Advice to the people in general, with regard to their health

by S. A. D. Tissot

4, A Cup of the Mixture [Nº. 8] must be taken every two Hours.

5. Blisters are to be applied to the Insides of the Legs.

When the Case is very doubtful and perplexing, it were best to confine ourselves to the three last-mentioned Remedies, which have often been successful in severe Degrees of this Disease; and which can occasion no ill Consequence.

§ 292. When this Malady invades old People, though they partly recover, they never recover perfectly, entirely, from it: and if due Precaution is not taken, they are very liable to fall into a Dropsy of the Breast after it.

§ 293. The spurious or false Pleurisy is a Distemper that does not affect the Lungs, but only the Teguments, the Skin, and the Muscles which cover the Ribs. It is the Effect of a rheumatic Humour thrown upon these Parts, in which, as it produces very sharp Pains resembling that which is called a Stitch, it has from this Circumstance, been termed a Pleurisy.

It is generally supposed by the meer Multitude, and even by some of a different Rank, that a false Pleurisy is more dangerous than a genuine, a true one; but this is a Mistake. It is often ushered in by a Shivering, and almost ever attended with a little Fever, a small Cough, and a slight Difficulty of breathing; which, as well as the Cough, is occasioned from the Circumstance of a Patient's (who feels Pain in Respiration, or Breathing) checking Breathing as much as he can; this accumulates a little too much Blood in the Lungs; but yet he has no Anguish, nor the other Symptoms of acute true Pleurisies. In some Patients this Pain is extended, almost over the whole Breast, and to the Nape of the Neck. The sick Person cannot repose himself on the Side affected.

This Disorder is not more dangerous than a Rheumatism, except in two Cases; 1, When the Pain is so very severe, that the Patient strongly endeavours not to breathe at all, which brings on a great Infarction or Stoppage in the Lungs. 2, When this Humour, like any other rheumatic one, is transferred to some internal Part.

§ 294. It must be treated exactly like a Rheumatism. See [§ 168] and [169].

After bleeding once or more, a Blister applied to the affected Part is often attended with a very good Effect: This being indeed the Kind of [⁷³] Pleurisy, in which it particularly agrees.

§ 295. This Malady sometimes gives Way to the first Bleeding; often terminating on the third, fourth or fifth Day, by a very plentiful Sweat, and rarely lasting beyond the seventh. Sometimes it attacks a Person very suddenly, after a Stoppage of Perspiration; and then, if at once before the Fever commences, and has had Time to inflame the Blood, the Patient takes some Faltrank, it effects a speedy Cure by restoring Perspiration. They are such Cases as these, or that mentioned [§ 96], which have given this Composition the Reputation it has obtained in this Disease: a Reputation nevertheless, which has every Year proved tragical in its Consequences to many Peasants, who being deceived by some misleading Resemblances in this Distemper, have rashly and ignorantly made Use of it in true inflammatory Pleurisies.