Practical observations on venereal complaints / By F. Swediaur, M.D.

  • Franz Xaver Swediauer
Date:
1786
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Practical observations on venereal complaints / By F. Swediaur, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    11/240 (page 5)
    the patient is infecled. In feme the progrefs is flow, and the difeafe appears fcarce to gain any ground ; while in others it advances with the ut- niolt rapidity, and foon produces the molt terrible fymptoms. At what time this dreadful malady, the very idea of which poifons the fource of hap pinefs, was firft known among mankind, is a matter 1 cannot ' pretend to decide. Even the time of its firfl ap¬ pearance in Europe, and whence it was imported thither, is uncertain. Thus much we may ven¬ ture to affirm, that we have no authentic proofs of its having exilled among the ancient Greeks and Romans ; though thefe undoubtedly were as licentious as their poflerity, whether barbarous or refined. Some diforders arc mentioned by an¬ cient writers which feem to intimate the exillence of the venereal difiemper, in forne fhape or other, from the earliefi antiquity. Such are the difeharge mentioned in the book of Leviticus, the difeafe of Job, and that related in the Pfalrns of David; fome complaints of the genital parts related by Paulus Aeginda, by Aetuis, &c. The corroding ulcers of the prepuce and glans, the dfcharge of thin famous matter from the penis, the mortification and cancer of the penis, the phagedoenic ulcer of the fame, the warts of the prepuce and glands, condy- lomata ad anum, the jwelled ttjhcles arifing with¬ out external contufion, all mentioned by Celfus, L vi. cap. xviii. De obfccenarum partium vitiis9 and deferibed as obflinate difeafes, and hardly cu¬ rable without the hot iron. Rut whether thefe have been modifications of our more modern fy- philitic complaints, or diforders of a quite different A 3 nature*