DIGBY Sir Kenelme Discours… touchant la guérison des Playes, par la Poudre de Sympathie. Où sa composition est enseignée.

Caillet, 3124 (note); Dorbon, 1254 ; Guaïta, 1753.

Very intersting and rare work (first edition 1659) by Kenelm Digby, a friend of Descartes. 

In Rome he bought from a monk the secret of a preparation of vitriol to stop hemorrhages; he called it Sympathetic Powder. Instead of being content to praise his powder as styptic, he gave it imaginary virtues. It was at the Court of James I that this powder gained popularity. 

In Paris, Digby detailed the account of his hypothetical cures and endeavored to prove the possibility of sympathetic cures: spread on a cloth stained with the blood of the wounded or applied to the sword which had struck a person, this famous powder should heal the wounds. the most serious… This experience recalls those of Paracelsus. Alongside his subject, the author relates a host of extraordinary facts, the origin of numerous legends and sayings current in the countryside.

Fine copy.