Examination of Officinal Medicines

It is very well known to those with eye infections and to barbers—not to mention veterinarians original: "Mulomedicis," literally mule-doctors—that this substance remarkably extinguishes all inflammations and cools the earth. To what end is Salt of Dove Dung original: "Sal fimi Columbini" prepared?
What do the wool-fats smell of, even if sent from Athens?
says Ovid. A reference to Ovid's Ars Amatoria, mocking the foul smell of cosmetic lanolin. Naturally, to bring back the scent of sheep's dung, one must collect greasy wool original: "lana succida" for their preparation, specifically from the thighs, and that being unwashed. Does it truly please us to place such great hope and confidence in dung? That might indeed seem a harsh thing to say: let those hated names be changed, and perhaps the thing itself will be less odious.
He who names "dung," even if it breathes the scent of ambergris or civet, moves one to inevitable nausea: but who would not more easily tolerate wool-fat original: "oesypum" or Greek white? original: "album graecum," a polite term for calcined dog droppings used in medicine. This was undoubtedly what those had in mind who called it water of all flowers, which is distilled from the fresh dung of cows. Yet they have not yet sufficiently cleared themselves of all blame: at the very least, a mark of shameful ignorance can scarcely, if at all, be avoided by one who trusts more in the brain of an ox than in his own genius or his art when choosing cooling or softening herbs.

§. 10.

Away with the unlearned and ignorant herd! Let dung and urine be worthy dishes for those who have not hesitated to splash that stain upon the most noble Medical Art, a stain never again to be washed away. They have mixed darnel-weed with the wheat in imitation of the evil spirit—that is, they have added all sorts of foul, obscene, and filthy things to the most praised medicines, even though the Most High The Creator has, out of His immense goodness, produced from the earth an abundance of things that should by no means be despised by a prudent man.
Do they not, in my judgment, provide a just handle for mockery to the Slanderers? They are unworthy to have their names tolerated in the Most Gracious Order of Physicians. Is it right to thus defile the best Art, which is utterly Divine, and expose it to the ridicule of all?
I should not think so. Therefore, it is no pleasure for me to dwell longer on the treatment of this subject. Rather, I conclude thus: Whatever creates inevitable nausea in the sick, and convicts Physicians of simplicity, inexperience, or sluggishness, such things do not deserve the name of medicine.