The will of Dr. Linacre includes annuities to his two sisters, a bequest to his brother, and other legacies. To his nieces Alice and Margaret he bequeathed each a bed, Margaret to have the better; and to William Dancaster, a priest who witnessed the will, a feather-bed and two Irish blankets were left. The simplicity of these details shows that a man of high distinction in many ways at that time counted as important possessions articles now universal.[1]
John Kaye or Key, better known by the Latinised form Caius, which retains nevertheless the pronunciation derived from the English original, Keys, was born at Norwich on the 6th of October, 1510, being thus fourteen years old at Linacre’s death. He entered Gonville Hall, Cambridge, on the 12th September, 1529, and here he early distinguished himself by translating from Greek into Latin two treatises—one by Chrysostom—and by making an abridgment of Erasmus’s “De Verâ Theologiâ.” He took the degree of B.A. in 1532-3, and was appointed principal of Physwick Hostel on the 12th November, 1533, being elected to a fellowship of Gonville Hall on December 6th following. Proceeding M.A. in 1535, he is recorded as subscribing, with the master and fellows of Gonville Hall, the submission to Henry VIII.’s injunctions.
In 1539 he went to Italy, and studied medicine at Padua under Montanus, lodging in the same house with Vesalius, who became the most distinguished anatomist of his time. In 1541 the degree of Doctor of Medicine was conferred upon him at Padua, where in the next year we find him delivering public lectures on the Greek text of Aristotle, in conjunction with Realdus Columbus, the stipend for which was provided by some Venetian nobles. The next year, 1543, he largely occupied in visiting all the most celebrated libraries of Italy, collating manuscripts, principally with a view to publishing correct editions of Galen and Celsus.
Returning to England after further travels in France and Germany, he was incorporated M.D. at Cambridge, and practised apparently at Cambridge, Norwich, and Shrewsbury, with such success that he was appointed physician to Edward VI., an appointment he continued to hold under Queens Mary and Elizabeth. On the 22d December, 1547, he was admitted a Fellow of the College of Physicians, and in 1550 became an Elect, in 1552 Censor. In the latter year appeared his English treatise on the Sweating Sickness, which had broken out at Shrewsbury in 1551. This was afterwards enlarged and published in Latin.
“The Boke or Counseill against the Sweatyng Sicknesse,” was dedicated by Dr. Caius to William, Earl of Pembroke. The dedication begins thus: “In the fearful time of the sweat, many resorted unto me for counsel, among whom some being my friends and acquaintance, desired me to write unto them some little counsel how to govern themselves therein.... At whose request at that time, I wrote divers counsels so shortly as I could for the present necessity, which they both used and did give abroad to many others, and further appointed in myself to fulfil the other part of their honest request for the time to come. The which the better to execute and bring to pass, I spared not to go to all those that sent for me, both poor and rich, day and night. And that not only to do them that ease that I could, and to instruct them for their recovery; but to note also thoroughly the cases and circumstances of the disease in divers persons, and to understand the nature and causes of the same fully, for so much as might be.”
A certain conceit is evident throughout the brief treatise, as when he describes his early translations from Latin into English, and partially apologises for writing in English, then gives an account of the life and writings of his friend, William Framingham, a fellow-townsman of his who died young. The description of the disease which he gives indicates a very acute rheumatic affection, inasmuch as perspirations of disagreeable odour, acute pains in the limbs, delirium, quick and irritable pulse, &c., were prominent among them.
It is notable how little medical science was progressing beyond Galenic principles. Dr. Caius says, “This disease is not a sweat only, but a fever in the spirits by putrefaction venomous, with a fight, travail, and labour of nature against the infection received in the spirits, whereupon by chance followeth a sweat, or issueth an humour, compelled by nature, as also chanceth in other sicknesses which consist in humours.” Still, a glimpse of truth is shown in the view expressed that “our bodies can not suffer anything or hurt by corrupt and infective causes, except there be in them a certain matter prepared, apt and like to receive it, else if one were sick, all should be sick.”
Dr. Caius showed himself notably before his age also in his censures of excess in eating and drinking, his commendation of the bath, and of muscular exercise. His advice to his readers to have recourse to a good physician, and to be at least as good to their bodies as to their hose or their shoes, is followed by a picture of the army of quacks who in default of science preyed upon the masses. “Simple-women, carpenters, pewterers, braziers, soapball-sellers, apothecaries, avaunters themselves to come from Pole, Constantinople, Italy, Almaine, Spain, France, Greece, Turkey, India, Egypt or Jury; from the service of emperors, kings, and queens, promising help of all diseases, yea incurable, with one or two drinks, by drinks of great and high prices, as though they were made of the sun, moon, or stars, by blessings and blowings, hypocritical prayings, and foolish smokings of shirts, smocks, and kerchiefs, with such others, their phantasies and mockeries, meaning nothing else but to abuse your light belief, and scorn you behind your backs, with their medicines (so filthy, that I am ashamed to name them), for your single wit and simple belief, in trusting them most, which you know not at all, and understand least; like to them which think far fowls have fair feathers, although they be never so evil favoured and foul; as though there could not be so cunning an Englishman, as a foolish running stranger, or so perfect health by honest learning, as by deceitful ignorance.” From all which the reader may judge whether somewhat similar remarks might not be applicable to the last century, and even to a great part of the present, in its credulity of the efficacy of quack medicines and the powers of audacious empirics.
In 1555 Dr. Caius was elected President of the College of Physicians, an office which he continued to hold until 1561. He applied himself with devoted energy to promoting the interests of the college, commencing to record its annals, till then unpreserved, procuring the copying and binding in grand style of the college statutes, designing the insignia, the cushion of crimson velvet edged with gold on which the statutes were laid, the silver staff ornamented with the college arms borne by the President, to remind him, according to Caius, by its material (silver), to govern with patience and courtesy, and by its symbols (the serpents), with judgment and wisdom. His zeal further exhibited itself in protecting the privileges of the college, as when he appeared successfully, in Elizabeth’s reign, against the barber surgeons, who were claiming the right to prescribe medicines for internal administration in cases where their operative assistance was called in.