Therapeutics and materia medica: a systematic treatise on the action and uses of medicinal agents, including their description and history (Volume 2).

  • Stillé, Alfred, 1813-1900.
Date:
1860
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Therapeutics and materia medica: a systematic treatise on the action and uses of medicinal agents, including their description and history (Volume 2). Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    properties. Dioscorides even states that the juice of the wild lettuce (lactuca virosa) was regarded as so much like opium in its powers, as to be employed for adulterating this drug. Both Paulus J^gineta and Galen refer to lettuce as a cure for watchfulness, and the latter, in particular, found it a sovereign remedy for that wakefulness which beset him in his old age, and when his mind was over-excited by study. The reputed powers of lettuce in allaying amorous desires procured for it the name of iwovxtor, or eunuch-maker; the same idea is conveyed by the custom of including this plant amongst the herbs used at the festival in commemoration of the death of Adonis; for Venus was fabled to have deposited the dead body of her favorite upon a bed of lettuce.1 Kay2 attributes to the strong-scented let- tuce decided aphrodisiac virtues, but admits that the garden lettuce, before it has run to seed, is sedative and refrigerant. Kutty3 points out that the hypnotic qualities of the plant reside in its milky juice, says that it is useful in opacity of the cornea, and diseases of the skin, and prevents libidinous dreams. If modern observations have not directly confirmed the prevalent opinion of the ancient world upon the last point, they have at least rendered it probable, by show- ing the close analogy of the medicinal part of lettuce with opium, in everything but its stimulant qualities, upon which the aphrodisiac virtues of the latter entirely depend. Lettuce and its extract appeared to have nearly fallen into disuse, owing, probably to the more general employment of opium, particularly since the time of Paracelsus, and although the plant is mentioned by Bonetus and Sylvius as useful in uterine hemorrhage, and is briefly alluded to by Jones, Alston, Hill, and the other writers mentioned, no importance was attached to it as a medicinal agent, by the profession in general, when Dr. John Redman Coxe, of this city, made experiments with its juice, which confirmed the opinions of the ancients in regard to it, and led to its being adopted anew into the materia medica.4 Dr. Coxe gave it the name of lettuce opium. His opinions in regard to it were subsequently confirmed, in the main, by Duncan, of Edinburgh, Bidault de Villiers, Francois, Aubergier, and other continental observers. Action and Uses.—Dr. Coxe reports lactucarium to possess stimu- lant qualities, causing acceleration of the pulse, and a general glow like that produced by a glass of wine. These effects, however, do not appear to have been noted in more than one or two cases, and may be 1 Akthon's Class. Diet., art. Adonis. 2 Synopsis Method. Stirp. Brittan., Lond. 1724, p. 162. % Materia Med. Nov. et Antiq., Rotterodami, 1775. 4 Trans, of Am. Phil. Soc, vol. iv. p. 387.