CHAPTER VIII

Of the passage of Meat and Drink.

That there are different passages for Meat and Drink, the Meat or dry aliment descending by the one, the Drink or moistening vehicle by the other, is a popular Tenent in our daies, but was the assertion of learned men of old. For the same was affirmed by _Plato_, maintained by _Eustathius_ in _Macrobius_, and is deducible from _Eratosthenes_, _Eupolis_ and _Euripides_. Now herein Men contradict experience, not well understanding _Anatomy_, and the use of parts. For at the Throat there are two cavities or conducting parts; the one the Oesophagus or Gullet, seated next the spine, a part official unto nutrition, and whereby the aliment both wet and dry is conveied unto the stomack; the other (by which tis conceived the Drink doth pass) is the weazon, rough artery, or wind-pipe, a part inservient to voice and respiration; for thereby the air descendeth into the lungs, and is communicated unto the heart. And therefore all Animals that breath or have lungs, have also the weazon; but many have the gullet or feeding channel, which have no lungs or wind-pipe; as fishes which have gils, whereby the heart is refrigerated; for such thereof as have lungs and respiration, are not without the weazon, as Whales and cetaceous Animals.

Again, Beside these parts destin'd to divers offices, there is a peculiar provision for the wind-pipe, that is, a cartilagineous flap upon the opening of the Larinx or Throttle, which hath an open cavity for the admission of the air; but lest thereby either meat or drink should descend, Providence hath placed the _Epiglottis_, _Ligula_, or flap like an Ivy leaf, which alwaies closeth when we swallow, or when the meat and drink passeth over it into the gullet. Which part although all have not that breath, as all cetaceous and oviparous Animals, yet is the weazon secured some other way; and therefore in Whales that breath, least the water should get into the lungs, an ejection thereof is contrived by a Fistula or spout at the head. And therefore also though birds have no Epiglottis, yet can they so contract the rim or chink of their Larinx, as to prevent the admission of wet or dry ingested; either whereof getting in, occasioneth a cough, until it be ejected. [SN: _Why a man cannot drink and breath at once._] And this is the reason why a Man cannot drink and breath at the same time; why, if we laugh while we drink, the drink flies out at the nostrils; why, when the water enters the weazon, Men are suddenly drowned; and thus must it be understood, when we read [SN: Anacreon _the Poet, if the story be taken literally_.] of one that died by the seed of a Grape, and another by an hair in milk.

Now if any shall still affirm, that some truth there is in the assertion, upon the experiment of _Hippocrates_, who killing an Hog after a red potion, found the tincture thereof in the Larinx; if any will urge the same from medical practice, because in affections both of Lungs and weazon, Physitians make use of syrupes, and lambitive medicines; we are not averse to acknowledge, that some may distil and insinuate into the wind-pipe, and medicines may creep down, as well as the rheum before them; yet to conclude from hence, that air and water have both one common passage, were to state the question upon the weaker side of the distinction, and from a partial or guttulous irrigation, to conclude a total descension.