Cache-Control: public, max-age=1024000 Pharmacopoeia Extemporanea: An Oxymel of Tobacco

An Oxymel of Tobacco.

Take Tobacco leaves (powdered and tied up in a Rag) 1 ounce and half; Agaric (likewise tied up) Liquorice, each 1 ounce; Senna, Raisins of the Sun, each 2 ounces; Vinegar 2 quarts, boil to 2 pints and half, adding towards the last, Thyme, Hyssop, each 2 handfuls; Aniseed half an ounce; Cloves 3 drams, having strained and clarified it, add Honey 1 pint and half; and then boil it up to a due Consistence.

When you have occasion to use it (saith Quercetan, who composed a mighty operose Oxymel of Tobacco, of which this an Epitome) give Cochlearia aliquot, some spoonfuls, either alone, or with a Pectoral Water.

Truly this Medicament most excellently and strongly purges, exhausts, deterges, extirpates the Saburra, and Eluvies of depraved Humours out of the whole Body in general, and the Ventricle and Thorax in particular, and is most accommodated, and specifically peculiar, to Asthmatic People.

But in giving it there's need of Caution and Distinction, to increase or diminish, and nicely adjust the Dose, so as to fit the Age and Strength of the Sick.

Sometimes (because of the Tobacco) it provokes Vomiting; but then the other Purgers that are mixt with Vinegar (which is it self a prime Corrector and Mollifyer) divert its vehemence, by drawing it downward, and so render it a good and effectual Remedy for Pituitous Maladies of the Ventricle and Thorax. Thus he.

Thomas Fuller
Pharmacopeia Extemporanea 1710