This is intended as satire, not advice….

I know many are frustrated and angry with today’s dysfunctional politics.  Many are wont to engage in violence but as the Regimental Brewmeister, I would be remiss in not pointing out a solution (pun intended) from history — distilled spirits.  Not only do these elixirs have the ability to balance the four humours but they also have industrial/military uses as accelerants.  In these days of the of all things true Americans hold dear, we can take solace in what the alchemists of the Islamic Golden Age knew was a powerful means of transforming matter, health, and society – alcohol!

In 1512, Hieronymus Brunschwig published the Small book of Distillation.  Like anyone living in medieval times, Brunschwig knew that the world was strictly divided into two separate realms: heaven and earth and while the heavenly spheres were perfect, revolving in harmonious clockwork precision and unchanging, the earthly world was rather different, full of corruption, decay, disease, and strife.  Since all earthly matter was made up of the four elements: fire, air, earth, and water, there must be some other, yet undiscovered element, present in the earth that upset these humous. 

Medieval medicine (practiced well into the 19^th Century) argued that health was maintained by balancing the four humours. Since the time of Hippocrates, the four earthly elements (fire, water, air, and earth) it was postulated that a person’s temperament and health were based a delicate balance of these elements and their bodily equivalents (yellow bile, black bile, blood, and phlegm). 

Elements	Seasons	Qualities	Humors	Illness/Symptoms	Temperament
Fire	Summer	Hot-dry	Yellow bile	Fever, Vomiting, Yellow skin	Choleric
Earth	Autumn	Cold-dry	Black bile	Dry skin, Vomiting	Melancholy
Air	Spring	Hot-moist	Blood	Dysentery/Nose bleeds	Sanguine
Water	Winter	Cold moist	Phlegm	Sneezing/colds	Phlegmatic

Brunchwig further speculated that the entire of the earth was similarly governed and that decay and degradations, in fact all evil, in the world must be caused by a similar imbalance.  When these four elements were not is balance, the world was volatile, prone to haphazard permutations. To achieve stability and harmony, to keep physical corruption at bay, Brunschwig argued, the elements must be distilled, removing the corrupted substances and leaving behind the true essence of the world. 

Haunted by apocalyptic visions, Brunchwig was convinced that the coming of Antichrist (Trump) was neigh.  In order to prevail in the final battle, men needed to find the panacea, a universal medicine which cures all illnesses by adjusting any imbalance of the four humours. The only substance fitting the bill was “quintessence of wine”– alcohol distilled many times over, the stronger the better.

This marvelous liquid was not, like all other earthly things, imbued with the qualities of the four sublunar elements and thus doomed to decay. Instead, it was perfectly balanced.  It had to be the elusive fifth element which made up the heavenly spheres incorruptible. Multiple distillation at different carefully-regulated temperatures was followed by “circulation” of the substance in specially made glass vessels to remove any remaining traces of the corruptible elements

“Quintessences” separated a plant’s healing virtues from its material dross.  This led to more standardized remedies with predictable effects.  The shelf life remedies properly distilled were also predictable.  The response of the body to remedies thus purified were much more powerful.  While, Brunchwig’s distillation could not go all the way to yield the perfect balance and incorruptibility of heaven, it channeled some of heaven’s clockwork and made earthly medicines more reliable.

So, today the world experiencing tremendous instability.  Christian theologist often speak of an “anti-Christ” or false prophet who corrupts their teachings to exploit and destroy.  Brunchwig would simply deem this person an imbalance in the world’s humours.  To restore harmony, the solution is the same, we must distill off the corrupting elements, those people and policies that corrupt and destroy our world.  When we do this, the world becomes more stable, predictable, and our American values become more powerful. 

Either way, the solution is alcohol.  Drink it to dull the pain. Imbibe to achieve “Dutch Courage” needed to take action. Serve it in your salons where you want others to hear how the world can be different if we make changes then motivate them to take political action.  Employ this powerful elixir to hake the world whole again.  Or, you can simply soak the problem (Trump and his MAGA supporters) in alcohol and set it on fire.

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