On the Treatment and Management of the More Common

West India Diseases 1750 1802 1st Edition Edward J.

Hutson - PDF Download (2025)

https://ebookultra.com/download/on-the-treatment-and-management-
of-the-more-common-west-india-diseases-1750-1802-1st-edition-
edward-j-hutson/

Visit ebookultra.com today to download the complete set of

ebooks or textbooks
We have selected some products that you may be interested in
Click the link to download now or visit ebookultra.com
for more options!.

Japanese Kampo Medicines for the Treatment of Common

Diseases Focus on Inflammation 1st Edition Edition
Somasundaram Arumugam And Kenichi Watanabe (Eds.)
https://ebookultra.com/download/japanese-kampo-medicines-for-the-
treatment-of-common-diseases-focus-on-inflammation-1st-edition-
edition-somasundaram-arumugam-and-kenichi-watanabe-eds/

Pulmonary Circulation Diseases and Their Treatment 4th

Edition Andrew J. Peacock

https://ebookultra.com/download/pulmonary-circulation-diseases-and-
their-treatment-4th-edition-andrew-j-peacock/

Bridging the Distance Common Issues of the Rural West 1st

Edition David B. Danbom

https://ebookultra.com/download/bridging-the-distance-common-issues-
of-the-rural-west-1st-edition-david-b-danbom/

Drugs for the Treatment of Respiratory Diseases 1st

Edition Domenico Spina

https://ebookultra.com/download/drugs-for-the-treatment-of-
respiratory-diseases-1st-edition-domenico-spina/
Common Skin Diseases 18th Edition Motley

https://ebookultra.com/download/common-skin-diseases-18th-edition-
motley/

Armies of the East India Company 1750 1850 Men at Arms

Book 453 1st Edition Stuart Reid

https://ebookultra.com/download/armies-of-the-east-india-
company-1750-1850-men-at-arms-book-453-1st-edition-stuart-reid/

Soil Science Management Sixth Edition Edward J. Plaster

https://ebookultra.com/download/soil-science-management-sixth-edition-
edward-j-plaster/

The Geology of the Everglades and Adjacent Areas Edward J.

Petuch

https://ebookultra.com/download/the-geology-of-the-everglades-and-
adjacent-areas-edward-j-petuch/

John Adams and the Diplomacy of the American Revolution

James H. Hutson

https://ebookultra.com/download/john-adams-and-the-diplomacy-of-the-
american-revolution-james-h-hutson/
On the Treatment and Management of the More
Common West India Diseases 1750 1802 1st Edition
Edward J. Hutson Digital Instant Download
Author(s): Edward J. Hutson
ISBN(s): 9789766402358, 9766402353
Edition: 1
File Details: PDF, 6.09 MB
Year: 2010
Language: english
 On the Treatment and Management
of the More Common West-India
Diseases, 1750–1802
This work brings together, in one volume, a number of monographs from the mid
to late eighteenth century (the period known as the Age of Reason) on the diagno-
sis and treatment of diseases of African and Creole slaves in the English-speaking
Caribbean. Included here are James Grainger’s Essay on the More Common West-
India Diseases (1764) and Book IV of The Sugar-Cane (1764); Book II of the
Reverend Griffith Hughes’s Natural History of the Island of Barbados (1750); and
Benjamin Moseley’s Miscellaneous Medical Observations (1789). These monographs
have been all but forgotten; however, they are of importance to scholars. Dr
Hutson provides a fully annotated text that explains archaic terminology, makes
medical, botanical and Latin terminology accessible to non-specialists in those
fields, and provides useful explanations of eighteenth-century medical concepts.
This fascinating collection has much to offer historians and health-care profes-
sionals, as well as general readers with an interest in the West Indies.

“This volume will provide a treasury of source material for the study of medical his-
tory in the Caribbean. It comes 250 years after Hughes, Moseley and Grainger were
first published, yet so much of their writing resonates today. We in the University of
the West Indies, and students of medical history everywhere, must be grateful to Dr
Hutson, who, like Dr Grainger before him, has taken ‘liberal pains in the Notes . . .
to enlarge knowledge of the medicinal . . . plants of the West Indies’.”
– Henry S. Fraser, University of the West Indies, Barbados

J. Edward Hutson is Antiguan by birth, Barbadian by descent and Canadian by

choice. A graduate of the University of Liverpool, he has practised medicine in
England, Barbados and Canada. Following retirement he has indulged his interest
in West Indian history and previously produced three annotated versions of an-
cient texts: Richard Ligon’s 1657 True and Exact History of the Island of Barbadoes;
The English Civil War in Barbados, 1650–1652; and The Voyage of Sir Henry Colt to
the Islands of Barbados and St Christopher, May–August 1631, all published by the
Barbados National Trust. Dr Hutson lives in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

ISBN 978-976-640-235-8

University of the West Indies Press

Jamaica • Barbados • Trinidad and Tobago
www.uwipress.com
On the Treatment and Management
of the More Common
West-India Diseases (1750–1802)


 On the Treatment and
Management of the More
Common West-India Diseases
(1750–1802)


Works by
James Grainger, MD, 1764 (with additional notes
by William Wright, MD, FRS, 1802)
Griffith Hughes, MA, FRS, 1750
Benjamin Moseley, MD, 1789

Edited and annotated by

J. Edward Hutson
MB, ChB, DA

University of the West Indies Press

Jamaica • Barbados • Trinidad and Tobago
University of the West Indies Press
1A Aqueduct Flats Mona
Kingston 7 Jamaica
www.uwipress.com

© 2005, 2010 by J. Edward Hutson

All rights reserved. Published 2005

Paperback edition published 2010

CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION DATA

On the treatment and management of the more common West-India diseases

(1750–1802): works by James Grainger, MD, 1764, with additional notes by
William Wright, MD, FRS, 1802; Griffith Hughes, MA, FRS, 1750; Benjamin
Moseley, MD, 1789 / edited and annotated by J. Edward Hutson

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN: 978-976-640-235-8 (paper)

1. Medicine – West Indies, British – History – 18th century. 2. Medicine –

West Indies, British – History – 19th century. 3. Slaves – Diseases – West Indies,
British – History. 4. Slaves – Medical care – West Indies, British – History.
5. Diseases and history. 6. Grainger, James, 1721?–1766. 7. Wright, William,
1735–1819. 8. Hughes, Griffith, 1708?–1758?. 9. Moseley, Benjamin, 1742–1819.
I. Hutson, J. Edward. II. Title.

R473.067 2010 614.594

Cover illustration: William Clark, The Mill Yard, from Ten Views in the Island of
Antigua (London, 1823). Reproduced by permission of the British Library.
Cover illustration copyright British Library 1786.c.9.

Book and cover design by Robert Harris.

Set in Adobe Garamond 11/14 x 24
Printed in the United States of America.
This work is dedicated to the memory of the multitude
of men, women and children who endured the era of
slavery and indentured servitude in the West Indies.


 Contents


Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv
Notes on Editorial Procedures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxiii
An Essay on the More Common West-India Diseases,
James Grainger, MD (1764), with additional notes
by William Wright, MD, FRS (1802) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Advertisement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
An Essay on the Management and Diseases of Negroes, Part I . . . . . . . . . 9
An Essay on the Management and Diseases of Negroes, Part II . . . . . . . . 13
An Essay on the Management and Diseases of Negroes, Part III . . . . . . . 41
An Essay on the Management and Diseases of Negroes, Part IV . . . . . . . 51
Linnæan Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

The Sugar-Cane, James Grainger, MD (1764): Book IV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

The Natural History of the Island of Barbados, The Reverend

Griffith Hughes, MA, FRS (1750): Book II, Of Diseases
peculiar to this and the neighbouring Islands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Miscellaneous Medical Observations,

Benjamin Moseley, MD (1789, revised 1800) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
 Foreword

C 
onsidering the economic importance of the former British West Indian
colonies to England, and later Great Britain, in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, it is surprising that there is not wider recognition of the
considerable scientific and medical contributions made by physicians and
others in the Caribbean during the Age of Enlightenment. Dr Edward
Hutson’s annotated compilation of “ancient West Indian medical writings”
will go a long way towards filling this gap in medical and historical awareness
of today’s scholars and general readers. He has brought together essays and
chapters from several eighteenth-century writers, some of which are virtually
inaccessible to scholars. Only the work of the Reverend Griffith Hughes –
The Natural History of the Island of Barbados – has been republished within
the past century.
The West Indian colonies attracted many types – the adventurous and
curious; those who wanted to get rich quickly; and those who came,
fortunately, almost by a curious quirk of fate. Two interesting examples of the
latter, whose writings include observations on illness and health, diseases and
cures, were Richard Ligon and Joshua Steele. Ligon, a scholar and Royalist
supporter of Charles I, fled to Barbados in 1647 to escape debtors’ prison. He
advocated the use of “hot rum” for its medicinal value, and the “pounded
pisle of a green sea turtle” as a cure for kidney stones – he himself was the
patient! Joshua Steele inherited two estates in Barbados – Kendal and Guinea
in the parish of St John – from his wife, and at the venerable age of eighty
decided to go to Barbados to see them. Steele was a musical scholar,
humanitarian and entrepreneur, and a wonderful letter writer. His letters to
friends in the Society of the Arts in London contain a wealth of fascinating
observations, including accounts of the healthy climate of Barbados and
details of people living there to ages in excess of one hundred years.
But the Caribbean is of particular importance in the history of medicine:

ix
x  Foreword

it was not only the theatre of European battles for wealth and power, and of
a massive, dehumanising experience of human enslavement; it was also the
site of a clash of cultures of a different kind – an exchange of infectious
diseases between the Old and New Worlds. Europeans brought the agents of
smallpox, measles, influenza and typhus to the New World, and in the
conquest of Latin America and the Caribbean by the first waves of Spanish
conquistadores, germs proved to be more deadly than firearms.
With transportation of African slaves came mosquitoes carrying malaria
and yellow fever, in addition to parasitic diseases. In the opposite direction,
into the ports of the Mediterranean, went syphilis. It was noted by early
physicians that African slaves survived yellow-fever epidemics far better than
Europeans, an observation that undoubtedly contributed to expansion of the
slave trade.
The result of this “Columbian exchange” of germs and parasites was an
extremely rich spectrum of diseases, many of which were foreign to European
physicians. At the same time there was a clash of cultures between African
traditions of disease interpretation and treatment, and European medical
views. The two had one general principle in common, and that was a strong
belief in the efficacy of plants and plant extracts as remedies and cures.
Europeans brought their time-honoured herbal recipes while Africans
brought their practices and some of their plants; the rich tropical flora
provided many innovative ideas and therapeutic opportunities.
The authors Dr Hutson has selected demonstrate an intense curiosity
concerning local diseases, and they concentrate on the differences and, often,
the need for different approaches to treatment. The Reverend Griffith
Hughes, not himself a physician but the curate of St Lucy’s Parish Church,
Barbados (who mysteriously disappeared some years after publication of his
book), nevertheless gave an accurate, detailed description of “dry belly-ach”.
This was the syndrome of acute-on-chronic lead poisoning, characterized by
abdominal colic without diarrhoea. It was described around the same time in
Jamaica by Sir Hans Sloane. Dry belly-ach was epidemic in the West Indies
when rum was distilled through lead pipes.
The first lengthy treatise in English on diseases of the tropics was William
Hillary’s Observations on the Changes of the Air and the Concomitant
Epidemical Diseases, in the Island of Barbadoes. To which is added a Treatise on
the putrid Bilious Fever, commonly called the Yellow Fever; and such other
Diseases as are indigenous or endemial, in the West India Islands, or in the Torrid
Zone. It was first published in London by L. Hawes and W. Clarke in 1759,
 Foreword  xi

following Dr Hillary’s return from Barbados, where he had lived, practised

medicine and pursued his research for twelve years. James Grainger’s An Essay
on the More Common West-India Diseases followed soon after in 1764.
Grainger was a Scot who trained at Edinburgh University and went to St
Kitts in 1759, the same year Hillary returned to England. Grainger married a
Kittitian, and in his writings demonstrated enormous empathy for slaves. For
example, he wrote, on the “seasoning” or acclimatization of newly arrived
slaves, that “new Negroes, in particular, must be managed with the utmost
humanity . . . The African must be familiarised to labour by gentle degrees
. . . No Negroe can be said to be seasoned to a West-India climate till he has
resided therein for at least a twelvemonth.”
Another of Grainger’s observations, remarkable for its time, is his emphasis
on the importance of medical research, or, as he termed it, “inquiry” and
“discoveries in Materia Medica”. He speculated that many cures, including a
cure for leprosy, would be found among the plants of the “Torrid Zone”.
Moreover, he complained:

Premiums are daily bestowed for improvements in agriculture, but no rewards have
ever been offered for discoveries in Materia Medica; as if every art was more
necessary than physic, and every object more considerable than the health of the
community. And yet such discoveries would not, like many others, be confined in
their influence to one nation only: The world would reap the advantage of them,
for the world is interested in the improvement of medicine . . .

There are many fascinating treasures to be discovered in these pages, and

many common threads and interests. It is worth noting that both William
Hillary and Benjamin Moseley studied at the University of Leyden, Holland,
which in the first half of the eighteenth century was the most prestigious
medical school in Europe. Its fame rested to a great extent upon the brilliance
of Dr Herman Boerhaave, Professor of Anatomy and Medicine there for most
of his professional life. Boerhaave was famous for his book of aphorisms
published in 1709 and his lectures, but mostly for emphasizing the
importance of “learning from the patient”. His philosophy and practice of
bedside teaching were carried on in Edinburgh, making Edinburgh
University (at which James Grainger studied) the leading medical school in
Britain. It is of interest that these two universities prepared these three
physicians for their Caribbean work (Hillary actually trained under
Boerhaave), and that many of the sons of West Indian planters, for the next
two hundred years, underwent their medical training in Edinburgh. This
xii  Foreword

tradition continued until the 1960s, by which time the University of the West
Indies was well established.
This volume will provide a treasury of source material for the study of
medical history in the Caribbean. It comes 250 years after Hughes, Hillary,
Moseley and Grainger were first published, yet so much of their writing
resonates today. We at the University of the West Indies, and students of
medical history everywhere, must be grateful to Dr Hutson, who, like Dr
Grainger before him, has taken “liberal pains in the Notes . . . to enlarge
knowledge of the medicinal . . . plants of the West Indies”.

Henry S. Fraser
Professor of Medicine and Clinical Pharmacology,
School of Clinical Medicine and Research, and
Director, Chronic Disease Research Centre,
University of the West Indies, Cave Hill, Barbados
 Acknowledgements


D uring the compilation of this work I received help, advice and much-
needed direction from several individuals and organizations that I wish
to acknowledge publicly. I am particularly indebted to:
The Syndics of Cambridge University Library, who granted me permission
to reproduce James Grainger’s An Essay on the More Common West-India
Diseases.
Senator Keith Laurie of Barbados, who introduced me to the works of
James Grainger and permitted me to photocopy Book IV of his 1764 version
of The Sugar-Cane.
Richard B. Goddard of Barbados, who graciously allowed me access to
his library at Burnt House Plantation, wherein I encountered Benjamin
Moseley’s Treatise on Sugar and photocopied its contained Miscellaneous
Medical Observations.
Professor Sean Carrington, Department of Biological and Chemical
Studies, University of the West Indies, Cave Hill, Barbados, who made
identification of the many Caribbean plant varieties possible.
Carmen Herrgott of Austria, who read and reread my script and made
many suggestions regarding its content. Her help in compiling this work was
invaluable.
Early in the nineteenth century Dr Thomas Percy, Bishop of Dromore,
County Down, Northern Ireland, “an intimate friend of Dr Grainger’s”,
expressed the wish that An Essay on the More Common West-India Diseases
should be published in conjunction with Dr Grainger’s poetical works “as a
valuable Appendix to The Sugar-Cane”. It gives me particular pleasure that Dr
Percy’s hope for simultaneous publication of those particular works of Dr
Grainger’s is realized, if only in part, with the present volume.

J. Edward Hutson
Edmonton, Alberta,
Canada

xiii
 Introduction


De Englishmens did find de sun did hot enuff fu true,
Dey cool-out in de palm-tree shade an’ say, “Wha’ we goin’ do?
In Englan’ all we skin dus white, we cheeks dus nice an’ pink,
Bu’ lookah how we blista-up, an’ getting black as ink.”

Sum person say, “De very t’ing, we’ll sen’ across de sea,
An’ get sum Africans tu come an’ work de lan’ fu we.”
Su Mr. Hawkins tie we up, an’ pack we in he ship,
An’ Massa we did pack su tite, yu couldn’t pout yu lip.
– Kathleen Catford, 1935

S ugar and African slavery dominated the English-speaking Caribbean from

the third decade of the seventeenth century to that of the nineteenth, and
yet, despite provision of medical care to slaves during most of that era, very
little was published relative to diagnosis and treatment of diseases of African
and Creole slaves. The first physician to publish a manual on the medical
treatment of slaves in the British West Indies was James Grainger, MD.
Grainger was born in about 1721, in Berwickshire, Scotland. He pursued
medical studies at Edinburgh University, served as an army surgeon during
the Seven Years War, and graduated MD in 1753. He then removed to
London, where he became a member of the Royal College of Physicians,
practised medicine and wrote poetry that brought him into close contact with
many of the leading literary lights of the time. In London he met, and
befriended, several absentee plantation owners from the West Indian island of
St Christopher (St Kitts). Grainger experienced difficulties in making an

xiv
 Introduction  xv

adequate living as a London physician and in 1759 agreed to go to St Kitts as

tutor to John Bourryau, heir of a sugar estate. On the voyage out Grainger
rendered medical aid to Louisa Burt, widow of the late Pym Burt, Chief
Justice of St Kitts, in the course of which he became attracted to one of her
daughters, Daniel Mathew Burt [sic]; shipboard romance led to engagement
and subsequent marriage following the couple’s arrival at St Kitts.
In St Kitts Grainger added the avocation of planter to his medical and
poetic careers, and in 1764 he published The Sugar-Cane (a Virgil-like West
Indian georgic depicting the culture of sugar), of which Book IV deals with
“the management and care of slaves”. In that same year Grainger anonym-
ously published An Essay on the More Common West-India Diseases, the first of
its kind to appear in the English-speaking Caribbean. Grainger’s West Indian
writings display his understanding of, and compassion for, the unhappy lot of
enslaved peoples, while at the same time achieving their chief purpose, which
was imparting medical information to West Indian physicians and slave
owners.
James Grainger died in 1766, a victim of “West Indian fever”. He is
variously reported to have died in St Kitts or Antigua; however, no trace of his
final resting place has been discovered. The lack of a tombstone may reflect
Grainger’s wishes, for he wrote in verse 654, Book III, The Sugar-Cane,
“Though not a stone point out my humble grave.”


The Reverend Griffith Hughes, sometime rector of St Lucy’s Parish,

Barbados, made no pretence of being a physician; however, this did not
prevent him from writing Of the Diseases peculiar to this and the neighbouring
Islands in his 1750 Natural History of the Island of Barbados.
Hughes was born in about 1708, in the small coastal town of Towyn,
North Wales. After attending Oxford University, he was ordained a Church
of England minister at age twenty-five and sent by the Society for the
Propagation of the Gospel to serve an isolated Welsh community in
Pennsylvania. In 1735 he was appointed curate at St Lucy’s Parish Church,
Barbados, where he indulged his interest – common among clergymen of the
time – in observing and collecting natural history specimens. Hughes was
elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1748 and subsequently granted a Master
of Arts degree from Oxford University.
The Natural History of the Island of Barbados was published, by private
xvi  Introduction

subscription, in 1750, although Hughes conceived the idea of his book some
ten years previously. It enjoyed wide acclaim and remains available today in
facsimile. Despite being published almost simultaneously with Grainger’s The
Sugar-Cane and An Essay on the More Common West-India Diseases, it is
unlikely that Hughes and Grainger knew, or even knew of, one another.
Griffith Hughes is thought to have died in 1758.


Perhaps in unintentional imitation of his West Indian colleague James
Grainger, Benjamin Moseley, MD, published his 1789 Treatise on Sugar,
wherein he included a section of Miscellaneous Medical Observations.
Moseley was born in 1742, in Essex, England. He pursued medical studies
at the University of Leyden in the Netherlands, and in 1784 graduated MD
from the University of St Andrews, Scotland. In 1768 he immigrated to
Jamaica where he practised medicine and amassed a considerable fortune,
while simultaneously observing that medical science was “backward, chiefly
because acquirement of wealth was the principal goal of the adventurers in
physic in the West Indies”. He did not have a high opinion of the writings of
physicians who, after short periods of residence in the islands, promoted “new
methods of treating existing diseases”, maintaining that “only long residence,
great practice, and observation” made it possible to produce a medical
publication of practical use in the West Indies. He returned to England in
1788 to assume the position of Physician to the Royal Hospital, Chelsea.
In addition to his Treatise on Sugar, Moseley published Observations on the
Dysentery of the West Indies, with a new and successful Method of treating it
(1780), A Treatise on Tropical Diseases and on the Climate of the West Indies
(1787), A Treatise concerning the Properties and Effects of Coffee (1792), A
Treatise on Lues bovilia, or Cow-pox (1805), A Review of the Report of the Royal
College of Physicians of London on Inoculation (1808) and On Hydrophobia, its
Prevention and Cure, with a Dissertation on Canine Madness, illustrated with
cases (1809).
Benjamin Moseley died in 1819 at the age of seventy-seven.


Following the lead of English physician and naturalist Sir Hans Sloane,
William Wright, MD, in an attempt to advance knowledge of both medical
 Introduction  xvii

science and natural history, practised medicine for many years in Jamaica
(where he served as both surgeon- and physician-general) while at the same
time studying and collecting specimens of the island’s flora.
Wright was born in the village of Crieff, Perthshire, Scotland, in 1735. He
pursued medical studies at Edinburgh University. During the Seven Years
War he served as a surgeon’s mate in the West Indies, and in 1763 he returned
to Scotland. After obtaining an MD degree, he immigrated to Jamaica where
he established his medical practice and acquired a plantation. Unlike many
other West Indian physicians of the day, who spoke of yaws only in terms of
the loss of slave labour caused by the disease, Wright opined “that humanity
and sound policy call aloud on us to alleviate the sufferings and distresses of
[slaves] when they are so unfortunate as to be infected with this cruel
malady”.
While practising in Jamaica, Wright collected more than seven hundred
specimens of the island’s flora. In 1778 he read a paper before the
Philosophical Society of Edinburgh in which he described his collection
according to the method of Linnæus, outlining his pleasure as he “ascertained
many hundreds of new plants which had escaped the diligence of former
botanists”. Shortly after presentation of his paper, Wright was appointed
Fellow of the Royal Society.
Wright and Grainger were, in all probability, unknown to one another;
still, Wright expressed his desire “to cooperate, however little, with my
learned and ingenious countryman, in promoting knowledge of the diseases
of Negroes, and the virtues of the indigenous plants of the West Indies”
when, in 1802, he agreed to revise Grainger’s “long out of print and much
wanted” Essay on the More Common West-India Diseases.
William Wright died in 1819 at the age of eighty-four.


As practised during the era of slavery in the English-speaking Caribbean,

medicine remained much influenced by the teachings of Aristotle, which held
that matter was composed of the four qualities of heat, cold, moistness and
dryness, and by those of Galen, who adapted Aristotle’s theory of matter to
the human body. Aristotelians assumed the planet Earth to be composed of
the four elements of Greek philosophy, earth, water, air and fire, and those
elements themselves to be formed from the combination of basic matter with
two more pairs of opposite qualities, heat and coldness, moisture and dryness.
xviii  Introduction

Matter combined with coldness and dryness produced earth; water is cold
and wet; air is hot and wet; fire is hot and dry. These four qualities are the
foundation of Galenic medical theory: in the human body they combined to
form the four humours, blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile; blood, for
example, being hot and wet, was regarded as the analogue of air. A tempered
balance of the humours was requisite for maintenance of a state of health; a
patient distempered by fever, for example, could be returned to a state of
health by letting of hot blood or eating cooling foods.
References to cooling and heating regimens will be found throughout the
texts, as well as many references to letting of blood. However, by 1789 Dr
Moseley was prepared to suggest that current medical events in England,
particularly the appearance of cowpox, threatened to “kick down all the old
gally-pots of Galen”, and even that the theory of contagion, as related to
transmission of disease and propounded in the sixteenth century by
Girolamo Fracastoro, deserved consideration.
Therapeutics revolved about the use of compounds of antimony, mercury,
sulphur, iron, tin and magnesium, both alone and in various combinations,
with the occasional use of such exotic composites as “tobacco steeped in
urine”, “gunpowder taken inwardly with cow-piss”, “soap-medicines with hog
lice”, and enemas containing tobacco smoke; medicinal compounds were
frequently dissolved in “good old rum” or various wines. A few patent
medicines are mentioned in the texts, although Dr Grainger cautions against
the use of “empirical compositions” because “Creoles are but too fond of
quackery”. All other recommended medications were compounded from
various parts of plants, both native and imported, including flowers, seeds,
leaves, roots, fruit and bark.
Importation of plants from Europe and elsewhere began early in the
colonization of the British West Indies. Richard Ligon arrived in Barbados in
1647 carrying seeds of Cæsalpinia pulcherrima (Spanish carnation or Pride of
Barbados) that he had collected at São Tiago, Cape Verde Islands, as well as
seeds of many English herbs that “grew and prospered well”. Dr Grainger
recommended that plantation sick-houses should be planted “round the
borders with such herbs as are commonly used in physic”. He would have
been familiar with the use of herbs in the treatment of illness because
instruction in botany formed an important part of the medical curriculum at
European universities.
Traditional African medicine, combining poisons with magical rituals and
herbal remedies, was brought to the West Indies by imported slaves as part of
 Introduction  xix

their cultural baggage. European physicians, confident of their educational

superiority, tended to dismiss traditional African medicine as mere
superstition. Over the ensuing era, however, they came to realize that there
were slave illnesses that were not amenable to “white medicine”. Notable in
this category was the slave who was bewitched or under the spell of obeah.
Regarding such a slave, the Reverend Griffith Hughes observed that
“[European] medicines seldom availing, he usually lingers till death puts an
end to his fears”. In a similar vein, Dr Grainger, with perhaps more than just
a hint of condescension, wrote, “as the negroe-magicians can do mischief, so
can they do good on a plantation, provided they are kept by the white people
in proper subordination”. Dr William Hillary, a physician practising in
Barbados, wrote that traditional African treatment “with the caustic juices of
certain escharotic plants” was effective in curing yaws; however, the slaves
“kept this method of treatment secret from the white people and preserved it
among themselves by tradition”. (See Observations on the Changes of the Air
and the Concomitant Epidemical Diseases of Barbadoes, William Hillary, MD,
1759.)
Belief in the efficacy of traditional African magic has waned in modern
Caribbean society, but evidence of its persistence surfaces from time to time,
with news items appearing in the popular press of obeah, voodoo or Shango
ceremonies being performed in the islands: “In the past six months, more
people are coming to see me about being ‘obeahed’,” said Dr____________,
“and many colleagues have said they are getting a resurgence of patients
whose behaviour is influenced by this belief system” (Barbados Advocate, June
1985).
Widespread belief in the efficacy of traditional bush medicines has also
persisted, and use of bush teas, derived from herbal or other plant material,
is commonplace throughout the Caribbean basin. Despite popular
perception that all knowledge of traditional Caribbean bush medicine derives
from African sources, I believe that over the years such an agglomeration of
traditional African and European folklore relating to bush teas has occurred
in the Caribbean that it is today all but impossible to differentiate one from
the other.
The “West Indian Weed Song” appearing below originated in British
Guiana (Guyana); Camp Street and Orange Walk are well-known George-
town landmarks. The text illustrates the variety of herbs and other plant
material offered for sale and used in traditional Caribbean bush teas.
Other documents randomly have
different content
 TOUSSAINT

XVII

Ces vrais vivants qui sont les saints,

Et les vrais morts qui seront nous,
C'est notre double fête à tous,
Comme la fleur de nos desseins,

Comme le drapeau symbolique

Que l'ouvrier plante gaîment
Au faîte neuf du bâtiment,
Mais, au lieu de pierre et de brique,

C'est de notre chair qu'il s'agit,

Et de notre âme en ce nôtre œuvre
Qui, narguant la vieille couleuvre,
A force de travaux surgit.

Notre âme et notre chair domptées

Par la truelle et le ciment
Du patient renoncement
Et des heures dûment comptées.

Mais il est des âmes encor,

Il est des chairs encore comme
En chantier, qu'à tort on dénomme
Les morts, puisqu'ils vivent, trésor

Au repos, mais que nos prières

Seulement peuvent monnayer
Pour, l'architecte, l'employer
Aux grandes dépenses dernières.

Prions, entre les morts, pour maints

De la terre et du Purgatoire,
Prions de façon méritoire
Ceux de là-haut qui sont les saints.

IN INITIO

XVIII

Chez mes pays, qui sont rustiques

Dans tel cas simplement pieux,
Voire un peu superstitieux,
Entre autres pratiques antiques,

Sur la tête du paysan,

Rite profond, vaste symbole,
Le prêtre, étendant son étole,
Dit l'évangile de saint Jean:

«Au commencement était le Verbe

«Et le Verbe était en Dieu.
«Et le verbe était Dieu.»
Ainsi va le texte superbe,

S'épanchant en ondes de claire

Vérité sur l'humaine erreur,
Lavant l'immondice et l'horreur,
Et la luxure et la colère,

Et les sept péchés, et d'un flux

Tout parfumé d'odeurs divines,
Rafraîchissant jusqu'aux racines
L'arbre du bien, sec et perclus,
 Et déracinant sous sa force
L'arbre du mal et du malheur
Naguère tout en sève, en fleur,
En fruit, du feuillage à l'écorce.

O Jean, le plus grand, après l'autre

Jean, le Baptiste, des grands saints,
Priez pour moi le Sein des seins
Où vous dormiez, étant apôtre!

O, comme pour le paysan,

Sur ma tête frivole et folle,
Bon prêtre étendant ton étole,
Dis l'évangile de saint Jean.

VÊPRES RUSTIQUES

XIX

Le dernier coup de vêpres a sonné: l'on tinte.

Entrons donc dans l'Église et couvrons-nous d'eau sainte.

Il y a peu de monde encore. Qu'il fait frais!

C'est bon par ces temps lourds, ça semble fait exprès.

On allume les six grands cierges, l'on apporte

Le ciboire pour le salut. Voici la porte

De la sacristie entr'ouverte, et l'on voit bien

S'habiller les enfants de chœur et le doyen.

Voici venir le court cortège et les deux chantres

Tiennent de gros antiphonaires sur leurs ventres.

Une clochette retentit et le clergé

S'agenouille devant l'autel, dûment rangé.

Une prière est murmurée à voix si basse

Qu'on entend comme un vol de bons anges qui passe.

Le prêtre, se signant, adjure le Seigneur,

Et les clers, se signant, appellent le Seigneur.

Et chacun exaltant la Trinité, commence,

Prophète-roi, David, ta psalmodie immense:

«Le Seigneur dit…» «Je vous louerai…» «Qu'heureux les saints…»

«Fils, louez le Seigneur…» et, vibrant par essaims,

Les versets de ce chant militaire et mystique:

«Quand Israël sortit d'Égypte…» Et la musique

Du grêle harmonium et du vaste plain-chant!

L'Église s'est remplie. Il fait tiède. L'argent

Pour le culte et celui du denier de Saint-Pierre

Et des pauvres tombe à bruit doux dans l'aumônière.

L'hymme propre et Magnificat aux flots d'encens!

Une langueur céleste envahit tous les sens.

Au court sermon qui suit sur un thème un peu rance,

On somnole sans trop pourtant d'irrévérence.

Le soleil luit faisant un nimbe mordoré,

Le vieux saint du village est tout transfiguré.

Ça sent bon. On dirait des fleurs très anciennes.

S'exhalant, lentes, dans le latin des antiennes.
Et le Salut ayant béni l'humble troupeau
Des fidèles, on rejoint meilleurs le hameau.

Le soir on soupe mieux, et quand la nuit invite

Au sommeil, on s'endort bien à l'aise et plus vite.

COMPLIES EN VILLE

XX

Au sortir de Paris on entre à Notre-Dame.

Le fracas blanc vous jette aux accords long-voilés,
L'affreux soleil criard à l'ombre qui se pâme,

Qui se pâme, aux regards des vitraux constellés,

Et l'adoration à l'infini s'étire
En des récitatifs lentement en-allés,

Vêpres sont dites, et l'autel noir ne fait luire

Que six cierges, après les flammes du Salut
Dont l'encens rôde encor mêlé des goûts de cire.

Un clerc a lu: Jube, domne, comme fallut,

Et l'orage du fond des stalles se déchaîne
De rude psalmodie au même instant qu'il lut,

Le bon orage frais sous la voûte hautaine

Où le jour tamisé par les Saints et les Rois
Des rosaces oscille en volute sereine.

Cela parle de paix de l'âme, des effrois

De la nuit dissipés par l'acte et la prière.
L'espérance s'enroule autour des piliers froids.

C'est la suprême joie, et l'extrême lumière

Concentrée aux rais de la seule Vérité,
Et le vieux Siméon dit l'extase dernière!

Recommandons notre âme au Dieu de vérité.

PRUDENCE

XXI

Contrition parfaite,
Les anges sont en fêtes
Mieux d'un pêcheur contrit que d'un juste qui meurt.

Bon propos, la victoire

Préparée et la gloire
Presque déjà dans l'au-delà sans choc ni heurt.

Absolution sainte
Savourée avec crainte
D'en être indigne encor, d'en peut-être abuser.

Rentrée emmi le monde

Et son horreur profonde
Avec un cœur d'amour qui ne sait biaiser,

Car c'est l'amour divine

Qui prévoit et devine
Les pièges, le manège et les tours du Péché.
 Garde à toi tout de même,
Gare au trompeur suprême,
Chrétien certes fidèle encore qu'empêché

Par l'extase première

D'avoir vu la Lumière,
Et les yeux éblouis et tous les sens tremblants.

O chrétien nouveau, prie

A la Vierge Marie,
Et marche vers la bonne mort à pas bien lents.

PÉNITENCE

XXII

La luxure, ce moins terrible des péchés,

Ces deux pires de tous, l'Avarice et l'Envie,
La Gourmandise, abus risible de la vie,
Toi, Paresse, leur mère à tous, à ces péchés,

Et la Colère, presque belle en sa hideur,

Avec de faux reflets d'héroïsme, on veut croire,
Et l'Orgueil son grand frère à la gloire illusoire
Et tous dans leur révolte horrible et leur hideur,

Pénitence, presque innocence, tu les vaincs,

Tu les poursuis, tu les arrêtes et les captes,
Sauvant les âmes, par l'excellence des actes,
De l'Enfer et de ses milices que tu vaincs.

Oui, tu nous dictes et fait faire d'excellents

Actes à cause de l'excellence des causes,
Épanouissant, sur les épines de roses
Que la Prière après vient cueillir à pas lents,

Pénitence, du fond de mes crimes affreux,

Luxure, orgueil, colère et toute la filière,
J'invoque ton secours, Vertu particulière,
Seule agréable à Dieu qui voit mon cœur affreux.

OPPORTET HÆRESES ESSE

XXIII

Opportet hæreses esse.

Car il faut, en effet, encore,
Que notre foi, donc, s'édulcore
Opportet hæreses esse.

Il fallait quelque humilité,

Ma Foi qui poses et grimaces,
Afin que tu t'édulcorasses;
Et l'hérésiarque entêté

T'a tenté, ne nous dis pas non,

Jusque vers les pires péchés,
T'entraînant du doute impur chez
Le Diable t'ouvrant son fanon.

Or maintenant, courage! assez

De larmes sur l'erreur d'un jour,
Songe au pardon du Dieu d'amour.
Opportet hæredes esse.
 FINAL

J'ai fait ces vers bien qu'un bien indigne pécheur,

O bien indigne, après tant de grâces données,
Lâchement, salement, froidement piétinées
Par mes pieds de pécheur, de vil et laid pécheur.

J'ai fait ces vers, Seigneur, à votre gloire encor,

A votre gloire douce encore qui me tente
Toujours, en attendant la formidable attente
Ou de votre courroux ou de ta gloire encor,

Jésus, qui pus absoudre et bénir mon péché,

Mon péché monstrueux, mon crime bien plutôt!
Je me rementerais de votre amour, plutôt,
Que de mon effrayant et vil et laid péché,

Jésus qui sus bénir ma folle indignité,

Bénir, souffrir, mourir pour moi, ta créature,
Et dès avant le temps, choisis dans la nature,
Créateur, moi, ceci, pourri d'indignité!

Aussi, Jésus! avec un immense remords

Et plein de tels sanglots! à cause de mes fautes,
Je viens et je reviens à toi, crampes aux côtes,
Les pieds pleins de cloques et les usages morts,

Les usages? Du cœur, de la tête, de tout

Mon être on dirait cloué de paralysie
Navrant en même temps ma pauvre poésie
Qui ne s'exhale plus, mais qui reste debout

Comme frappée, ainsi le troupeau par l'orage,

Berger en tête, et si fidèle nonobstant
Mon cœur est là, Seigneur, qui t'adore d'autant
Que tu m'aimes encore ainsi parmi l'orage.

Mon cœur est un troupeau dissipé par l'autan

Mais qui se réunit quand le vrai Berger siffle
Et que le bon vieux chien, Sergent ou Remords, giffle
D'une dent suffisante et dure assez l'engeance

Affreuse que je suis, troupeau qui m'en allai

Vers une monstrueuse et solitaire voie,
O, me voici, Seigneur, ô votre sainte joie!
Votre pacage simple en les prés où j'allai

Naguère, et le lin pur qu'il faut et qu'il fallut,

Et la contrition, hélas! si nécessaire,
Et si vous voulez bien accepter ma misère,
La voici! faites-la, telle, hélas! qu'il fallut.
 VERS POSTHUMES

ACTE DE FOI

«Le seul savant c'est encore Moïse»!

Ainsi disais-je et pensais-je autrefois,
Et quand j'y pense encore et, sans surprise,
Me le redis avec la même voix,

Ma conviction, que tous les problèmes

Étalés en vain à mon œil naïf
N'ont point mise à mal, séducteurs suprêmes,
T'affirme à nouveau, dogme primitif.

La doctrine profane et l'art profane

Ont quelque bon, mais, s'ils agissent seuls,
C'est comme des spectres sous des linceuls.

La Genèse est claire, elle est diaphane,

Et par elle je crois avec ardeur
En Dieu, mon fauteur et mon créateur.
 PAQUES

Dic, nobis, Maria

quem vidisti in via.

De Rome, hier matin, les cloches revenues,

Exhalent un concert glorieux dans les nues.

L'écho puissant qui flue et tombe de la tour,

Vient magnifier l'air et la terre à leur tour.

L'oiseau, sanctifié par l'or des salves saintes

Lui-même entonne un hymne aimable et las de plaintes,

Clame l'alléluia sur un air de chanson,

Dans l'arbre, au ras des prés, et parmi le buisson.

L'alouette, un motet au bec, s'est envolée;

Le rossignol a salué l'aube emperlée

D'accents énamourés d'un amour plus brûlant,

Et comme lumineux d'un bonheur calme et lent,

Le printemps, né d'hier, allègrement frissonne;

La nature frémit d'aise, et voici que sonne

Partout dans la campagne, au cœur des vieux beffrois,

De l'altier campanile et du palais des rois,

Et de tous les fracas religieux des villes,

Des Paris aux Moscous, des Londres aux Sévilles,

Le frais appel pour l'alme célébration

De l'almissime jour de résurrection…

La colombe vole au sillon et l'agneau broute.

Dis-nous, Marie, qui tu rencontras en route?

Le fleuve est d'or sous le soleil renouvelé…

C'est le Seigneur «en Galilée il est allé!»

—Ah! que le cœur n'est-il lavé dans l'or du fleuve,

Sanctifiée en l'or des cloches l'âme veuve!

Et que l'esprit n'est-il humble comme l'agneau,

Blanc comme la colombe en ce clair renouveau

Et que l'homme, jadis conscience introublée,

N'est-il en route encore pour la Galilée!

ASSOMPTION

Aujourd'hui c'est ma fête et j'ai droit à des fleurs

(Sous mon autre prénom je n'ai droit qu'à mes pleurs),
Car sachez-le bien tous, je m'appelle Marie
Et sous le nom puissant d'une mère chérie
Je me sens protégé du mal et du péché
Qui m'avaient investi grâce au bien négligé.
Je me sais à l'abri d'un monde que j'abhorre
Et dont je ne saurais me séparer encore,
Je me crois défendu contre tout choc et heurt
Par ce nom qui s'en vient prier lorsque l'on meurt.
En ce jour merveilleux de triomphe et de gloire,
Il me semble que j'ai ma part de la victoire.
O ma femme, entrons donc joyeux, c'est notre droit
Dans le bonheur heureux… et le devoir qu'on doit.
 PRIÈRE

Me voici devant Vous, contrit comme il le faut.

Je sais tout le malheur d'avoir perdu la voie
Et je n'ai plus d'espoir, et je n'ai plus de joie
Qu'en une en qui je crois chastement, et qui vaut
A mes yeux mieux que tout, et l'espoir et la joie.

Elle est bonne, elle me connaît depuis des ans.

Nous eûmes des jours noirs, amers, jaloux, coupables,
Mais nous allions sans trêve aux fins inéluctables,
Balancés, ballottés, en proie à tous jusants
Sur la mer où luisaient les astres favorables:

Franchise, lassitude affreuse du péché

Sans esprit de retour, et pardons l'un à l'autre…
Or, ce commencement de paix n'est-il point vôtre,
Jésus, qui vous plaisez au repentir caché?
Exaucez notre vœu qui n'est plus que le vôtre.

LE CHARME DU VENDREDI SAINT

La cathédrale est grise admirablement,

Tandis que le jour luit adorablement
Et que les arbres sont verts tout doucement.

Les paysans sont naïfs et de province

Pour la plupart parents, dont la toilette grince,
De parisiens dont l'orgueil n'est pas mince
De les promener autour du fameux monument
Qui, néanmoins froissant l'orgueil de leur village,
Semble à leurs yeux matois quelque chose qui ment
Et va, comme un peu vil dans le sillage

Des bateaux mouches d'ailleurs pleins abondamment

D'une clientèle amusante en diable,
Qui file néanmoins, dévots irrémédiables,
Voir les autels déserts et les tombeaux décorés richement.

Paris, jeudi 30 mars 1893.

II

Le soleil fou de mars éveille encore un peu plus la verdure

Des fins arbres du quai bordant la beauté pure
Et forte de la cathédrale on dirait en guipure

De pierre, on croit, immémoriale et si dure!

Les cloches de la veille ont fui (leur âme, au moins,
S'est tue) et pendent, patients témoins
Muets jusqu'au samedi fier où, lentes sur les foins,

Enfin, elles reviennent (ou, du moins, leur âme

Planant sur les villes légères et les autres)
Et pendant leur voyage de miraculeux apôtres
A travers les humanités chastes et les infâmes,

Dans la nef désolée où seulement les flammes

Des ténèbres sévèrement bien plus sur toutes autres,
S'affligent, grands ouverts, les tabernacles, âmes
Muettes, symbolisent l'attente immense des apôtres.
 Vendredi, 31 mars 1893.

EX IMO

O Jésus, vous m'avez puni moralement

Quand j'étais digne encor d'une noble souffrance,
Maintenant que mes torts ont dépassé l'outrance.
O Jésus, vous me punissez physiquement.

L'âme souffrante est près de Dieu qui la conseille,

La console, la plaint, lui sourit, la guérit
Par une claire, simple et logique merveille.
La chair, il la livre aux lentes lois que prescrit

Le «Fiat lux», le créateur de la nature,

Le Verbe qui devait, Jésus-Christ, être vous
Plein de douceur, mais lors faisait la créature
Matérielle et l'autre en tout grand soin jaloux.

La Science, un souci vénérable, tâtonne,

Essaie et, pour guérir, à son tour, fait souffrir,
Et, le fer à la main, comme un bourreau te donne,
Triste corps, un coup tel que tu croirais mourir,

Ou se servant du feu soit flambant, soit sous forme

De pierre ou d'huile ou d'eau raffine ta douleur,
Tu dirais, pour un bien pourtant; mais quel énorme
Effort souvent infructueux, chair de malheur!

Chair, mystère plus noir et plus mélancolique

Que tous autres, pourquoi toi! Mais Dieu te voulut
Et tu fus, et tu vis, comment? au vent oblique
Des funestes saisons et du mal qui t'élut.

Et tu fus, et tu vis, comment! miracle frêle,

Et tu souffres d'affreux supplices pour un peu
De plaisir mêlé d'amertume et de querelle.
Oui, pourquoi toi?

Jésus répond: «Pour être enfin

Mienne et le vase pur de l'Esprit de sagesse
Et d'amour et plus tard glorieuse au divin
Séjour définitif de liesse et de largesse!

Encore un peu de temps, souffre encore un instant,

Offre-moi ta douleur que d'ailleurs la science
Peut tarir, et surtout, ô mon fils repentant,
Ne perds jamais cette vertu, la confiance!

La confiance en moi seul! Et je te le dis

Encore: patiente et m'offre ta souffrance.
Je l'assimilerai, comme j'ai fait jadis,
Au Calvaire, à la mienne, et garde l'espérance.

L'espérance en mon Père. Il est père, il est roi,

Il est bonté: c'est le bon Dieu de ton enfance.
Souffre encore un instant et garde bien la foi,
La foi dans mon Église et tout ce qu'elle avance.

Suis humble et souffre en paix, autant que tu pourras.

Je suis là. Du courage. Il en faut en ce monde.
Qui le sait mieux que moi? Lorsque tu souffriras
Cent fois plus, qu'est cela près de ma mort immonde,

Et de mon agonie et du reste? Allons, vois.

C'est fait. Le mal n'est plus: tu peux vivre dans l'aise
Quelques beaux jours encore et vieillir sur ta chaise,
Au soleil, et mourir et renaître à ma voix.»
8 août 1893, hôpital Broussais.

FIN
 TABLE

Préface de J. K. HUYSMANS I à
XXIV

SAGESSE

I. Bon chevalier masqué qui chevauche en silence 3

II. J'avais peiné comme Sisyphe 6
III. Qu'en dis-tu, voyageur, des pays et des gares? 9
IV. Malheureux! Tous les dons, la gloire du baptême 13
V. O vous, comme un qui botte au loin, Chagrins et
Joies 16
VI. Les faux beaux jours ont lui tout le jour, ma pauvre
âme 17
VII. La vie humble aux travaux ennuyeux et faciles 18
VIII. Sagesse d'un Louis Racine, je t'envie 19
IX. Non. Il fut gallican, ce siècle, et janséniste 20
X. Petits amis, qui sûtes nous prouver 21
XI. Or, vous voici promus, petits amis 24
XII. Vous reviendrez bientôt, les bras pleins de pardons 27
XIII. On n'offense que Dieu qui seul pardonne 29
XIV. Voix de l'Orgueil; un cri puissant comme d'un cor 31
XV. Va ton chemin sans plus t'inquiéter! 33
XVI. Pourquoi triste, ô mon âme 35
XVII. Né l'enfant des grandes villes 37
XVIII. L'âme antique était rude et vaine 39

II

I. O mon Dieu vous m'avez blessé d'amour 42

II. Je ne veux plus aimer que ma mère Marie 45
III. Vous êtes calme, vous voulez un vœu discret 47
IV. Mon Dieu m'a dit: Mon fils, il faut m'aimer 40
V. Désormais le Sage puni 58
VI. Du fond du grabat 60
VII. Le ciel est, par dessus le toit 67
VIII. Le son du cor s'afflige vers les bois 68
IX. La tristesse, langueur du corps humain 69
X. La bise se rue à travers 70
XI. Vous voilà, vous voilà, pauvres bonnes pensées! 71
XII. L'échelonnement des haies 73
XIII. L'immensité de l'humanité 74
XIV. La mer est plus belle 75
XV. La «grande ville». Un tas criard de pierres blanches 77
XVI. Toutes les amours de la terre 78
XVII. Sainte Thérèse veut que la Pauvreté soit 80
XVIII. C'est la fête du blé, c'est la fête du pain 81

AMOUR

Prière du matin 85
É
Écrit en 1875 90
Un conte 94
Bournemouth 98
There 101
Un crucifix 103
Un veuf parle 105
Il parle encore 107
Saint Graal 109
Angélus de midi 111
A Victor Hugo 114
Saint Benoit-Joseph Labre 115
Paraboles 116
Sonnet héroïque 117
Pensée du soir 118

BONHEUR

I. L'incroyable, l'unique horreur de pardonner 123

II. La vie est bien sévère 124
III. Après la chose faite, après le coup porté 120
IV. De plus, cette ignorance de Vous! 128
V. L'homme pauvre du cœur est-il si rare, en somme 130
VI. Bon pauvre, ton vêtement est léger 131
VII. Le «sort» fantasque qui me gâte à sa manière 135
VIII. Prêtres de Jésus-Christ, la vérité vous garde 140
IX. Guerrière, militaire et virile en tout point 143
X. Un projet de mon âge mûr 140
XI. Sois de bronze et de marbre et surtout sois de
chair 150
XII. Seigneur, vous m'avez laissé vivre 152
XIII. La neige à travers la brume 157
XIV. O! J'ai froid d'un froid de glace 159
XV. Un scrupule qui m'a l'air sot comme un péché 162
XVI. Après le départ des cloches 165
XVII. L'ennui de vivre avec le monde et dans les choses 167
XVIII. Vous m'avez demandé quelques vers sur «Amour» 171
XIX. Or, tu n'es pas vaincu, sinon par le Seigneur 172
XX. Les plus belles voix 175
XXI. L'autel bas s'orne de hautes mauves 175
XXII. L'amour de la Patrie est le premier amour 177
XXIII. Immédiatement après le salut somptueux 183
XXIV. La cathédrale est majestueuse 184
XXV. Voix de Gabriel 186

LITURGIES INTIMES

I. Asperges me 191
II. Avent 193
III. Noël 195
IV. Saints innocents 197
V. Circoncision 199
VI. Rois 201
VII. Kyrie Eleison 203
VIII. Gloria in excelsis 205
IX. Credo 207
X. Ascension 209
XI. Veni sancte 211
XII. Juin 213
XIII. Sanctus 215
XIV. Immaculée conception 217
XV. Dévotions 219
XVI. Agnus Dei 221
XVII. Toussaint 222
XVIII. In initio 224
XIX. Vêpres rustiques 226
XX. Complies en ville 229
XXI. Prudence 231
XXII. Pénitence 233
XXIII. Opportet hæreses esse 235
XXIV. Final 237

VERS POSTHUMES

Acte de Foi 241

Pâques 242
Assomption 244
Prière 245
Le Charme du Vendredi Saint. I 246
— II 247
Ex imo 248

ACHEVÉ D'IMPRIMER
Le sept mars mil neuf cent quatre
PAR

BUSSIÈRE
A SAINT-AMAND (CHER)
pour le compte
DE

M. A. MESSEIN
éditeur
19, QUAI SAINT-MICHEL
PARIS (Ve)
 *** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POÉSIES
RELIGIEUSES ***

Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.

Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S.

copyright law means that no one owns a United States copyright in
these works, so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it
in the United States without permission and without paying
copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of
Use part of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™
concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following
the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use
of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything
for copies of this eBook, complying with the trademark license is
very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as
creation of derivative works, reports, performances and research.
Project Gutenberg eBooks may be modified and printed and given
away—you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with
eBooks not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject
to the trademark license, especially commercial redistribution.

START: FULL LICENSE

THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
 PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK

To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free

distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work (or
any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
Project Gutenberg™ License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.

Section 1. General Terms of Use and

Redistributing Project Gutenberg™
electronic works
1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg™
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree
to and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in your
possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
Project Gutenberg™ electronic work and you do not agree to be
bound by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund
from the person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in
paragraph 1.E.8.

1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be

used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people
who agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a
few things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg™ electronic
works even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.
See paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with
Project Gutenberg™ electronic works if you follow the terms of this
agreement and help preserve free future access to Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.
1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the
collection of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works. Nearly all the
individual works in the collection are in the public domain in the
United States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law
in the United States and you are located in the United States, we do
not claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing,
performing, displaying or creating derivative works based on the
work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of
course, we hope that you will support the Project Gutenberg™
mission of promoting free access to electronic works by freely
sharing Project Gutenberg™ works in compliance with the terms of
this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg™ name associated
with the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this
agreement by keeping this work in the same format with its attached
full Project Gutenberg™ License when you share it without charge
with others.

1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also
govern what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most
countries are in a constant state of change. If you are outside the
United States, check the laws of your country in addition to the
terms of this agreement before downloading, copying, displaying,
performing, distributing or creating derivative works based on this
work or any other Project Gutenberg™ work. The Foundation makes
no representations concerning the copyright status of any work in
any country other than the United States.

1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:

1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other

immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg™ License must
appear prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg™
work (any work on which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears,
or with which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” is associated) is
accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, copied or distributed:
 This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United
States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away
or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License
included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you
are not located in the United States, you will have to check the
laws of the country where you are located before using this
eBook.

1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg™ electronic work is derived

from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not contain a
notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the copyright
holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in the
United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, you must
comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through
1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project
Gutenberg™ trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg™ electronic work is posted

with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg™ License for all works posted
with the permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning
of this work.

1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project

Gutenberg™ License terms from this work, or any files containing a
part of this work or any other work associated with Project
Gutenberg™.

1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this

electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1
with active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg™ License.

1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form,
including any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you
provide access to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg™ work
in a format other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in
the official version posted on the official Project Gutenberg™ website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or
expense to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or
a means of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original
“Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must
include the full Project Gutenberg™ License as specified in
paragraph 1.E.1.

1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,

performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg™ works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.

1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing

access to or distributing Project Gutenberg™ electronic works
provided that:

• You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive
from the use of Project Gutenberg™ works calculated using the
method you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The
fee is owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg™ trademark,
but he has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to
the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty
payments must be paid within 60 days following each date on
which you prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your
periodic tax returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked
as such and sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
Foundation at the address specified in Section 4, “Information
Welcome to our website – the ideal destination for book lovers and
knowledge seekers. With a mission to inspire endlessly, we offer a
vast collection of books, ranging from classic literary works to
specialized publications, self-development books, and children's
literature. Each book is a new journey of discovery, expanding
knowledge and enriching the soul of the reade

Our website is not just a platform for buying books, but a bridge
connecting readers to the timeless values of culture and wisdom. With
an elegant, user-friendly interface and an intelligent search system,
we are committed to providing a quick and convenient shopping
experience. Additionally, our special promotions and home delivery
services ensure that you save time and fully enjoy the joy of reading.

Let us accompany you on the journey of exploring knowledge and

personal growth!

ebookultra.com