But getting back to Dr. Monardes.
“Sometimes it is permissible,” he said, “for everyone to smoke tobacco fumes as a preventative measure. For example, if someone, even if he does not suffer from mucousy phlegm, or rheum, as we call it, has to travel in foggy, windy, or rainy weather, especially during the winter, it could be expedient for him, even if he does not suffer from rheumatism or cold temperature, to inhale four to five puffs of tobacco smoke immediately upon arriving at home or at the inn, so as to prevent the discharge of mucousy phlegm or other harmful agents, which could befall him due to the bad and unclean air. Ergo, the smoking of tobacco must be practiced primarily after travelling in foggy and rainy weather, since it hinders the inflammation of the mucus membranes and hence rheum, and generally removes all harmful agents, which the moist and foul air normally induce within the head and other parts of the body. The smoking of tobacco at such a moment is beneficial for every bodily state, except for when the brain has a very dry composition. This was the fully indisputable example for the advantages of its use, which I can give and which will be difficult even for skeptics to dispute. We must also remember that there are two ways of using tobacco: the first is to hold the smoke in the mouth and from there to pass it through the nostrils to warm and dry the brain and to dissolve and disperse the cold humors and unnecessary air found therein.”
“Wherein?” A voice from the audience called.
“In the brain,” Dr. Monardes replied. “The other way to take it is into the lungs and stomach to disperse and destroy impurities and flatulent winds, which irritate these organs. Consequently, if you wish to know whether tobacco smoke is useful or harmful for your body, first you need to consider whether it will be proper for your head: because if your brain is too cold and wet or filled with unnecessary matter, then the holding of smoke in the mouth and passing it through the nostrils will be of use to you. My experience has shown, señores, that the brains of almost all people are filled with unnecessary matter. This is very strange, since their brains are clearly short of certain extremely important things, while at the same time they are filled with a load of unnecessary matter. How this happens is at first glance a great mystery, but in fact, like most great mysteries, it is no mystery at all, but simply and purely an inexplicable fact of Nature. You might ask yourselves why that fact is as it is, what the explanation for it is, but the answer very frequently is that there is no explanation and that the fact is as it is simply because it is so. We frequently reason assuming that Nature is obliged to give us some explanation. But in fact, she owes us nothing, let alone an explanation. And one of the most striking characteristics of tobacco, señores, is that also without giving any explanations — neither to Nature, nor to ourselves — it simply regulates the activity of Nature in a particular way. You can easily recognize truly powerful things by the fact that they neither give explanations, nor allow them, rather they simply act in a particular way, whose characteristics we can merely register and nothing more. It is in this registering, namely, that our life-saving science expresses itself.”
The more insightful segment of the audience applauded this profound claim. Indeed, Dr. Monardes’ ability to see the grand scheme of things is downright amazing and immediately sets him apart from other representatives of the medical profession, who are often highly learned, but spend their whole lives sunk in details due to their narrow view of things. Thus, they are capable of spending years debating some or other niggling property of tobacco, reaching absurdly complicated extremes in their pettiness, without being able to see the place that wondrous plant occupies in the grand scheme of things. But not Dr. Monardes.
“Ergo our medical science, like every other science,” Dr. Monardes continued, “must express itself primarily in that: in the registration of facts, without too much speculation over their causes. Too much speculation is usually the source of errors. And it most probably is due to unnecessary matter in the brain. Here, for example, even though I cannot explain it convincingly, I can register the fact that tobacco is an effective diuretic in cases of dropsy and difficulty in urination. I can also establish that a strong infusion made from the stem, with dock and alum added to it, gives good results when applied externally for skin diseases and especially scabies — to this end, some boil tobacco stems in urine. It is also, by the way, a flawless treatment for scabies in dogs.”
“And for that end, what urine should it be boiled in? Dog’s urine?” A voice from the hall called, followed by laughter by one half of the audience.
“No,” replied Dr. Monardes with an icy calm, after waiting for the laughter to die down. “You find the wittiest fellow nearby and boil it in his urine. Sometimes”—the doctor’s voice rose above the laughter bursting from the other half of the audience—“along with him, too. But I’ve heard that this only ruins the mixture. However, I do not know this first hand, so I cannot claim this with certainty. I do know, however, several absolutely indisputable facts relating to the use of tobacco amongst the Indians, and I can simply keep these facts in mind, without speculating overly much and trying to explain them at any cost. Through these facts I have come to know several indisputable effects that this plant has, and if I would like to achieve the same effects, I simply need to apply the same or a similar procedure. Too much speculation in this case can only hurt us. Following the path of logic, it is entirely possible for us to reach the convincing conclusion that it is impossible for a given substance to have certain effects, yet contrary to our convincing conclusion, it de facto has them. It is also possible for us to give an incorrect explanation for its actually existing properties, and when afterwards someone refutes our explanation, he could reach the conclusion that the very properties described by us de facto do not exist, which, however, would not be true. For example, I can claim that it is an absolute fact that the Indians smoke tobacco to banish exhaustion, as mentioned by my most learned colleague, Dr. Chey-. . Chou. .”
“Cheynell,” Mr. Frampton prompted.
“Yes, Dr. Cheynell. Señores, it is an indisputable fact that the Indians of our Occidental Indies, do use the tobacco to take away weariness, and to take lightsomeness of their labor. As a result of their evening dances they become so much wearied, they remain so weary, that they can scarcely stir; and so that they may labor the next day, and return to do that foolish exercise, they do take the smoke of the tobacco at the mouth and nose, and they remain as dead people, and being so, they are eased in such sort that when they are awakened of their sleep, they remain without weariness, and may return to their labor again. And so they do always, when they have need of it: for with that sleep they do receive their strength and are much the lustier. Despite that they sleep only three or four hours, at least since the Spaniards are there.”
Not a word about so-called “visions” and foretelling the future. The doctor is no fool, no sir!
“And they also use it against hunger and thirst. This is a fact. When they shall travel a long way through any dis-peopled Country, where they shall find neither water, nor meat, the Indians put a little ball of tobacco between the lower lip and the teeth, and they chew it, or rather, ruminate, swallowing the spittle. In this way they do journey, three or four days, without water or weariness. How is this done? Very simply: The balls of tobacco bring phlegm into the mouth, which they then swallow into the stomach, which does retain the natural heat, which does go consuming, and maintaining them — which we do see happen in many beasts, for that much time of the winter, they are shut up into their caves, and hollow places of the earth, and do pass there without any meat. Here I could risk offering an explanation and say that for that, they have to consume the natural heat of the fatness which they had gotten in the summer. The Bear, for example, being a great and fierce beast, much time of the winter is in his cave, and does live without meat, or drink, with only chewing his paws, which perhaps he does for the same reason as the Indians. This is a fact. This is why, most learned señores, I summon all scholars, and especially physicians, to simply take into account the facts, which unambiguously show that tobacco has exceptional healing properties and qualities strengthening to the organism, which strongly resemble the panacea of the ancients, for precisely which reason I took the liberty of calling it the ‘herba panacea’ in my works. It is not necessary for a panacea to have a nice smell, nor a pleasant taste. The important thing is for it to be a panacea. For those other things, you need Indian aromatic sticks, which come from the East Indies, by the way, not from the West, or figs from the Barbary Coast or Lebanon. But for good health, you need tobacco.”