392 INTRODUCTORY LECTURES. 



This book was called the Currus Triumphalis Antimonii ; and 

 from this it appears that chemical pharmacy had been privately- 

 cultivated and had made considerable progress. The medicines 

 now proposed were generally of a violent kind, very different 

 from the mild remedies which the Galenists generally employ- 

 ed, and therefore not likely yet to be received by this sect. 

 But another circumstance at the same time happened to bring 

 chemical remedies into some credit. The Lues Venerea had 

 been lately introduced from America, and yielded to none of 

 the ordinary remedies of the Galenists. It was soon found to 

 yield to nothing so readily as to mercury, which was a remedy 

 hitherto only employed by the chemists. This discovery of the 

 power of mercury, and the publication 1 have mentioned, re- 

 commending the virtues of antimony, prepared the public for 

 favouring chemical remedies ; and these might have been re- 

 ceived without any alteration in the system of medicine, had it 

 not been that Paracelsus, who came soon after, took advantage 

 of the power of chemical remedies to make a considerable re- 

 volution both in the theory and practice of medicine. This 

 noted person was born about the year 1492. He does not appear 

 to have studied in any of the established schools of those days ; 

 but, having determined to follow his father's profession, which 

 was that of physic, he seems to have travelled about in quest of 

 remedies amongst all sorts of people, and particularly among 

 the chemical practitioners of those times. From these he learned 

 the use of mercury and antimony ; and from some hardy em- 

 pirics, the use of opium ; at least, a more free use of this than 

 was then common. By employing these remedies, he was ena- 

 bled to cure many diseases which had baffled the inert remedies 

 of the Galenists ; and being of a bold and boastful disposition, 

 he made the most of these accidents, while at the same time the 

 partiality of mankind to empiricism soon contributed to give 

 him great fame. 



Paracelsus was so far more fortunate than any former chemical 

 practitioner had been in acquiring a general reputation, that he 

 was called to a professor's chair in the university of Basle. In this 

 situation he found it necessary to become systematic ; and mak- 

 ing use of such theories as he could derive from his predeces- 

 sors in chemistry, he upon these grounds attempted a system of 



