Thomas Sydenham, the English Hippocrates

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Thomas Sydenham, the English Hippocrates ' 143 THOMAS SYDENHAM, THE ENGLISH HIPPOCRATES. "THOMAS SYDENHAM, THE ENGLISH HIPPOCRATES."1 % w. H. Coupland, L.R.C.P.Edin., Senior Assistant Medical Officer, The Royal Albert Asylum for Idiots, Lancaster. Gentlemen,?Iii the paper that1 had the this Club, entitled "Sir Thomas Browne, ^"^^^anyhmen- tioned pmitpinnoraries, and quoted an anecdote concerning one of his Thomas the of theo^mp ^ Sydenham, greatest physician ^ and one called tl century, who has been _ J ^ Of in e 0f niy him I purpose to and speak to-night, him remarks I shall mention others of his time v, ^uenced either m the intellectualinteilec by their friendship or by their position world of that day. , .j t <-omi can must of be omi ,, only Many particulars necessity ^ attempt a mere sketch of his career, leaving 5 c ^ have used interest is aroused, to refer to some of the ma and ia en^on t0 which is before me; and among this I } the editions of the works of Sydenham issue? Sydenham " J,,. f0 the "Life to the of National Biogi y > Society; Dictionary (< iiellt of written Dr. Samuel John on Sydenham," by ^ Mr. and to^m Doctors," by Bettany; also "Masters of Medicine" Series, writtenespecially^: b) ? Payne-who wrote the article in the " Dictionary of a, 1 i>;0crraphy,"?a ^ book to am accu ' 0rmation, many which I indebted for much , points in the career of our hero jn obscurity, j?emS ivnwn ' to be found Lastly, to that essay, by in " delightful L>i-0111, friend Horae Subsecivl," in which j Locke, the are so > My physician-philosopher, and has paper is, I will at once confess, but a mass extracts, common been compiled the aid of scissoi s 1 only by jc factor in the of literary work, for, like Molieie, 1prcnds tnon hi*? -.v. etiologyi j 111011 bien ou jc le trouve. Thomas Sydenham, " the man of many vnown Sydenham's mother was killed auiiu0 for the have been year 1644. His stay in the army cannot of the Lancastei rjlni "^T a(Wress delivered at tlie annual meeting 2,Kia.uuar y "or. in- Med. Joum., April 1905. 144 W. H. COUPLAND. in 1648 he took the degree of Bachelor of Physic at Oxford, very little preparation for which sufficed in those elastic days, when curricula and degrees could be easily attained by influence, either active or passive. On 3rd October of the same year he was made a Fellow of All Souls' College in the place of one of the expelled Eoyalists, and after staying at the for some little time, " university according to Desault in his Dissertation on Consumptions," he took a journey to the celebrated medical school at Montpellier in France. It seems that he took up the study of medicine owing to the influence and advice of a Dr. Th. Coxe, for in his " Medical Observations," third edition, Sydenham wrote: " It is now the thirtieth year since the time when, being on my way to London, in order to go from thence a second time to Oxford (from which the misfortunes of the first war had kept me for some years), I had the good fortune to fall in with the most learned and honourable Dr. Thomas who was Coxe, at that time attending my brother during an and as illness, then, he has been up to the present time, practising medicine with great distinction. He, with his well-known kindness and courtesy, asked me what profession I was preparing to enter, now that I was resuming my interrupted studies, and was come to man's estate. I had at that time no fixed plans, and was not even dreaming of the profession of medicine ; but moved by the recommendation and influence a of so great man, and in some way, I suppose, by my own destiny, I applied myself seriously to that pursuit. And certainly, if my efforts have turned out to be of the least public utility, the credit must be referred to was thankfully him who the patron and promoter of my early studies. After spending a few years in the university, I returned to London and entered on the practice of medicine." It is probable, although the point had not been settled in Dr. mind when he Payne's wrote his life, that Sydenham was pre- sented with the M. A. degree; however, by command of the Earl of Pembroke, he was inducted to the Bachelorship of Medicine on 14th April 1648, and it is apparent that this installation was hurried on to allow of him being made a Fellow of All Souls', as has been previously mentioned. Unlike practitioners of to-day, he obtained his qualification at the beginning instead of at the end of his student's course, but we shall with the remark of " agree apt Dr. Payne, who says, If we consider the incalculable gain to the science of medicine involved in making Sydenham a doctor, we must admit that seldom has the blind Goddess of Patronage dis- pensed her favours with a happier hand." The year 1647 was a stirring one for the University of Oxford, for the Parliament then appointed Visitors, of necessity advanced Puritans, to control it and to make fresh appointments. Any opposition was futile, as the University had to capitulate to the Earl of Pembroke in March 1648, who expelled about 400 Eoyalists; and we learn that in "THOMAS SYDENHAM, THE ENGLISH HIPrOCEATES." 145 September, the month after the overthrow had been completed, Sydenham entered Wadham College as a Fellow Commoner, lor views of some colleges at this time we can consult the volumes of Alumni Oxoniensis, one of which is before me. Some of the men thus forcibly introduced were afterwards famous, the names including Wallis, the mathematician; Seth Ward, Professor of Astronomy, one who had been previously ejected from Cambridge; also the celebrated Willis, of the group of Invisible Philosophers, the forerunners of the Boyal Society of London; there was Jonathan Goddard, Warden of Merton College and Cromwell's physician, who, it has been reported, made the first telescope in England; and many others, of whom we can learn much in the pages of the amusing, if not too accurate, historian, Anthony a Wood. He describes some of the scholars who came from Cambridge, "as the dregs of the neighbour University," as having a peculiar cut of their hair, which he styled the committee cut, with their clothes so shabby that they looked like apprentices or antiquated schoolboys. During the Puritan rule there were vastly more sermons than the modern Verdant Green would care . to hear, much less to transcribe, which was then the regulation. In his history of the Rebellion, Clarendon confesses that the " depopulation so roughly carried out yielded a harvest of extra- ordinary good and sound knowledge in all parts of learning," and, as has been noticed often in the course of the world's history, a period of political or military activity is succeeded by a revival of mental and intellectual output. This was so at this time, for the Eenaissance must be largely credited to the influence of the Commonwealth and not to that of Charles it., the Puritans making their appointments with great foresight, and choosing young men for promotion, while the scholars were kept under stern, steady discipline, which certainly increased their industry. Regarding medicine, Dr. Norman Moore remarked in the Lectures^ " Fitzpatrick of last year, that Sydenham is often regarded as the originator of modern medicine; his works might also be considered the culmina- tion of the effects of the Eenaissance." John Evelyn visited Oxford in 1654 and at other times, and in his diary has left us an impres- sion of the people he met there; he thought Dr. Wm. Petty, who was the deputy reader in Anatomy, a genius, for indeed he was a master of many sciences, being really the one who founded the study of demography or vital statistics. Petty was a friend of Hobbes of Malmesbury, and if Sydenham had been at all interested in anatomy he could not but have benefited by contact with him, and so lessened the narrow view he always had of matters scientific, since doubtless Hobbes' method of looking at phenomena would have appealed to him, filtered as it would have been through Petty's mind. The statutes authorised one dissection yearly, performed in the Lent term if possible; and in 1650 it fell to Petty's lot to revive a woman, named Anne Greene, who had been hung at 10 ED. MED. 626?NEW SER.?VOL. XXII.?II. 146 \V. H. COUPLAND. Oxford, but whose body on being brought for dissection was found not to be dead, the case creating much interest at the time. At Oxford at this period the opportunities for medical study were small. There was no clinical work, but a bi-weekly lecture by the Professor of Medicine 011 a text from the writings of Hippocrates or Galen. There was some regular teaching on anatomy, a subject which never appealed to Sydenham, and for the want of a knowledge of which he made some serious mistakes later as in his writings on, for instance in his work on Dropsy. in our Lower, associated minds with the tubercle of that name, the all-round and genius Christopher Wren?better known as an architect than as a scientist?founded their work on a know- ledge of the circulation which for " Sydenham entirely ignored, he We said: may know the larger organs of the body, but its minute structure will always be hidden from us.
Recommended publications
  • C:\Data\WP\F\200\Catalogue Sections\Aaapreliminary Pages.Wpd
    Jonathan A. Hill, Bookseller, Inc. 325 West End Avenue, Apt. 10B New York City, New York, 10023-8145 Tel: 646 827-0724 Fax: 212 496-9182 E-mail: [email protected] Catalogue 200 Proofs Science, Medicine, Natural History, Bibliography, & Much More Introduction & Selective Subject Index on Following Pages Introduction TWO HUNDRED CATALOGUES in thirty-three years: more than 35,000 books and manuscripts have been described in these catalogues. Thousands of other books, including many of the most important and unusual, never found their way into my catalogues, having been quickly sold before their descriptions could appear in print. In the last fifteen years, since my Catalogue 100 appeared, many truly exceptional books passed through my hands. Of these, I would like to mention three. The first, sold in 2003 was a copy of the first edition in Latin of the Columbus Letter of 1493. This is now in a private collection. In 2004, I was offered a book which I scarcely dreamed of owning: the Narratio Prima of Rheticus, printed in 1540. Presenting the first announcement of the heliocentric system of Copernicus, this copy in now in the Linda Hall Library in Kansas City, Missouri. Both of the books were sold before they could appear in my catalogues. Finally, the third book is an absolutely miraculous uncut copy in the original limp board wallet binding of Galileo’s Sidereus Nuncius of 1610. Appearing in my Catalogue 178, this copy was acquired by the Library of Congress. This is the first and, probably the last, “personal” catalogue I will prepare.
    [Show full text]
  • Download Thesis
    This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from the King’s Research Portal at https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/ Religion, Medicine and Confessional Identity in Early Modern England Mann, Sophie Liana Awarding institution: King's College London The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. END USER LICENCE AGREEMENT Unless another licence is stated on the immediately following page this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Non Commercial: You may not use this work for commercial purposes. No Derivative Works - You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you receive permission from the author. Your fair dealings and other rights are in no way affected by the above. Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact [email protected] providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Download date: 26. Sep. 2021 Religion, Medicine and Confessional Identity in Early Modern England by Sophie Liana Mann Department of History, King’s College London Submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History, March 2014 1 Abstract Early modern historians often frame ‘religion’ and ‘medicine’ as distinct categories of experience and conduct.
    [Show full text]
  • History of Medicine in the City of London
    [From Fabricios ab Aquapendente: Opere chirurgiche. Padova, 1684] ANNALS OF MEDICAL HISTORY Third Series, Volume III January, 1941 Number 1 HISTORY OF MEDICINE IN THE CITY OF LONDON By SIR HUMPHRY ROLLESTON, BT., G.C.V.O., K.C.B. HASLEMERE, ENGLAND HET “City” of London who analysed Bald’s “Leech Book” (ca. (Llyn-din = town on 890), the oldest medical work in Eng­ the lake) lies on the lish and the textbook of Anglo-Saxon north bank of the leeches; the most bulky of the Anglo- I h a m e s a n d Saxon leechdoms is the “Herbarium” stretches north to of that mysterious personality (pseudo-) Finsbury, and east Apuleius Platonicus, who must not be to west from the confused with Lucius Apuleius of Ma- l ower to Temple Bar. The “city” is daura (ca. a.d. 125), the author of “The now one of the smallest of the twenty- Golden Ass.” Payne deprecated the un­ nine municipal divisions of the admin­ due and, relative to the state of opin­ istrative County of London, and is a ion in other countries, exaggerated County corporate, whereas the other references to the imperfections (super­ twenty-eight divisions are metropolitan stitions, magic, exorcisms, charms) of boroughs. Measuring 678 acres, it is Anglo-Saxon medicine, as judged by therefore a much restricted part of the present-day standards, and pointed out present greater London, but its medical that the Anglo-Saxons were long in ad­ history is long and of special interest. vance of other Western nations in the Of Saxon medicine in England there attempt to construct a medical litera­ is not any evidence before the intro­ ture in their own language.
    [Show full text]
  • Volume 6, Number 1 (2013)
    Volume 6, Number 1 (2013) Journal of Literature and Science i Volume 6, Number 1 (2013) ISSN 1754-646X Contents Special Issue: Rethinking Approaches to Illness Narratives iv Keir Waddington and Martin Willis Introduction: Rethinking Illness Narratives 1 Alysa Levene and Kevin Siena Reporting Dirt and Disease: Child Ill-Health in Seventeenth- and Eighteenth-Century England 18 Hazel Morrison Conversing with the Psychiatrist: Patient Narratives within Glasgow’s RoyalAsylum 1921- 1929 38 Angela Woods Rethinking “Patient Testimony” in the Medical Humanities: The Case of Schizophrenia Bulletin’s First Person Accounts 55 Martin Willis, Keir Waddington and Richard Marsden Imaginary Investments: Illness Narratives Beyond the Gaze Article Reviews 74 Christopher Daley Review of Daniel Cordle’s “Protect/Protest: British Nuclear Fiction of the 1980s.” 76 Christopher Daley Review of Jonathon Hogg’s “‘The Family that Feared Tomorrow’: British Nuclear Culture and Individual Experience in the late 1950s.” 78 Michelle Geric Review of Gowan Dawson’s “Literary Megatheriums and Loose Baggy Monsters: Paleontology and the Victorian Novel.” 80 Maeve O’Brien Review of Janine Rogers and Charlotte Sleigh’s “‘Here is my Honey-Machine’: Sylvia Plath and the Mereology of the Beehive.” 82 Anne Schwan Review of Cristina Hanganu-Bresch and Carol Berkenkotter’s “Narrative Survival: Personal and Institutional Accounts of Asylum Confinement.” 84 Ben Winyard Review of Kay Young’s “‘Wounded by Mystery’: Dickens and Attachment Theory.” The Journal of Literature and Science is produced by the Centre for the Study of Science and Imagination (SCIMAG), 309 Regent Street, London, W1B 2HW Journal of Literature and Science ii Volume 6, Number 1 (2013) ISSN 1754-646X About the JLS The Journal of Literature and Science (JLS) is a peer-reviewed academic journal published twice annually in Summer and Winter .
    [Show full text]
  • 6. WESTERN TIDEWATER FREE CLINIC The
    SOUTHAMPTON COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS Regular Session i November 26, 2012 6. WESTERN TIDEWATER FREE CLINIC The Western Tidewater Free Clinic has requested a few moments on your agenda to provide you an update on their activities. The presentation will be given by Dr. Patsy Joyner, one of their Board members and a Southampton County resident. In 2011, the Western Tidewater Free Clinic responded to more than 1,200 patient visits. Approximately 12% of their patients are Southampton County residents. In order to meet eligibility requirements, patients must have no health insurance and live at or below 200% of the federal poverty level (for a family of four, this would be an annual income of $44,100 or $21,660 for a single individual). Southampton County included $9,000 for the Western Tidewater Free Clinic in its FY 2013 annual budget. From: Mike Johnson [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, November 19, 2012 2:33 PM To: [email protected] Cc: Cindy Edwards; Michael W. Johnson ([email protected]) Subject: RE: WTFC Board Presentation Texie, I wanted to confirm that I've added Dr. Joyner to our agenda on November 26. The meeting begins at 7:00 p.m. and this will be agenda item #6. We look forward to receiving her remarks. Best regards, Mike Michael W. Johnson County Administrator Southampton County P.O. Box 400 Courtland, VA 23837 (757) 653-3015 www.southamptoncounty.org From: Texie Marks [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, November 08, 2012 10:53 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Texie Marks and Western Tidewater Free Clinic Hi Cindy, We would love to have an opportunity to do a very short (less than five minutes) presentation to the Supervisors at their November 26th meeting.
    [Show full text]
  • The Dissenting Tradition in English Medicine of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries
    Medical History, 1995, 39: 197-218 The Dissenting Tradition in English Medicine of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries WILLIAM BIRKEN* In England, medicine has always been something of a refuge for individuals whose lives have been dislocated by religious and political strife. This was particularly true in the seventeenth century when changes in Church and State were occurring at a blinding speed. In his book The experience of defeat, Christopher Hill has described the erratic careers of a number of radical clergy and intellectuals who studied and practised medicine in times of dislocation. A list pulled together from Hill's book would include: John Pordage, Samuel Pordage, Henry Stubbe, John Webster, John Rogers, Abiezer Coppe, William Walwyn and Marchamont Nedham.1 Medicine as a practical option for a lost career, or to supplement and subsidize uncertain careers, can also be found among Royalists and Anglicans when their lives were similarly disrupted during the Interregnum. Among these were the brilliant Vaughan twins, Thomas, the Hermetic philosopher, and Henry, the metaphysical poet and clergyman; the poet, Abraham Cowley; and the mercurial Nedham, who was dislocated both as a republican and as a royalist. The Anglicans Ralph Bathurst and Mathew Robinson were forced to abandon temporarily their clerical careers for medicine, only to return to the Church when times were more propitious. In the middle of the eighteenth century the political and religious disabilities of non-juring Anglicanism were still potent enough to impel Sir Richard Jebb to a successful medical career. But by and large the greatest impact on medicine came from the much larger group of the displaced, the English Dissenters, whose combination of religion and medicine were nothing short of remarkable.
    [Show full text]
  • Library Exhibition
    LIBRARY EXHIBITION DRAMATIS PERSONAE William Cole (1635-1716): Physician in Henry Sampson (1629-1700): Historian of the Worcester. Author of a treatise on the se- dissenters and physician to non- cretions of animals. conformists in London. Contributor to the Sir John Floyer (1649-1734): Physician in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. Lichfield. Author of works on asthma, John Wilkins (1614-1672): A cadaver. Once therapeutic bathing, and enthusiast for tak- Bishop of Chester. Founder member of the ing a patient’s pulse. Royal Society. Popularizer of Galileo. Crea- Richard Higgs (ca. 1632-1690): A physician in tor of a universal language. Coventry. Supplier to the pesthouse there. Thomas Willis (1621-1675): Physician in Ox- Richard Lower (1631-1691): Physician in ford. Associate of Messrs Boyle, Wren, London. Author of a major work on the Locke, Hooke. Writer of pioneering work heart and circulatory system, performed the on the brain. Sedleian Professor of Natural first successful blood-transfusion on two Philosophy at Oxford. dogs. Walter Needham (1631?-1691?): Anatomical lecturer to the Company of Surgeons. Au- thor of a work on foetal anatomy. The Medical Correspondence of Richard Higgs Gathered together in a single album kept here in the Library are a selection of letters from numerous key figures of the late 17th century flowering of scientific and medical thought and discovery that took place in Oxford. All of these letters are addressed to Dr Richard Higgs, and yet, for an associate of such illustrious figures, Higgs himself is elusive in the historical record. Originally from Gloucestershire, he appears to have matriculated at Queen’s College in Oxford in 1642 at around the age of 17, before embarking on medical training at Hart Hall, to graduate DM in 1659.
    [Show full text]
  • Samuel Doody and His Books
    Samuel Doody and his Books David Thorley Based on title page inscriptions, the online catalogue of Sloane Printed Books identifies forty- one volumes as having been owned by ‘J. Doody’ or ‘John Doody’.1 Typically, these inscriptions have been taken to indicate that the books were ex libris John Doody (1616-1680) of Stafford, the father of the botanist and apothecary Samuel Doody (1656-1706), but he may not (or at least may not always) be the John Doody to whom the inscriptions refer.2 While it is plausible that several of these books did belong to that John Doody, it is impossible that all of them were his: at least seven inscribed with the name were published after 1680, the year of his death. Only two books can certainly be said to have passed through his hands. First, a 1667 copy of Culpeper’s English translation of the Pharmacopœia Londinensis (shelfmark 777.b.3), bears several marks of ownership. On the reverse of the title page is inscribed in secretary characters ‘John Doodie his book’, while the phrase ‘John Doodie de Stafford’ appears on pp. 53 and 287, and the words ‘John Doodie de Stafford in Cometatu’ are written on to p. 305. A further inscription on the final page of Culpeper’s appendix giving ‘A Synopsis of the KEY ofGalen’s Method of Physick’ reads ‘John Doodie de Stafford ownth this booke and giue Joye theron to looke’. In two other places, longer inscriptions have been obliterated. Second, a 1581 edition of Dioscorides’s Alphabetum Empiricum (shelfmark 778.a.3) contains annotations in apparently the same hand that inscribed the 1667 Pharmacopœia.
    [Show full text]
  • UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Small Mites for the Treasury of Learning: the Everyday Life of the New Science in Late Seve
    UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Small Mites for the Treasury of Learning: The Everyday Life of the New Science in Late Seventeenth-Century London A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in History by Laura Ritchie Morgan 2016 © Copyright by Laura Ritchie Morgan 2016 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Small Mites for the Treasury of Learning: The Everyday Life of the New Science in Late Seventeenth-Century London by Laura Ritchie Morgan Doctor of Philosophy in History University of California, Los Angeles, 2016 Professor Margaret C. Jacob, Chair Drawing on experimental notebooks, account books, estate inventories, and bureaucratic memoranda, this dissertation demonstrates that the investigation and manipulation of the natural world in Restoration London stretched beyond the well-known Royal Society. The Society relied on skills, labor, and unexpected expertise outside its Fellowship to shape its work, while skills valued by the Society’s Fellows were found in pre-existing industries. In addition, the experimentation, observation, and collection practices essential to the new science occurred in small shops, Royal palaces, and the streets of metropolis. Chapter Two argues that the Society’s first home at Gresham College was an uncontrolled space, neither public nor private, through which many Londoners moved. While some servants, craftspeople, and experts were invited in to contribute skill or labor, the experience and knowledge outsiders unexpectedly brought into the Society, the College, or London itself also influenced the questions investigated by the Society. ii Chapter Three is a detailed examination of apothecary John Conyers’s years-long efforts to disprove the theory of air pressure by observing changes in atmospheric moisture.
    [Show full text]
  • Annotated Bibliography of the Works of Walter Charleton1
    ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE WORKS OF WALTER CHARLETON1 Published works Chorea Gigantum, or, The Most Famous Antiquity of Great-Britan [sic], Vulgarly called Stone-Heng, Standing on Salisbury Plain, Restored to the Danes, London, Printed for Henry Herringman, 1663. The Most Notable Antiquity of Great-Britain, Vulgarly called Stone-Heng, on Salisbury Plain, Restored, by Inigo Jones . to which are added Chorea Gigantum and Mr Webb’s Vindication, London, Printed for D. Browne Junior, and J. Woodman and D. Lyon, 1725. A facsimile edition of the 1725 edition has been produced, introduced by Stuart Piggot, Farnborough, Gregg, 1971. Charleton dedicated Chorea ‘to the King’s Most Excellent Majesty’, and referred to the monarch’s personal interest in the matter. In July 1663, when the physician presented his observations on Stonehenge to the Society, Aubrey was asked to look into the matter.2 He indicated that the King was quite taken with Charleton’s theory about Stonehenge. Charleton and Aubrey attended the King and the Duke and Duchess of York when they visited the area in 1663.3 Chorea contributed to contemporary debate about the origins of the mon- ument. It criticised Inigo Jones’ The Most Notable Antiquity of Great Britain, vulgarly called Stone-heng, restored, which argued for the Roman origin of the stone monuments. Charleton claimed that Stonehenge was in fact the construction of ancient Danes. This initiated considerable contro- versy, and was ill-received in London. Wood claims Charleton’s text was ‘exploded by most persons when t’was published’. Chorea garnered a severe retaliation from Jones’s son-in-law, John Webb.4 1 The works are organised alphabetically, and are designed to provide a quick reference while read- ing the main body of the book.
    [Show full text]
  • The Works of Thomas Sydenham, M.D
    THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES THE SYDENHAM SOCIETY INSTITUTED MDCCCXLIII LONDON MDCCCXI.VHI THE WORKS OF THOMAS SYDENHAM. M.D. TRANSLATED FBOM THE LATIN EDITION OF DR. GREENHILL A LIFE OF THE AUTHOR R. G. LATHAM, M.D. KTC. KTC. ETC. IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. I. LONDON PRINTED FOR THE SYDENHAM SOCIETY MDCCCXLVIU. C. AND J. ARI-ARD, PRINTKRS, BARTHOLOMEW CM*' "R V.) TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. THE present translation is from the text of Dr. GREENHILI/S edition; a work of great care and accuracy, and one from which the notes and indices have supplied the present writer with an amount of information that has materially lightened his labour. The latitude that he has allowed himself in rendering the Latin of the original into equivalent English may, to some, appear considerable : nevertheless, it is considered not to exceed the average latitude recognised by the translators of long works. This permits the breaking up of long and compound periods, the fusion of many simple sentences into a few complex ones, the conversion of parenthetic observations into independent sen- tences, transpositions, and similar licences. But it does not admit misrepresentations, omissions, or additions. It may be necessary to suggest to the reader that, although the Latin style of the works of Sydenham is highly valued, and, with the single fault of being somewhat too studiously idiomatic, is altogether worthy both of its subject and its author, it is far from improbable that the English equivalent may disappoint such readers as are prepared, or over-prepared, with their admiration.
    [Show full text]
  • WILLIAMI COLLIER, Fdcamb
    rImaTRxITIN 221 J'ULY 30, 1904.] ANNUAL MEETING: PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. IMIDICAL JOURNAL I spondent, signing himself "A Member of Convocation,' wrote a long and bitter letter complaining of the tway in which the study of medicine was entirely overlodked .t DBLIVERED AT THE Oxford. As a medical school Oxford, he declared, had SEVENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING OF THE within the preceding quarter of a century entirely ceased to BRITISH MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, exist. No teaching in the. preliminary subjects of medicine BY was being given, and the medical faculty had recently lost even its nominal existence, and now appeared under the head WILLIAMI COLLIER, f.D.CAMB., of physical science and mathematics. He attributed this F.R.C.P.LOND., decadence largely to the influenceof the then Regius Professor Physician, Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford; and Litchfield Lecturer in of Medicine, and to the Professor of Physiology. They Medicine, University of Oxford; were ably defended by several of their old students, President of the Associatioh. who showed how much the teaching of natural scienoe at Oxford owed to their personal efforts. The con- THE GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE OXFORD troversy on medical teaching at Oxford was carried MEDICAL SCHOOL. on with vigour for, many months by many writers, of and while all, or nearly all, were in favour of I HAVE chosen as the subject my address this evening the making adequate provision for the teaching of anatomy growth and development of our Medical School. I wAs led to and physiology at the University, some were most do so by remembering that since the last visit of our Associa- anxious to establish a complete medical school, declaring tion to this city in i868 great changes have occurred, that in many of the most illustrious medical schools in Ger- e6pecially so far as the teaching of science is concerned in many the hospital population was not larger than it was at 1tliis University, and more particularly those branches of Oxford.
    [Show full text]