HISTORY OF MEDICINE. 395 



showed some disposition to oppress the chemical practitioners 

 in the person of Francis Antony, it was more under the pre- 

 tence of checking quackery than of opposing chemistry. 



Very early in the seventeenth century, Sir Theodore Mayerne, 

 who as a chemical physician had been much opposed and op- 

 pressed by the Galenists of France, was called over into Eng- 

 land, where he was appointed first physician to the king, and 

 continued to hold that office for more than thirty years after. 

 His theory and his prescriptions were very like those of the 

 Galenists ; but he was a greater favourer of chemical medicines, 

 and particularly of antimony, the medicine with regard to which 

 the two sects were most especially divided. It does not how- 

 ever appear, that upon this account he met with any opposition 

 from the physicians of England ; and, indeed, on the contrary, 

 we find him becoming a member of, and acquiring great autho- 

 rity in the London college. It is probable that this great cre- 

 dit put an end, in England, to all distinction between the 

 Galenic and chemical practitioners ; and the year 1666, when 

 the faculty of physic of Paris, by a solemn decree restored the use 

 of antimony, which, just a hundred years before, they had con- 

 demned, may be considered as the period of the downfall of 

 Galenism, and of the full establishment of chemical remedies. 

 The philosophy of Des Cartes also, which adopted so much from 

 the doctrines of the chemists, united readily with their general 

 system, and established its credit. 



The Chemists, thus in possession of the schools, became less 

 empirical, and necessarily more systematic; but this was at- 

 tended with no improvement in their medical practice. They 

 never were men of liberal and comprehensive views, and they 

 formed only a short imperfect system of acid and alkali, which 

 neither led to the study of diseases, nor to the improvement of 

 remedies. They were still within the very narrow bounds of a 

 sect, almost entirely neglected blood-letting, and in many re- 

 spects they corrupted or limited the practice. The Cartesians, 

 as we have said, adopted the chemical system, and made some 

 additions to it in so far as they considered the consistence as 

 well as the quality of the fluids. They were accordingly the 

 first who introduced the consideration of viscidity or lentor, 

 which has since made such a figure in our systems. 



