emen of the faculty: one by Dr. _Summers_; who in a pamphlet _on
the success of warm bathing in paralytic cases_, controverts Dr.
_Mead_'s assertion, that "hot bathing is prejudicial to all
paralytics" ... "_calidae vero immersiones omnibus paralyticis
nocent_[25]."--Some reflections upon the advocates for Mrs.
_Stephens_'s medicines, in the cure of the stone and gravel, by our
author, occasioned a letter to him on that subject by Dr. _Hartley_ of
_Bath_. The former expressed himself in the following manner; "_Neque
temperare mihi possum, quin dicam in opprobrium nuper medicis
nonnullis cessisse, quod insano pretio redimendi anile remedium
magnatibus auctores fuerunt._[26]" ... "Nor can I forbear observing,
tho' I am extremely sorry for the occasion, that some gentlemen of the
faculty a few years since acted a part much beneath their characters,
first in suffering themselves to be imposed on, and then in
encouraging the legislature to purchase an old woman's medicine at an
exorbitant price."[27] Of this the latter complains as an unmerited
indignity, "_Illud interea_ (inquit) _tanquem inopinatum, & ab
aequitate tua alienum queri liceat_, TE, _qui in obvios quoscunque
comis & urbanus esse, bene autem merentibus de re medica, vel etiam
literaria quavis, summa cum benignitate favere soleas, in
lithrontriptici fautores acerbius invectum fuisse; & non potius laudi
illis dedisse, quod arcanum sine pretio vulgatum, virorum dignitate,
fide, ingenio, artis nostrae peritia illustrium examini subjecerent,
neque aliam viam ad praemium reportandum aperiri voluerint, quam quae,
veris licet rerum inventoribus facilis & munita, jactatoribus tamen &
falsiloquis esset impervia.[28]_" ... In the mean while, I cannot but
complain of it as a thing unexpected, and greatly inconsistent with
your usual candour, that YOU, who are so courteous and humane to all
mankind, and so remarkably the patron of those who excel in the
profession of physic, or indeed in any branch of learning, should so
severely reproach the favourers of this lithontriptic medicine; and
not rather have commended them, for submitting a secret, communicated
to them without fee or reward, to the examination of some worthy
physicians, eminent for integrity, ingenuity, and learning: and for
endeavouring to excite the munificence of the publick in such a manner
only, as to render it accessible to the true authors of an important
discovery, but impervious to boasting impostors.