The development of the doctrine of contagium vivum 1500-1750 : a preliminary sketch / by Charles Singer.
- Charles Singer
- Date:
- 1913
Licence: In copyright
Credit: The development of the doctrine of contagium vivum 1500-1750 : a preliminary sketch / by Charles Singer. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![a charming' passage in Romeo and Juliet (Act I., sc. iv.), first published in 1597, where Mer- cutio says : — O, then, I see Queen Mab has been with you. She is the fairies’ midwife; and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate-stone On the fore-finger of an alderman. Drawn with a team of little atomies. Her waggoner, a small grey-coated gnat, yot half so hiq as a ro'inid little 'worm Fricl'ed from the lazy finger of a maid (a). And in this state she gallops night by night, U’er ladies’ lips, who straight on kisses dream; T17n’c/? oft the angry ]\fah with blisters plagues. Tlie infliience of current theories on the lay mind may also be seen in a book of Mon- conys, written about 1629 (h). In the course of this work he describes the custom of “capri- fication” as practised in the Greek islands, and he tells how the women gather wild figs and lay tlieni to decay on trees of the cultivated variety. This is iVIonconys’ admirable explana- tion of the custom. “Nature,” he writes, “has provided all animals and plants with an infinite number of minute invisible insects, wliich are for the purpose of sucking and drawing forth the corruption and im])urities incident on vital ])rocesses. They are like the emunc- tories of Nature, and if, by some disturbance, these little living atoms increase and multiply praeternaturally, then epidemics arise which cause mortality among their hosts. “There have, indeed, been observed in the buboes of the plague-stricken, immense num- bers of these insects which, taking wing, convey the infection far and wide. It is probable that similar minute insects remove foreign and excrementitious matter from the figs, and thus get rid of the very ])rinciple of putrefaction, and so after this the fruit remains attached to the tree until it is perfected” (c). Monconys also definitely makes the suggestion•»that figs have sexes, and that insects take a part, in their fertilization, and he comes very close to the modern view of caprifica- tion which recards the development of the fig as aided bv the entrance of minute hymenop- tera through the terminal pore. The process has. therefore, definite analogies with infection. Surprising as seems the originalitv of ^lonconys’ views, he may have derived them, in part at least, from Cesalpinus, who had .spoken of a “halitus” or emanation from the male plant fertilising the female (d). Monconys, however, had certainly the ])riority of Nehemiah Grew (e) and of Thomas Millington, who are usually regarded as the founders in modern times of the sexual theory in plants. While speculation such as we have illustrated from iMouffet and Monconys was con- cerned with the nature and meaning of minute living creatures, another o-roup of ideas was asserting itself and assistimr to develop and clarifv the prevalent conceptions of the nature of infection. These ideas dealt with the nature of fennents and their relation to infective processes. Prom earliest times an association had been observed between putrefaction and fevers. Aforeover, some exact knowledge was available as to the phenomena of fermentation. Thus, among Hebrew writers, considerable attention had been paid to the nature of leaven, from the importance of that subject in the celebration of the Passover. In a remarkable passage in the Talmud (f) the process of reproduction and putrefaction are brought into comparison. Amonor Christian writers also the importance and nature of wine in the celebration of the Communion had given rise to an extensive theological literature. Early (a) At this date it wae customary to treat scabies bv the removal of each .separate acarus with a needle. So laborious a process was naturallv as a rule far from complete. (h) DE MONCOXYS. “Journal des Vovages,” Paris 1647. Posthumously published by bis son. (c) Caprifieation, and its kindred custom Palmification. are of immeasurable antiquity. They are mentioned bv Herodotus, and were apparently known to the Ecvptians. Hebrews, Greeks and Babylonians. The impor- tance of insects in the process was realized bv Plinv. The sexual dharacter of plants wes also entertained at a very early date, and is referred to bv Aristotle, Theophrastus and Plinv among others. The association of fies and plasue was probably suasested to Monconvs bv Isaiah xxxviii., 21, or by Jeremiah xxiv. ANDREAS CESALPINO. De Plantis libri XVI. Florence, 1583. tfi) NEHEMIAH DREW. Anatomy of Plants. London, 1682, and previous papers before the Eoyal Society. If) Pirke Aboth III, 1. 0](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22463392_0010.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
