Medicina Flagellata; Or, The Doctor Scarify'dAnonymous
Science
Medicina Flagellata; Or, The Doctor Scarify'd
Anonymous
Hygiene; Medicine -- Practice -- Early works to 1800; Plague -- Early works to 1800; Quacks and quackery
Another Instance of a Woman whose Husband had a Bruise by a Fall down
Stairs, carry'd his Urin to the Urin casting Doctor in _Moor-fields_, who
pretended likewise to be a Conjurer; he (after shaking) seeing little
Specks of Blood float in it, had so much Understanding to tell her, that
the Party had receiv'd some internal Hurt; the Woman agreed to this as
Truth, but demanding by what Means he came by it: Upon this he erected a
Scheme, and in the mean time asked her so many Questions, that by the
Drift of her Discourse, he gather'd that he had tumbled down Stairs: The
Woman not minding well what she had said, (in the Consternation she was in
at the hard Words he had utter'd) suppossing he was conjuring up the
Devil, to be resolv'd in the Matter, told her own Words in a different
Title; the Woman acknowledged it true, with some Admiration, but desir'd
to know how many Pair of Stairs he might fall down? She had told him
before where she liv'd (and he considering the Place chiefly consisted of
low Buildings) answer'd, two Pair. Nay, now said she, you are out in your
Art, he fell three Story I'll promise. This put our Doctor to his Trumps,
when having mused a while for an Excuse, he shook the Urinal again, and
asked her if there was all the Water her Husband had made? No, reply'd
she, I spilt a little in pouring it in. O ho, did you so? said he: Why
that, Woman, was the Business that made me mistake, for there went away
the other Pair of Stairs in the Urin you spilt.
I shall but trouble you with another Instance, which explodes this Cheat,
of what happened in the early Practice of the fam'd Dr. _Radcliff_ when at
_Oxford_; of a Country Woman that brought to him her Husband's Urin in a
Glass-Bottle, very carefully cork'd up; and after a low Courtesy,
presented the Bottle, desiring the Doctor to send a Remedy for her
Husband, who then lay very ill: The Doctor observing the Simplicity of
this Woman, put no other Question, but of what Profession or Trade her
Husband was of? Who reply'd, a Shoemaker: At which he pours forth the Urin
in a Basin then by him, and after he had supply'd it with a like Quantity
of his own, he gives it her, and says, Good Woman, carry this to your
Husband, and bid him fit me with a Pair of Boots: but she replying, Her
Husband must first take Measure; to which he return'd, The Shoemaker
might as well judge by the Urinal the fitting of his Leg, as he in that of
his Distemper. That the Effects of Confederacy in promoting a Physician to
a popular Vogue, are as powerful as sinister and disingenuous, may not
only be deduced from the aforesaid Naratives, but from the common Design
of vulgar Empericks, who to raise their Fame as high as a Pyramid, send
forth several prating Fellows into all publick Places, Taverns,
Coffee-houses, and Ale-houses, to publish their vast Abilities, expecting
with that Bait to hook in as many Patients as will swallow it. Others are
no less skill'd in counterfeiting their great Practice, by causing their
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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