was unknown till the Year 1493, or thereabouts; that he himself had it, when he was a Child, and so consequently that it was hereditary, or from the Nurse. He Wrote his Book of this Distemper at _Mentz_, where it was printed by _John Scheffer_ in 4_to_, 1519. Now if we allow him to be but 27 Years of Age, when he wrote, (for he cannot be suppos’d to be less, who before this took upon him to cure his Father of the _Venereal Disease_, without the Assistance of any Physician or Surgeon,) he must have had the Distemper upon him, according to his own Account, before ever it was in being. Thus we may see, how Persons may be impos’d upon by a hasty and inconsistent Writer, no way qualified for such an Undertaking, and greedily receive in Falshoods instead of Truths, if they will not be at the Pains of consulting the Original Writings of our Predecessors, the only sure Method of overthrowing such chimerical and imaginary Notions. I have in my former Letters, to Dr. DOUGLASS, sufficiently I think proved that the _first_ Degree of the _Venereal Disease_ was very common among us some hundreds of Years before it is commonly said to have been known in _Europe_; there will be no Reason for any body to conceive we were at that time in any measure Strangers to it, when it came to be confirmed; more especially, when we consider the Methods of Treatment in those Times, which consisting principally in topical Applications, many of their Patients could not possibly escape having it confirmed on them. Now when it was in this confirmed State, the Writers of those early times looked upon it as an _entirely new_ Disease, and not a Consequent of any Evil before contracted, because they were not apprised, that the _first_ Symptoms being removed, and the Disease to Appearance cured, it should afterwards discover it self in such a manner, as should not seem to have the least Analogy with the Symptoms, that first attack’d a part which had been for a considerable time free from any Misfortune. But because the Symptoms are the only true Characteristicks, whereby we are infallibly able to know one Disease from another, it may be expected, that I produce sufficient Authorities to demonstrate they were all of them known and described by ancient Physical and Chirurgical Writers, just as they appear to be in the _Venereal Disease_ at this Day, if I would prove that _Disease_ to be of a much more ancient Date, than is generally thought; and if I do this, I cannot but think it will be satisfactory, since we can have no other way of coming to a Knowledge of any one Distemper, than by its Symptoms. The Method of laying down the exact Succession of them, will be impossible to be reduced to any certain and infallible Rule, there being so great a Variety of Causes, that obstruct such a Regularity; for which Reason, I shall take notice of them in such Order as they most generally appear, which was upon no account to be expected from