Cache-Control: public, max-age=1024000 Pharmacopoeia Extemporanea: Scorbutic Juices

Scorbutic Juices.

Take Juice of Plantain, Brooklime, Water Cresses, Dandelion, each 1 pint; of Sorrel, Lemons, and Whitewine, each half a pint, let it stand (in a Cellar) till the thick part subside; then having decanted the clear Liquor, add to it Horse-Radish water compound, magistral Worm-water, fine Sugar, each 4 ounces; Spirit of Scurvey Grass 6 drams, mix.

The Juices of Herbs egregiously dilute, edulcorate, purifie, and soften salt, harsh, torrid, and irritable Blood; convey off by Urine, Saline, and Bilious Recrements, refresheth the estuating Hypochondria, with a grateful Refrigerium, correct a dry strigose Habit with mollifying Moisture: And (in my Judgement) are the very first in the Family of Antiscorbutics; and so much the more, because they are carried into the Blood in their true natural State, and full and entire Virtues, without being perverted and spoiled by Coction, or any other ill applied Artifice.

But they are more medicinal in the Spring than any other time of the Year, and that not only, because Nature in human Bodies being then of itself upon raising a [Sigma Upsilon Mu Omega Sigma Zeta], and Renovation of the Blood, may be easily assisted in its Work: But also, because the Juices themselves are then, in their own Nature, really much richer, and efficacious, as Simon Paulli observes, saying, An evident Proof that Scorbutic Herbs are enriched with Volatile Salt, most especially in the Spring Season is this; that if we prepare an Essence or Tincture of them, at the end of April, or beginning of May, 'twill look red like Chio, or Malvatic Wine, which it will not do in other Seasons of the Year.

Let a quarter of a pint be drank daily in the Morning, and at four in the Afternoon.

Thomas Fuller
Pharmacopeia Extemporanea 1710