It was not however until the end of the thirteenth century, that Chemistry can be said to have added any considerable power to the arm of Physic.
BASIL VALENTINE, a German Benedictine monk, led the way to the internal administration of metallic medicine, by a variety of experiments on the nature of _Antimony_, and in his “_Currus Triumphalis Antimonii_,” a work written in high Dutch, he has described a number of the combinations of that metal. If however we may credit a vague tradition, he was extremely unfortunate in his first experiments upon his brother monks, all of whom he injured if not killed; those who have keen ears for etymological sounds will instantly recognise, in this circumstance, the origin of the word _Antimony_,—ἁντί Μονοχους.
It appears that the ancients were ignorant of the internal use and administration of the metals, with the exception of iron, although they frequently used them in external applications. Hippocrates recommends _Lead_ in several parts of his works, as an _epulotic_ application, and for other external purposes. _Litharge of Gold_ and _Cerusse_ also entered the composition of several powders extolled by that ancient physician as possessing great efficacy in defluxions of the eyes. Oribasius and Ætius added “_Lithargyrium_” to several plaisters, and the composition of the “_Snow-like plaister_,” from _Minium_, was long preserved amongst their most valuable secrets. Whether antimony is the _Stimmi_ or _Stibium_ of the ancients has been a matter of conjecture; for Pliny, in speaking of its preparation observes, “Ante omnia urendi modus necessarius, ne _Plumbum_ fiat.” This plumbum however was evidently the revived metal of _Antimony_, with which the ancients were unacquainted, and therefore mistook it for _Lead_; besides, the word _Plumbum_, like many others which I have before mentioned, was used as a general term; thus, according to Pliny, Tin was called _Plumbum album_; and Agricola calls Lead Plumbum _nigrum_.[103]
The question however is unimportant, for this _Stibium_ was never used but as an external Astringent, especially for the purpose of contracting the eye-lids, and thereby of making the eyes appear very large, which has been considered from the most remote antiquity, as a feature of great beauty; thus the epithet βοῶπὶς is constantly applied by Homer to Juno. This practice appears also to have been followed by the Jews, for Jezebel is said to have painted her eye-brows to make the eyes appear big;[104] the expression also shews that the drug employed was the _Stimmi_. Εστὶμμὶσατο τους οφθαλμους ἁυτης.