Primitive Physic: An Easy and Natural Method Curing Most Diseases

When man came first out of the hands of the great Creator, clothed in body as well as in soul, with immortality and incorruption, there was no place for physic, or the art of healing. As he knew no sin, so he knew no pain, no sickness, weakness, or bodily disorder. the habitation wherein the angelic mind, the Divine particular Aura abode, though originally formed out of the dust of the earth, was liable to no decay. It had no seeds of corruption or dissolution within itself. And there was nothing without to injure it: Heaven and earth and all the hosts of them were mild, benign and friendly to human nature. The entire creation was at peace with man, so long as man was at peace with his Creator. So that well might "the morning stars sing together, and all the sons of God shout for joy." 2. But since man rebelled against the Sovereign of heaven and earth, how entirely is the scene changed. The incorruptible frame hath put on corruption, the immortal has put on mortality. The seeds of weakness and pain, of sickness and death, are now lodged in our inmost substance; whence a thousand disorders continually spring, even without the aid of external violence. And how is the number of these increased by every thin* round about us ! The heavens, the earth, and ail things contained therein, conspire to punish the rebels against their Creator. The sun and moon shed unwholesome influences from above; the earth exhales poisonous damps from beneath; the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, the fishes of the sea, are in a state of hostility: the air itself that surrounds us on every side, is replete with the shafts of death: yea, the food we eat, daily saps the foundation of the life which cannot be sustained without it. So has the Lord of all secured the execution of his decree, - " Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return." 3. But can there nothing be found to lessen those inconveniences, which cannot be wholly removed ? To soften the evils of life, and prevent in part the sickness and pain to which we are continually exposed? With- out question there may. One grand preventative of pain and sickness of various kinds, seems intimated by the great Author of nature in the very sentence that entails death upon us: "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return to the ground." The power of exercise, both to preserve and restore health, is greater than can well be conceived; especially in those who add temperance thereto; who if they do not confine themselves altogether to eat either "bread or the herb of the field." (which God does not require them to do) yet steadily observe both that kind and measure of fool, which experience shows to be most friendly to strength and health. 4. It is probable, physic, as well as religion, was in the first ages chiefly traditional: every father delivering down to his sons, what he had himself in like manner received, concerning the manner of healing both outward hurts, and the diseases incident to each climate, and the medicines which were of the greatest efficacy for the cure of each disorder. It is certain, this is the method wherein the art of healing is preserved among the Americans to this day. Their diseases are exceeding few; nor do they often occur, by reason of their continual exercise, and (till of late) universal temperance. But if any are sick, or bit by a serpent, or torn by a wild beast, the fathers immediately tell their children what remedy to apply. And It is rare that the patient suffers long; those medicines being quick, as well as, generally, infallible.