A concise historical sketch of the progress of pharmacy in Great Britain, from the time of its partial separation from the practice of medicine until the establishment of the Pharmaceutical society. Intended as an introduction to the Pharmaceutical journal / By Jacob Bell.

  • Jacob Bell
Date:
1843
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A concise historical sketch of the progress of pharmacy in Great Britain, from the time of its partial separation from the practice of medicine until the establishment of the Pharmaceutical society. Intended as an introduction to the Pharmaceutical journal / By Jacob Bell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    should take upon him to exercise and occupy as Physician and Surgeon, except he be first examined, admitted, and approved by the Bishop of Lon¬ don, &c. * * : Sithence the making of which said Act, the Company and Fellowship of Surgeons of London, minding onely their owne lucres, and nothing the profit or ease of the diseased or patient, have sued, troubled, and vexed divers honest persons, as well men as women, whom God hath endued with the knowledge of the nature, kind, and operation of certain herbs, roots, and waters, and the using and ministering of them, to such as have been pained with customable diseases, as women’s breasts being sore, a pin and the web in the eye, uncomes of the hands, scaldings, burnings, sore mouths, the stone, stranguary, saucelin, and morpliew, and such other like diseases. * * * And yet the said persons have not taken anything for their pains or cunning. * * In consideration whereof, and for the ease, comfort, succour, help, relief, and health of the King’s poor subjects, inha¬ bitants of this his realm, now pained or diseased, or that hereafter shall be pained or diseased, Be it ordained, &c., that at all time from henceforth it shall be lawfull to every person being the King’s subject, having knowledge and experience of the nature of herbs, roots, and waters, &c., to use and minister * * according to their cunning, experience, and knowledge * * the aforesaid statute * * or any other act notwithstanding.” This act is understood to apply to the practice of medicine without remuneration, and accordingly it was not uncommon for empirics to evade the law by pretending to practise gratuitously. This, however, was not always successful; and Dr. Goodall’s His¬ tory of the Proceedings against Empirics (published in 1684) contains an account of numerous prosecutions, in which the law was put in force in a summary manner. In the year 1552, Grig, a poulterer, in Surrey, “ taken among the people for a prophet, in curing divers diseases by words and prayers, and saying he would take no money,” was set on a scaffold in the town of Croydon, with a paper on his breast, declaring him to be an impostor. He was afterwards set on a pillory in Southwark. In the reign of Queen Mary, a great number of empirical impostors were prosecuted and punished, not only in London but in other parts of the country ; and during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, these prosecutions continued, the delinquents being fined various sums from £5 to £20, and in many cases being imprisoned. Some of these quacks were patronised by persons of rank, who wrote to the President of the College on their behalf. Sir Francis Walsingham, secretary of state, interceded on behalf of 4< Margaret Kennix, an outlandish ignorant sorry woman/' but the College refused to remit the sentence (1581). John Booffeat (1583) was liberated from prison on the interces- of a person of quality, upon condition that he would submit to any penalty the College might inflict, if he ever practised again. Paul Fairfax (1588) was prosecuted for cheating the people by puffing the pretended virtues of a water which he called Aqua Ccelestis. He was fined £5 and imprisoned. The Lord
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