Dr. Caius showed himself notably before his age also in his censures of excess in eating and drinking, his commendation of the bath, and of muscular exercise. His advice to his readers to have recourse to a good physician, and to be at least as good to their bodies as to their hose or their shoes, is followed by a picture of the army of quacks who in default of science preyed upon the masses. “Simple-women, carpenters, pewterers, braziers, soapball-sellers, apothecaries, avaunters themselves to come from Pole, Constantinople, Italy, Almaine, Spain, France, Greece, Turkey, India, Egypt or Jury; from the service of emperors, kings, and queens, promising help of all diseases, yea incurable, with one or two drinks, by drinks of great and high prices, as though they were made of the sun, moon, or stars, by blessings and blowings, hypocritical prayings, and foolish smokings of shirts, smocks, and kerchiefs, with such others, their phantasies and mockeries, meaning nothing else but to abuse your light belief, and scorn you behind your backs, with their medicines (so filthy, that I am ashamed to name them), for your single wit and simple belief, in trusting them most, which you know not at all, and understand least; like to them which think far fowls have fair feathers, although they be never so evil favoured and foul; as though there could not be so cunning an Englishman, as a foolish running stranger, or so perfect health by honest learning, as by deceitful ignorance.” From all which the reader may judge whether somewhat similar remarks might not be applicable to the last century, and even to a great part of the present, in its credulity of the efficacy of quack medicines and the powers of audacious empirics. In 1555 Dr. Caius was elected President of the College of Physicians, an office which he continued to hold until 1561. He applied himself with devoted energy to promoting the interests of the college, commencing to record its annals, till then unpreserved, procuring the copying and binding in grand style of the college statutes, designing the insignia, the cushion of crimson velvet edged with gold on which the statutes were laid, the silver staff ornamented with the college arms borne by the President, to remind him, according to Caius, by its material (silver), to govern with patience and courtesy, and by its symbols (the serpents), with judgment and wisdom. His zeal further exhibited itself in protecting the privileges of the college, as when he appeared successfully, in Elizabeth’s reign, against the barber surgeons, who were claiming the right to prescribe medicines for internal administration in cases where their operative assistance was called in.