He settled as a physician in Edinburgh, where he was appointed titular professor of medicine. His practice extended beyond example, and he was more consulted by foreigners than any Edinburgh physician either before or after his time. He died in October, 1713, admired and regretted by the whole country. He was a zealous supporter of iatro-mathematics, and as such a professed antagonist of the iatro-chemists. He refuted their opinions with much strength of reasoning, while his high reputation gave his opinions an uncommon effect; so that he contributed perhaps as much as any one, to put a period to the most disgraceful, as well as dangerous, set of opinions that ever overspread the medical horizon. Into the merits of the iatro-mathematicians it is not the business of this work to enter; they at least display science, and labour, and erudition, and in all these respects are far before the iatro-chemists. Perhaps their own opinions were not more agreeable to the real structure of the human body, nor their practice more conformable to reason, or more successful than those of the chemists. Probably the most valuable of all Dr. Pitcairne’s writings, is his vindication of the claims of Hervey to the great discovery of the circulation. Boerhaave, the pupil of Pitcairne, and afterwards a professor in Leyden, was a no less zealous or successful opponent of the iatro-chemists. Herman Boerhaave, perhaps the most celebrated physician that ever existed, if we except Hippocrates, was born at Voorhout, a village near Leyden, in 1668, where his father was the parish clergyman. At the age of sixteen he was left without parents, protection, advice, or fortune. He had already studied theology, and the other branches of knowledge that are considered as requisite for a clergyman, to which situation he aspired; and while occupied with these studies he supported himself at Leyden by teaching mathematics to the students--a branch of knowledge to which he had devoted himself with considerable ardour while living in his father’s house. But, a report being raised that he was attached to the doctrines of Spinoza, the clamour against him was so loud that he thought it requisite to renounce his intention of going into _orders_.[171] He turned his studies to medicine, and the branches of science connected with that pursuit, and these delightful subjects soon engrossed the whole of his attention. In 1693 he was created doctor of medicine, and began to practise. He continued to teach mathematics for some time, till his practice increased sufficiently to enable him to live by his fees. His spare money was chiefly laid out upon books; he also erected a chemical laboratory, and though he had no garden he paid great attention to the study of plants. His reputation increased with considerable rapidity; but his fortune rather slowly. He was invited to the Hague by a nobleman, who stood high in the favour of William III., King of Great Britain; but he declined the invitation.