By these, according to his opinion, the
quality of the air, and of the other elements, was so altered that
they set poisonous fluids in motion towards the inward parts of
the body, in the same manner as the magnet attracts iron; whence
there arose in the commencement fever and the spitting of blood;
afterwards, however, a deposition in the form on glandular
swellings and inflammatory boils. Herein the notion of an
epidemic constitution was set forth clearly, and conformably to
the spirit of the age. Of contagion, Guy de Chauliac was
completely convinced. He sought to protect himself against it by
the usual means; and it was probably he who advised Pope Clement
VI. to shut himself up while the plague lasted. The preservation
of this Pope's life, however, was most beneficial to the city of
Avignon, for he loaded the poor with judicious acts of kindness,
took care to have proper attendants provided, and paid physicians
himself to afford assistance wherever human aid could avail--an
advantage which, perhaps, no other city enjoyed. Nor was the
treatment of plague-patients in Avignon by any means
objectionable; for, after the usual depletions by bleeding and
aperients, where circumstances required them, they endeavoured to
bring the buboes to suppuration; they made incisions into the
inflammatory boils, or burned them with a red-hot iron, a practice
which at all times proves salutary, and in the Black Plague saved
many lives.
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