12 They apply pigeons to the feet to draw the vapours from the head

What will not kill a man if a vapour will? How great an elephant how small a mouse destroys!

To die by a bullet is the soldiers daily bread, but few men die by hail shot.

A man is more worth than to be sold for small change, a life to be valued above a trifle.

In a violent shaking of the air by thunder or by cannon the air is condensed above the thickness of water, of water baked into ice, almost petrified, almost made stone, and no wonder that that kills.

But that a vapour, and a vapour not forced but breathed should kill? That a nurse should overlay a baby or air that nourishes us should destroy us?

It is a half atheism to murmur against nature who is Gods immediate commissioner. But who would not think himself miserable to be put into the hands of nature who sets him up for a mark for others to shoot at and delights herself to blow him up like a glass till she sees him break even with her own breath?

It is not as if this infectious vapour were sought for or travelled to, as Pliny hunted after the vapour of Etna and challenged death to do his worst. He felt the worst, he died.

It is not as if this vapour ambushed us out of a long shut well or out of a new opened mine. Who would lament or accuse when we had nothing to accuse, none to lament against but bad luck?

But when our own body is the well that breathes out this exhalation, the oven that spits out this fiery smoke, the mine that spews out this suffocating and strangling damp? Who could blame his neighbour, his familiar friend, his brother for any sin against us when we ourselves kill ourselves with our own vapours?

Did we bring this self-destruction upon ourselves? Through any contribution from our own wills, any assistance from our own intentions, nay from our own errors? If so we might chide ourselves.

Fevers caused by eating or drinking too much, consumptions from intemperances and licentiousness, madness from misplacing or overbending our natural faculties proceed from ourselves. In all those cases we ourselves are in the plot and we are not only passive but active too, in our own destruction.

But what have I done either to breed or to breathe these vapours?

They tell me it is my melancholy - did I infuse it, did I drink in melancholy into myself?

It is my thoughtfulness - was I not made to think?

It is my study - does not my calling call for that?

I have done nothing, wilfully, perversely toward it yet must suffer in it, die by it.

There are too many examples of men that have been their own executioners and that have worked hard to be so.

Some have always had poison about them in a hollow ring upon their finger and some in their pen that they used to write with.

Some have beat out their brains at the wall of their prison and some have eat the fire out of their chimneys.

One is said to have strangled himself, though his hands were bound, by crushing his throat between his knees.

But I do nothing upon myself and yet am mine own executioner.

We have heard of death upon small occasions and by scornful instruments. A pin, a comb, a hair pulled has gangrened and killed.

But if I were asked what is a vapour I could not tell. It is so insensible a thing, so near nothing is that which reduces us to nothing.

Consider the equivalent in any body politic, in a state.

That which is fume in us is in a state rumour. These vapours in us which we consider infectious fumes are in a state infectious rumours, detracting and dishonourable calumnies, libels.

The heart in that body politic is the king and the brain his Council. the magistracy that ties it all together is the sinews. And the life of all is honour and just respect and due reverence. Therefore when these vapours, these venomous rumours are directed against these noble parts the whole body suffers.

But yet for all their privileges they are not privileged from our misery. Just as the pernicious vapours arise in our own bodies so do the most dishonourable rumours, those that wound a state most, arise at home.

What ill air that I could have met in the street, what gutter, what shambles, what dunghill, what vault could have hurt me so much as these home-bred vapours?

What fugitive, what almsman of any foreign state can do so much harm as a detractor, a libeller, a scornful satirist at home?

They that write of poisons and of creatures naturally disposed to the ruin of man mention the flea as well as the viper. Although the flea kills none he does all the harm he can. And so even these libellous and licentious satirists utter venom.

Sometimes virtue, and always power, is a good pigeon to draw this vapour from the head and from doing any harm there

Diagnostic note: A vapour is caused by an imbalance in the 4 humours of the body. The vapour rises to the head & death may result. The application of pigeon carcases, plucked & singed, to the soles of the feet will draw the vapour away from the head