the testicles into the Cod. I observed this not long ago in a Boy, which an unskilful Chirurgeon had long, and grievously troubled, as if he had had a rupture: for when I had observed that there was but one Stone in the Cod, and knew the Boy was never gelt; I bid them cast away the Plai∣sters and Trusses, and wisht his Parents that they should suffer him to run and leap, that so the idling Stone might be drawn into the Cod, which thing by little and little, and without pain, had the event as I fore-told.
That the reason of this affect may be understood, we must know a man differs from a woman, only in efficacy of heat; but it is the nature of strong heat to drive forth, as of cold to keep in. Hence it is that the Stones in men hang forth in the Cod, but in women they lie hid in the lower Belly. Therefore it happens that in some males more cold by nature, the Testicles are shut up some certain time, until at length they are forc't down in the Cod by youthful heat. But that we may return to our former Treatise of the Cod, although that way of Curing Ruptures wants not pain & danger, yet it is safer than that which is performed by Gelding, which by the cruelty there∣of exposes to the to Patient manifest danger of death. For the Gelders whilst they fear lest when the cure is finished, the relaxation may remain, pull with violence the process of the Peritonaeum from the parts to which it adheres, & together with it a nerve of the sixth conjugation which runs to the Stones; they offer the same violence to the spermatick vessels; by which things ensue great pain, convulsion, efflux of bloud, inflammation, putrefaction, and lastly, death, as I have obser∣ved in many whom I have dissected, having died a few dayes after their gelding. Although some escape these dangers, yet they are deprived of the faculty of generation for all their life after; for performance whereof, Nature hath bestowed the Testicles, as parts principally necessary for the conservation of mankind. Through which occasion Galen hath not feared to prefer them before the Heart; because the Heart is the beginning of life, but the Testicles of a better life; for it is far more noble to live well, than simply and absolutely to live; therefore Eunuches de∣generate into a womanish nature; for they remain without beards, their voyce is weak, their courage fails them, and they turn cowards; and seeing they are unfit for all humane actions, their life cannot but be miserable. Wherefore I will never subscribe to the cutting out of the Stones, unless a Sarcocele or Gangrene invade them. But that the way of performing the Punctus aureus may be better known, I have thought good (in the fore-going Page) to set down the Instruments, by which this operation is performed, before your view.
Another more easie and safe way to restore the Gut and Kall.
THeodorick and Guido have invented another way of performing this operation. They put back into their places the Gut and Kall being fallen down, the Patient being so placed, that his thighs are high and his head is somewhat low; then they draw aside the lower portion of the pro∣duction of the Peritonaeum, and also the spermatick vessels, and cremaster-muscle to the Ischium; then by applying a caustick fitted to the age and disease, they burn the other part of the process, directly perpendicular to the Sharebone, where the Gut did fall down. Then they pull off the Es∣char thus made with a Knife even to the quick, then they apply another caustick in the same place, which may go even to the Bone, then procure the falling of this Eschar made on the foresaid pro∣cess. And afterwards they heal the ulcer which remains; which presently contracting somewhat a thick Callus, so keeps up the guts and kall, that it binds them from falling down into the cod. This way of restoring the Gut and Kall, though it be safer and more facile; yet the Chirurgeon must not attempt it, if the Guts or Kall stick so fast, agglutinated to the process of the Peritonaeum, that they cannot be severed, nor put back into their places (for from the Guts so burnt and violated, greater mischief would ensue) if by the broken and too much dilated process, the Bodies there∣by restrained, make an exceeding great Tumor by their falling down; if the Testicle yet lying in the Groin as in a Bubonocele, a kind of Enterocele, being not yet descended in the Scrotum, or Cod, if the Patients be not come to such age, as they can keep themselves from stirring, or hold their excrements while the operation is performed.