cure of blood-shotten eyes.

Since the last edition of this work, there hath been published An Essay of Health and long Life, Pag. 42, 43, 44. by Dr. Cheyne, wherein this truth is asserted too, ‘That water was the primitive, original beverage—(and happy had it been for the race of mankind, if other mixt and artificial liquors had never been invented) and that water alone is sufficient and effectual for all the purposes of human wants in drink. Strong liquors were never designed for common use, tho’ now we see the better sort scarce ever dilute their food with any other liquor: And thereby we see their blood becomes inflamed into gout, stone, rheumatisms, raging fevers, and pleurisies; and their passions enraged into quarrels, murders, and blasphemies; their juices dried up; and their solids scorched and shriveled.’ This author, p. 46., exclaims against strong drinks, as the root of one half of all the human miseries; but finds they are unwilling to leave them off, pretending the danger of all sudden changes. But he alledgeth, ‘That he hath known good and constant effects from leaving off suddenly great quantities of wine, and flesh-meats too, by those accustomed to both; and never observed any ill consequences from it in any case whatsoever; but that broken constitutions have thereby lived longer, and grown better, by so doing.’

Some few, and but very few, have pretended, that by leaving off wine and strong drink, and using only water, they found their bodies weakened: But this perhaps may proceed only from the same fancy which made the lady believe her doctor could not cure her, because he did not keep a coach. There may be some constitutions that water doth not agree with, even as cheese will not agree with some: Nay, I once met with an ancient woman, who affirmed, she could not, and never did eat bread. And there are so few in comparison to them who have found benefit by the use of water, to those who have not, that no wise man will refrain on their account, till, upon trial, he really finds it will not agree with him.

One of the most ingenious watch-makers in London, very lately, from a long continued flux, was very much weakened, and entirely lost his appetite, so far that he could eat no food whatsoever: He had the advice of an able physician, his intimate acquaintance, who could not give him any relief: He, upon reading my book, came to ask me, whether I thought he might venture to drink water? I thereupon prevailed with him to drink half a pint of cold water going to bed, and half a pint in the morning: He, tho’ an immoderate drinker of wine before, was so far from being injured by it, that in a fortnight he began to eat, and in about a month recovered as good a date of health and countenance as he had before.