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The use of emetics and cathartics, abominable ‘comforts for an
overloaded stomach,’
1 ought never, except under the stress of
great necessity, to be inaugurated, as is the way of most people, who fill
up their bodies for the sake of emptying them, and then empty them for the
sake of filling them up again, thus transgressing against nature, and are
vexed no less at their fullness than at their emptiness—or,
better, they are utterly depressed over their fullness, as being a hindrance
to enjoyment, but set about bringing on emptiness with the idea of making
room always for pleasures. The harmfulness in all this is manifest; for both
procedures give rise to disorders and convulsive movements in the [p. 277] body. What is peculiarly bad in the use of an emetic is
that it increases and fosters an insatiate greediness. For the feelings of
hunger become rough and turbulent, like rivers that are interrupted in their
course, and they gulp the food down violently, always ravening and
resembling not appetites that need victuals, but inflammations that need
medicines and poultices. For this reason the pleasures that lay hold upon
such persons are swift in their action and imperfect, and attended by much
palpitation and agitation while being experienced, and these are succeeded
by distensions and sharp pains in the passages, and retention of gases,
which cannot wait for the natural movements, but stay in the upper part of
the body as in water-logged ships which require the jettisoning of their
cargo, not merely of their surplus. The violent disturbances lower down in
the bowels resulting from medication, by decomposing and liquefying the
existing contents, increase rather than relieve the overcrowding. Just
imagine that anybody , feeling much troubled at the crowd of Greeks living
in his city, should fill up the city with Arab and Scythian immigrants ! Yet
it is just this radical mistake that some people make in connexion with the
expulsion of the surplus of habitual and familiar foods, when they introduce
into the body from the outside Cnidian berries, scammony, or other
incongruous and drastic agents, which have more need of being purged away
than power of purging our nature. It is best, therefore, by moderate and
temperate living to make the body constantly selfsufficient and well
adjusted as regards filling the stomach and emptying it.
If ever absolute necessity befall us, vomiting [p. 279] should be
induced without medication and a great ado, and without causing any
disturbance beyond merely avoiding indigestion by at once allowing the
excess to be peacefully ejected. Just as linen cleansed with lye and washing
powders wears out faster than that washed in plenty of water, so vomitings
with drugs maltreat and ruin the body. If the bowels are getting sluggish,
there is no medicine like some sorts of food that afford a mild stimulus to
the inclinations and gently dissolve the cause of trouble. Experience with
these is familiar to all, and their use is not attended by discomfort. But
if it will not yield to these, the drinking of water for several days, or
fasting, or an enema, should be tried next rather than disturbing and
pernicious dosing to which most people hurriedly resort, after the manner of
licentious women who employ drugs and instruments to produce abortion for
the sake of the enjoyment of conceiving again.
1 Plato, Critias, p. 115 B.