The Linacre Quarterly

Volume 22 | Number 3 Article 2

8-1-1955 Who is Thomas Linacre? James F. Gilroy

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Recommended Citation Gilroy, James F. (1955) "Who is Thomas Linacre?," The Linacre Quarterly: Vol. 22 : No. 3 , Article 2. Available at: https://epublications.marquette.edu/lnq/vol22/iss3/2 Linacre's collation of manuscripts and for seven miles around, and in the Vatican libraries gained him for the punishment of offenders. a reputation as an authority in Four years afterwards these privi­ Who is Thomas Linacre? Humanistic learning. During the leges and responsibilities were course of these studies he became confirmed by statute and extended JAMES F. GILROY, S.J. so interested in the ancient writers to the whole country. "3 Linacre on medicine that he directed his financed the whole project out of EW have ever done reform and too conscientious not studies to this field and earned a his own fortune, since the royal more for their profession F than to do his best to bring it about. To degree at the charter made no provision for sup­ Thomas Linacre. When he re­ combat the ignorance of scientific of . port. ceived his M.D. at the beginning medical methods he gave lectures of the fifteenthcentury, the practice After his return from Lin­ The importance of this establish­ at Oxford and established reader­ ment can be seen, for "no profes­ of medicine in England was car­ acre was chosen tutor and physi­ ships in medicine at Oxford and sional foundation, at home or ried on largely by "a great multi­ cian to Prince Arthur and teacher Cambridge. In order to limit the abroad. stands higher today in tude of ignorant persons, of whom of Italian to Princess Mary. Soon practice of medicine to competent public estimation than this College. the greater part had no insight he became domestic to . phys!cians he founded the Royal King Henry VII and in due course Its Fellowship is recognized as into physic, nor in any other kind College of Physicians to license was made King's Physician to evidence of culture, professional of learning; some could not even doctors and regulate their practice skill. and high character: one read the letters on the book, so far Henry VIII. But all this court fa­ and to punish irregular practi­ vor did not turn his attention from might say that by it the attributes forth, that common artificers, as tioners. what had become a dominating in­ of the founder are preserved,"4 smiths, weavers, and women, bold­ ly and accustomably Born about 1460, young Linacre terest in his life-the establishment and "it is impossible not to recog­ took upon studied at the monastery school of them great cures to of a firm foundation for medicine nize a strong constructive genius the displeasure Christ Church, Canterbury, under of God, great infamy as � respectable profession in Eng­ in the scheme of the College of to the fac­ the learned monk William Selling ulty, and the grievous land. His first steps in this direc­ Physicians, by which Linacre not hurt, dam­ and then proceeded to Oxford. In age, and destruction tion were the medical lectures he only first organized the medical of \Ilar4' of 1488 he accepted the offer of trav­ the King's liege people." 1 gave early in th� century at Ox­ profession in England, but im­ Not too eling to Italy with his old teacher, long before this, Geoffrey ford. Soon, however, he saw that pressed upon it for some centuries Chaucer Selling, who had been appointed in the Prologue to his it would be better to carry on his the stamp of his own individu­ Canterbury Henry VII's ambassador to the Tales spoke of a doctor work from . ality."5 of his Pope. At the most famous of the time: "He watched sharply When by 1509 he had become His last great contribution to for fa­ Italian , , Flor­ vorable hours and firmly established at Court, he the advancement of medicine was an auspicious ence, Rome, , and Padua, ascendant for his gave himself even more completely the establishment shortly before patients' treat- . Linacre spent about ten years. as­ ment, for he was well to the task. At last. in 1518, he his death of readerships in medi: grounded in sociating with and studying under astrology. "2 received the reward for his long cine at Oxford and Cambridge. many of the leading figures of the efforts, a royal charter establishing Unfortunately, however, "owing to Linacre was too intelligent not , such as Her­ the Royal College of Physicians neglect and bad management of to perceive the immense need for molaus Barbarus and the future . of London. He became its first the funds, they fell into useless- EmToR's NOTE: The abeve thoughtful Medici Pope, Leo X. At Rome President. "It was Linacre's zeal account of this great physician [or whom mas Linacre is given in the first part of for the advancement of medicine 3 W. J. O'Donovan. "Thomas Linacre:" our journal is named reminds us-and not Great Catholics. edited bv Claude W1l­ for the first time-that there seems to be the article on him in the book Great that led him to obtain by Royal Catholics. liamson, 0.S.C. (New York: Macmil­ no full-length biography of Thomas Lin­ 1 lan & Co., 1939) p. From the Charter of the College of Letters Patent a charter from Kinq 87. acre althou{lh there are scores for his 4 J. P. Pye, "Thomas Linacre, Schola�. famous student and contemporary, Tho­ Physicians, quoted by Anthony Bassler Henry VIII made out to himself Twelve Catholic The Linacre Quar� Physician, Priest," mas More. A definitive biography and "Thomas Linacre," and five other physicians for the Men of Science, edited by Bertra m terly, I (1933). Windle at least one popular biography is highly 2 The Canterbury foundation of a College of Physi­ (London: Catholic Truth So­ desirable. It would not be an easy task. Geoffrey Chaucer, Tales, ciety, 1914). p. 9. It does look interesting. A rather good edited by John Tatlock and Percy cians of London, for the regulation 5 Encqclopaedia Britannica, 9th ed Vol. bibliography of source materials on Tho- MacKaye for modern readers (New Article, "Thomas Linacre. ;: York: Macmillan & Co., 1946) , p. 8. of the practice of physic in London XIV. 86 87 LINACRE QUARTERLY AUGUST, 1955 ness and obscurity." But ·'the Ox­ Besides being a great physician, opinion of Sir William Osler. the graces of life and refinements of ford foundation was revived by Thomas Linacre was also a great great modern physician and heart which make up character. the university commissioners in scholar. He knew Greek thorough­ founder of the Johns Hopkins hese have been the leaven that 1856 in the form of the Linacre ly and was famous for the purity University School of Medicine. raised our profession above the professorship of anatomy. Poster­ of his style. He included "Many of the greatest physicians." level of business. Of such as these ity has done justice to the gener­ among his students such outstand­ said Osler. "have influenced the Linacre was one."12 osity and public spirit which ing personages as the Prince Ar­ profession less by their special thur already mentioned, the Prin­ prompted these foundations."G work than by exemplifying those 12 O'Donovan, op. cit., p. 84. In 1520 Lin.acre. unlike Chau­ cess and future Queen Mary, Sir cer's physician. whose "studie was , the Saint and bril­ but litel on the Bible, "7 culminated liant Humanist, and , the a thoroughly Christian life by be­ greatest scholar of the age. The ing ordained a priest of the Catho­ leading scholars of Europe in his lic Church. Four years later, on day united in their praise of Lin­ October 20, 1524. he died and was acre as the first great English buried in St. Paul's Cathedral. Humanist as well as the outstand­ London. He had lived his sixty­ ing physician of the time. Indeed, four years of life to the full. Few his intellectual gifts were such that before or after him can display a Erasmus wrote: "What can be more acute, more perfect, or more comparable record of intellectual i body or in soul, man is in pain; refined than the judgment of Lin­ WHEN SOMETHING GOES WRONG n and cultural achievements. his work in the world is interrupted and may be left unfinished. It is the acre,"9 and "Linacre is as deep by helpin g m an Thomas Linacre was a great part of doctors and nurses to co-operate in the plan of God and acute a thinker as I have ever s s the physician in his time; of this there over these difficult times, to relieve the p ain and to cure the icknes by met with."10 It is indeed a credit s and placed at the disposal can be no doubt. Among his pa­ use of natural means which God ho created . tients were numbered two kings, and high compliment to the profes­ of man. sion that such a man should devote Henry VII and Henry VIII. a Doctors and nurses get closer to the heart and spirit of man than any­ prince. a future queen. the Lord himself to the practice of medicine one else except priests. More than anyone else, they understand the wonders High Treasurer. Sir Reginald at a time when it was scarcely a of the human body, how· it works, and what interferes with its well-being. Bray. Cardinal Wolsey. and other respectable pursuit. God gives them such wisdom and skill because He loves man so much and desires right order to be restored. notables in the realm. Erasmus Linacre left no original worh from the considered him the introducer of on medicine in writing, but "his Christ became man in order to die for men; · and He rose wholeness of both body medical science into England. In Greek scholarship ... was applie dead in order to raise them up with Him in perfect Christ. Doctors and nurses to purifying the �reat works of and mind. We are living in the age of the Risen ?Ur own times, "Sir George New­ mirocle­ classical science and medicine from should live with Him and for Him as did the Apostles and other man in his Linacre Lecture . . for His workers who worked thefr cures in His name, in His power, and (asserted) that to him we owe our medieval accretion,"11 notably such works of as De divine purposes. · conception of the splendor and Sani­ De league of The Sacred Heart amplitude and the high purpose of tate Tuenda, Pulsuum Usu, and Methodus Medendi. Apostleship of Prayer the science and art of medicine."8 ( Intention for June-Doctors and Nurses) These qualities alone would be But it is less for any specific sufficient to allow the British and contribution to medicine than for American medical men of today to the man himself that we should be look with pride to Linacre as a grateful. This at least was the Father of English Medicine. o Ibid., p. 84. 10 Pye, op. cit., p. 15. 6 Ibid. 11 Douglas Bush, The Renaissance and 7 Prologue, I. 438. English Humanism (Toronto: Univer­ 8 O'Donovan, op. cit., p. 83. sity of Toronto Press, 1939}, p. 72. AUGUST. 1955 88 LINACRE QUARTERLY