The mechanico-dynamic system was a sort of compromise or mixed system, which was held in high honor by the most eminent physicians and better minds of the last century, and has even been prized by Sprengel as the best of all. It was originated by Friedrich Hoffmann (1660-1742). Hoffmann's father was a physician, and he was himself born in Halle, whose university he attended. He acquired lasting reputation as an oculist, and was made Professor of Anatomy, Surgery, Medicine, Physics, and Chemistry at his _alma mater_. Our commonplace "Hoffmann's anodyne" is named after him. He was one of the most erudite professors of his day, more easily understood than Stahl, widely known for his fluent diction and amiable temper, and, accordingly, won great renown for his university. His good fortune as a practitioner was so great that even Boerhaave declared him his own equal. As a writer he was voluminous, one edition of his works comprising twenty-seven large volumes. According to Hoffmann's views, life was simply mechanical movement, especially of the heart; death, the cessation of heart-action, putrefaction thereupon resulting. Health meant regularity of movements; disease, a disturbance of the same. He used the word "tonus" extensively. Ether he regarded as an important factor, producing and maintaining movements of the body, itself extremely volatile, corresponding largely to the "pneuma" of the ancients; it was, in fact, a motor principle and, at the same time, the perceptive soul. Ether was stored in the medulla, and circulated in a double way in the body; spasm was the consequence of too strong, atony of too feeble, influx of ether. Fever was a general spasm of the arteries and veins, having its cause in the spinal cord. Hoffmann's therapeutics were simple, and poor in drugs. These latter were intended to weaken, alter, or evacuate, and he{198} was especially partial to the use of vinous remedies. The strong and toxic drugs he used but little. William Cullen (1712-1790), a Scotchman, rose from the deepest poverty to the greatest celebrity. First a barber, he afterward became an apothecary, then a ship-surgeon, then a village practitioner, finally entering into partnership with William Hunter as a general practitioner. Both of these eminent men being in equally poor circumstances, they agreed to live in the same place and that, while one was studying, the other should take care of the practice. In this way Cullen was enabled to graduate in 1740. Six years later he taught chemistry in Glasgow, and in ten years more came to Edinburgh as Professor of Medicine. He continued very active and famous up to the time of his death, but died as he had been born,--in poverty. Among his numerous other charitable deeds, he supported the widow of Robert Burns and published the latter's poems.