The compleat midwifes practice, in the most weighty and high concernments of the birth of man. Containing perfect rules for midwifes and nurses, as also for women in their conception, bearing, and nursing of children: from the experience not onely of our English, but also the most accomplisht and absolute practicers among the French, Spanish, Italian, and other nations. A work so plain, that the weakest capacity may easily attain the knowledge of the whole art. With instructions of the midwife to the Queen of France (given to her daughter a little before her death) touching the practice of the said art. / Published with the approbation and good liking of sundry the most knowing professors of midwifery now living in the city of London, and other places. Illustrated with severall cuts in brass. By T.C. I.D. M.S. T.B. practitioners.
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Title
The compleat midwifes practice, in the most weighty and high concernments of the birth of man. Containing perfect rules for midwifes and nurses, as also for women in their conception, bearing, and nursing of children: from the experience not onely of our English, but also the most accomplisht and absolute practicers among the French, Spanish, Italian, and other nations. A work so plain, that the weakest capacity may easily attain the knowledge of the whole art. With instructions of the midwife to the Queen of France (given to her daughter a little before her death) touching the practice of the said art. / Published with the approbation and good liking of sundry the most knowing professors of midwifery now living in the city of London, and other places. Illustrated with severall cuts in brass. By T.C. I.D. M.S. T.B. practitioners.
Author
Chamberlayne, Thomas.
Publication
London, :: Printed for Nathaniel Brooke at the Angell in Cornhill.,
1656.
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Subject terms
Obstetrics -- Early works to 1800.
Midwives -- Early works to 1800.
Gynecology -- Early works to 1800.
Medicine -- Early works to 1800.
Cite this Item
"The compleat midwifes practice, in the most weighty and high concernments of the birth of man. Containing perfect rules for midwifes and nurses, as also for women in their conception, bearing, and nursing of children: from the experience not onely of our English, but also the most accomplisht and absolute practicers among the French, Spanish, Italian, and other nations. A work so plain, that the weakest capacity may easily attain the knowledge of the whole art. With instructions of the midwife to the Queen of France (given to her daughter a little before her death) touching the practice of the said art. / Published with the approbation and good liking of sundry the most knowing professors of midwifery now living in the city of London, and other places. Illustrated with severall cuts in brass. By T.C. I.D. M.S. T.B. practitioners." In the digital collection Early English Books Online 2. https://name.umdl.umich.edu/A78521.0001.001. University of Michigan Library Digital Collections. Accessed May 26, 2024.
Pages
CHAP. XIII. Of the actions of the womb.
THe first use of the womb is to attract the seed, by a familiar sympathy, just as the load-stone draws iron.
The second use is to retain it, which is pro∣perly called conception.
The third is to cherish the seed thus attracted,
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to altar it, and change it into the birth, by rai∣sing up that power which before lay sleeping in the seed, and to reduce it from power into act: The fourth action of the womb is to send forth the birth at the time prefixed; the apt time of ex∣pulsion, is when the expulsive faculty begins to be affected with some sence of trouble, that is when the birth afflicts and oppresses the womb with its own weight.
Besides these uses, it hath these moreover to nourish the birth, and to dilate it self, which it doth by the help of veins and arteries, which do fill more and more with matter, as nature requires.
The chiefest action of the womb and most proper to it, is the retention of the seed; with∣out which, nothing of other action could be per∣formed for the generation of man.