THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES THE SYDENHAM SOCIETY INSTITUTED MDCCCXLIII LONDON MDCCCXI.VHI THE WORKS OF THOMAS SYDENHAM. M.D. TRANSLATED FBOM THE LATIN EDITION OF DR. GREENHILL A LIFE OF THE AUTHOR R. G. LATHAM, M.D. KTC. KTC. ETC. IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. I. LONDON PRINTED FOR THE SYDENHAM SOCIETY MDCCCXLVIU. C. AND J. ARI-ARD, PRINTKRS, BARTHOLOMEW CM*' "R V.) TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. THE present translation is from the text of Dr. GREENHILI/S edition; a work of great care and accuracy, and one from which the notes and indices have supplied the present writer with an amount of information that has materially lightened his labour. The latitude that he has allowed himself in rendering the Latin of the original into equivalent English may, to some, appear considerable : nevertheless, it is considered not to exceed the average latitude recognised by the translators of long works. This permits the breaking up of long and compound periods, the fusion of many simple sentences into a few complex ones, the conversion of parenthetic observations into independent sen- tences, transpositions, and similar licences. But it does not admit misrepresentations, omissions, or additions. It may be necessary to suggest to the reader that, although the Latin style of the works of Sydenham is highly valued, and, with the single fault of being somewhat too studiously idiomatic, is altogether worthy both of its subject and its author, it is far from improbable that the English equivalent may disappoint such readers as are prepared, or over-prepared, with their admiration. Now the responsibility for any difference between the merits of our author in his original garb and his English dress lies only partially with the translator. That some of it lies with him, it is unnecessary to affirm. Some, however, is attributable to another cause. There is one style for the Latin writer of Rome, and another for the English writer of Great b 865578 vi TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. Britain. Neither of them, however, is the style of the English- man who writes Latin. In this latter case the sense is almost in to the always, some degree, sacrificed the expression ; question being not so much what to say, as how to say it. Hence unim- portant matters are expanded into well-rounded sentences, ideas are introduced simply for the sake of the metaphor, quotation, or idiom, that shall embody them, and words, and clauses, find their way into sentences, not because they are wanted, but be- cause they are classical. Sydenham, for instance, is rarely content to say that his patient died. He says, ivit ad plures ; literally, he went over to the majority. Expressions like these can rarely be rendered exact it is to like by equivalents ; yet expressions these that the original Latin owes much of its Latinity. The main difficulty, however, is this: viz. that when the idea of a writer of modern Latin has been expanded into its Latin form, it often shrinks and looks small when retranslated into English. Any one may verify this by translating a sentence of any classical modern antique, e. g. Parr's Preface to Bellendenus. Virtually, the present work is the re-translation rather of translation a fact of which the (or re/ro-translation) a ; reader should be reminded, since the version of bulky works in modern Latin, sufficiently modern to suggest the sacrifice of matter to manner, and sufficiently classical to claim attention on the score of style only, has been too unfrequent to make the necessary allowances in the matter of criticism fairly under- stood, and generally admitted. At first sight all this may appear to constitute a reason for de- parting somewhat widely from the original, and for not following it in its sacrifices to a classical form of expression; for keeping to the exposition of the matter only, and being satisfied with giving the observations and opinions of Sydenham irrespective of the form in which they are embodied. Now, if the publication of an English Sydenham, by a Society bearing his name, and with which he is pre-eminently classical, had been undertaken TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. vii with no other view than that of giving the results of his expe- rience and reflection in a simply historical form, a mere general accuracy would have been sufficient, and the translator might have looked only to putting his book in the most readable form possible. I fear, however, that, in the present instance, scholars, at least, will (subject to the latitude indicated above) expect verbal as well as material closeness; since Sydenham in an English dress is a fact, not merely in medicine, but in medical literature as well. It was a decided opinion upon this point, combined with the fact of the previous versions of Peachey and Swann, representing in point of style and language neither the English of Sydenham's time, nor that of our own (whilst they of were as little remarkable for beauty of style, as for fidelity representation), that determined the Society upon preferring a full and fresh translation in toto, to a modification of either of the earlier English ones. In respect to the translation of the names of the different articles of Sydenham's Pharmacopoeia, I have generally taken the English synonyms from Lewis's translation of an old Edin- burgh Pharmacopoeia, and from Peachey's English translation, checked by reference to either Gerard's Herbal, or Nemnich's Polyglot Vocabulary of the Terms used in Natural History. All four sources, however, must be used with caution, and that for the following reason. The tendency of writers who under- take to render into their own tongue the specific and scientific names of such botanical, mineralogical, or zoological objects as occur in their original authors, to translate the Latin term verbally rather than really, is almost universal. Yet the difference is broad a little consideration that a name in ; and may show English is frequently a very different thing from an English name. Out of the four English species of the genus Bupleurum, three are more or less narrow-leaved, and, as such, with leaves capable of being compared to a hare's ear. Indeed (some or viii TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. all) they are so compared, and the term hare's ear has really been given to one (or more) of the species, viz. odontites, tenuissi- mum, and falcatum. But the botanical translation of Bupleurum odontites, as narrow-leaved hare's ear ; tenuissimum, as slender hare's ear ; falcatum, as falcate hare's ear, constitutes terms that were, perhaps, never applied to any one of the three species, except as renderings of the name in Latin, and are anything but English names in .the common accepta- tion of the word. Furthermore, the fourth species, Bupleurum the rotundifolium, is also called common hare's ear ; and here name is not only no name, but an impossible one. The round- leaved bupleurum has, in the very fact which makes its Latin name (rotundifolium) applicable, a condition incompatible with the term hare's ear. With this view, I have given the proper current idiomatic English name whenever I have been able to discover what it was ; and when I have not done so, I have preferred letting the Latin stand, to rendering it by a mere verbal translation. This is only an extension of the principle by which we say aqua vita, or lignum vita, instead of water is of life, or wood of life. In other words, the Latin term naturalized. What has just preceded applies to the identification of the English name of the particular species of plant or animal with the Latin one. The identification of the species itself is a different question. It is one thing to know that the Artemisia abrotanum of Linnaeus is the southernwood of the common people of England. It is another thing to know that the abrota- num of Sydenham is the Artemisia abrotanum of Linnaeus. Now, in respect to all such questions as the last, I have taken the genera and species as I found them in Dr. Greenhill's Index, and that with an additional confidence, from the fact of its having been benefited by the assistance of Drs.Pereira andRoyle. TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. ix The plan of the preliminary explanations headed Materia Medico, and Therapeutics is as follows : where a simple term of Sydenham's occurs in the present Pharmacopoeia no notice is taken of it at all, e. g., chamomile, aniseed, dill, cloves, bark, &c. Nor yet is any notice taken of those preparations of which the chief constituent is denoted by the name, e. g., strawberry-water, emplastrum de minio. This rule is held to even where the preparations are exceedingly compound. On the other hand, where a simple term does not occur in the present pharmacopoeia, its scientific botanical, zoological, or mineralogical synonym is whilst in supplied, (e. g., adderstongue, anagallis, &c.) ; respect to preparations of which the composition is not at all indicated by the name, the formula from one of the Pharmacopoeias of is in detail of the time given ; the arrangement the whole being strictly alphabetic. To have gone farther, and, by a second series of notices, to have explained all the new terms that were thus added from the Pharmacopoeias to the list found in Sydenham, would have carried me beyond the prescribed limits of my work. In some cases, too, I have been obliged to sacrifice absolute accuracy to precision, e. g., the white sandal-wood, or the young wood, the yellow sandal-wood, or the old wood of the Santalum myrti- folium, and the red sanders-wood of the Pterocarpus draco, are occasionally spoken of as the sandal-wood of the three kinds (santalum trium generum).