Science, medicine and dissent : Joseph Priestley (1733-1804) ; papers celebrating the 250th anniversary of the birth of Joseph Priestley together with a catalogue of an exhibition held at the Royal Society and the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine / edited by R.G.W. Anderson and Christopher Lawrence.

Date:
1986
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Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: Science, medicine and dissent : Joseph Priestley (1733-1804) ; papers celebrating the 250th anniversary of the birth of Joseph Priestley together with a catalogue of an exhibition held at the Royal Society and the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine / edited by R.G.W. Anderson and Christopher Lawrence. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Notes and References I am indebted to Roy Porter who read and commented on this paper in draft form. 1 See the papers by J. McEvoy, 'Joseph Priestley, 'Aerial philosopher': metaphysics and methodology in Priestley's chemical thought from 1762 to 1781', I. Ambix, 1978, 25: 1-55; II. Ibid., 93-116; III. Ibid.; 153-75; IV. Ibid., 1979, 26:16-38. See the critique of McEvoy in J.R.R. Christie and J.V. Golinski, 'The spreading of the word: new directions in the historiography of chemistry 1600-1800', Hist. Sci., 1982,20:236-266. See also Simon Schaffer, 'Priestley's questions: a historiographie survey', Hist. Sci., 1984 22:151-183. 2 One of the few authors to point strongly to Priestley's medical connections is Schaffer above, and in this volume, and I am indebted to his papers in this regard. 3 An outline of Priestley's life and a guide to the secondary sources can be found in the article by Robert E. Schofield in Charles C. Gillispie (ed.), Dictionary of scientific biography, New York, Charles Schribner's Sons, 1975, Vol. 2, pp. 139-149. Schofield's interpretation of Priestley's scientific work has been the object of some criticism, notably by McEvoy, op.cit., note 1 above. 4 Joseph Priestley, A sermon preached on behalf of the Leeds Infirmary (1768), Leeds, Richard Jackson, 1910, p.8. 5 Joseph Priestley, Memoirs, originally published in Northumberland, Pennsylvania in 1805 and reprinted as Autobiography of Joseph Priestley, Bath, Adams and Dart, 1970, p. 69. 6 There are many studies on Dissenters and their use of science. See Arnold Thackray, 'Natural knowledge in cultural context, the Manchester model', Amer. Hist. Rev., 1974, 79: 672-709. 7 Rev. Mr. Hargrove, The Inquirer, Jan. 16, 1904 cited in T.E. Thorpe Joseph Priestley, London, J.M. Dent and Co., 1906, p. 18. Thorpe cites from Priestley's journal on the range of his Daventry Studies, pp. 18-19. 8 John F. Fulton, 'The Warrington Academy (1757-1786) and its influence upon medicine and science', Bull. Hist. Med., 1933, 1: 50-80. 9 Christopher Lawrence, 'Ornate physicians and learned artisans: Edinburgh medical men 1726-1776', in W.F. Bynum and Roy Por ter (eds.), William Hunter, Cambridge University Press, 1985. 10 Priestley, to John Canton, Warrington June 1766. Cited in Robert E. Schofield, A scientific autobiography of Joseph Priestley (1733- 1804), Camb. Mass., M.I.T. Press, 1966, p.35. II See J.V. Pickstone and S.V.F. Butler'The politics of medicine in Manchester, 1788-1792: hospital reform and public health ser vices in the early industrial city', Med. Hist., 1984, 28, 227-249. 12 Priestley, op.cit., note 4 above. See S.T. Anning, The General Infirmary at Leeds, Edinburgh, E & S Livingstone Ltd., 1963, vol. 1., p.85, on the Quaker support for the Infirmary. 13 Schofield, op.cit., note 3 above, p.140. 14 See Barfoot this volume. 15 Douglas McKie, 'Joseph Priestley and the Copley Medal', Ambix, 1961, 9: 8-9. 16 Autobiography, op.cit., note 5 above, p. 120. 17 Robert E. Schofield, The Lunar Society of Birmingham, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1963; idem., 'Membership of the Lunar Society of Birmingham' Ann. Sci., 1956, 12: 118-136. 18 Autobiography, op.cit., note 5, above, p. 130. 19 Much of the following relies on the chapter on William Cullen in my PhD thesis, 'Medicine as Culture: Edinburgh and the Scottish Enlightenment', University of London 1984. See also Dale C. Smith, 'Medical science, medical practice and the emerg ing concept of typhus in mid-eighteenth century Britain' and W.F. Bynum, 'Cullen and the study of fevers in Britain 1760- 1820', in W.F. Bynum and Vivian Nutton, (eds.), Theories of fever from Antiquity to the Enlightenment, London, Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, 1981. 20 Mary Kilbourne Matossian, 'Mold poisoning: an unrecognized English health problem 1500-1800', Med. Hist., 1981, 25: 73-84. Guenter B. Risse, 'Epidemics and medicine: the influence of dis ease on medical thought and practice', Bull. Hist. Med., 1979, 53: 505-519. 21 Peter Mathias, 'Swords and ploughshares: the armed forces, medicine and public health in the late eighteenth century', in J.M. Winter(ed.), War and economic development, Cambridge, Uni versity Press, 1975. Ulrich Tröhler, 'Quantification in British medicine and surgery, 1750-1830, with special reference to its introduction into therapeutics', Ph.D thesis, University of Lon don, 1978. 22 John Pringle, Observations on the nature and cure of hospital and jayl- fevers, London, A. Millar and D. Wilson, 1750, p.2. 23 John Pringle, Observations on the diseases of the army, London, A. Millar and D. Wilson, 1752, p.356. 24 L.J. Jordanova, 'Earth science and environmental medicine: the synthesis of the late Enlightenment', in L.J. Jordanova and Roy Porter (eds.), Images of the earth, Chalfont St. Giles, BSHS Monog raphs 1. 1978; pp 119-146. Simon Schaffer, 'Natural philosophy and public spectacle in the eighteenth century', Hist. Sci., 1983, 21: 1-43. 25 Owsei Temkin, 'An historical analysis of the concept of infection', in his Studies in intellectual history, Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins Press, 1953, pp. 123-147. 26 Mary Douglas, Purity and danger, Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1970, p.48. 27 Cited in Temkin, op.cit., note 25, p.143. A work which discusses these issues is Norbert Elias, The civilizing process, New York, Uri- zen Books, 1978. 28 William Alexander, An experimental enquiry concerning the causes which have generally been said to produce putrid diseases, London, T. Beckett, 1771. Alexander thought it more likely that the cause of putrid disease lay in the follies and irregularities of our lives (p.3). 29 Joseph Priestley, 'On the noxious quality of the effluvia of putrid marshes', Phil. Trans. Roy. Soc., 1773-4, 64: 91. 30 Joseph Priestley, Experiments and observations on different kinds of air, London, J. Johnson, 2nd ed., 1775, Vol.1, pp. 288-324. Charles White had reported In putrid fevers and in the putrid sore throat I have frequently advised patients to breath the fixed air arising from effervescent mixtures A treatise on the manage ment of pregnant and lyinv-in women, London, Edward and Charles Dilly, 1773, p.179. 31 Joseph Priestley, Experiments and observations on different kinds of air, London, J. Johnson, 1775, Vol. 2, p.376. 32 [J.C. Lettsom], Reflections on the general treatment and cure of fevers, London, The author, 1772. Fixed air, Lettsom noted, is a power ful remedy in fevers with a putrid tendency (p.8) to which he footnoted Priestley's Essay on making artificial Pyrmont water (see below). 33 See especially 'Observations on respiration and the use of the blood', Phil. Trans. Roy. Soc., 1776, 66: 226-248. One of the few papers to deal more generally with Priestley's views on life is Harold J. Abrahams, 'Priestley answers the proponents of abiogenesis', Ambix, 1964, 12: 44-71. 34 Lloyd G. Stevenson, 'Exemplary disease: the typhoid pattern', J. Hist. Med., 1982, 37: 159-181. 35 David MacBride, Experimental essays London, A. Millar, 1764, pp.175-6 and p.190. 36 For an excellent account of the extent of the medical circles around Pringle see Dorothea Waley Singer, 'Sir John Pringle and his circle', Ambix, 1948-50,6: 127-80; 229-261. 37 [William Bewley], 'Account of Dr. Priestley's History of Electricity' Monthly Review, 1767, 37: 453. Cited in Schofield op.cit., note 10 above, p.131. Schofield is also the source of the evidence on Bewley's correspondence. 38 Christopher Lloyd and Jack L.S. Coulter, Medicine and the navy, Edinburgh, E.S. Livingstone, 1961, vol.3, 293-328. David MacBride's account of wort appeared as An historical account of a new method of treating the scurvy at sea, Dublin, W.G. Jones, 1767. This had first appeared as a pamphlet in 1764. See Lloyd p.308. 39 Joseph Banks, who was also on the voyage, recorded in his pri vate journal how wort had had no effect on his scorbutic symptoms but that, when he flew to the lemon juice, he was cured within a week. See Lloyd, op.cit. note 38 above, p.311. 40 Autobiography, op.cit., note 5 above, p.95. 41 Cited in Schofield, op.cit., note 10 above, p.131.