[p. 28]prevails; but the same kind is not always the strongest,
but sometimes one and sometimes another, according to the winds, for
the north wind imparts strength to this water, and the south to that,
and so also with regard to the others. There must be deposits of mud
and sand in the vessels from such waters, and the aforesaid diseases
must be engendered by them when drunk, but why not to all I will now
explain. When the bowels are loose and in a healthy state,| Coray remarks that Prosper Martian, in his commentary on this passage, confirms the truth of the observation here made, that persons affected with calculus have the bowels consipated. |
and when
the bladder is not hot, nor the neck of the bladder very contracted,
all such persons pass water freely, and no concretion forms in the
bladder; but those in whom the belly is hot, the bladder must be in
the same condition; and when preternaturally heated, its neck becomes
inflamed; and when these things happen, the bladder does not expel
the urine, but raises its heat excessively. And the thinnest part
of it is secreted, and the purest part is passed off in the form of
urine, but the thickest and most turbid part is condensed and concreted,
at first in small quantity, but afterwards in greater; for being rolled
about in the urine, whatever is of a thick consistence it assimilates
to itself, and thus it increases and becomes indurated. And when such
persons make water, the stone forced down by the urine falls into
the neck of the bladder and stops the urine, and occasions intense
pain; so that calculous children rub their privy parts and tear at
them, as supposing that the obstruction to the urine is situated there.
As a proof that it is as I say, persons affected with calculus have
very limpid urine, because the thickest and foulest part remains and
is concreted. Thus it generally is in cases of calculus. It forms
also in children from milk, when it is not wholesome, but very hot
and bilious, for it heats the bowels and bladder, so that the urine
being also heated undergoes the same change. And I hold that it is
better to give children only the most diluted wine, for such will
least burn up and dry the veins. Calculi do not form so readily in
women, for in them the urethra is short and wide, so that in them
the urine is easily expelled; neither do they rub the pudendum with
their hands, nor handle
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