506 Review of New Publications. work," was taken from your countryman Montaigne, for instance; how would every men fmile, who has the honour of being a Frenchman, to find, that, to fave me the trouble of clofe thinking, I only took the works of that lively-fpirited Gascoigne; diffected them to my own likings then tacked them together again in my own language, with a few notions of my own, and call it my works? The injury here, to that illuf. trious Frenchman, would be like my attempting to render Athley-river dry by drawing out of it a bucket of water; whereas, with sefpect to me, who want talents, inclination, and leifure to write, ftripping my book, M. de Count, was like robbing the poer, and taking from it the little covering it had to Page 9, of my work, the words run thus: "They (peaking of the Cincinnati) "will attend incifontly to prefer ve inviolate the * exalted rights of human nature. Are there then, most illustrious Cincinnati, two forts of rights belonging to human nature? Is "there one kind fubordinate, and on a level with the humble condition of plebeicus ? And others more exalted, which the citizens are incapable of preferving inviolate without the inceffant watching of a dig"nified order of patricians? They muft mean this, ar nothing The people of "America, it feems, arenot fit to be trufted er with their own national honour, or their et own affairs, unless the order takes the fu"perintendence and direction of them. Can ""contradiction be more ftrong and glaring? la one moment they institute an order, and raise a diftinétion, which looks down 4 as from an high mountain, on all beneath 4tkem. They have laid in ruins that fine, plain, level frate of civil equality, over "which the fight of the beholder paffed "with pleafare; which God laid out for our 4 use and happiness; which our laws, and the nature of a republican government, 4 promised us. They have violated all;→ and yet, in the fame breath, by way of a mask thrown over their doings, they spread "before us the fine words lait quoted. But other species more eminent, the individuals of which are incapable of maintaining their rights without the inceffant watching of a dignified order of patricians? Yet this they muft mean, or nothing. The contradition is too glaring. They have intuted an order; they have erected a proud diftinction, from the fummit of which they losk down on all beneath them. Bat the difguife is too thin. No man, who has the ufe of his reafon, will believe that a people's rights will not be food invaded by men who difdain the condition of private citizens, and foar to a prefumptuous title which they have invented for themselves." "Again, from my work, p. 16, 17:— "Some of its members affume the cloak of "political modefty, and under it talk, that "they are no more dangerous than a city "corporation of shopkeepers, taylors, or other "mechanics; or like the free-mafons, and other "clubs, who wear badges or medals. Here we "fee how ambition can affume all shapes and colours, and humble itself to the very "duft to accomplish its purpofe: this mo"ment take upon them the fuperintendence "of empire, the bonour, union, and barpiness "of nations, and the exalted rights of buman nature; and, the very next, proftrate them"felves to the level of men, with whom to "be compared on any other occafion, the "order would deem en infult," &c. "Thofe words you have tranflated thus (p. 65, 66): Some of them already affume the cloak of political modefty, and pretend to be affonithed that they should be thought more dangerous than a city corporation of tradefien and mechanics, or than free-mafens and other clubs, who wear badges or medals. How frange a paffion is pride, which can affume all thapes and colours, and humble itfelf to the very deft, to accomplith its • purpose! This moment the Cincinnati take upon themselves the difpenfation of bounty, the fuperintendence of the public weal, and of the bonour, union, and happiness of na tions, and the prefervation of the most exalted rights of human nature; and the next they proftrate themselves to the level of men, with whom, upon any other occafion, they would deem all comparifon an infult.' "The limits of a letter will not allow me to purfue this matter farther. Your book, upon the whole, compared with mine, taking almost every page of both, proves that you understand the English language very well; and that your tranflator is maffer alfo of the French. "To convince the reader of this, I only refer him to the following pages of your work: 2, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 83, 84, 33, 34 35, 36, 37, 38, 41, 42, 52, 53, 54, 57, 58, 59, 60, 62, 63, 64, 65, 68, 69, 7, 71. Let them be compared with the following pages of mine, viz, 5, 7, 21, 22, 23, 24, 7, 8, 18, 9, 11, 10, 12, 13, 14, 24, 17, 16, 17, 24, 29, &c. "In Review of New Publications "In the republic of letters, Sir, the intereft of the whole is materially concerned, that literary property should be fecured to its refpective members, as a number of them feldom poffefs any other. How far you have broke in upon its laws, in the cafe before us, I leave the literati to determine. A CITIZEN OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Charleston, Dec. 10, 1785.” 80. Medical Sketches. In Two Parts. By John Moore, M. D.. 8vo. THIS lively and ingenious writer, after remarking the revolutions of fyftems in medical history, and the danger of implicitly adopting the fashionable doctrines of the day, proceeds to fhew, that phyfical skill is only to be acquired by noting the general properties of drugs, by acutely obferving their parti. cular operations on the human fyftem, under various circumftances, and by drawing judicious inferences from cau tious experiments.-To follow this line of conduct with fuccefs requires a clear understanding, in a two-fold viewclear in the exercife of vigorous powers, and alfo clear from an obftinate, fond attachment to pre-conceived theories. From the introductory part we fall extract fome general obfervations that may afford fome useful hints to our valetudinary readers; though poffibly our author, like Dr. Buchan, may be eyed akance by his brethren, as a betrayer of the myfteries of his profeffion. "What is the bufinefs of a phyfician?Why, to apply his knowledge and experience to the cure of d feafes, in which he must be directed by that degree of underfanding he poffeffes; and if he is deficient in fenfe, his experience will prove a fource from which he will draw falfe inferences; and learning, if he has it, will make him more prefumptuous, and lead him farther into error. "How many practitioners do we meet with, who are convinced that fevers are cared by the draughts, impregnated with and cardiac confection, contrayerva root with which they teize the patient every two or three hours? And how are they convinced of this? They will anfwer, from experience; for the drugs, not having actually killed the patient, but only retarded his cure, he recovers at length, notwithstanding all the draughts he has been obliged to fwallow. The fagacious doctor imputes the cure to his own prefcriptions, and probably publishes the cafe for the benefit of poflerity. "I have known a very well-meaning man miftake a prefcription of feeble efficacy for ne of the most powerful febrifuges that 50% ever was contrived; he had ordered it probably at first, when the disease began to take a favourable turn, or immediately before a happy crisis took place, and imputed the whole effect to the prescription. "He gives the fame medicine in another inftance or two, on the very day the fever commences; it is an ephemera; and he is confirmed in his opinion of the power of the medicine; he proclaims it the happiest combination that ever was invented, which, by a kind of electric attraction, draws the morbific matter to itself, and then hurries it out of the body. After a few inftances of this kind, it is impoffible to open his eyes; he imputes the unfortunate termination of other cafes to fome latent caufe, which oppofed the falutary effects of his favourite medicine. That any man, particularly a man of letters, and bred to the practice of phyfic, thould be fo eafily deceived, could fcarcely be believed, if we did not fee fuch examples frequently, and if we did not know with what partiality mankind in general view what they confider as their own inventions, and with what com placency they embrace opinions which flatter their own judgment. "Another thing which prevents fome practitioners from knowing the futility of their own prefcriptions, and what Nature, left to herself, can do, is, that they never leave Nature, to herself. The inftant they are called, they fall to work with their draughts, juleps, and apozems, and perfevere, with unrelenting affiduity, till the difeafe terminates one way or other. If the patient recovers, the medicines get the credit; if he dies, the difeafe is thought to have been in curable. "The being teized to fwallow drugs is a fpecies of diftrefs to which the rich are more expofed than the poor, provided the latter keep out of hofpitals. Nature is allowed to cure as many of them as the can; and Art, being little folicitous of feducing fuch patients out of her fister's hands, they generally have real peed of medicines before they are preffed to take them. But a phyficiau, whofe practice lies among the highest fpheres of life, if it amounts to three thousand pounds yearly, is fuppofed, at a moderate computation, to receive two thousand five hundred of that fum for preferibing for imaginary complaints, or fuch as would have difappeared fully as foon had they been left to themselves. But this ought not to be imputed as a crime to the physician. If an old lady canuct dine with comfort till he has felt her pulfe, looked at her tongue, and told her whether her chicken thould be roaged or boiled, it is reasonable he should be paid. for his trouble. "The difference between a good phyfician and a bad one is certainly very great; but "A fever that begins and ends in the compass of one day." the 5089 Review of New Publications." the difference between a good phyfician and no phyfician at all, in many cafes, is very little. "If, during the courfe of the common epidemic difeafes which occur in this island every Spring and Autumn, 206 patients were taken promifcuously, and one half delivered to the care of the faculty, to be treated according to art, that is, as private patients, by whom they are fee'd every time they prefcribe, and the other half delivered to the care of nurses, inftructed to give them 'no' phyfic whatever, but merely cooling drinks, and fuch light and fimple food as the patients appetites might lead them to with for, I am convinced the world would be a good deal furprised at the refult of the experiment. "It is aftonishing how exceedingly apt medical practitioners of every denomination are to impute to drugs that falutary effect which proceeds from the univerfal influence of another caufe, which caufe is that inherent bias observable in the animal economy to restore health; for, as the surface of a lake, which clearly reflects the fky and hills and verdant fcenes around its borders, when it is difturbed by the falling of a tone, immediately endeavours to recover its scattered images, and restore them to the same beauteous order in which they are wont to ap pear in like manner, when the natural courfe of the animal economy is interrupted and difturbed by the difeafe, the powers of the conflitution are continually endeavouring to restore its organs to the perfect ufe of their functions, and to recover its ufual vigour and ferenity. "This vis medicatrix naturæ, this conftant tendency in nature to overcome difeafe and reftore health, was obferved by the father of medicine; and a fentiment to the fame purpofe is the very firft expreffed by Sydenham, in his ineftimable work, and is acknowledged by all candid and difcerning practitioners to have a powerful influence in the care of difcafes. Indeed I am inclined to believe, that phyficians, in proportion to their candour and difcernment, acknowledge and rely upon this power in mure; and, in proportion to their felfishness and weakness, impute every recovery to their own prefcriptions. "A judicious and experienced phyfician confiders himself merely as an affiftant to Nature; when her force feems to be fufficient, he leaves her to perform the cure; when the feels too feeble, he affifts her by every means in his power. His patients, therefore, are fure, in the first place, of all the aid which Nature can give them; and, as often as it is requifite, if Art has difcover. ed or invented any thing to alleviate or remove their complaint, they are fure of that alfo. "Whereas, a phyfician, who has an overweening conceit of his own powers and thofe of his art, is apt, by unnecessary and officious 3 attempts, to interrupt the falutary process of Nature, and, like the inconfiderate man who would plunge his hand into the difturbed lake, in order to affift its efforts to regain its left tranquillity, he only helps to increase the diforder and confufion he means to remedy. "If well-meaning practitioners, who really wish to do every thing in their power for the recovery of their patients, and whofe greatest errors proceed from thinking more in their power than there is, can do fo much harm, how much greater mifchief is to be dreaded from the number of cunning, unprincipled, interested practitioners in medicine, who, without being deceived themfelves, impofe upon the weaknefs and credulity of others? Thofe, generally, are men of fuperficial knowledge, of a confiderable degree of natural threwdness, and fuch a portion of impudence, as fets them above embarrassment, even when their ignorance and fraud ace made manifeft. "Such men ftudy the foibles of mankind, fatten on the fears and hopes and caprices of the rich valetudinarians, and squeeze the laft lingering fhilling out of the weakened hands, of the poor. "There is a kind of quackery which fome people seem to invite; they cannot be fully convinced of their phyfician's fkill and attention without it. Proofs of this are to be met with every where. In a certain city on the Continent 1 happened to call upon a lady, who, on account of a pain and flight fwelling in her ancle, had confulted a wellknown phyfician, who, although he is accufed by his brethren of much charlatanical parade in his practice, commands the admiration of his patients in a more fupreme degree than any doctor I was ever acquainted with. He had juft left her when I entered. She told me he had ordered a poultice of bread and milk to be applied to the part; and then, giving her watch to her maid, the defired her to take particular care that the poultice fhould be boiled exactly four minutes and a half, for fech were the exprefs orders of Monfieur le Docteur. On my expreffing fome furprife at the minuteness of thefe orders, the exclaimed, "Mon Dieu, "quelle precifion! il calcule comme un "ange!" The fortunes that have been made, and are fill making, by men of this defcription, in the cities of London and Paris, and by the venders and inventors of naftrums, or fecret and infallible cures, is quite aftonishing. I mention Paris and London particularly, becaufe, though other towns are in fome degree expofed to the fame evil, yet the reputation of those pretended cures is always highest where the field for impofition is wideft, and the chance of delection least,” 81. Vite Review of New Publications. 31. Vite Antiquæ San&torum qui vixerunt in ea Parte Britanniæ nunc vocata Scotia, vel in ejus Infulis. Plerafque edidit ex MSS. quafdam folummodo collegit, Joannes Pinkerton; qui et variantes Le&iones, et Notas pauculas, adjecit. 8vo. Of this intended biographical volume, of which it is propofed to publish only a fmall number, by fubfcription, after the manner of Tom Hearne, we are favoured with the following analyfis ; "Lives of Saints," fays Mr. Pinkerton, have deservedly been held in fupreme contempt, ever since the light of literature revived. As Proteftants, and as men of fenfe, let us laugh at their ridiculous miracles; bar, as philofophers, let us allow that history and geography they feldom pervert, having no motives, but, on the contrary, every in ducement to preferve them exactly, in order to colour their other tales. That this is actually the cafe, we know to a certainty, from the Lives of Saints of other countries; in which, as appears from contemporary hiftorians, geography and hiftory are never violated. Old hiftorians of Scotland we have very few; hence the Lives of our Saints become even valuable, as they throw light on our earliest hiftory. The French hiftorians and antiquaries, and, of late, Mr. Carte in England, have, by means of Lives of Saints, illuftrated many an obfcure point in hiftory and geography. "It fo happens, that the Lives of Scotifh Saints are moftly written by men of eminence. Cuminius, Adamnan, Jocelin, Turgot, Allred, were all men of real talents and celebrity. Keith, in his Catalogue of Scotifh Bifhops, has given a Calendar of Scotifh Saints, amounting to 1ob in number. But of thefe two-thirds belong to the Irish; and if they want any more they may have them. Others belong to England and Wales; and not above twenty are found who actually either lived, or were born, in prefent Scotland; and of these not above half were real Scotifh Saints, or born in prefent Scotland. But the defign of this work is to ferve our ancient history and geography, which can only be done by giving the lives of thofe who lived iz prefent Scotland. "First appears St. Ninian, who converted the Southern Picts, as Beda teils us; and that, as Uher thews, about the year 412. His Life was tranflated from the Saxon, by the famous Alred, abbot of Rieval, about 1150; and two copies were in the Cotton Library, but both were unfortunately burnt in that well-known fire in 1731. But another copy, written about the XIIIth century, is in the Bodleian Library, and the Editor has procated a tranfcript. GENT. MAG. June, 1786. 509 "Above all, the two Lives of St. Columba, who converted the Northern Picts in 565, as Beda tells us, are the most curious remains of the very earliest Scotish antiquities. They are written by Caminius Alber, fixth abbot of Hyona (or Icolmkil), in 657 ; and by Adamnan, eighth abbot of Hyona, in 679. The latt of thefe writers is mentioned thenticity of their works is unquestionable. by Beda; the firft, by the laft; and the auCuminius and Adamnan are well put by Father Innes as the very earlicft writers who illuftrate Scotish history. Cuminius is pub lifhed by that great antiquary Mabillon, in his "Sæcula Benedictina" (nine volumes in folio); a work not to be found in the firft libraries of the kingdom. An Abridgement of Adamnan was published by Canifius, in his "Lectiones Antiquæ" (fix volumes in 4to), and republished by Surius, and other SanctoIngifts. This Abridgement Goodal, who had never feen a dozen MSS. in his life, was fo ignorant as to think complete, and to blame Bollandus for fome additions from the full ancient copy, in his "Vitæ Sanétorum," in 32 volumes folio. But a moft correct and fine MS, exifts in the King's Library, and from it the work thall now be published li teratim. It is a large production, in three books, of 40 or 50 chapters each, and is fin gularly minute, curious, and interesting; the parts omitted, being those which relate to hiftory, geography, private manners, &c. are juft the most important, though the ftrange names feem to have thocked Canifius. From two pages of Adamnan more may be learned as to the ancient manners, &c. of the Scots, than from the whole fictions afcribed to Offian. His ftyle is excellent for the time; and Uther even ranks him with Beda as an hiftoric writer, "St. Kentigern, or Mungo, in 578, appears to much advantage, his Life being written, at great length, in 45 chapters, by Jocelin, a monk of Furnes. He dedicates his book to another Jocelin, bishop of Glasgow from 1174 till 1199. A contemporary MS. is in the Cotton Library, and is very valuable, containing frong lights as to the Cumbrian kingdom in Scotland; of three fucceffive kings of which, Morken, Roderech, and Constantine, it contains arecdotes; befides many geographical informations. The author tells us, he compiled it from two old Lives, the one in Irith, the other in Latin. "The Life of St. Margaret, Queen of Scotland 1070, by Turger, Bithop of St. An drews, her confeffor, thall be given from Surius, compared with MSS, if any can be "Bishop Nicolfon (Scot. lift. Lib.) mentions a Life of Columba by Segenius, as published in the "Sæcula Benedictina," A mistake" found, Renew and Catalogue of New Publications. found, that in the Cotton Library being burnt. That curious piece of Northern hiftory, The Life of St. Magnus, Earl of Orkney, 1103, shall be given in the Latin tranfstion of the original 10andic, printed at the end the Orkneyinga Saga, or History of the Orkneys," published by Jonæus, Hafe. nie, 1780, 4to. The fhort eulogy of St. David, King of Stofland, 1124, by Allred, abbot of Rieval, his contemporary, fhall also be given, compired with three or four MSS. in the Cotton Library, "The Editor fhall only add, that the mode of fubfcription has become fo common among thofe who use it as a pitiful fare to catch money, that pride might have deterred him from it, had he not been accustomed to defpife that pride, which would prevent a man from being ufefal. And he believes the reader is, ere now, convinced that the pre fent will be a work of utility, as well as cu riphay. Indeed, as to the later quality, few books can exceed it. The Lives of Saints were almoft, the fole profe reading of our ancestors, as the metrical Romances were. their poetry. Both were "The claffics of an age which heard of ,; Bath abound with the most lively pictures of life and manners. And the Lives of Scotith, Saints happen to be fingulatly curious and interesting, from the eminence of the writers, from their length, and minuteness, and from the light they throw on the ancient hiftory and geography of a country, most of whofe more precious records have perished." 82. Moral and Infirudive Tales for the Im provement of Young Ladies, calculated to amufe and form the Mind to Virtue. 12mo. THESE Tales are seven in number,' well chofen, and not ill written. 83. A Legal Attempt to enforce the Practice of Infant Baptifm. A crafty means of introducing the ftrongeft arguments against it. 84. The Cafe of G. R. Fitzgerald, Efq, im partially confidered; with Anecdotes of bis Life. To subich is added, A circumfiential Account of the premature Death of the laté Patrick. Kandal MiDonnel, Efq. in a genuine Letter from T. Brecknock, Elq. to bis Friend in London, woritun a fer Weeks before his own and Fitzgerald's Execution. The Second Edition. Svo. › WE mention this pamphlet for the prefent (intending to lay more of it in our next), that we may have an opportunity of faying that THIS is the ori gal, whence a compilation under the title of "Authentic Memoirs" hath been very unhandfomely compiled. |