The Bower Manuscript 1.6

1.6

Digestion of food, equilibrium of the bodily elements, and health, / nourishment, splendour, and energy, and long life are produced from the digestive fire. // 44
For the digestive fire has food as its root, and the bodily elements have digestion as their root; / from equilibrium of the bodily elements comes health, and from health, supreme nourishment. // 45
From nourishment come splendour and energy, and from all these the life / of living beings increases; therefore, one should examine the digestive fire first of all. // 46
From equilibrium of the bodily elements it is said to be balanced; that indeed is declared to be the best. / When it is irregular, one should drink curd-clarified butter or [a ghee] prepared with havuṣā and other [drugs]. // 47
Unctuous and warm suppositories are desirable, as well as drinks and food; / but when it is sluggish, fasting comes first, followed by digestive and fire-kindling remedies. // 48
And the administrations of powders and fermented liquors that remove bile and phlegm are beneficial; / thus, when the digestive fire is balanced, [the physician] should apply what is agreeable, according to physicians. // 49
And on this point there is [a verse]: / When it is sluggish and when it is sharp, a man dies without remedies; / when it is irregular, there is an abundance of disease; when it is balanced, he will live long and happily. // 50
Therefore, in all diseases at all times, a wise man / should carry out treatment rooted in the digestive fire first, for the pacification of the disease. // 51
With the fresh juice of śaṅkhapuṣpī, brāhmī, maṇḍūkaparṇī, and liquorice, / one desiring intellect, health, and strength, and wishing to live, should make use of it. // 52
In a month he becomes intelligent; after six months, able to retain what is heard and free from old age; / by using it according to rule for a year, he lives for a thousand years, [or] for two hundred. // 53
Using it thus continuously, he becomes free from old age. […] // 54
In gruels, khaḍa soups, and pulses, and in electuaries, powders, and antivenoms, / and in pills, collyria, suppositories, and in medicinal inhalations and nasal blowing powders, // 55
and in closed-pot baking, saturating drinks, fomentations, sternutatories, and eye-drops, // 56
and in others not mentioned, wherever the proportion is not stated, / the ingredients should be in equal parts, and honey and clarified butter in double [amount]; // 57
but one should add threefold jaggery, and fourfold sugar-powder, where among ingredients to be ground