JOHN CASE.
“In one of the profound pieces of astrological bombast written by this singular genius, he gives an account of the creation of Adam: ‘Thus Adam was created in that pleasant place Paradise, about the year before Christ 4002, viz. on April 24, at twelve o’clock, or midnight.’ His name was latinized to Caseus, which was occasionally interpreted Dr. Cheese. Granger says the following anecdote of Case was communicated to him by the Rev. Mr. Gosling, in these terms: ‘Dr. Maundy, formerly of Canterbury, told me, that in his travels abroad, some eminent physician, who had been in England, gave him a token to spend at his return with Dr. Radcliffe and Dr. Case. They fixed on an evening, and were very merry, when Radcliffe thus began a health: ‘Here, brother Case, to all the fools your patients.’ ‘I thank you, good brother,’ replied Case; ‘let me have all the fools, and you are heartily welcome to the rest of the practice.’’
THOMAS DAWSON.
“The following anecdote is related of him: After he became M.D. he attended his neighbour Miss Corbett, of Hackney, who [p331] was indisposed; and found her one day sitting solitary, piously and pensively musing upon the Bible, when, by some strange accident, his eyes were directed to the passage where Nathan says to David, ‘Thou art the Man.’ The doctor profited by the kind hint; and, after a proper time allowed for drawing up articles of capitulation, the lady, on 29th May, 1758, surrendered herself up to all his prescriptions, and the doctor very speedily performed a perfect cure.
PHILIP HECQUET.
“‘C’est une erreur de penser que le sang soit nécessaire à la conservation de la vie; on ne peut trop saigner un malade;’ are the words put into the mouth of our doctor, in the character of Sangrado by the facetious Le Sage. Hecquet, both in theory and practice, carried the anti-phlogistic system to a greater extent than any other man, and defended the ‘boisson’ and the bleeding, saying, ‘J’ai pour garants de mon sentiment, sur le Régime maigre, les médecins les plus fameux, tant anciens que modernes.’ He was a conscientious practitioner of his own eccentric doctrines, and it was perfectly consistent with his character, that ‘loin d’imputer la mort du chanoine à la boisson et aux saignées, il sortit en disant, d’un air froid, qu’on ne lui avait pas tiré assez de sang, ni fait boire assez d’eau chaude.’
“The practice of bleeding was carried to a singular extent in France, and it was the fashion, at one time, to bleed on the opposite side to the part affected; if the pain was on the right side, they bled in the left arm, and vice versâ. Pierre Brissot produced a civil war in the medical world by writing against the custom, and, in the year 1600, was driven into exile, by edict of the University of Paris, for thus opposing the established practice.
SIR CHARLES SCARBOROUGH
“Was a man of great versatility of talents; he wrote a ‘Treatise on Trigonometry,’ and a ‘Compendium of Lilly’s Grammar;’ gave lectures on mathematics at Cambridge, and on anatomy in London. His epitaph records that he was
Inter Medicos Hippocrates,