This article explores a set of medications, called les remèdes des pauvres, that were distributed from the late seventeenth century onward to the sick poor of rural France and to French missions abroad. Although it was eventually absorbed into the French state as a form of royally sponsored poor relief, this drug distribution network began in 1670 as a distinctly ecclesiastical endeavour, aimed at allowing parish priests, missionaries, and charitable laywomen to imitate the healing ministry of Christ and his apostles. While critics saw them as peddling a dangerous chemical drug in poor villages, their promoters argued that the active charity involved in distributing the remedies, and even the faith placed in their effectiveness by the sick, played an important role in effecting their cures. As such they offer a useful perspective on the shifting boundaries between medical charity and medical commerce, as well as between natural and supernatural healing.

本文探讨了一组称为les remèdes des pauvres的药物，从 17 世纪后期开始分发给法国农村生病的穷人和法国海外使团。虽然它最终作为皇室赞助的救济形式并入法国政府，但这个药物分销网络始于 1670 年，作为一项明显的教会努力，旨在允许教区神父、传教士和慈善的平信徒模仿基督的医治事工和他的使徒。虽然批评者认为他们在贫困村庄兜售危险的化学药物，但他们的发起人认为，参与分发药物的积极慈善机构，甚至病人对其有效性的信心，在实现治愈方面发挥了重要作用。因此，它们为医疗慈善和医疗商业之间的界限转变提供了有用的视角，