remove presentments upon which process may be awarded in this Court The Reason why 't is not sufficient to plead the Tenor of Letters Patents or to shew or produce to the Court the Tenor of Letters Patents as in Pages case is resolved is because the Letters Patents are the private conveyance of a particular person and therefore he must plead and shew forth and produce to the Court the Letters Patents themselves and the Tenor thereof was not sufficient at the Common Law But upon nul tiel Record pleaded a Certificate of the Tenor onely and not of the Record it self hath always béen held a sufficient proof of that issue and the Tenor certified is to be filed in this Court and to remain here always to this purpose onely viz. as a proof of this issue but the Record it self remains where it was before to be made use of for any purposes that may happen hereafter The rest of the Iudges were of the same opinion and so Iudgment was given for the Plaintiff De Termino Sanctae Trinitatis Anno 28 Car. secundi 1676. Banco Regis The King and the President and College of Physicians Plaintiffs against Marchamont Needham Defendant THe President and the College qui tam c. brought an action of debt upon the Statute of 14 H. 8. cap. 5. for so much money against the Defendant for practising Physick for so many months without licence of the College whereby he was to forfeit 5 li. per month one moiety thereof to the King and the other moiety to the President and College The Defendant pleaded as to part of the money in the Declaration mentioned nul tiel Record as the said Act of Parliament and as to the Residue of the money the Defendant pleaded nil debet The Plaintiffs demurred to the Barr. The cause of the demurrer was for that the Defendant's plea was double viz. it contained two matters one whereof alone would go in answer to the whole money in the Declaration mentioned and would of it self be a good and full Barr to the Plaintiffs Action in case the said matter be true as the Defendant alledgeth and that is the matter of nul tiel Record and therefore the pleading of nul tiel Record to part onely and the pleading of other matter viz. nil debet to the residue makes the Defendant's plea in Barr to be vicious and to be an ill plea in Law The Councel for the Defendant did then object that the Plaintiffs Declaration is naught 't is an action of debt brought by the President and College qui tam c. upon the Statute and an action of debt doth not lie the Plaintiffs should have brought an information upon the Statute and not an Action of debt upon the Statute for the Statute doth not give an action of debt and therefore an action of debt doth not lie Twisden Iustice answered that an action of debt doth lie by equity and construction of the Statute Jones Iustice said that in the Statute of Tithes in 3 Ed. 6. no action of debt is mentioned and yet an action of debt lies upon that Statute and so here Thereupon Rule was given by the Court that Iudgment should be entred for the Plaintiffs In Mich. Term. Anno Car. secundi xxvi THe College brought their Action against John Bourne to which he pleaded nil debet and upon tryal of the Cause at Guild-Hall before Iudge Twisden the Plaintiffs recovered 40 li. Trin. xxxv Car. secundi THe President and College c. brought an Action of Debt upon the Statute of the 14 of H. 8. against Frederick Harder for practising Physick and thereupon had a Verdict against him at Westm for 25 li. which he paid and the Costs that were taxed The same Term they had a Verdict against Nathaniel Merry for 40 li. and against Richard Stone for 45 li. College Questions resolved by the Lord Chancellor and Judges in the fifth of King James his Reign An. Dom. 1607. THe King 's most Excellent Majesty having directed his Letters to the Right honourable Thomas Lord Ellesmere Lord Chancellor of England and to Sir John Popham Knight Lord Chief Iustice of England and one of his Highness's most honourable Privy Council They the said Lord Chancellor and Lord Chief Iustice by virtue of the same Letters called unto them Sr. Thomas Fleminge Knight then Lord Chief Baron of his Majestie 's Court of Exchequer Sir Thomas Walmesley and Sr. Peter Warburton Knights two of his Majestie 's Iustices of the Court of Common Pleas and Sir David Williams and Sir Laurence Tanfield Knights two of his Majesties Iustices of the King's Bench and after due consideration had both of the Charter of King H. 8. made unto the said President and College of Physicians in the tenth year of his Raign and several Acts of Parliament thereof made one in the 14 year of the same King and the other in the first year of Q. Mary for the ordering and governing of the said College and of all the Practisers in London and 7 Miles compass did on the first of May 1607. at the house of the said Lord Chancellor called York house resolve the several questions hereafter mentioned as is expressed under every Question Tho. Harries These Questions were resolved as is expressed under every question by the right honorable the Lord Chancellor of England Lord Chief Iustice of England the Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer Iustice Walmesley Iustice Warburton Iustice Williams and Iustice Tanfield being assembled by the King's Majestie 's appointment to examine view and consider of the Charters Statutes and Laws made for the government of the College of Physicians in London and the Practisers of Physick there the first day of May 1607. at the house of the Lord Chancellor Quest 1. Whether Graduates of Oxford and Cambridge may practise in London or 7 miles compass of the same without licence under the said College Seal by virtue of the clause in the end of the Statute of 14 H. 8. and whether that clause hath not relation to the Statute of 3 H. 8. onely or how far it doth extend Resp All resolved that no Graduate that is not admitted and licensed by the President and College of Physicians under their Common Seal could practise in London or within 7 miles compass of the same Quest 2. Whether by Graduates Graduates in Physick onely are to be understood Resp They resolved That the exception in the Statute of 14 H. 8. cap. of Graduates in the two Vniversities is to be understood onely of Graduates of Physick and of no others And all resolved That by that exception those Graduates may practise in all other places of England out of London and 7 miles of the same without examination But not in London nor within the said Circuit of 7 miles Quest 3. If Graduates not admitted to practise in London practise there whether for evil practice or misdemeanour therein they be not subject to the Correction and government
and streightly commandyng the said Grocers and Apothecaries and every of them not to faile herof as thei tendre our pleasure the health and securitye of our lovyng Subjects and as thei shall answere for doyng the contrarie before yow to their such losses damages and penalties as be prescribed in our Lawes and Statutes above mentioned aswell concernyng Physicians as also Grocers and Apothecaries Yeven under our Signet at our Manor of St. James the xxiiii daye of June in the fourthe and fivethe yeres of our Reignes PROCEEDINGS Against Empiricks c. In Queen Elizabeth 's Reign IN the first year of this Queen's Reign Thomas Glamfelde was committed to prison for practising Physick and Stalworth and Gylmyn Norwich Empiricks fined upon the same account In the second year of her Reign a Commission was given by the College to Walter Hawgh a Norwich Physician and to Hugh Glynne a Chester Physician to Prosecute all Empiricks of their own and neighbour Counties Several others were summoned before the College and severely rebuked for exposing Pills to sale without their approbation Others were punished for the ill preparation of Medicines Amongst whom one Edward Stephens a sweet Grocer that he might be released from his imprisonment for obstinately refusing to appear upon the President 's summons of his own accord fell down upon his knees before the President and humbly begg'd pardon of the Queen's Majesty for his disobedience to the President of her College the Lord Cobham and several others being present In the 6th year several Empiricks were prosecuted others were imprisoned for practising Physick In the 12th year the Wife of one Bomelins an Empirick having procured the Lord Treasurer's Letter to the College petitioned that her husband might be discharged from prison he having given satisfaction to the Queen's Majesty for his violation of the Statutes in practising unlearnedly and by Magical Arts. To this Letter the College answered that her husband must first pay 20 l. for his practice and 15 l. for expences in the suit and likewise give security that he would not practise Physick for the future After this the President of the College and Dr. Caius were appointed to wait upon Sir William Cecil Secretary of State he having wrote a Letter to the College in favour of Bomelins upon whose application the Secretary was pleased to express great respect to the College and all the members of it assuring them that he should be well pleased to have Bomelins banished the Kingdom Some time after Bomelins was released from prison by consent of the College having given Bond of 100 l. that he would not for the future practise Physick in London nor in any other parts of England It was ordered by the College that the President should enter an Action against Dr. Lewes Judge of the Admiralty for suffering William Rich an Empirick committed to his care in the Marshalsea to practise Physick against the Laws of the Kingdom his own trust in contempt of the College and to the great prejudice of the Queen's Subjects A foreign Physician who had taken his Degree at Lovain in Brabant was summoned before the President and Censors and examined by what authority he practised Physick in England without licence He pleaded his ignorance of the Laws and was dismissed upon promise of not practising in London nor any other parts of England being likewise ordered to return into his own Country in a few days Dr. Walker was summoned to appear before the College to answer several things objected against him by Dr. Corimbec he having examined and admitted some Physicians in Norwich and Norfolk and extorted above 100 Marks from several Empiricks in those parts whom he had licensed to practise He was Fined for not appearing and Letters were wrote by the College to Dr. Corimbec to authorize him to cite those Empiricks to appear before the College in order to their due punishment One Sylva an Italian was charged before the President and Censors for evil practice in that he undertook to cure an old woman by suffumigation with which she died and prescribed Stibium to another person troubled with an affection of his Lungs to his great prejudice He was afterwards examined and rejected by the whole College by reason of his egregious ignorance in Philosophy and Physick and was fined 20 l. for having practised Physick for half a year to the apparent hurt of the Queen's subjects and the year following was committed to prison in that he had practised without College licence Thomas Pennye was summoned for practising Physick but pleading that he had taken his Doctours degree he was dismissed and ordered that he should bring his Letters testimonial to the Censors which accordingly he did but upon examination was found so ignorant in the first principles of Philosophy and Physick that he was thought unfit for that employment and prohibited the practice thereof and afterwards imprisoned for contemning the Judgment of the College and adventuring to practise without their licence In the 13th year of this Queen a Surgeon was Fined 20 l. for practising Physick but upon the intercession of some persons of Quality the College forgave him 20 Marks of that Fine upon condition that he bound himself in a bond of 100 l. that he would not practise for the future which refusing he was forced to pay the forementioned 20 l. Richard Reynold was examined and rejected as being very ignorant and unlearned But voluntarily confessing that he had practised Physick for 2 years the College ordered that he should be imprisoned untill he had paid 20 l. In the 14th year One Emme Baxter an impudent and ignorant woman was committed to prison for practising Physick the 7th of February Upon the 11th she was brought before the College where her husband William Baxter and Nicholas Staples a Citizen entring into bond to the College and their Successors that she should not practise for the future in London nor any other parts of England she was dismissed paying all Fees due to the Officers of the Prison c. In the same year it was argued in the Lord Mayor's Court before Sir William Allen then Lord Mayor Whether the Surgeons might give inward medicines in the Sciatica French Pox or any kind of Ulcer or Wound Many arguments were used by the Bishop of London Master of the Rolls c. for their practice in this manner Dr. Caius the President of the College being summoned by the Lord Mayor in his own and the Queen's Delegates names did defend the illegality of their practice upon the forementioned accounts After which it was agreed by all present that they ought not to practise In the 23th year of the Queen's Reign one Baptista an Empirick was fined by the President and Censors 6 l. 13 s. 4 d. which he paid to the President He afterwards paid 5 l. to the College ob rem malè gest am in praxi gave bond to pay 5 l. more at our Lady day and at Midsummer was required to pay
privileges they deputed some of their Members to wait upon the Right Honourable Sir Francis Walsingham Secretary of State humbly to beg the favour of him to write his Letter to the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen to require them that they should give the College no farther trouble but suffer them to live free and undisturbed they being freed from finding Arms by virtue of Royal Charters given to them by the Royal bounty of their Princes and Acts of Parliament made in their favour Which the Honourable Secretary was pleased to doe and the College thereupon discharged from farther charge or trouble Paul Fairfax a foreign Empirick gave out Bills stuffed with arrogance and ostentation of the admirable virtues of a Water which he called his Aqua Coelestis with which he cheated the People He confessed that he had practised Physick in London for 4 months and pretended that he had done several Cures with his water and other remedies for which he was fined 5 l. and required to give bond that he should not practise for the future which if he refused he was to be committed to prison Upon this he procured a Letter from the Lord Chamberlain directed to the President and College which he delivered with Letters testimonial of having taken his Degree at Frankfort which seeming to be fictitious they were kept by the College and he forbidden to practise Physick However the following Letter was presented by the President and College in answer to the Lord Chamberlain's To the Right Honorable our very good Lord the Lord Hunsdon Lord Chamberlaine one of the Lords of her Majesties most honorable Privy Councill RIght Honorable and our very good Lord Having received a Letter from your Lordship in the behalf of one Paul Fairfax for the liberty of his practice in Physick here in London and understanding by the Contents of the same that your Honor hath been misinformed as well of the quality of the man as also of our dealings towards him We most humbly beseech your good Lordship to accept of our answer which we here present in most dutifull wise Touching the Man albeit by some travell he seemeth to have gotten some kind of Language and therewithall hath boldly put himself into some Empirical practice more daungerous in trueth to the Patient then any-wise commendable to the Practitioner Yet upon just examination we find the man very weak in the substance of all kind of good learning and rather to be pitied for his fantasticall conceits and well weening of his owne ignorance then any wise to deserve toleration in so daungerous a function A man never trained up in any good Schoole of Learning ignorant in the very principles of the Art and for lack of other good matter furnished with certain ridiculous termes and childish phrases invented onelie to entertain the simple hearer and to delude the unlearned multitude withall And whereas he laieth some challenge to a Doctorship He hath in deed shewed unto us the Letters Testimoniall for the same Yet we being better acquainted with the coorse of Universities then he have a better opinion of Frankfort then to think that wittinglie and willinglie they would commit so foul an errour as to admit either him or the like And having made good survey of the Letters find by evident proofs that they are vehemently to be suspected to have been rather by some sinister means devised than by any ordinary course obtained Touching us and our hard using of him as he termeth it to your Lordship as well by imprisoning his body as by exacting the paiment of money to his great impoverishing Maie it please your good Lordship to understand that as yet he hath paied no one penny but standeth bound indeede and that for a very small summe considering the quality of the offence and the straightness of our Lawes in that behalf and yet for the paiment thereof hath as long a day as himself requested And as for his imprisonment it was rather procured by his owne undiscreet frowardness then ment by us at all if he had shewed any conformitie in time For being a Gentleman as himself saieth and having so good acquaintance as he protested being offered to be set at liberty if he would have put in but any one sufficient surety a matter of great ease for him to do if the rest of his talk had been to be credited He as one rather contemning us and our friendly dealing then not able to satisfie our reasonable request more upon stomach then discretion made choice of imprisonment Thus have we delivered unto your good Lordship a truth beseeching your Honor so to interpret of our dealing toward him and all other in the like degree as of men altogether abhorring from all extremity but enforced to do that little which we do even by the very duetie that we owe to our Lawes and good orders and by the consideration of our strict solemne Oth and conscience in that behalf And so praying for your Lordships most prosperous estate we most humbly take our leave At our College this last of Ianuary 1588. Your Lordship 's most humble The President and Society of the College of Physitions in London Iohn Halsey appearing before the College confessed that he had practised Physick in London for several years wherefore the College ordered that he should pay 20 l. for his former practice and take a licence for the future if found fit or else give bond of 100 l. that he should not practise hereafter in London which if refused then to be committed to prison He desired time to consider and then promised forthwith to enter into bond as required by the College Tomazine Scarlet a Woman so egregiously ignorant that she confessed she understood nothing in Physick neither could reade or write yet had hundreds under her cure to whom she gave purging Medicines Stibium c. For which she was required to give a bond with good security that she would not practise for the future which accordingly she did But after some years practising again and refusing to give bond as before she was committed to prison but then procured Letters from Court to the President of the College that she might be released but by Order of the College she was continued And after some short time being sent for she refused to desist from practice or to give bond for her due observance of the Laws as before demanded wherefore she was for this contumacy of hers remanded back to prison About 3 years after she was again committed to prison and fined 10 l. for practising Physick and using dangerous Medicines as Stibium Antimony Mercurial Unguents c. all which she confessed Five years after she was a third time sent to prison and fined 5 l. upon the same account In the 31 th of the Queen Paul Buck a very impudent and ignorant Empirick appeared before the President and Censors and then confessed he never had any liberal education yet had practised Physick
ob raram praxin and that by the prescription of others he should have so severe a fine inflicted upon which the College Register was searched and there it appeared that before this Fine he had been 6 times accused for practice and several times had been fined in small mulcts Upon which account the Chief Justice declared that he thought it most reasonable that after he had been treated with so great clemency and yet render'd himself incorrigible he should have a severe Fine inflicted upon him And by reason that Physicians bills were often pleaded to justifie illegal practice he thought it most advisable that all Physicians for the future should write upon all their bills their Patients names and day of the month and year by which means the Cheats of Empiricks and other Impostors might more easily be detected Thus the Chief Justice having heard this cause and well approved of the censure of the College ordered that Ienkins should be forthwith returned back to Prison untill he had given satisfaction to the President and Censors Some friends of Ienkins moving that he might give security for his appearance and not be reimprisoned the Chief Justice answered that it was not in his power to grant their request for the Laws of the Kingdom had determined that as a Privilege belonging to the President and Censors It was then objected that by the Law no Citizen of London could be imprisoned per forinsecum aliquem The Chief Justice reading the words of the Statute and observing that they would bear no such sense replied that by such interpretations they might likewise infringe his authority As to Read he complained that the College had fined him more than the Statute would allow upon which complaint the Chief Justice diligently looked over the words of the Statute and declared that the College might inflict what penalty they pleased but the Keeper of the Prison was not obliged to detain his prisoner if they exceeded the fine of 20 l. He then justified his practice by a Statute made in the 34 35 H. 8. C. 8. By which it was lawfull for any person having the knowledge of herbs c. to practise at least in some diseases to which the Chief Justice answered that this he ought not to do because he was not admitted by the College In short the sum of the Chief Justice's opinion in hearing and deciding this cause was the following 1. There is no sufficient Licence without the College Seal 2. No Surgeon as a Surgeon may practise Physick no not for any disease though it be the great Pox. 3. That the authority of the College is strong and sufficient to commit to prison 4. That the censure of the College rising from lesser mulcts to greater was equal and reasonable 5. That it were fit to set to Physicians bills the day of the month and the Patient's name 6. That the Lord Chief Iustice cannot baile or deliver the College prisoner but is obliged by Law to deliver him up to the College censure 7. That a Freeman of London may lawfully be imprisoned by the College 8. That no man though never so learned a Physician or Doctour may practise in London or within seven miles without the College Licence Upon this the President and College presented the following Letter to the Lord Chief Justice To the Right Honorable Sir John Popham Knight Lord Chief Justice of England and one of her Majestie 's most honorable Privy Councill RIght honorable Albeit we acknowledge our selves to be most infinitely bound already to your good Lordship for many your most honorable favours extended to us and our Society heretofore for the which we render your Lordship most humble thanks Yet such is your Lordship's great care and continual good inclination to the maintenance of learning good orders and vertue That not onely we and our Societie that now is are now again more deeply obliged to your honor but also all our posterity in time to come shall have just cause to pray for your Lordship 's long lief and prosperity whose unspottable Integrytie hath been so well knowen to all England these many yeares and many moe shal be as we hope to the great good of our Countrie and to your Lordship's everlasting prayse and Memory and whose tender particuler favours have been so honorably and so willingly perfourmed to us of late in defence of our privileges against one Ienkins and Reade two ignorant intruders into the profession of Physick and two daungerous infringers and abusers of her Majestie 's Laws and Leege people as while the memory of the Society and College of Physitions of London shall remaine so long shall your Lordship's honorable most worthy name be celebrated and recorded among all such as ether love or professe the title of Learning And heere for our parts we protest we are right sorrie that our weaknesse is such as we are not any otherwise able moore then only by bare wordes and speeches to make manifest our inward affections and dutifull good meaning to your honor But yet all that lyttle whatever it is that lieth in our poore powre to perfourme we heere offer and present unto your Lordship with most humble devoted mynds to do your good Lordship any service that we can And so desiring to rest in your honor 's good conceyt and opinion we most humbly take our leave and praie for your Lordship 's long lief and prosperytie This 10th of Aprill 1602. Your Lordship 's most humble The President and Society of the College of Physitions in London After this upon the submission of Ienkins and request of the Chief Justice a third part of the fine of 20 l. imposed upon Ienkins by the Censors was remitted and he discharged from Prison Read likewise by the interest of the Bishop of London procured his discharge About 2 years and 4 months after Ienkins was again charged for practising of Physick which he denied but several instances of it being given he confessed that to some few Patients of Fevers c. he had prescribed purging physick c. Being then charged with selling of one sort of drink to all that came for it he confessed that he had sold such a Medicine but for the future would never do it and if in this manner or any other hereafter he should act contrary to the privileges of the College he would readily submit to the severest punishment Upon this modest confession of his and promise of not offending for the future but more especially out of respect to the Lord Chancellour in whose service he was the Censors inflicted no punishment upon him but onely interdicted him practice and then order was given by the College that 2 of their Members should wait upon the Chancellour to acquaint him how ill Ienkins had behaved himself towards the College and how candidly they had dealt with him upon his Honour's account This was taken very kindly by the Lord Chancellour who returned the College thanks for their
confessed that she had given him Physick but said it was innocent but the matter of fact was so notorious and the event so fatal that she was forthwith committed to Prison and fined 5 l. Dr. Saul being made one of the Queen's Physicians and yet an illiterate and ignorant person in his profession the College ordered the following Letter to be presented to the Right Honourable the Lord Sidney RIght Honorable and our very good Lord The great care that your good Lordship hath for the preservation of her Majestie 's health as it is right well knowen to others so hath it been fully signified unto us by the speech of Dr. Browne Physition to his most excellent Majesty In regard whereof we perceive by him it is your pleasure that your Lordship might be rightly and thoroughly enfourmed of the true sufficiency of one Saul who is entertained into her Majestie 's service a matter of noe small moment touching her Majestie 's health and safety Wherein we are thus much to say in respect of our bounden duty and upon our credits That this said Saul in the year 1591. made his appearance at our College upon one of our solemne meeting daies there to be examined for his skill and sufficiency in Physick and there being orderly opposed in the Latine tongue according to our custome and as we are bound to do stood mute and answered not one woord ether for that he woold not or coold not understand us Then being demanded in English what part of Galen or other good Authors he had read He answered that he had read Galen all over Then being required to name some one book or other of the said Author that he said he had read to the end he might have been examined with all favour in that book which he was best acquainted with He coold not so much as name any one book of his And for that he then shewed us certain Letters testimonial of his Doctorship at the University of Leyden gotten by what corrupt and indirect means we know not we requested him to impart those questions unto us wherein he answered when he proceeded Doctor But herein also he refused to name any one of them unto us Whereupon his ignoraunce so manifestly appeared unto us as we coold do no lesse upon our Oathes then to forbid him from practice at that time and thereupon immediately wrote our Letters to one Heurnius Doctor of the Chair there sharply reprehending him for committing such an error and for suffering such grosse abuses to the great discredit of themselves and their University who promised the like fault should never be committed again And from that time till now of late we never heard more of this Saul and doe not a little marveile how he cometh by this credit in Physick unlesse either by infusion learning hath been powered into him or els by some extraordinary means he hath of late obtained a special gift of healing And thus having most faithfully discharged our dutie to your good Lordship not with any malitious mind to the party but in regard of our loyall fidelitie to her Majestie we most humbly take our leave About the Second year of King Iames his Reign a Copy of the Surgeons Letters Patents which they had procured from the King's Majesty for enlarging their Privileges was read to the College which being found long and full of Law subtilties It was ordered that some of the Fellows should examine and compare their Old Charter with their New which being done and reported to the College the President with two of the Elects waited upon the Lord Cranbourne to acquaint him what great inconveniences and mischiefs would ensue not onely as to the privileges of the College of Physicians but likewise as to the publick good of the whole kingdom in case their Letters Patents were passed Notwithstanding the Surgeons presented a Petition in Parliament to procure an authority for prescribing inward as well as outward medicines in Wounds Ulcers and French Pox a Copy of which is the following To the Honourable Knights Citizens and Burgesses of the House of Commons in his Majestie 's high Court of Parliament assembled The humble Petition of the Masters or Governors of the Mystery and Commonalty of Barbers and Surgeons of London Most humbly shewing THat whereas it hath pleased his Majestie to grant unto the College of Physicians of London a Patent under his Majestie 's great Seal of England and thereby hath given them not onely many large privileges and other grants but also power to call and convent before them in London and 7 miles compasse and to examine upon Oath the servant or attendant upon any person or persons that shall either give or take Physick and in fine to imprison at their pleasure all such persons as doe or shall administer any internall remedy whatsoever By reason whereof they doe not onely take unto themselves the Arts of the Physician Chirurgion and Apothecary but doe likewise goe about to restraine your Petitioners from using unto their grieved and wounded Patients such wound-drinks Potions and other inward remedies as they by their long practice study and tried experience have found most necessary for the recovery of their diseased Patients as well in the City of London as in all his Majestie 's services both by Sea and Land in preserving both their lives and limbs and without which many times they cannot performe their Cures nor give such speedy ease and remedy to the grieved Patients as otherwise they may and can doe which Patent is very prejudicial not onely to your Petitioners but to all his Majestie 's subjects who shall have occasion to use their help and will prove a great and heavy burthen to the Common-wealth in general when for every hurt apperteyning to the Chirurgions cure the Patient must be forced to entertain a Surgeon a Physician and an Apothecary The humble Suite of your Petitioners is that this honourable House will be pleased to take the same Patent into your grave considerations and the unlawfull privileges and hurtfull power to them given to set Fines to take Recognizances inflict Imprisonments and other authorities grievous to his Majestie 's subjects and to them given by the same Patent being by your wisdomes weighed and examined and the Petitioners with their Councell heard that this honourable House upon hearing thereof being truly informed of the said generall wrong such course may be therein taken through your Justice and grave Wisdomes as may tend to the relief of your Petitioners and the good of the Common-wealth And they as in duty bound shall daily pray to God for your ever during prosperities c. Your Petitioners preferring their Petition to his Highnesse touching the Premises his Majesty was thereby graciously pleased to leave the Petitioners free to seek any lawfull remedy for their grievances either in Parliament or otherwise Rich. Cooper Tho. Allen. Rich. Mapes E. Ingolsbye Will. Clowes Iohn Woodall Tho. Bonham Christoph Frederick C.
down the head The Coronal Being further asked what disease he had cured he replyed the Yellow Jaundise What is that The overflowing of the Gall. What part goes it to To the Mawe What is the Mawe The place of the first decoction Having several other questions proposed to him it was resolved by the Censors that he was insufficient and therefore forbid practice PROCEEDINGS Against Empiricks c. In King Charles I. his Reign MAster President with 3 of the Fellows of the College waited upon the Right Honourable the Lord Keeper Coventry to return him thanks in the name of the College for the great favour he was pleased to express to them in the affair of the Surgeons who endeavoured to procure a Licence for their practising Physick in all cases Chirurgical and a power of Licensing for the future those that should practise their Art But this Noble person opposed their most unjust Petition refusing to grant the Seal and gave the King a full and satisfactory account of this his denial Edward Graves Apothecary was complained of by a Woman whose Husband died under his ill practice He having bled him whilst ill of a Dropsie and Tympany Graves confessed the practice but charged the Patient's death upon an ill course of diet and immoderate use of Wine The Censors upon a full examination of both parties unanimously agreed that he should be imprisoned and fined 5 li. Iames Winter Apothecary was accused for trying practice upon one Cottaw to whom he gave a purging Potion for a light galling When Cottaw told him that he was exceeding well in his stomach he gave his opinion that he was therefore in the greater danger and for that reason prescribed him 9 pills which Cottaw complaining had done him no good he order'd him another pill with which all his teeth grew loose He extorted 30 s. from him Winter confessed that he had given him 2 pills of Turbith Mineral and diet-drink For which the Censors fined him 10 li. which he promised to pay within a week Dr. Iaquinto was accused of evil practice upon a Woman with Child who miscarried upon the use of his Medicines for which the Censors ordered his imprisonment and a fine of 5 li. to be inflicted upon him Upon this he procures the following Letter from the Earl of Manchester To my very loving friend Dr. Argent President of the College of Physicians in London Mr. President I Am informed by Dr. Iaquinto whom I have long known and heard well of That upon occasion of businesse that stayes him for a while in this City He was requested by Mr. Basil Nichols to minister physick to his daughter for which he is now questioned in the College though both the Patient and her Parents confesse she received good thereby And he hath intreated me to mediate his freedome from further trouble and molestation during his stay he behaving himself inoffensively without intruding himself into other mens Cures Which I am induced unto both for the honour of our Nation which hath been ever hospitable to strangers and also for the respects I bear to learning and his profession having practised in this Kingdome 25 years and thereby done good to many I do therefore pray you and the rest of the College of Doctors the rather for my sake to afford him to favour that he may live quietly demeaning himself orderly and I shall take it kindly and wherein I may rest Your very loving friend W. Manchester When it pleased God to visit me with a great sickness at Exeter this Doctor was of use to me which makes me willing to use for him any favour I have with you W. M. Canon Row Feb. 14. To this Letter the College returned the following Answer To the Right Honourable the Earl of Manchester Lord President of his Majestie 's most honourable Privy Council Right Honourable and our very good Lord HAving seen your Honour's Letter directed to Dr. Argent President of this College and by him shewed unto us the Censors thereof and the rest of this Society in favour of one Mr. Iaquinto that we would for your Honour's sake forbeare to molest him in his practice It may please your Honour to understand that we are all of us exceeding glad to have this occasion offered us to gratify your Honour the rather for the remembrance we have of your Honour 's many favours done to this Profession and of the support which your Honour in general giveth to the whole estate of Learning And notwithstanding we are not altogether without feare lest your Honour in your deeper Judgment may conceive us to be men somewhat too remisse in our publick duty in not shewing what we think hath been misreported to your Honour in this business Whereupon happily might have followed that your Honour would have been pleased to relinquish the patronage of him the matter whereof he is convicted being no lesse than the miscarriage of a woman with Child however it be now carryed Yet we are enforced to satisfie your Honour in this in a double respect First for your Honour's care in not extending your demand further than that little while which he is to stay here and secondly for your Honour's testimony of personal use made of him against which we may not contest So that there remayneth now on the part of our duty Humbly to intreat your Honour to take in worth this poor service we present you in suffering the said Iaquinto to live quietly during the time limited And what he hath concealed from your Honour for feare of a rebuke which is that he is fined by the College in a certain summe of money though but little to the King that your Honour would excuse us of it it being not now in our power to reverse it And we most humbly recommend our best service to your Honour wishing to the same all increase of estate and happiness Your Honour 's humbly at commandment Argent Pres Ro. Fludd Helkiah Crooke Fr. Herrin Otwell Meverell Censors At our College-house this 18th of Feb. 1627. About a year and half after Iaquinto was summoned to appear before the Censors and admonished that he should not practise out of the Venetian Embassadours house He was charged for a debt of 40 s. being the remainder of a fine imposed upon him by the College which he promised to pay within a week He was after this accused by Dr. Crook for practising physick and prescribing improper remedies to a young woman sick of a Fever and Catarrh which being examined and judged by the Censors unsutable for the Patient's distemper He was fined 5 li. which by the intercession of the Venetian Embassadour was remitted provided he abstained from practice for the future One Reve an Apochecary was charged by Dr. Clement for practising physick and for behaving himself rudely towards Physicians likewise by Dr. Hinsloe Reve excused himself that all he had given was by the prescription of Dr. Yelverton He was after this frequently complained of
But though he did not appear yet evil practice being proved against him by several the Censors fined him 20 li. and ordered his imprisonment till it was paid as soon as the College Officer could take him Mr. Buggs Apothecary was complained of for practising physick being charged therewith he said that he would not accuse himself but that being proved against him he refused to give any answer behaving himself very insolently and saucily After this He was accused by a Gentleman to whom he gave great hopes of curing his Son pretending himself a Physician but when he saw that he would dye he engaged this Gentleman to the Tavern demanded money of him and after a week sent him a bill Buggs gave a Vomit to another which wrought so churlishly that for 3 hours the sick person was in continual lipothymies One Watson took physick of Buggs who dyed under his hands Dr. Grent acquainted the Censors that a Pewterer complained of Buggs who by his physick put out his Eyes Complaint was likewise made that he gave physick to one Burton who dyed by 3 a Clock the next morning the particular account of which is the following Laurence Relfe servant to Mr. George Burton Haberdasher saith that he was sent by his Master to call Mr. Buggs to him and he thinketh that Mr. Buggs was with his Master Maii 4 o in the morning and further saith that his Master was that day abroad in divers places and that coming home he complained that he was stuffed in the stomach and could hardly fetch his breath and that having sitten a while and rested himself he found himself well But he having met with Mr. Buggs in the evening and complaining that he was stuffed in the stomach Mr. Buggs promised speedily to help him and thereupon in the evening sent him a Clyster which Mr. Burton then refused to take finding himself well and having as he said a good stomach to his Supper he would first sup After Supper Mr. Buggs's man came again the rising from the Table he went to his Chamber where the Fellow gave him the Clyster upon which he fell presently very sick so that the Fellow went home to tell his Master how ill Mr. Burton was who presently sent him some things to take which was after acknowledged to be Syrup of Violets and Flos Sulphuris But he growing worse and worse Laurence Relfe was sent to fetch Mr. Buggs himself who brought him by twelve a Clock at night to his Master where presently Mr. Buggs did let Mr. Burton bloud after which seeing him to grow sicker Mr. Buggs went home saying he would send him some things to give him ease which he sent by his own servant being three things each of the bigness of a pryone which he took all severally and dyed by 3 a Clock in the morning William Wallye Mr. Buggs's man being called to inform the College the truth of this business concerning Mr. Burton saith that he knew Mr. Burton and that he dyed on Friday last and that his Master made a Clyster for Mr. Burton which was sent by his younger Fellow and given about 7 at night and that about 12 at night his Master let Mr. Burton bloud but this Wallye was not with his Master at the doing thereof for he was at the Tower giving one Mr. Foster a Clyster which his Master ordained and sent him to give and more he knoweth not Upon this and the like informations the College prosecuted Mr. Buggs at Law whereby he was made a prisoner in the Fleet after which the President presented to the College the following Letter sent from the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas about granting Mr. Buggs an Habeas Corpus for the Summer Vacation To his very worthy friends the President and College of Physicians in London Gentlemen MAster Iohn Buggs a prisoner in the Fleet at your suite and at the suite of one more onely hath been a suiter for an Habeas Corpus The other hath both by word and writing given his consent He informeth me that with a little liberty he will make soe good use thereof as to give you satisfaction which otherwise he shall be disabled to doe and he will not give your College offence I recommend him to your selves and desire a word from you whether you will be entreated to doe this for this tourn onely If his carriage hereafter shall not be such as shall deserve your favour his condemnation will be the greater otherwise you may doe honour to your selves and subdue him by a courtesy For my selfe I am and shall alwayes be Your very loving friend 30 June 1632. Ro. Heath At the request of some friends I will him well but will not overrule but perswade your consent To this Letter the President returned the following Answer To the Right Honourable Sir Robert Heath Lord Chief Justice of his Majestie 's Court of Common Pleas deliver this Right Honourable UPON the receipt of your Letter on the behalfe of Mr. Buggs for the obtaining of an Habeas Corpus I call'd our Society together Where I received a command from all first to give your Honour all humble thanks That you would be pleased to doe soe great a favour to our College as not to grant the Writt without our consent and especially with this addition not to overrule us For the quality of this Buggs we beseech your Honour to understand from us that he hath alwayes been a dangerous Empirick and against whom there are many complaints in our Register and never any man behaved himself with that insolency and contempt against our College as he hath done in arresting and suing to a tryall 3 of our Doctors for performing service to the Commonwealth in searching his Shop and carrying away his dangerous and evil medicines to be examined by the Censors Yea and since his eviction in this our suite he hath yet persisted in his evil courses and hath been an unfortunate Practitioner upon one Master Burton who having well supped and then received certain administrations from the said Buggs who also let him bloud that night with his own hands the Patient dyed before morning as we are informed and this very day we purposed to examine this businesse but that in tendernesse to your Honour we did forbeare till we had given you an accompt of him and his dangerous wayes As for the other Creditor we are informed that the debt was but supposed from the beginning onely to remove him from the Compter to the Fleet and therefore that consent was easy Sir the trust that the King and State hath placed upon us binds us in all duty and conscience to prosecute such dangerous abusers for the preservation of the lives of his Majestie 's people And therefore we beseech your Honour to continue your favour and help to suppress and punish such illiterate men as formerly you have done And we shall be bound to pray God for your Honour's health and safety And so I rest Your
LIbrum hunc cui Titulus The Royal College of Physicians of London founded and established by Law c. dignum censemus qui typis mandetur D. Whistler Praeses Tho. Witherley Johan Atfield Edvardus Browne Tho. Alvey Censores THE Royal College OF PHYSICIANS OF LONDON Founded and Established by Law As appears By Letters Patents Acts of Parliament adjudged Cases c. AND An Historical Account of the College's proceedings against Empiricks and unlicensed Practisers in every Princes Reign from their first Incorporation to the Murther of the Royal Martyr King Charles the First By CHARLES GOODALL Dr. in Physick and Fellow of the said College of Physicians LONDON Printed by M. Flesher for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1684. To the Right Honourable FRANCIS LORD GVILFORD Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England and one of his Majestie 's Most honourable Privy Council My Lord 'T Is now no less than seven years since I adventured the prefixing of your Lordship's name to a Book written in defence of the College of Physicians against a bold and impudent Libell published with design to expose that Learned Society to contempt Since which time I have not onely had the honour of being made one of their Members but have been entrusted with the search of their Records and received encouragement to publish a Collection of their Royal Patents Acts of Parliament Trials with and proceedings against Empiricks that so the Adversaries of this Society might be convinced of the reason and Justice of their actings against those illiterate and vile Impostors whose practice by Act of Parliament is declared to be To the high displeasure of God great infamy to the faculty and destruction of many of the King's Liege people Your Lordship knows very well the grounds which first moved that noble and renowned King Henry 8. in the tenth year of his Reign to constitute this Royal foundation whose Princely wisedom herein was highly approved by Act of Parliament in the 14 15. years of his Reign in which the King's Letters Patents and all and every Graunt Article and other thing contained and specified therein were approved graunted ratified and confirmed About seventeen years after a second Act of Parliament was granted to this Society by the same King of glorious memory for enlarging of their Privileges with the addition of many new ones In the first of Q. Mary being but 29 or 30 years from the 14 15 H. 8. a third Act of Parliament was made in confirmation of the forementioned Statute and many more privileges of great moment were added to the former Queen Elizabeth and King James of ever glorious memory and his Sacred Majesty now Reigning whom God long preserve from all traiterous Associations and Conspiracies of bloud-thirsty and malicious men have by their several Royal Patents granted them farther Liberties Powers and Privileges by reason of the great increase of unskilfull illiterate and unlicensed practisers of Physick in London and within 7 Miles thereof who now my Lord are arrived to that height of impudence not onely in their publick writings but even in the King's Courts of Judicature that they dare adventure to question the Authority of an Act of Parliament though owned as such by those Royal Testimonies already named by the Chief Justices and Judges of the King's Bench and Common Pleas such as Popham Coke Fleming Foster Walmesly Warburton Daniel Williams Tanfield Crook Littleton c. in their several Books of Reports and in their resolutions of several questions relating to the College of Physicians wherein they gave their opinions by an order from K. James directed to the Right honourable Thomas Lord Ellesmere Lord Chancellour of England which opinions are inserted in this book c. by its being printed in several Statute books and Abridgments of the same which were published even in that King's Reign in which they were enacted by Robert Redman Thomas Berthelet Wyllyam Mydylton Thomas Petyt and Thomas Powel Printers to his Most Excellent Majesty and since in all the Statute books and Abridgments that have been Printed to this time Nay more than this In the Rolls Chapel and in the Journal books formerly collected by that famous Antiquary Sir Robert Cotton and preserved by Sir John in his Father's Library and in the Journal books of the Right honourable the Earl of Clarendon which I had the honour to look over I find 36 Acts of Parliament passed in that Session of 14 15 Hen. 8. At the end of the twenty fourth this is inserted Item diverse communes petitiones rem publicam concernentes exhibite erant dicto Domino Regi in Parliamento predicto cum suis responsionibus quarum tenores sequuntur sunt tales Amongst which upon the same Roll the 33th is an Act concerning Physicians and after the 36th is entred the King's Commission to Cardinal Wolsey Printed p. 12. of this book which finisheth that Roll of Parliament In which it is thus expressed Reverendissimus Dominus Legatus Cancellarius Acta omnia in presenti Parliamento pro bono publico edita facta ex mandato Domini Regis recitari publicari jussit Quibus ex ordine per inicia recitatis lectis singulis per Clericum Parliamenti responsione secundum annotationes Regie voluntatis declarativas à dorso scriptas facta c. Add to this that excellent and learned account given by the Lord Chief Justice Hales why the Royal Signature might not be entred by the Clerk of Parliament in his transcript of the Original Rolls under this Act of Parliament and nine others passed in that Session in a late Judgment given against Huybert As likewise the testimony of the Lord Herbert of Cherbury in his excellent book of the Life and Reign of King Henry 8. drawn out of his Majestie 's Records In which he acquaints us with the more famous Statutes enacted in the Parliament of 14 15 Henry 8. amongst which we find this relating to the College of Physicians Now my Lord from these Authorities and many others of the like kind We should be in some hopes that these men being formerly driven from their old plea of 34 35 of Hen. 8. c. 8. An Act made against Surgeons for their unconscionable dealing with their Patients and for giving liberty to all such who practise for Piety and Charity without taking money or gain as appears by a Judgment given against Butler p. 258 and from this their late Plea of Nul tiel Record that our profession might flourish and that as King James hath expressed it in his Royal Patent by rejecting such illiterate and unskilfull Practisers those that were Learned Grave and Profound Practisers in that Faculty should receive more bountifull reward and also the industrious Students of that profession would be the better encouraged in their Studies and endeavours But that we have to deal with a sort of men not of Academical but Mechanick education who being
as in other Towns and Villages to keep Watch and Ward and be chosen to the Office of Constable and other Offices within the said City and suburbs of the same as in other places within this your Realm to their great fatigation and unquieting and to the peril of their Patients by reason they cannot be conveniently attended It may therefore please your most Excellent Majesty with the assent of your Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in this present Parliament assembled and by authority of the same to enact ordain and establish That the said President of the Comminalty and fellowship for the time being and the Commons and Fellows of the same and every Fellow thereof that now be or that at any time hereafter shall be their Successors and the Successors of every of them at all time and times after the making of this present Act shall be discharged to keep any Watch and Ward in your said City of London or the suburbs of the same or any part thereof and that they or any of them shall not be chosen Constable or any other Office in the said City or suburbs And that if any time hereafter the said President for the time being or any of the said Commons or Fellows for the time being by any ways or means be appointed or elected to any Watch or Ward Office of Constable or any other Office within the said City or suburbs the same appointment or election to be utterly void and of none effect any order custom or Law to the contrary before this time used in the said City notwithstanding 2. And that it may please your most Royal Majesty by the authority aforesaid that it may be further enacted ordained and established for the common wealth and surety of your loving subjects of this your Realm in and for the administration of medicines to such your said subjects as shall have need of the same that from henceforth the said President for the time being Commons and Fellows and their Successors may yearly at such time as they shall think most meet and convenient for the same elect and chuse four Persons of the said Commons and Fellows of the best learned wisest and most discréet such as they shall think convenient and have experience in the said faculty of Physick And that the said four persons so elected and chosen after a corporal oath to them ministred by the said President or his Deputy shall and may by virtue of this present Act have full authority and power as often as they shall think méet and convenient to enter into the house or houses of all and every Apothecary now or any time hereafter using the mystery or craft of Apothecary within the said City onely to search view and sée such Apothecary-wares drugs and stuffs as the Apothecaries or any of them have or at any time hereafter shall have in their house or houses And all such wares drugs and stuffs as the said four persons shall then find defective corrupted and not méet nor convenient to be ministred in any Medicines for the health of man's body the same four Persons calling to them the Wardens of the said mystery of Apothecaries within the said City for that time being or one of them shall cause to be brent or otherwise destroy the same as they shall think méet by their discretion And if the said Apothecaries or any of them at any time hereafter do obstinately or willingly refuse or deny the said four persons yearly elected and chosen as is beforesaid to enter into their said house or houses for the causes intent and purpose before rehearsed That then they and every of them so offending contrary to this Act for every time that he or they do so offend to forfeit C. s. the one half to your Majesty and the other half to him that will sue for the same by Action of debt bill plaint or information in any of the King's Courts wherein no wager of Law essoin or protection shall be allowed And if the said four persons or any of them so elected and chosen as before is said do refuse to be sworn or after his said oath to him or them administred do obstinately refuse to make the said search and view once in the year at such time as they shall think most convenient by their discretions having no lawfull impediment by sickness or otherwise to the contrary That then for every such wilful and obstinate default every of the said four persons making default to forfeit fourty shillings 3. And forasmuch as the science of Physick doth comprehend include and contain the knowledge of Surgery as a special member and part of the same Therefore be it enacted That any of the said Company or Fellowship of Physicians being able chosen and admitted by the said President and Fellowship of Physicians may from time to time as well within the City of London as elsewhere within this Realm practise and exercise the said science of Physick in all and every his members and parts any Act Statute or Provision made to the contrary notwithstanding 32 H. 8. C. 42. For Barbers and Surgeons THE King our Sovereign Lord by the advice of his Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in this present Parliament assembled and by the authority of the same by all the common assents duly pondering among other things necessary for the common wealth of this Realm that it 's very expedient and néedful to provide for men expert in the science of Physick and Surgery for the health of mans body when infirmities and sickness shall happen for the due exercise and maintenance whereof good and necessary Acts be already made and provided Yet nevertheless forasmuch as within the City of London where men of great experience as well in speculation as in practice of the science and faculty of Surgery be abiding and inhabiting and have more commonly the dayly exercise and experience of the same science of Surgery than is had or used within any parts of this Realm and by occasion thereof many expert persons be brought up under them as their servants Apprentices and others who by the exercise and diligent information of their said Masters as well now as hereafter shall exercise the said science within divers other parts of this Realm to the great relief comfort and succour of much People and to the sure safeguard of their bodily health their limbs and lives And forasmuch as within the said City of London there be now two several and distinct Companies of Surgeons occupying and exercising the said science and faculty of Surgery the one Company being commonly called the Barbers of London and the other Company called the Surgeons of London which Company of Barbers be incorporated to sue and be sued by the name of Masters or Governours of the Mystery or Comminalty of the Barbers of London by virtue and authority of the Letters Patents under the great
10 l. or else to be punished ex Collegii arbitrio One Moses was punished 20 l. for illegal practising of Physick and gave bond to the College to pay that sum within a twelvemonth A Letter was sent from the Right honourable Sir Francis Walsingham Secretary of State to the President and College of Physicians in favour of one Margaret Kennix an outlandish ignorant sorry woman the Copy of which follows To my very loving frendes Mr. Dr. Giffarde President of the College of Physicians in London and to the rest of his Associates or Fellow Assistants belonging to the same and every of them AFter my very harty commendacions unto you Whereas heretofore by her Majesties commandment upon the pityfull complaint of Margaret Kennix I wrote unto Dr. Symondes then President of your Cellege and fellowship of Phisitions within the City signifying how that it was her Highness pleasure that the poore wooman shoold be permitted by you quietly to practise and mynister to the curing of diseases and woundes by the meanes of certain Simples in the applieing whereof it seemeth God hath geven her an especiall knowlege to the benefit of the poorer sort and cheefly for the better maintenance of her impotent husband and charge of Family who wholy depend of the exercise of her skill Forasmuch as now I am enformed she is restrained either by you or some other of your College contrary to her Majesties pleasure to practise any longer her said manner of mynistring of Simples as she hath doon Wherby her undooing is like to ensue unles she maie be permitted to continue the use of her knowlege in that behalfe I shall therefore desire you forthwith to take order amongst your selves for the readmitting of her into the quiet exercise of her small Talent least by the renewing of her complaint to her Majesty thorough your hard dealing towards her you procure further inconvenience therby to your selfe then perhaps you woold be willing shoold fall out Whereas contrariwise it will be well taken that you affoord her the like favour she hath found at the hands of your Predecessor And so not doubting but that you will therfore accordingly consider to leave the poore wooman satisfied in this behalf I bid you hartely farewell From the Coorte the viiith of December 1581. Your loving frend Fra. Walsingham To this Letter the President and College returned the following answer To the Right honorable Sir Fra. Walsingham Knight Secretary to her Majesty and one of her Highness most honorable Privy Council RIght honorable having received your Honor's Letters in the behalf of one Margaret Kennix for her quiet practice and mynistring of Physick and willing us in the same as well in respect of her speciall knowlege in Simples as also for avoiding such inconvenience as maie otherwise ensue that she may be readmitted to the practise of her Talent May it please your Honor for that all and every one of us are for our parts most desirous in all duetifull sort to have your Honor satisfied herein and therewithall truly to be advertised of the matter what report soever hath hetherto been delivered for her knowledge and ability in that thing wherein in very deed her weaknes and insufficiency is such as is rather to be pitied of all then ether envied of us or maintayned of others We therfore have sent some of our company to attend upon your Honor and to deliver our moste humble and duetifull answer to the same most humbly beseeching you to afford them your good accustomed and favourable hearing And for that we are fully perswaded there is no one thing more allowable in your Honor's eyes then the preservation of holsome Lawes and the maintenance of good and laudable orders being not onely the cheefest stay but also the greatest ornament and beawty of a Common-wealth We are of opinion that the diligent care which we have and are bound to have over the health and lief of her Majesties Subjects the dutifull regard we beare to the maintenance of our priviledge graunted espetially for that respect by her Majesties most noble Predecessors and the straight band of our Oth and Conscience which we esteeme of greater weight then 〈◊〉 we can release our selves thereof at our pleasure will proâ—ure your Honor to enter into a more favourable consideration of our doings herein then to think us any whit culpable for not suffering ether her or any other whatsoever being not qualified accordingly to intrude themselves into so great and daungerous a Vocation not onely against good order priviledge and conscience but also to the evident daunger of the lief and health of such her Majesties most loving subjects as shall be abused by their notorious and wilfull ignoraunce And therefore being in good hope that your Honor will nothing mislike for seeking lawfull and direct means to resist such daungerous disorders as by other means we cannot redress And professing our selves to be most willing and content to abide any inconvenience whatsoever may ensue rather then to be brought to allow of so disorderly an attempt ether in her or any other her lyke and therewithall most humbly beseeching your Honor that as most excellent Virtues and Learning hath made your famous to the World and posterity so it might please you to be a favourable Patron to such as have been trained and brought up therein We most duetifully take our leave and wishe you increase of all honor and prosperity From our College the 22 of December 1581. Your Honor 's to commaunde The Presidente and Society of the Physitions of London Thomas Thumwood with his Wife were summoned to appear before the President and Censors for her practising of Physick where he promised to enter into a penal bond of 20 l. to the College that his wife should not practise for the future and in the same month did seal a Bond obligatory upon the same account Robert Iones being security for one Dean an Empirick that he should not practise Physick in London c. Dean leaving the town Iones humbly petitioned the College that he might be discharged his bond which was granted accordingly In the 24th Iohn Gyle a Surgeon appeared before the College being charged for practising Physick contrary to Law which was proved partly by witness and partly by his own confession wherefore he was fined 20 l. and sent to the Counter About 2 months after he was sent for out of prison by the order of the College and then behaved himself so insolently and answered so ignorantly that he was forthwith returned back to the same prison Propter malam in re medicâ praxin In the 25th Iohn Booffeat appearing before the College propter malam audacem praxin in re medicâ was committed to prison but upon the intercession of a Person of Quality he was freed from thence upon condition that if ever he practised Physick again he should submit to any penalty the College should assign One Leager a Surgeon was ordered to enter
was fined by the Censors 40 s. and a Warrant was making out for her commitment to prison But being a miserable old woman and submissive the Warrant was stopp'd After this a fresh complaint was made against her that for pain in the Head and Stomach she gave drinks and had Linen in pawn She confessed her Diet-drink of Liquorish Senna and Coloquintida accounting 16 drachms for one ounce She was commanded by the Censors to restore the Linen that night to the College Beadle and ordered a small fine and prohibited all practice Thomas Greenwood Surgeon was accused by one William Adams that for the grief of a little skin rubb'd off with his saddle in riding he promised cure in 4 days but physick'd him a fortnight gave him diet-drinks purged and over heated him and now sued him for 20 l. for the cure Being asked what his disease was he replied Morbus Gallico The Censors order's his imprisonment and a mulct of 5 l. to be inflicted upon him Christopher Beane a prisoner 7 years for Debt in the King's Bench was charged for giving Physick to one Mr. Sparkes who as Beane said had a Rheum and sharp humour running from his Head to his Legs which came by an obstruction of the Liver with an ascent to the Head and thence down for which he fomented anointed and purged He was told of applying of clouts which he said wrought by natural means likewise using the Adamant to which he used no words but said it was both attractive and repulsant the one over draws the other draws back North draws and South drives back This he said he did to drive back the humours which it will disperse that is drive back He being poor and already a prisoner was fined but 40 s. order'd to be kept in prison by the Censors and prohibited all practice In the 15th year of this King's Reign the following Petition was presented to his Majesty for the obtaining a Patent for the cure of Ruptures To the King 's most Excellent Majesty The humble Petition of Robert Pawlet and Ralphkewe MOst humbly shewing that your Majestie 's poore suppliants have by their long travail experience and practice in Physick and Chirurgery attained unto a rare secret for the curing of Ruptures in people of all ages without any paine or administration of Physick but onely with outward application and inward Cordials and being willing to participate the benefit thereof to the glory of God and comcomfort of your Majestie 's subjects soe diseased throughout your Highnesse's Dominions We doe most humbly intreat your Majestie 's gracious Letters Patents during our lives freely to practise the same by our selves or sufficient Deputies without the lett or hindrance of any whatsoever And that it may appeare that we have noe intent to abuse your Majestie 's Grant or wrong your Subjects we do freely offer that it shall be conteyned in your Majestie 's Letters Patents that no party so grieved shall pay for his cure untill he be perfectly cured and that all such as are poore and unable to pay shall be cured freely without paying any thing And we shall according to our bounden dutyes ever pray to God for your Majestie 's long and prosperous Reigne At the Court at Theobalds 25 Febr. 1617. His Majestie 's pleasure is that the President of the College of Physicians in London shall take consideration of this Petition and certifie his Majestie in what manner it is meet for his Highness to grant the Petitioners request Sidney Montague The College returned the following answer THe President and College of Physicians of London the 20th of this present March being assembled together to consider of the Petition referred unto them by his Majestie finding the effect thereof to be a Royall Patent to be granted for the Practising of a Secret in Ruptures and suspecting all secret practices which for the most part are but colours and shadowes for ignorance and falshood and because there are many sorts of Ruptures and of diverse causes not all curable by one Medicine They doe humbly pray his Majestie that the said petitioners may come to the said President and College and before them make manifest by reasons and experience the truth of the said remedyes and they will upon true knowlege had thereof informe his Majestie of the certainty and truth thereof leaving all to his Majestie 's most Royal consideration Henry Atkins President of the College of the Physicians of London Iohn Lambe a bold Empirick was complained of for demanding 40 or 50 l. for his Cures as lately of Mr. Pickering in Cheapside who died in his hands Mr. Evans gave in the following account against him and in these very words The persons to whom Lambe a notable Mountebank and Impostor gave Physick and got great sums of money thereby this last year are Mr. Springham a Mercer Mrs. Springham Mrs. Puckle Mrs. Cutts Mr. Mosse a Lawyer Mrs. Newport Mrs. Littleton Mr. Wilson the Keeper of Newgate A Gentle-woman whom he undertook to cure and took a great sum before-hand and did her no good He also cheated one Parry of 6 l. by shewing him delusions He cheated one Mr. Peny of 40 s. by shewing him tricks in a Crystal He cheated one Mrs. Littleton of 3 l. 10 s. by making her believe he shewed her what husband she should have He gave Physick to one Mrs. Palmer and undertook to cure her for 40 Marks whereof he had half in hand but the woman died and he cousened her He now gives Physick to one Mr. Tristram of whom he hath received 40 l. to cure him He gave Physick to the Countess of Exceter and by means of delusions in a Crystal insinuates himself into Ladies esteem and conceits On Saturday last he got 50 l. for undertaking a cure The Censors ordered Lambe to be summoned and Evans was required to prove the forementioned accusations against him After this Lambe procures the following Letter in his behalf from the Bishop of Durham To the Right Worshipfull my very loving friends the President and the rest of the College of Physicians of London WHereas the bearer Ioh. Lambe in some examinations of his taken by us hath professed that he maketh a poor living by practice in Physick and Chirurgery whereto by his long experience and practice he holdeth himself sufficient affirming that he hath done many and great cures in each kind His Majestie being herewith acquainted hath commanded me to send him to you that upon the conference with him you may both deliver you opinions of his fitnesse as also take such further course with him according to your opinions of his worth as appertaineth to the care and trust of the welfare of his Majestie 's Subjects inhabiting in and about the City of London by Law committed unto you So I commit you to God and rest Your very loving friend B. Duresme Durham house Dec. 1627. This Lambe was very famous throughout the Town being admired for his great skill in the
hidden Arts of Magick and Astrology for which reason he was highly admired by some Ladies of Quality who were very bountifull to him But in truth he was a very wretched Knave and formerly well known to the College for many of his wicked and knavish Impostures and at this very time by the command and at the instance of some persons of Quality was in prison out of which that he might free himself he personated the Physician to the right Reverend Bishop of Durham who being sent by him as appears by his Lordship's Letter to the College He was by the Censors found most egregiously ignorant as appears by the following examination a Copy of which with the College's answer to the Bishop's Letter was sent by Sir William Paddy the Contents of which are the following To the Right Reverend Father in God the Lord Bishop of Duresme one of the Lords of his Majestie 's most honourable Privy Council Right Reverend and our especial good Lord ACcording to your Honours order signifyed unto us by your Letter to take Mr. Lambe into our examination who was brought before us the 18th of this December It may please your Honour to understand that we have attended the performance thereof with all the duty and care we could And for that we conceived your Honour's pleasure was and so likewise our own Statutes doe direct us that he should be entreated with favour rather than otherwise We therefore caused him to be opposed though contrary to our custome in that language wherein alone he is good and further in the easiest way of Physick and Chirurgery that we could think of The brief of which examination and of his answers we have sent herewith to your Honour that your Honour may see the particulars of our proceedings with him and from what confession of his owne and from what other evidences besides it comes that by the sentence of the College Mr. Lambe stands convict and guilty of all manner of infufficiency and ignorance in this faculty Whereof that your Honour hath been pleased to require to be certified from us and to that end hath caused the Offender to be brought hither as the true and proper place of his trial as an Act intended by your Honour to advance the cause of learning We do acknowledge our selves to be ever most highly bounden to your Honour and in our most dutifull manner do give your Honour most humble thanks therefore Almighty God keep your Honour in long prosperity At our College house the 19th of this December Your Honours humbly at commandment Io. Argent Pres Sim. Fox Regist Othowell Meverell Fr. Herrin Robert Fludd Helkiah Crooke The Examination of Iohn Lambe before the College of Physicians as it was sent to the Bishop of Duresme 1. Being asked of his beginning in Physick and of the means how he came by his knowledge and whether his bringing up were that way or no and required to reade a little in a Latine Galen He answereth that he never had taken to that study that he makes no profession thereof but that he lives by making Gentlemen merry nor understandeth Latine 2. Being asked by what signs he knows a disease and how to cure it He answereth he knoweth no signs but onely as he is told by the party and for cure that he is not wont to use any thing but a few outward things and sometimes a little pulvis sanctus which from the Apothecaries he hath learned to be a Purge 3. Being asked in Astrology what house he looketh unto to know a disease or the event of it and how the Lord Ascendant should stand thereto He answereth he looks for the sixth house which being disproved he saith he understands nothing therein but what he hath out of Caliman and being asked what books he hath read in that Art he saith he hath none but Caliman 4. Being asked how he knows an Apoplexy and how he cures it He answereth he knows nothing unless he be told nor doth use any thing for cure but a few Oils and Unguents and that for satisfaction onely 5. Being asked in Chirurgery What is a Revulsion or Derivation He answereth he knoweth not the terms 6. Being charged with contradiction that in the College he confesseth himself ignorant and denieth practice whereas in his examination by the Lord Bishop of Durham he made shew of long experience and sufficience and of having done many great cures as by his Lordship's Letter appeareth He answereth that he did not profess any such thing to his Lordship and that he craves mercy of the College and that they would not be the cause of his undoing 7. Being pressed from the notoriousness of his practice and publick fame that goes of him and the great resort made unto him He answereth it is without his desert that he cannot hinder comers to him and that all he did was trifles and fooleries and babbles to get a little money Dr. Alexander Leighton being required by the Censors to give an account by what authority he practised Physick He told them by virtue of his Doctour's degree which he had taken at Leyden under Professour Heurnius He was charged as being in Presbyter's orders and asked why he did not stick to his Ordination He excepted against the Ceremonies yet owned himself a Preacher and acknowledged his practising of Physick In several parts whereof he was examined but giving no satisfaction and being perverse as to Ecclesiastical affairs He was by the President and Censors interdicted practice After this endeavouring to procure a Licence it was denied him because in Holy orders the Statutes of the College declaring that none such should be admitted into the College or permitted to practise Wherefore he was a second time forbidden practice But he still persisting to practise in London or within 7 miles was arrested and afterwards censured tanquam infamis he having been censured in the Star-Chamber and lost his ears Ellin Rix was complained of by Mrs. Lee for her boy dead of a consumption Rix having promised her in 14 days to make him sound and bargained for 3 li. she had 15 s. aforehand and arrested her for the rest She gave this boy purging drinks once a day for 7 days together and twice a day for 7 days more But the boy dyed in a fortnight after She likewise complained of her for promising an absolute cure to her husband in 14 days of a dead Palsie she had of him 3 li. and was to have as much more upon cure She confessed practice and was censured imprisonment with a mulct of 5 li. and required to give bond that she would not practise for the future She lay in prison for 14 days then endeavoured her enlargement by Habeas Corpus which being denied and being referred to the Censors she was then willing to pay part of her fine presently and the rest shortly after and give a bond of 20 l. with security to the King that she would not practise for
William Clapham Apothecary for that he administred Physick for diverse moneths together to the said William Turner for which he hath received great summes of money to the summe of 80 li. and more and yet hath presented more Bills and sued the said Executors for 12 li. 14 s. and 10 d. more as appeareth by his Declaration exhibited to the honourable Court of Common Pleas. We taking into consideration the misdemeanours that are daily in this kind presented unto us and having sent for the same William Clapham and examined him concerning this businesse as also having examined diverse of his Bills brought in by him to us and affirmed by his Servant to be the Original Bills which we find not to agree with those mentioned in his Declaration neither in substance nor number And that besides the Bills presented to us are not likely to be of any Physicians prescribing they being irregular and contrary to Art Therefore we do certify to all whom it may concerne that we have just cause to think that the Patient hath been unconscionably and unreasonably dealt withall In witnesse whereof we the President and Censors of the College have hereunto set our hands Dated the 18th day of November at our College Subscribed by the President and Censors In the 7th year of the King's Reign Mr. President presented a Letter sent to him and the College by his Majestie 's command concerning the poisoning of Mr. Lane the Contents of which Letter and of this whole affair are the following To my very loving friends the President and the rest of the College of Physicians in London AFter my hearty commendations Since the Sentence pass'd against one Cromwell for the murder of his Master because he persisted in a constant denyall of the fact it hath occasioned his Majestie 's gracious care to informe himself by all means possible which might serve to draw the truth thereof into further light and evidence To that purpose as there hath been employed the ministery of Divines to perswade his conscience and the feare of death to unmask it soe his Majestie taking notice of some question was made amongst the Physicians whether the party dead were poysoned or noe hath thought fit to heare the judgment of you the College of Physicians thereupon and doth accordingly require and authorise you to assemble your selves in such manner as in the like enquiryes and consultations is accustomed and there to take as exact information as may be from the relation of such as were present of the state of his sicknesse the manner of his death and what hath been besides observed upon the view and opening of his body or may yet be collected from the sight and tryall of the Medicine if any part of it be still remaining Whereupon having heard and weigh'd the arguments on both sides you are to set downe your opinions in writing with the reasons of them under your hands and present the same unto his Majestie before Wednesday next his Majestie not intending to suspend the course of Justice any longer unlesse something may appeare in the meane time fit to induce and warrant a further act of mercy towards the prisoner Thus much I was commanded by his Majestie to signify unto you of his Royal pleasure and so I bid you heartily farewell and rest Your very loving friend He. Hollande Greenwich the 27th of May 1632. By this Letter the College is commanded to take exact information from the relation of such as were present of Mr. Lane's sickness of the manner of his death and what hath been observed upon the view and opening of his body as also from the sight of the bolus which was left It being therefore enquired of Mr. Matthewes Apothecary of whom without the Counsel of any Doctour he took physick what sickness Mr. Lane had he answered that he was not sick but that he was desirous to take a Medicine which Dr. Poe had heretofore appointed him and which he since had taken sundry times The Medicine he said was this ℞ Pulv. Sanct. ʒjss Syr. Augustan ℥ j. Vini albi ℥ iij ss m. f. potio This he took upon Monday and he had thereby 7 or 8 stools But not thinking himself sufficiently purged he desired Master Matthewes that he might have it again which Master Matthewes accordingly prepared on Tuesday for Wednesday but he took not this Medicine till Friday following upon the taking of which after the walking 5 or 6 turns he vomited and grew sick The Medicine also did work downward much even to the purging of bloud and the said Mr. Matthewes gave Mr. Lane a Cordial of Diascordium Dr. Gifford was called to Mr. Lane on Sunday and can say nothing what was done before He then found that Mr. Lane did cast and scowre much and that he was feverish his breath stinking his mouth black especially on the right side and about his gumms The Doctour the nappointed him Clysters of milk and to drink milk and water On Monday against night he did appoint him a Bolus with Laudani Parac gr j. ¼ which night he vomited the Bolus and purged much more than before casting and scowring bloud after the Bolus On Tuesday the Doctour gave him some Diacodium and Plantain Water On Wednesday he appointed him Laudani gr j. cons flor garyophyllor ℈ j. Cromwell was sent for this Bolus who returned not home in half an hour The Apothecary's man saith it was sent gilt but the gilt was broken and being suspected to be more in quantity than was appointed it was tasted and it made their mouths sore that tasted it and then it being searched there appeared a white powder in it And it is confess'd that Cromwell came to Mrs. Bacon's shop and bought 2 drams of Sublimate there which he pretended to grave knives withall and with a third part thereof he then and there did engrave a knife the other 2 parts he carryed away with him of which he being questioned denied the same making this excuse that the asker was neither Constable nor Justice and being further questioned what he did with the rest of the Sublimate he said it was between the window and his desk where a piece of Sublimate was found but not the powder Dr. Gifford did think that there was a mortification in his mouth Dr. Gifford did answer to 2 Objections made concerning the poison 1. That the Corps was outwardly fair Resp The evacuation did prevent the coming of the poison to the skin 2. It was said the bottom of the stomach was not offended Resp The sides of the stomach were offended and the evacuation came so suddenly upon the taking it that it did not settle Dr. Andrews saith that he was called with others to view the body of Mr. Lane which they found outwardly fair his lips onely appearing white as if they had been blistered Some blackness there appeared in his mouth and his Tongue was black and hard but from his throat to his stomach it was very fair
The stomach its self in the bottom was fair but the upper part had a blackness round about which it was inflamed the blackness he scraped off with his nail but the other coats were sound In the Aspera Arteria there was seen no offence but one lobe of the Lungs seemed to be rotten and one part of the Liver was pale and scirrhous Dr. Meverell saith that he being on Saturday to view the body he found an Eschar between the gumms and the Cheek with blackness of the teeth the tongue also black and hard but the gula all fair and clear In the Stomach in the upper part a circular inflammation with a blackness in the middle which with his nail was easily scraped off His Liver was hard and his Lungs bad yet not so as that they should cause his death At the Sessions he said the same but there the Lord Chief Justice asking him that if the Circumstances which were alledged by the sworn witnesses were added to that he saw whether then he thought him poisoned The Dr. answered that he did think that he died of poison Francis White servant to Mr. Matthewes saith that hearing that the Bolus was disliked he went and did fetch back the Bolus and that opening it he found Sublimate in it which he shewed Cromwell and after this Francis going home Cromwell followed him and wish'd him by Fleet-bridge to cast it away which he refused to doe Dr. Gifford did further declare that Cromwell had 2 powders one white which was sublimate the other black which was some Amalgama of Quick-silver which Cromwell said he had out of his Master's pocket He did also desire the College to take into their consideration what Scammony could doe whether by that the mouth and stomach could be made black so suddenly and to cause an Ulcer with an Eschar upon the side of the mouth After the forementioned examination of several Witnesses the following Letter by his Majestie 's Order was sent to the College To my very loving Friends the President and College of Physicians in London AFter my hearty commendations You have by some other of his Majestie 's servants understood his pleasure in that which now I must by his expresse pleasure require of you That you assemble together and inform your selves as particularly as you can First whether that man for whose death one Cromwell a young man is condemned did in your judgment dye of poyson or otherwise And secondly whether that Potion which was sent from the Apothecary and which he received had any poysonable Ingredients which might produce this effect In these things you must return to his Majestie the report of your Judgment on Friday at the farthest which you must doe with the more care according to your best skill because herein you may perceive how tender his Majestie is both of his Justice and Mercy for as he is alwayes most graciously inclined to favour when the offence is of a nature capable of remission so he is no lesse graciously severe in regard of Justice and publique example that the crying Crimes of bloud and especially by poysoning which hath noe pretence of sudden anger shall not escape unpunished Doe therefore your dutyes to informe him in the truth to the uttermost of your knowledge So I rest Your assured friend to doe you service Iohn Cooke Greenwich 29 Maii 1632. BY this second Letter the College was required to resolve two things First Whether Mr. Lane died of poison or no Secondly Whether the Potion which was made by the Apothecary and taken by Mr. Lane had any poisonable Ingredients therein which might produce this effect Mr. President was desirous to hear what might further be informed by the Assistants Doctours or any other and first there presented himself Mr. Francis Banister of Bedford who came to Mr. Lane his Son-in-Law on Wednesday about 2 or 3 a clock in the afternoon There he found the â„ž of Dr. Gifford's Bolus which he sent by Cromwell to Mr. Matthewes who after some long stay brought it to Mrs. Lane which she did presently deliver to this Mr. Banister her Father which he seeing thought it more than was directed by the Doctour and presently taking it he found it sharp offending his tongue Then he sent for one Walter Mr. Matthewes his man to whom he said the Bolus was not rightly prepared and therefore caused him to go to make another Bolus according to the direction Which Bolus being brought Mr. Lane took and it did well with him and Francis the Apothecary's man coming thither on Thursday morning Mr. Banister caused him to taste the Bolus of which he presently complained and that night both the Apothecary's men came and shewed him the Sublimate in it by which both their mouths were distated and on this Thursday Mr. Banister told Dr. Gifford that there were the symptomes of Mercury for his evacuations were bloudy his tortions great his mouth black exulcerated stinking and withall he had convulsions Mrs. Elizabeth Lane sister to Mr. Lane who was in the house from his first falling sick saith that upon Friday upon the taking the purge he presently after half a dozen turns in a little room fell a vomiting and vomited black humour and bloud and that upon every stool he was ready to faint and she saith that Cromwell found fault with the maid for giving the Child Pills in that Porringer out of which Mr. Lane took the Medicine Dr. Foxe before he would make report of what he knew in this business produced the Copy of a Report made by himself Dr. Andrews Dr. Meverell and Dr. Ramsey which was as followeth We are of opinion that having found in this body some inflammation and mortification whereof must necessarily follow death by the force of them and that yet the same inflammation and mortification might proceed from some other causes it cannot be resolved by Art whether this Gentleman died by Poison or other means Which he pressed much to be assented to by the whole College and the other Doctours did acknowledge this Note to be the sense of that which they subscribed unto but the College thought fit a little to advise thereon Then Dr. Foxe related that he was called to Mr. Lane by a stranger to him and that he found some passion in the house After some time the body was opened and the mouth gula and stomach were found so as hath been formerly related and saith that the Chirurgion said the Guts were fair Then Dr. Foxe as a Censor began to enquire after the Physick given to Mr. Lane and who gave it and calling for Mr. Matthews he enquired of the Potion by whom he was informed what it was After this the Dr. coming to consult soon found cause to suspect poison Dr. Andrews conceived otherwise by whom Dr. Foxe was partly led and the rather because the Apothecary was found to have given one irregular medicine and the Dr. related how one Ioslyne died by Physick given him upon an
ceteris dominis Spiritualibus Temporalibus quandam Comissionem Domini Regis magno figillo suo sigillatam Cujus tenor sequitur in hec verba HENRICUS Octavus Dei gratia Anglie Francie Rex fidei defensor Dominus Hibernie Reverendissimo in Christo Patri intimoque ac dilectissimo Consiliario suo domino Thome miseracione divina tituli Sancte Cecilie Sacrosancte Romane Ecclesie Presbitero Cardinali Eborum Archiepiscopo Angl ' Primati Apl'ice Sedis etiam de latere Legato Cancellar ' suo salutem Sciatis quod propter infeccionem aeris Pestiferi ubique per Civitatem nostram London invalescentem de avisamento assensu Consilii nostri assignavimus vos Ac vobis tenore Presentium committimus potestatem authoritatem Specialem ad presens Parliamentum nostrum usque Westmonaster ' ad diem Veneris proximum futur ' Prorogand ' continuand ' ibidemque tenend ' Dante 's ulterius universis singulis tam Archiepiscopis Episcopis Abbatibus Prioribus Ducibus Comitibus Vicecomitibus Baronibus Militibus Civibus Burgensibus quam omnibus aliis quorum interest ad dictum Parliamentum nostrum predict ' conventur ' tenore presentium firmiter in mandatis quod vobis in premissis faciend ' exequend ' pareant obediant intendant prout decet In cujus rei testimonium has literas nostras fieri fecimus Patentes Teste meipso apud Westmonaster ' vicesimo nono die Julii anno regni nostri Quintodecimo Quaquidem Comissione publice per Clericum Parliamenti l'ca dictus Reverendissimus dominus Legatus Cancellarius virtute ejusdem Comissionis Prorogavit continuavit adjournavit presens Parliamentum usque Westmonaster ' ad diem Veneris tunc proxime futur ' ibidemque tenend ' hora consueta Mandavit insuper dictus Reverendissimus Dominus Legatus Cancellarius Attorn ' Solicitatori Domini Regis quod assumpta secum dicta Comissione die sequente accederent in Domum Comunem intimaturi eis de domo Comuni dictam Prorogacionem Continuacionem adjornacionem lecturique coram eis dictam Comissionem ad intencionem quod ipsi Comunes diem prefixum apud Westmonaster ' observent prout decet Die Jovis tertiodecimo die Mensis Augusti CXXX die Parliamenti ad horam firme sextam post Meridiem Domino Rege in Solio Majestatis sedente in Camera vulgariter dicta Camera Parliamentorum infra Palacium suum Westmonaster ' assedentibus dominis tam Spiritualibus habitibus sive Robis Parliamentalibus decoratis Presente etiam de domo Comuni sive inferiori toto populo plebe Thomas Moore Miles eorum Prolocutor silencio prius indict ' graviter eloquent ' magno cum honoris humilitatis ac modestum honestament ' Regiam affatus est Majestatem eandem summis merit ' quidem extollens laudibus dotes graves nature fortune eedem sue Majestati à Deo Maximo concessas copiosissime prosequebatur magnam in Prudencia excellenciam promptam fortitudinis agilitat ' mirum temporancie moderamen divinum Justicie ardorem innatam Clemencie erga subditos benignitatem Subditorum erga eandem suam Majestatem amorem obedienciam ac debitam observanciam multa per exempla declarabat In cujus rei comprobacionem quoddam scriptum Indentatum concessionem cujusdam maximi subsidii in se continens Regie Majestati optulit Argumentum certe evedentissimum summe devocionis bonorum Regem Subditorum Cui tam excellente oracioni finem tam imposito dictus Reverendissimus dominus Legatus Cancellarius Domino Rege prius consult ' singula egregie recitando respondebat Quo fact ' idem Reverendissimus Dominus Legatus Cancellarius Acta omnia in presenti Parliamento pro bono publico edita facta ex mandato Domini Regis recitari publicari jussit Quibus ex ordine per inicia recitatis lectis singulis per Clericum Parliamenti responcione secundum annotaciones Regie voluntatis declarativas à dorso scriptas facta dictus Reverendissimus dominus Legatus Cancellarius exhortando admonendo nomine Regis omnes Dominos ac Comunes supradictos ut diligent ' Ordinat ' Statuta pro bono publico in hoc Parliamento observarent ab aliis observari procurarent Post graciar ' ex parte Domini Regis accionem dict' Dominis Comunibus pro eorum diligenti laboriosa perseverantia circa expedicionem premissorum Parliamentum predictum nomine Regio duxit finiend ' dissolvend ' illud realit ' finivit perit dissolvit concedens omnibus liberam ad propria prodendi facultatem Anno Regni supradicti metuendissimi ac potentissimi domini nostri Regis Quintodecimo Nos autem tenorem Premissorum predictorum ad requisicionem Georgii Ent Militis in Medicinis Doctoris ac Presidentis dicti Collegii Medicorum London duximus exemplificand ' per presentes In cujus rei testimonium has literas nostras fieri fecimus Patentes Teste meipso apud Westmonaster ' vicesimo septimo die Februarii Anno regni nostri vicesimo quinto Examinat ' per nos Will'm Childe S. Clerk in Cancellaria Magistror ' duos MEMORANDUM THere are 36 Acts stitched together on the same Roll of Parliament amongst which the Physicians Act is to be found 26 Of these were signed at the bottom of each Act Respons Regis Le Roy le veult The other 10 whose titles are as follow were stitched to the former 26 in order as they are under-written At the bottom of which upon the same Roll you may find the foregoing Commission which was exemplified with the Physicians Act and Patent at the request of the College of Physicians 27 An Act for the Haven or Port of Southampton 28 An Act for George Guleford to lay out a new way 29 An Act that the 6 Clerks of Chauncery may Marry 30 An Act for George Roll to hold his place 31 An Act for the Clothiers in Suffolke 32 An Act concerning Cordwayners 33 An Act touching Physicians 34 An Act for payment of Custome 35 An Act against tracing of Hares 36 A discharge of Edmond Shaa 32 H. 8. C. 40. For Physicians and their Priviledges IN most humble wise sheweth unto your Majesty your true and faithfull subjects and liege men the President of the Corporation of the Comminalty and fellowship of the Science and faculty of Physick in your City of London and the Commons of the Fellows of the same that whereas divers of them many times having in cure as well some of the Lords of your most honourable Councill and divers times many of the Nobility of this Realm as many other your faithfull and liege People cannot give their due attendance to them and other their Patients with such diligence as their duty were and is to doe by reason they be many times compelled as well within the City of London and suburbs of the same
of Aldermen charged the College with Arms whereupon they applied themselves to Queen Elizabeth and her Council upon which Secretary Walsingham wrote a Letter to the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London that they should no more trouble the College but permit them to live quietly and free from that charge After this they met with no farther trouble or molestation till the Reign of K. James at which time the College being charged with Arms Sir William Paddy pleaded their Privilege before Sir Thomas Middleton Lord Mayor and a full Court of Aldermen and Sir Henry Mountague Recorder an account of which is at large Printed in this Book But the issue thereof was in short the following viz. That the Recorder then perusing every branch of the Statutes recited by Sir William Paddy with the reasons by him urged and opening every part thereof at large did conclude that the Act of Parliament did extend to give the College as much immunity as in any sort to the Chirurgeons Whereupon the Court desired a List of the Members of the College which was immediately given them and an Order entred for a dispensation to the College from bearing of Arms and also a Precept was then awarded by the Mayor and Court to commit all other Physicians or Surgeons refusing to bear or find Arms who were not of the College allowed or Chirurgeons licensed according to form About 3 years after this debate King James granted the College his Royal Charter wherein he confirms all former Statutes and Patents given them by his Royal Progenitors and therein granted To all and every Physician of the College to be wholly and absolutely free from providing or bearing of any Armour or other Munition c any Act or Statute to the contrary notwithstanding After this the College enjoyed this privilege without interruption during the Reign of King Charles the First of glorious memory untill the times of the late Rebellion in which Rights both Civil and Sacred were invaded and our College exposed to publick sale by mercenary Villains But upon the return of his Sacred Majesty He was pleased to take this Royal foundation into his protection and in the 15th year of his Reign gave them his Letters Patents confirming all their former Privileges and endowing them with many new ones amongst which this of being exempted from bearing and providing Arms c. is contained in the following words And we will and by these presents for Vs Our Heirs and Successors do give and grant unto the said President Fellows and Commonalty of the King's College of Physicians and their Successors that all and every Physician and Physicians that now is or are or that hereafter shall be elected and admitted and made a Member of the same College shall from time to time be wholly and absolutely fréed exempt and discharged of and from serving and appearing in any Iury or Iuries for the trial of any matter or cause or taking finding or executing of any Commission or inquisition whatsoever and of and from being or chosen to be Churchwarden Constable Scavenger or any such or the like Officer or Officers and of and from the undertaking execution or exercise of all and every the same and such like Office and Offices place and places and every of them and also of and from all Watch and Ward and of and from bearing and providing Arms within our Cities of London or Westminster or either of them or within 7 miles compass thereof And in case they or any of them shall at any time hereafter by any ways or means be designed appointed nominated or chosen into or to undergo or bear or perform any of the said Office or Offices place or places Duty or Duties or any of them within our said Cities or the Suburbs or Liberties thereof or limits aforesaid That all and every such designation appointment nomination or election shall be utterly void and of none effect Any Statute Act Ordinance Constitution Order Custome or Law to the contrary thereof in any wise notwithstanding In the Seventeenth of his Majestie 's Reign he was pleased pursuant to his Royal Patent to send the following Letter in behalf of the College by Sir Alexander Frazier his chief Physician the Superscription of which was To our trusty and well-beloved the Lord Mayor of our City of London for the time being and to the Deputy Lieutenants and Commissioners of the Militia of London and Westminster that now are and hereafter shall be and to all other Officers and Ministers whom it may concern CHARLES R. WHereas in conformity to several Grants and Charters made by our Royal Progenitors Kings of England unto the College of Physicians in our City of London We have béen pleased of our especial Grace and Favour to confirm all their ancient Privileges and Immunities with the addition of some further Powers and Clauses for the reguiation of that faculty by our Letters Patent bearing date the 26th of March in the 15th year of our Reign Wherein amongst other things it is exprefly provided and by us granted that every Physician who is or shall be a Member of the said College be frée and exempt and discharged of and from all Watch and Ward and of and from bearing and providing Arms within our Cities of London or Westminster or either of them or within 7 miles compass thereof We have thought fit hereby to acquaint you therewith and with our pleasure thereupon Willing and Requiring you in your several Places and Stations to give effectual orders from time to time that the said exemption from Watch and Ward and from bearing and providing Arms be now and hereafter punctually observed in favour of the Members of the said College within the limits aforesaid And that you suffer them not to be any wise molested on that behalf And for so doing this shall be your Warrant Given at our Court at Whitehall the 28th day of June 1665. in the seventéenth year of our Reign By his Majestie 's Command William Morice This is a true Copy of His Majestie 's Letter Will. Morice Thus by the especial grace and favour of the Kings and Queens of England the College of Physicians have been freed from bearing and providing Arms and though some particular Member may of late have been summoned upon that account by the Lieutenancy yet upon producing his Majestie 's Patent and asserting his Sovereign's Natural right in dispensing with a Corporation of men from bearing and providing Arms which was an inherent prerogative in the Crown and therefore an Act of Parliament was made in 13 Car. 2. 6. positively declaring That the sole and Supreme Power government command and disposition of all the Militia and of all Forces by Sea and Land c is and by the Laws of England ever was the undoubted right of his Majesty and his Royal Predecessors They were freed from any further trouble An instance of which we lately had in the case of Dr. Novell then Candidate of the
College of Physicians who Anno 1680. was summoned to appear before the Lieutenancy of London for not bearing and providing Arms. Upon which Summons attending with the Patent of 15 Car. Secundi Regis nunc The Lieutenancy upon a long debate of this matter desired him to leave a Copy of that part of the Patent which exempted the Members of the said College from bearing and providing of Arms and they would advise with their Councell thereupon ordering the Dr. to attend them their next Committee day in which they promised to give him their positive resolution Accordingly he attended and they told him that they were satisfied that the words of the Patent were sufficient to exempt the Members of the College from bearing and providing Arms and desired that a List of them might be given in under the College Seal which was accordingly done The Opinion of Sir Francis Pemberton late Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas as to the College's finding Arms given under his hand April 1680. Quest Whether the King may not excuse the College from finding Arms by virtue of his Letters Patent granted after an Act of Parliament which requires all persons to find Arms without exception Ans I conceive his Majesty may by his Patent excuse the College from finding Arms if he think sit The Opinions of Sir Edmund Saunders late Lord Chief Justice of England and Mr. Holt given under their hands upon the same account An. Dom. 1682. Quest Whether the general clause of Non obstante in the King's Letters Patent concerning the College of Physicians expressed in these words And we will and by these presents for Vs Our Heirs and Successors do give and grant unto the said President Fellows and Commonalty of the King's College of Physicians and their Successors that all and every Physician and Physicians that now is or are or that hereafter shall be elected admitted and made a member of the same College shall from time to time be wholly and absolutely fréed exempt and discharged of and from bearing and providing Arms within our Cities of London or Westminster or either of them or any of the Suburbs or Liberties of the same Cities or either of them or within 7 miles compass thereof Any Statute Act Ordinance Constitution Order Custome or Law to the contrary thereof in any wise notwithstanding doth operate upon the Acts of Parliament of the 13 14 and 15. years of his now Majestie 's Reign for regulating the Militia and thereby exempt the Members thereof from bearing or providing Arms according to the purport of the said Acts they being not by name mentioned in the said clause of Non Obstante Sir Edmund Saunders his Opinion The Patent doth discharge the Physicians from bearing or providing of Arms notwithstanding the Militia Act. Mr. Holt his Opinion I conceive by the Patent all the Members of the College are exempted from being at any charge to wards the Militia FINIS AN HISTORICAL ACCOVNT OF THE COLLEGE'S Proceedings AGAINST EMPIRICKS AND Unlicensed Practisers c. In every Prince's Reign from their first Incorporation to the Murther of the Royal Martyr King Charles the First By CHARLES GOODALL Dr. in Physick and Fellow of the said College of Physicians LONDON Printed by M. Flesher for Walter Kettilby at the Bishop's Head in St. Paul's Church-Yard 1684. TO THE RIGHT WORSHIPFULL Dr. Whistler PRESIDENT The Censors and Fellows of the College of Physicians in London 'T Is now about 165 years since your College was first founded by Royal Authority The causes which moved the renowned Princes King Henry 8. Q. Mary Q. Elizabeth King James and our present Sovereign whom God long preserve to stamp such eminent characters and signal marks of their Royal favour and bounty upon you cannot be unknown to those who have read over the Acts of Parliament passed in two Princes Reigns with the Charters granted by others and Printed in this Book In which you may find it thus expressed That they out of their Princely wisedom deeply considering and by the example of Foreign well-governed States and Kingdoms truly understanding how profitable beneficial and acceptable it would be unto the whole body of this Kingdom of England to restrain and suppress the excessive number of such as daily professed themselves learned and profound Practisers in the faculty of Physick Whereas in truth they were men illiterate and unexperienced rather propounding unto themselves their private gain with the detriment of this Kingdom than to give relief in time of need And likewise duly considering that by the rejecting of those illiterate and unskilfull practisers those that were learned grave and profound practisers in that faculty should receive more bountifull reward and also the industrious Students of that profession would be the better encouraged in their studies and endeavours c. Vpon these and many other weighty Motives causes and considerations recited at large in the forementioned Acts and Charters did our Kings and Queens of England erect found and establish a College Commonalty or Incorporation of Physicians in the City and Suburbs of London and for 7 miles every way in distance from the same to be remain and have existence for ever Now much honoured Collegues How far you have answered the great and noble ends of these Princely favours and Royal Grants will fully appear in this book I mean as to the primary cause of your Incorporation viz. The restraining and suppressing illiterate unexperienced and unlicensed practisers As to the Second viz. How far you and your predecessors have answered the Character of learned grave and profound practisers in the faculty of Physick will in some measure appear in this Epistle wherein I have endeavoured to give a true though brief account of several memorable passages relating to the Lives and Works of some of the eminent Physicians of this College This is a work I must confess more fit for a large Volume than an Epistle a work which I hope in due time may be attempted by a more able and elegant pen than I can pretend to and that because I know there want not good materials to encourage such an honourable and worthy undertaking several Authours having already written somewhat memorable of the Worthies of this our Royal College our own Annals acquainting us with much more and the learned Dr. Hamey having left behind him in a Manuscript of his own writing the lives of above 50 of them Some of which were highly valued for their knowledge in the learned Languages others for being general Scholars polite Latinists accurate Grecians eloquent Oratours great Antiquaries and deep Philosophers Others for the improvement of their own faculty in the Theoretick and Practick Anatomick and Spagirick parts thereof that they were and are no less valued and esteemed in other Countries than in their own having by their matchless and most incomparable works not onely merited but obtained the name of immortal Some are admired and read in foreign Vniversities as Hippocrates and Galen
Bond to the College propter malam illicitam praxin which if he refused he was to continue in prison untill his Fine was paid Iohn Not an Empirick of the County of Kent appeared before the College propter audacem suam illicitam in medicinâ praxin He was ordered to give bond with sufficient security that he would not for the future practise Physick which refusing he was committed to prison After this he procured the following Letter in his behalf from Secretary Walsingham AFter my verie hartie commendacions Whereas I understand that you have caused one Not a practisioner in physick to be committed to prison in the Coumpter in Woodstreet where he presently remaineth Forasmuch as both my self have heretofore used him and divers other Gentlemen have also receaved good by him These are hartely to praie you that you will not deteine him any longer in prison to his great hinderance and utter undooing but rather at this my request to suffer him to go at liberty without putting him to farther trooble unlesse there be some great cause to the contrary wherein I will think my self beholding unto you and so do bid you hartely farewell From Westminster the 28th of September 1586. Your very loving frende Fra. Walsingham To this Letter the College returned the following answer To the Right honorable Sir Francis Walsingham Knight Secretary to her Majesty and one of her Highness most honorable Privy Council WHereas it hath pleased your Honor to direct your Letters unto us in the behalf of one Not to the end that we woold no longer deteine him in prison unless there be some great cause to the contrary Maie it please you to be advertized that we and everie one of us being most desirous to shew our ready and dutifull good minds to your Honor immediately sent for the party to our College mynding in respect of your Honor's motion to have delt with him by all maner of curtesy And albeit we know him to be utterly ignorant in that profession and such one as hath been often heertofore convented before us and found subject to great punishments and yet released from all extreamity upon his own caution put in amongst us and earnest promisse that he woold never after that deale with the practice of Physick All which notwithstanding he now more stubbernly then heretofore upon what encouragement we know not of purpose infringeth our privileges and the holsome Lawes of this Realme which we by solemne Oth are bound to maintaine and therewithall protesteth openly and that most infamously as we think and offensively to the credit and good name of such as admit him to their persons that he dealeth with none but onely for the Pocks Yet seeing it hath pleased your Honor to deale for him so earnestly whose good opinion we are and ever wil be most willing to satisfie in what we maie we were fully resolved freely to remit all offenses and to set him at liberty onely upon his own small bond for the not abusing of himself hereafter in Phisick within this City of London according to the Statutes of the Realme provided for the same and our particuler Othes taken in that behalf Which most reasonable demand for that he so wilfully denieth to accomplish We have therefore sent the bearer hereof an officer of our College as well to make report of the truth as also seing the party himself hath refused this favour most humbly to intreat your Honor to accept of our good meaning minds and so most humbly take our leave Your Honor 's moste dutifully The President and Society of the Physitions of London London 2 Octob. 1586. After this Not entred into bond that for the future he would not practise Physick which being forfeited the College put it in suit whereby he was forced to flee into foreign parts But returning again in K. Iames's Reign He was complained of by Dr. Gulston and a Gentleman who had taken Physick of him whereby he fell into a great Vomiting and Loosness Hiccough and great pains complicated with a paralytical disposition And though this Gentleman sent for him when he was in great extremity yet he would by no means come About a month after he was summoned and brought by an officer to the College where before the President and Censors he confessed that he was no Graduate that he understood not Latine or Physick unless it were the Stone which he could so dissolve in the bladder that it might be discharged by gravell and Fevers which he could cure by external applications He denied what had been proved against him by the forementioned Gentleman and others However the whole business being examined the President and Censors fined him 14 l. and committed him to prison About 5 years after a poor woman complained that being ill of a stopping about her throat and breast she went to him who would and did see her Urine and thereon said she had an Imposthume there and would soon die if not cured before Spring her Spleen being come up into her Lungs For which he was summoned to appear at the College where he said that an Imposthume about the throat and breast might hold 3 months without growing worse that the Spleen was in the radical parts Being told of some of his professed tricks in Alchymy and examined therein his answers were all impertinent and ignorant For which and his ill practice he was fined 5 l. to be paid presently or committed to prison and he interdicted all practice for the future But his Son paying this fine and becoming Surety for him he was released In the 28th David Ward an Empirick was committed to prison propter suam in Medicina praxin illicitam and fined 20 l. He was afterwards discharged and prosecuted at Common Law In the 29th Henry Ieffry confessed his practising of Physick in London for 6 years being examined in the rudiments of that Art he was found very ignorant not onely in that but all other learning Wherefore he was prohibited practice and a small fine laid upon him to be paid to the College Godfrey Mosan was fined 20 l. at one time and 10 l. at another for his evil and illegal practice in Physick and for his egregious ignorance He gave bond to pay the forementioned sums upon several days limited therein Peter Piers was brought before the College and committed to prison for giving Pills of Antimony Turbith and Mercury Sublimate by which he had killed several persons One Bright being also summoned and not appearing a Warrant was issued out for seizing him and committing him to the Fleet Others were imprisoned for practising Physick and others had their Bonds put in suit against them upon the same account In the 30th year of the Queen being in the year 1588 a time of most publick and eminent danger the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen sent their Precept to the College of Physicians requiring them to find Arms. This being looked upon as an infringement of College
in London for 6 years and pretended himself able to cure all diseases Being examined by the President he was found unable to give any reasonable account to any question asked him wherefore he was committed to prison and fined 10 l. for his illegal and ill practising of Physick About a month after he was sent for out of prison and required by the President and Censors to forbear the practice of Physick for the future and for his so doing to give bond with security he being wholly ignorant of that Art and unlearned in all other to which he replied that he would not give any bond upon that account but was resolved to practise as he had opportunity Upon this insolent and sawcy answer he was remanded back to the Counter in Woodstreet there to continue till he gave bond to the College for his good behaviour After 6 months imprisonment he was ordered by the Beadle to appear a third time before the President and Censors but refused to come The month after he procured the following Letter from Secretary Walsingham To our very loving frends the President and Censors of the College of Physitions AFter our verie hartie commendations Whereas I understand that you have of late committed to prison one Paule Buck a practitioner in Physick and Surgerie for exercising the same without a dispensation from you for as much as I am crediblie enfourmed that the man hath doon much good in his said profession and is otherwise of a verie good and honest disposition I am therefore mooved verie earnestlie to praie you that you wil be content the rather for my sake to yeeld to his enlargement and not further hereafter to molest him upon this occasion For the which you shall make me beholding unto you and finde me ready to requite it towards you And so I commit you to God From the Coort at Greenwich this 10th of February 1589. Your very loving freend Fra. Walsingham To which the College returned the following answer To the Right Honorable Sir Fra. Walsingham Knight Principal Secretary to her Majestie RIght Honorable Whereas it hath pleased you to write unto us in the behalf of one Paule Buck an ignorant and audacious Practitioner in Physick perceaving that your Honor hath been misenformed as well of the man as of the manner of our dealing with him We have therfore sent our President and some of our Society with him to attend your Honor's leasure and to deliver the true report thereof Most humbly beseeching you That for so much as we are by Oth and Conscience tied to do that which we do and for that the inconveniences are intolerable which daily fall out by the suffering and supporting such vagrant and loose persons altogether unskilfull in that wherein they make a coolorable Profession It might stand with your Honor's pleasure and good likeing to leave it to our discretion and liberty as much as in us lieth by all good orderly means possible to refourme the same Protesting unto your Honor That as we take small delight in punishing the ignorant so to all such as be honest and learned we will always be most ready and willing to shew what curtesie shall lie in our small power And so c. The President and Dr. Iames waited upon Secretary Walsingham with the forementioned Letter which he most readily read over and accepted very kindly from the College assuring them that he would never act any thing against the benefit or dignity of their Society And if at any time by the importunity of friends he did write upon such an occasion he notwithstanding left them to act what they thought most prudent Upon this Buck was sent for by the Beadle out of prison but he refused to come Wherefore order was given to acquaint the Secretary with this his obstinate and contumacious behaviour and to continue him still in prison About 2 months after the Keeper of the Counter set him at liberty without the consent or knowledge of the College wherefore the Treasurer was forthwith ordered to advise with the Recorder of the City and Counsellour Daniel for prosecuting the Keeper of the Prison for this his illegal releasing of Buck. About 2 or 3 years after he was again brought before the College confessed practice and was then ordered to appear at the next Court that he might understand the College pleasure In the interim he procured the following Letter from the Lord High Admiral To my lovinge freend Mr. Dr. Baronsdale geave these AFter my hartie commendations Whereas this bearer my servant Pawle Buck a practitioner in Physick is much sought after and well liked of by manie and hath as I am enformed doon manie great cures to the good of manie and the hurt of none I am to praie you being Governour of your fellowship to graunt him a licence to practise Physick hereafter unto such as shall at his hands come to require the same And in token of a dewtie to your house and that he wil be from time to time governed therebie he will present the same with 20 l. fine and will pale an yearlie Rent of 20 s. per an unto the Treasurie of your said howse And besides that ye shall pleasure a great many that desire his freedome you shall make me ready to requite the same to you in any good I can do you or your howse And so fare ye well From the Court at Nonesuch the 29 of May 1593. Your loving freend C. Howard Upon reading this Letter the College returned the following answer RIght Honorable and our very good Lord Whereas it hath pleased your Lordship to write your Letters to Dr. Baronsdale our President who hath imparted the same to the whole Society in the behalf of one Paule Buck your Lordship's servant That in respect he is such a practitioner in Physick as is well liked of many and hath doon many and good cures therein he might therefore have a licence graunted from us to exercise his practice in Physick to so many as hereafter shall come at his hands to require the same May it please your good Lordship to be advertised That for so much as we know the man to be utterly ignoraunt in all the parts of Physick and to have in him not so much as any taste of any good learning at all but to be one onely trained up in mechanicall matters and by profession and whole course of his lief nothing else but a meere Goldsmith and not onlie to have committed many gross and daungerous errours to the great hurt of divers that have been deluded by him and his cunnynge shifts but also do find him to be a man of very hard report for some suspitious and loose behaviour under pretence of the shew and colour of Physick We are therefore most humblie to beseech your Honor that it maie not be offensive to your good Lordship for us to use the libertie of our conscience in refusing to admit such a person to the practice
a Warrant from the Lord Chief Justice taken out of Prison and restored to his liberty Wherefore it was ordered that the President and one of the Censors should wait upon the Chief Justice with a Petition from the College to request his favour in defending and preserving the College privileges upon which Anthony submits himself to the College's censure and begs their favour Wherefore it was ordered that he should forthwith pay to the Treasurer of the College the 5 l. due sor his fine which he â—…ed to do and was likewise interdicted practice Not long after he was again accused of practising Physick which he confessed wherefore he was punished 5 l. for practising against the Statutes of the College and his own promise But he resusing to pay it was committed to prison and fined 20 l. About 8 months after order was given by the Censors for prosecuting him at Law he having confessed 3 years practice within the City and his prescribing medicines lately to one that died and to another in great danger After this Anthony's wife petitioned the College that they would deal mercifully with her husband and restore him to his liberty This Petition was rejected it being now out of the College's power to set him at liberty the suit depending being commenced in the Queen's name as well as the College's Wherefore about 2 months after Mrs. Anthony delivered a second Petition to the College with so great importunity and tears that partly upon that account and partly upon the account of Anthony's poverty c. they granted the following Warrant to the Keeper of the Prison Whereas Francis Anthony at the Suite of the President of the College or Comminaltie of the Physicians of the City of London lieth in execution after Iudgment for a certaine summe of money whereof 30 l. are due unto her Majestie and the rest to the said President for the time being and the Comminaltie We the said President and Comminaltie aforesaid are contented for our parts so much as concerneth us to discharge the abovenamed Francis Anthony so that it be no ways prejudicial to her Majestie 's part due upon the said execution Given under the College Seal this 6th of August 1602. Regnique Reginae Elizabethae quadragesimo quarto Two years after Anthony's release from prison Dr. Taylor with 2 Physicians more of the College and some other persons complained against him for prescribing Physick to several Patients amongst which one died upon the use of his remedies another lost all his teeth a third fell into such violent vomitings and looseness that the day after he died and charged his death upon Anthony who had said that when all other remedies failed him he used this as his last and extreme one which in the nature of it would either kill or cure The President and Censors gave order for his prosecution according to Law After which order several fresh complaints were brought against him as his prescribing his Aurum potabile to a Reverend Divine who upon his deathbed complained that this medicine had killed him he falling upon the use of it into an incurable inflammation of his Throat c. In the 43th Richard Edwards a servant of an Apothecary lately dead was charged for practising Physick He confessed that he had given Clysters and other medicines to some sick persons but not of his own invention but such as he had taken from bills on the file he likewise confessed that he had given various remedies to a woman troubled with the Scurvey c. Wherefore he was sent to prison and fined 5 l. A second time practice being proved against him he was fined 40 s. ob illicitam praxin In the 44th Iohn Clark being summoned by the Beadle to appear before the President and Censors to answer what should be charged against him for practising Physick without Licence wrote a Letter to excuse his absence which he said was not occasioned from from any contempt of College authority but from fear of being arrested by some Creditors About 6 months after he appeared and denied that he had practised from the time he was interdicted by the College but confessed that he had exposed to sale some choice waters the composition of which he was required to declare to the Censors upon a certain day appointed for that purpose upon the penalty of a contempt A month after appearing before the Censors he was required to give an account why he sold a Pint of Cinnamon water for 5 l. He answered that the College had no power to examine him that he made use of an extraordinary purging remedy and was master of another for Fevers made out of Mummy communicated to him by Hugo Plat that the book intituled Tuba Apollinis was wrote by him c. He was thrice admonished to think of a better course of life but notwithstanding obstinately persisting to violate the Laws of the Land and privileges of the College was fined 20 l. and ordered commitment to Prison but making his escape out of the custody of the College Officer he procured a Protection from the Lord Chamberlain upon which account the College directed the following Letter to be drawn up and presented by some of their Members to the Right honourable the Lord Chamberlain RIght Honorable and our very good Lord Understanding by the report of Mr. Dr. Forster our President that your Lordship is somewhat hardly conceated towards us and our College about the dealing with one Clark presupposed to be your Lordship's man We are humbly to crave your Lordship's patience and favourable heering till we have made plaine our true and innocent meaning therein May it please you therfore to understand That as we are bound by the Lawes and orders of the Realme and by a solemne Oath taken of every one of us particulerly for the strict observation of the said Orders So also we have had of late her Majestie 's Princely expresse commaundement that we should have a diligent care and circumspection for the punishment and weeding out of all such ignorant persons as under pretence of practising of Physick do mightily abuse her Majestie 's Subjects in that behalf as well to the great endaungering of their lives as also to the manifest exhausting of their goods And for that the numbre of those ill disposed abusers are moe in number then we can well find out and more subtle in their crafty devices then we can well express we have therfore of late obtained my Lord Chiefe Justice's most honorable Warrant for our better assistance in that behalf And now whereas one Clark among others hath been greatly complained of unto us by divers as a notorious offendor and malefactor among the rest and finding his dealing therein to be very offensive and to deserve just blame and correction and the man himself to be very weak and ignorant in the true principles of Physick beside the manifest contempt and breach of our privileges whereunto we are so precisely sworne We could
About 3 months after Dr. Rawlins accused him of illegal and evil practice in that he had undertaken the cure of a person complaining of an Arthritick disease by Unction Sweating Potions Purging Physick c. for which he was fined 5 Marks and obliged to give bond for the payment He paid 3 l. 4 months after and upon his submission was remitted the rest He was again charged by Mr. Patinson for practising Physick upon one Mrs. Blosse which at first he would have excused but then ingenuously confessed it and was onely fined 4 Marks Some time after a fine of 40 s. was imposed upon him de praxi medica illicita mala He notwithstanding persisted in practice confessing that he gave a drink to a Gentlewoman for 3 days to dry up a moisture that he supposed came from her back for which he was fined and committed to prison and though application was made to the College by the Lord Mayor yet the President and Censors would not consent to his release because he was committed pro mala praxi A Petition not long after was presented to the College against him for undertaking a cure for 10 l. of which he had received half and left the Patient worse than he found her He was likewise complained of for mala praxis in Child-bed women c. upon which the Censors interdicted him all practice Mr. Doughton a Surgeon was complained of by Mr. Flud an Attorney for that he had undertaken the cure of his Wife ill of a Maniack distemper for 20 l. and had done her little or no good for after a month or two she relapsed into as bad a condition as formerly But he confessing his fault and having been never before convicted of the like the President and Censors inflicted onely a fine of 40 s. upon him with an admonition that for the future he should not intrude himself into a profession that he understood not After this he was charged with a very inhumane and unskilfull practice upon a woman in labour by which both Mother and Infant perished which was proved against him by the Midwife Wherefore the President and Censors order'd his repayment of 5 l. which he received by agreement and required a bond of 200 l. that he should never profess or practise Midwifery for the future Edward Putman an old German Impostor brought a Letter from the Earl of Exceter in favour of himself Wherefore he was examined leniter tentandi causa by the President and Censors But found so egregiously ignorant that he knew not the definition of a disease nor the several species thereof Wherefore it was agreed by the Censors that out of respect to the Right honourable the Earl of Exceter he should be pardoned for his former Practice but interdicted for the future and that a Letter should be sent to the Earl to acquaint him with the proceedings of the College in this affair Mrs. Sadler being charged of illegal practising Physick she appeared with 3 or 4 of her Neighbours and confessed that she had given some Compositions which by chance might purge twice or thrice but she gave no Medicines This vain excuse of hers deserved a greater punishment but at that time the Censors onely order'd that her Neighbours which she brought along with her should engage on her behalf that she should not practise for the future which they did by subscribing their names to a Paper drawn up for that purpose Philippus Bernardinus an Italian was charged for selling a purging Medicine which he pretended was not brought into England by him but vended for a Merchant to whom he was to give an account but withall confessed that he had given one dose of it to a person sick of a Fever Wherefore he was obliged in a bond of 40 l. to appear at the next Comitia which he did and was by the Censors fined 20 l. and ordered to be imprisoned untill that sum was paid Mrs. Paine a bold and impudent woman was complained of by a Gentlewoman for practising Physick and undertaking the cure of several persons amongst whom was a Son of hers of 13 years old to whom she gave as she said gentle Pills which wrought the same day 40 times and the day after near as many She then anointed the Child's body head and all parts the Stomach onely excepted for 3 days and for 9 days after sweat him with hot tyles never suffering him to go out of his bed Notwithstanding a salivation appeared not but his Jaws and glands swelled so violently that they despaired of the Child's life After this a servant of one Mr. Crowder appeared before the President and Censors testifying that he was sent to Mrs Paine and that she alone without any other advice had undertaken the cure of his Master and had received of him 5 l. which she thought too mean a reward having neglected more valuable Patients at the same time At her first coming to him he was so well that he could walk about his Garden but having taken from her a Vomit and preparatory Medicine and after that been anointed thrice on his head back breast armes and thighs with a Mercurial Ointment he died under her cure She being hereupon summoned to appear before the President and Censors pretended that all she had done was by the order and authority of Dr. Bonham But being a second time cited to appear before them upon a penalty of 40 s. and yet neglecting to come she was fined 10 l. and order given for her commitment to prison with a total prohibition of practice In the 7th year of this King's Reign the following Warrant was sent from the King's Council to the Magistrates of the City of London for the attachment of Empiricks To all Justices Mayors Sheriffs Bailiffs Constables Headboroughs and all other his Majestie 's Officers and Ministers to whom this shall or may appertain within the City of London Suburbes and Liberties thereof and the limitts within mentioned and to every and either of them WHereas by the Laws and Statutes of this Realm power is given to the President of the College or Commonaltie of the faculty of Physick within the City of London and Suburbes thereof and seaven miles compass of the same for the time being or to such as the same President and College for the time being shall according to the Statute in that behalf made authorize to have the fyne search correction and government of all persons using the faculty of Physick within the limits aforesaid and to punish all such as shall unlawfully use or practise the said faculty within the same Precincts contrary to the true intent and meaning of the Statute in that case made with this further authority that all Iustices Mayors Sheriffs Bailiffs Constables and other Ministers and Officers within the City of London and Precinct aforesaid upon request to them made should help aid and assist the President of the said College and all persons by the said President and Commonalty from
time to time authorized for the due execution of the Acts and Statutes in that behalf made upon pain for not giving such aid help and assistance to run in contempt of the King's Majestie his Heirs and Successors Now forasmuch as we have been enformed by the President of the College that there are sundry unskilfull persons within the precincts and limitts aforesaid who doe use and practise the said faculty contrary to the same Statutes of this Realm in that case provided and to the great peril and danger of the lives of many of his Majestie 's subjects These are to will and require you and in his Majestie 's name streightly to charge and command you that henceforth at all time and times you according to the tenour of the said Act be aiding and assisting to the said President and to those that shall be lawfully authorized by the said President and College for the apprehending of all such persons as shall unlawfully use and practise the said faculty within the limits aforesaid contrary to the intent and meaning of the Statutes aforesaid when they or any of them shall give you notice of and require and thereupon to bring them before the said President or those authorised as aforesaid to their College there to be examined and proceeded against as to the Law in that case shall appertain Whereof fail you not as you and every of you will answer the contempt in that behalf made Yeven under our hands at Whitehall the xxiiiith day of July An. Dom. 1609. and in the seventh year of the Reigne of our Sovereign Lord James by the grace of God King of England France and Ireland Defender of the Faith c. and of Scotland the two and fortieth R. Cant. T. Ellesmer Canc. R. Salisbury H. Northampton T. Suffolk W. Knollys J. Stanhope Jul. Caesar Tho. Parry Tho. Fleming Jo. Corbet About 13 years after the King was pleased to send a Letter to the President and Censors of the College requiring them to summon all illegal and ignorant practitioners in order to examine their sufficiency and to punish the insufficient according to the Laws in that case provided The Contents of which are as follow To our trusty and welbeloved the President and Censors of the College of Physicians within our Cittie of London JAMES R. TRusty and welbeloved We greet you well Whereas the Art of Physick by many unlearned men making gain by the profession thereof to the great hurt and prejudice of many of our loving subjects is much abused in many places in this our Realm but especially in our City of London and the Suburbes thereof the government whereof as touching the practice of the said Art and the practitioners thereof being by the Lawes and Statutes of the Realme committed unto you the President and Censors of our College of Physicians and you having also from us by our Letters Patents more ample authority for the suppression and correction of such Delinquents We therefore minding so farre as in us lyeth the speedy reformation of all such abuses and inconveniences do by these presents as heretofore yet more strictly charge and command you the President and Censors aforesaid to call before you all such irregular and ignorant Practitioners as contrary to our Lawes and authority do abuse that Art and to examine their sufficiency and such as you shall find not sufficient to punish for their said practice according to our Lawes in that case provided And whereas we are credibly given to understand that many having been punished and warned by you to desist from any further practice do yet obstinately notwithstanding persist in the former contempt of our Laws and commandments We will and command you that you proceed against such Delinquents with all severity according to the tenor of our said Letters Patents and the due course of our Lawes by fine and imprisonment or by causing them to enter into Recognisances with condition restraining them to offend any more or otherwise as the case shall require and is agreeable to Iustice And our will and pleasure is that such offendors as shall be so imprisoned shall there remaine without being enlarged unlesse it be upon their conformity and submission to you the said President and Censors or other due course of Law Wherein we require all our Iudges and Iustices that they be very carefull and circumspect not to do any thing that may give encouragement to such offendors by enlarging any such too easily without due examination of the causes of their Commitment first calling thereto the President and Censors or some of them to declare the true reasons and causes thereof And whereas we are given to understand that oftentimes upon the sollicitation of some or other friend or person of Quality suiter to you for the sad Delinquents after their conviction you have been moved to wink at their faults and neglect their punishment to the great prejudice of the health of many of our poor subjects Our will and pleasure is and we do hereby streightly charge and command you that henceforth neither for favour friendship or respect of any you forbeare the just censure and punishment due by our Lawes to such Delinquents as you shall answere us on the contrary at your peril and that you require the aide and assistance of the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of our City of London whom by our Letters we have so required to do for your better expedition in the execution of this our Royal will and commandment not doubting but that you with more care will seek to suppresse such intolerable abuses and satisfy our trust in this case committed to you Given under our signet at our Palace of Westminster the second day of July in the twentieth yeare of our reign of England France and Ireland and of Scotland the five and fiftieth At the same time another Letter was sent from the King to the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Justices of London the Copy of which is the following WHereas in the time of our Predecessors of famous memory by several Acts of Parliament as also by our late Charter there hath been sufficient provision and power given and granted to the College of Physicians in London to reforme and suppresse all and singular unlawfull and unlearned practitioners in Physick and hearing neverthelesse that divers unskilfull and unlearned men and women do rashly adventure to enter into the practice of Physick to the great danger and hurt of our subjects We therefore now finding that neither Acts of Parliament nor our Charter heretofore granted have for want of execution wrought such good effects as we wish alwayes for the good of our subjects do by these presents charge you the Lord Mayor Aldermen and Iustices of peace within our City of London and the precincts that with all readynesse you do aide and assist the President and Censors for the time being of our College of Physicians in London or such Officers as the President and the said College
shall appear These are therefore to will and require you to appoint some three Physicians of your Society of good reputation as well for their learning as otherwise who together with the Physicians of the said Lady Arabella shall presently repayre unto the Tower and there view and search the Corps of the said Lady and to return joyntly their opinion unto me of the nature of the disease whereof she dyed that we may acquaint his Majestie therewithall And so I bid you heartily farewell From the Court at Whitehall this 27th of Sept. 1615. Your loving friend Ralphe Winwood According to the King's command some Physicians of the College met at the Tower and upon a diligent inspection of the body of the Lady Arabella were of an opinion that the cause of this noble Lady's death was a long chronical sickness that the species of her disease was a Cachexie which daily encreasing partly by her own neglect and partly by her aversation to medicine did at length bring her into a confirmed indisposition of her Liver and extreme leanness from which causes death must needs ensue This testimony was signed by the President Register and four Fellows of the College Iohn Bartley a practiser in Physick was accused by an Apothecary for ill practice after which upon a Censors day a Reverend Divine with his Wife made complaint that this Bartley having through ignorance and unskilfulness prescribed a very violent Medicine to their daughter had thereby hastened her death An exact relation of all the particulars with the names of the persons present drawn up in writing and signed with both their hands they offered to the Censors earnestly desiring that the Officers of the College would take cognisance thereof and by their censure give them all the assistance they could they intending to prosecute Bartley and bring him to trial for the death of their daughter The sum of their Narrative was this That the said Bartley being by certain Women recommended to them and having bargained for the cure and received part of the money in hand he gave their daughter amongst other Medicines a remedy which both vomited and purged her notwithstanding she had long laboured under an old Cough from which time she began visibly to sink and died in a few days after The Censors considering on the one hand the prayers and tears of the Parents and on the other hand Bartley's not being present to answer for himself thought they should do what became them if they condemned the fact for mala praxis as it stood reported in the Narrative In the 11th of this King's Reign the following Warrant was sent to the Apothecaries from the King's Council requiring them to deliver to the President and Censors the Bills of all illegal Practisers To all the Apothecaries within the City of London and the Suburbs thereof THese shall be in his Majestie 's name straightly to command you that upon the coming of the President and Censors of the College of Physick in London to your shops or houses you deliver unto them without any delay or excuse all such Bills and Receipts as you have of any Practitioners not licensed by the College Whereunto though you be bound by the Laws of the Land yet we have thought fit upon some causes known unto us now by these our Letters to command you to do the same April 22. 1613. G. Cant. Pembroke Ellesmere Canc. Ro. Rochester Jul. Caesar Gilb. Shrewsbury E. Wotton Th. Parry Dr. Brouuart a Leyden Physician was charged for practising Physick in London c. contrary to Law He replyed that it was necessity that obliged him to practise and that he was ignorant of the College authority The President told him that practising without licence was entring upon the lawfull possession of others against all right and reason But because he had behaved himself modestly he was respectfully dismissed He requested a connivence from the College if he might not have their admission The President told him that neither the one or the other was to be granted without examination About two months after he applied himself to the President and Censors and desired that they would permit him to enjoy the privileges granted him by the University and therefore He would put on the hat of honour as he called it which the University had put on him and not stand bare The President told him that it was their custome and a good one too that men should be examined uncovered and that this honour was not so much paid to the President and Censors as to the College in which they under the King's Majesty bore the Character of Magistrates He therefore pulling off his hat told them that he had been a Doctour four years and professed Physick in his own Country and in France The President demanded how that appeared and whether he had any Patent or Letters Testimonial which he not then being able to produce having left them as he said in his own Country the President told him that he could neither practise nor proceed any further towards the procuring a Licence till he brought his Patent and then afterwards must be examined which he refused But when he understood that it was unavoidable He took out of his pocket the King's Letter wrote to the President and College in his favour After which he was again summoned to appear before the President and Censors and being by them examined he was permitted to practise One Brown a Surgeon was complained of for giving internal Medicines in affections of the Eyes which was proved against him and he fined 50 s. which if not paid in fourteen days he was to be imprisoned but this he prevented by paying his fine to the Treasurer of the College at the time appointed William Blanke Chandler confessed his practising of Physick yet owned he understood no Latin but thought he had learning for it He was interdicted practice and threatned fine and imprisonment if found guilty for the future Not long after he was accused and confessed his giving of Medicines to one who he said had a convulsion of the Stomach with infection of the Liver and raised his Lungs into his Throat which he brought down by applying a Tench to his back He said that he may must and will purge as others did Wherefore for his ill and unlawfull practice the Censors committed him to the Compter with a Mulct of 40 s. which he paid and was released within three days He was again convented and declared that he practised but in trifles as Fevers He prescribed to one man a Medicine compounded of Cordials Purgatives and Opiates Being charged with giving a Vomit he said that all accusations against him were as the witnesses against Christ that in three days he would destroy the Temple and build it again and to answer before the President and Censors was but as to Herod and the rest that would harden their hearts For erecting of Figures he confessed he used it As for Surgery being
same He accordingly brought the ensuing Letter My good friends I Understand by this bearer Tho Cooke that he is by your command in custody of a Messenger for some occasions best known to your selves upon which you have enjoyned him to repayre to me to make submission which accordingly he hath fully and fairely done with much sorrow and for my part I remit and forgive all offences to me and desire with your savours he may be freed and so wishing you all happinesse I rest Your loving friend Ka. Knyvett This 2d of March 1638. In the 5th year of this King's reign several Empiricks pretending their Protection from Court the President and Censors presented the following Petition against them to the Lord Chamberlain To the Right Honourable Philip Earl of Pembroke and Montgomery Lord Chamberlain to his Majesty The humble Petition of the President and Censors of the College of Physicians Sheweth THat whereas there are diverse Empiricks which contrary to Law and conscience presume to practise Physick in and about the City of London as one Butler a Glover Trigge a Lastmaker Buggs one of the Queen of Bohemia's Players sometimes an Apothecary One Hill one Blagden one Blank a Pewterer and one Sir Saunder Duncombe a Pensioner to his Majestie with diverse others against whom the College cannot take the benefit of their Charter and his Majestie 's Laws by reason that they shrowd themselves under the colour of being his Majestie 's servants The Petitioners humbly beseech your Lordship in tender regard of the health and safety of his Majestie 's subjects to give them leave to take the ordinary course of Law for the suppressing of the unlawfull practice of the aforesaid Empiricks and all others that shall assume the like boldnesse And they shall pray c. To this Petition the following answer was returned None of the persons complained of in this Petition nor any other are admitted to his Majestie 's service to intitle them to the practice of Physick against the Charter of the College and his Majestie 's Laws And therefore if the Petitioners conceive that they have cause of Suit having acquainted the partyes interested with my reference they may freely take the benefit of his Majestie 's Laws for their relief Pembroke and Montgomery Febr. 7. 1630. Humphrey Beven Chymist was complained of for giving a Vomit to one Royston's daughter who in the time of her vomiting fell into convulsions and died After this he was accused for giving a Medicine to Mrs. Lane on a knife's point upon the taking of which she voided clods of bloud upwards and next day her gums were made black thereby and so she fell to spitting and spawling till she died The President and Censors did not think this business fit for them to censure and therefore it was referred to the Courts of Justice Thomas Bowden Surgeon confessed that he directed severl Medicines as Purges Diet-drinks c. to a Patient for the Morbus Gallicus and thought it lawfull he being so taught by his Master The Censors examining the case could not discover it to be a Gonorrhoea impura but onely a strain gotten by a fall which caused the running of the reins The practice having been 2 or 3 years past the Censors inflicted no other punishment upon him but onely discommuned him untill he submitted to the College which was done by the consent of all the Fellows and signified by the Beadle to all their Members About the same time one Flud an Apothecary was likewise discommuned who afterwards submitted himself to the College and craved a release from their interdiction which was granted he paying the mulct of 20 s. Mr. Sweno Clark and Executour to one Mr. William Turner presented a Petition against Mr. Clapham an Apothecary for giving physick to the said Mr. Turner whose bills of charges he presented Mr. Clapham appeared to whom Mr. President declared the complaint made against him concerning his practising Physick upon one Mr. Turner and of his suing the Patient's Executours and required him to produce what Doctours bills he had in that case Mr. Clapham answered that he had Dr. Peter Moyden alias Muden his Bills even from September 1630. till the latter end of March following which Dr. Moyden was sometime his fellow-servant in Mr. Garret's house but afterwards fell to the study of Physick He confessed that the Doctour never was with Mr. Turner onely saw his urines at Mr. Clapham's shop and was instructed by him of the disease He saith farther that Mr. Turner much despised Physick and Physicians yet relied upon him and was content at the last that Dr. Bruart should be brought to him who came as he said too late Margaret Woodman dwelling in Alhallows in the Wall who kept Mr. Turner in his sickness saith that Mr. Clapham did usually look upon Mr. Turner's urines causing them often to be turned sometimes liking and sometimes disliking them and that all the time she was with him which was 10 weeks she knew of no other Doctour but Mr. Clapham and she saith farther that by his bathing and medicining him his Legs did not onely swell but that his Toes rotted and his Legs became extremely noisome Mr. William Kerbye in Maiden lane Merchant saith that Mr. Turner being taken with a giddiness fell and by his fall hurt his Hip for which he did advise him to use Counsel and he answered he used Mr. Clapham who was his old acquaintance but Mr. Kerbye wishing him to use better Counsel he said that Mr. Clapham told him he had the Counsel of a Doctour and further saith that then he could use his armes well and that even to his death almost he had his senses well and he saith that he told Mr. Turner that Mr. Clapham had received of him 50 li. to which he answered that he had had of him twice as much And he saith that Mr. Bruart coming to him said he was called too late Mr. Henry Shelberrye Scr. faith that Mr. Turner had his fall about the 7th of October last to whom Mr. Turner said he feared the swimming of his head of which he had a fit 20 years ago coming from Paul's and he asked Mr. Turner whose Counsel he used he said Mr. Clapham was his ancient Apothecary and one that knew his body well yet that he had moneys from him for a Doctour Mr. Slater saith that he was with Mr. Turner the day he dyed and that he heard Mr. Turner's Maid blame Mr. Clapham who she said had received of her Master in his sickness well near 100 li. Mr. Clapham saith that if he would have taken 5 li. or 6 li. for his Bill that then this complaint had not been made Mr. Clapham neglecting to attend the Censors upon due warning they gave Mr. Sweno the following Certificate upon mature deliberation WHereas Mr. William Sweno Executor to one Mr. William Turner deceased in April last hath complained to us the President and Censors of the College of Physicians in London of
old receipt of Mr. Butler's Dr. Ramsey saith that about Noon one told him his Neighbour Mr. Lane was dead upon which he went thither presently and heard their complaint and then he look'd upon his gumms and teeth Next day he came to meet the other Doctours and found things as formerly have been related And he acknowledged that he set his hand to the Note formerly related and thought all had been done but withall he protested that he was and is of opinion that Mr. Lane was poisoned Mr. Pindar Mr. Coxe Mr. Dixon and Mr. Scot Chirurgions being all at the opening of the Body do severally acknowledge the blackness and Eschar in the mouth and the mortification in the stomach and Mr. Coxe saith that a quarter of a yard beneath the Stomach he found an inflammation inclining to a blackness After this information had Mr. President propounded to the Collegues to give their opinions whether Mr. Lane died of a violent death or naturally They every one severally were of opinion that he died a violent death upon some external cause Secondly Mr. President propounded to the Collegues whether they thought him to have been poisoned or not The Question being considered severally by the Fellows 18 of them were of opinion that he died of poison but 4 of them namely Sir William Paddy Dr. Andrews Dr. Crooke and Dr. Cademan did impute his death to the medicine Thirdly Mr. President desired the Collegues opinions concerning the medicine sent from the Apothecarie's whether that had in it any poisonable thing which might produce such an effect To this all the Fellows with one consent made answer that they could not give a direct censure concerning the Potion delivered by the Apothecary and made without the direction of a Doctour but if it were no other than pulvis Sanctus formerly set down that then they were of opinion that there was no poisonable thing in it which might produce such an effect But in the Bolus which remained there was found poison and all the Fellows did acknowledge it to be Sublimate Dr. Foxe pressed the Collegues for their opinion concerning the Note by him exhibited and their general opinion was that they having had no proofs but onely the inspection of the body they could not certifie assuredly of the poison Then Sir Theodore Mayerne was requested by the President and the College to draw up the opinion of the Collegues to be presented to his Majesty and to send it to Mr. President which he accordingly performed and the Friday following it was delivered to his Majesty by Mr. President Dr. Clement Dr. Hodson and Dr. Meverell at Greenwich in these words The determination of the College concerning the Questions proposed to them by the King's Majestie about the death of Joseph Lane THe College of Physicians in London being lawfully assembled by the command of their Soveregin Lord the King about certain questions proposed concerning the death of Ioseph Lane reported to be killed by poison and having made a diligent search and well considering all circumstances relating 1. As to the state of the body of the foresaid Lane 2. As to the disease which by a long series of violent symptomes brought him to his end 3. As to the kind and appearance of his death 4. As to the observations made upon his dead body by the Physicians and Chirurgions present 5. As to the conjectures taken from the strict examination of a Bolus extremely suspicious whose parts were artificially separated found in Mr. Lane's house when dead and after brought into Court before the Judges and from thence to the Physicians at their College To whom by the command and in the name of the King Letters were wrote from the Right honourable Sir Iohn Cooke principal Secretary of State that they might diligently enquire and give a faithfull account to the following Questions 1. Concerning Lane's death whether it was procured from poison 2. Their opinion about a purging potion carryed the 4th of April 1632. from Mr. Matthewes an Apothecary's shop to Mr. Lane's house and taken by Lane the 6th whether it had any thing of poison in it The College after very mature deliberation did humbly present the following Decree to his sacred Majesty as a testimony of their obedience 1. That the said Joseph Lane did certainly dye of a violent death 2. That he had taken poison and that corrosive 3. That they could determine nothing certainly concerning the Potion sent and given by Mr. Matthewes the Apothecary to Mr. Lane without the advice of any Physician because many of their medicines were too negligently prepared by their servants But if that Potion did only consist of those ingredients which he had given an account of and for which we have solely his word then there was nothing of poison contained therein 4. In the remainder of the foresaid Bolus there was found Mercury Sublimate not sweet but the most harsh and highly caustick which was separated from the rest of the Bolus and shewn to the whole College In testimony whereof the College by the unanimous consent of the President and Fellows and all present at this consultation signed this Decree with their own hands and sealed it with the College Seal that it might appear more authentick And because that from the beginning of the world to this very day good and wholsome Laws have derived their original from evil manners the whole College of Physicians doe most humbly beseech your most Sacred Majesty that as the Father of your Country you would consult the health and welfare both of your City Subjects and would by your Royal Proclamation strictly command that for the future No Grocer Drugster Apothecary Chymist or any other person presume to sell Arsenick Quicksilver Sublimate Precipitate Opium Coloquintida Scammony Hellebore or other Druggs either poisonous or dangerous to poor sorry Women or poor people which hath been too common but only to those who are willing to give their names that if there should be occasion they may give an account of the reason of their buying these dangerous medicines May it likewise please your Majesty to issue out your Royal Edict under the most severe penalties that no Apothecary for the future shall dare to compound for the Well or administer to the Sick any medicines especially Vomits Purges Opiates Mercurial or Antimonial remedies without the prescription of Physicians then living which prescription they shall be bound to produce upon the command or request of the Censors of the College He that shall act contrary shall be punished by the Law as a publick enemy to the life of man Dated from the College of Physicians in London the Last day of May 1632. And Subscribed Dr. Argent President Sir Theodore Mayerne Dr. Atkins Dr. Harvey Dr. Clement Dr. Foxe Dr. Fludd Dr. Ramsye Dr. Grent Dr. Cademan Dr. Andrewes Dr. Crooke Dr. Oxenbridge Dr. Rand Dr. Winston Dr. Wright Dr. Chamberlayne Dr. Hawlye Francis Roes alias Vintner was accused by William Clarke of
his Majestie 's most honourable Privy Council concerning James Leverett of Chelsey Gardiner aged as he saith about 60 years May it please your Lordships THat according to your Honours order dated the 20th day of October last we the said President and Fellows of the College of Physicians have called before us the said Iames Leverett whom we find by the Certificate annexed to be the 4th Son of one Simon Leverett late of St. Clements East-cheap Butcher deceased and examined him and made trial of him 6 several days according to his own appointment concerning his 3 years and a half practice for so long he pretends to have had the gift of healing and forsaken his trade and lived by means acquired by touching of diseased persons First he saith that when he began to take upon him to cure he used a bare touching without words but being told by a woman whose name he knoweth not that came to him to be touched for a pain in her Arm that God had given him the gift of Healing he afterwards used words whilst he was touching but who put those words into his mouth or the certain time when or where or to whom he first used those words he will not confess Among many whom he pretends to have cured he made choice of 3 of them and brought them and others with him to the College to be examined concerning the Cure he had done upon them namely Robert Monday aged 8 years the son of Richard Monday Waterman for a sore under his Arm which 3 months after his touching dried up of it self Eliz. Maye aged 11 years for the King 's evil in her Eyes She was cured by a flux of belly which happened before and continued after and Peter Norris aged 6 years for the Evil as is pretended in the left Eye which is not yet well as appeareth to us nor bettered by his touching as the Child said And likewise Serjeant Clowes brought some others as their Certificates annexed do shew whom he the said Leverett hath formerly touched but none of these are bettered by his touching In obedience to your Honour's command we have presented unto him 6 more which he touched for that he desired to touch those and especially if the King have touched them and he hath touched those 6 diverse times in our presence according to his own appointed times without the least contradiction or interruption by us made to which he promised if not present cure yet ease But we find that some of them immediately upon his first touching grew worse and desired the College that they might be no more touched by him Yet to remove all scruple and for the better satisfaction of your Lordships we caused him to touch them again albeit they were nothing bettered thereby when they last appeared at the College and therefore we remitted them to those who formerly had them in cure The manner and fashion of his touching is as followeth 1. He observeth in his touching to lay his hands in certain forms upon the places affected 2. He observeth his own disposition of body or indisposition to touch for if his hands be cold he will not touch or if he be ill affected in his body as he was the 17th of Nov. last when he absolutely denied to touch any 3. He mutters whilst he toucheth a certain number of set words viz. God give a blessing I touch God heals 4. He toucheth the parts ill affected a certain number of times as thrice thrice and thrice 5. He covereth the part himself with a Cloth first wiping the Cloth on both sides with his hands 6. He exhorteth the Patient to call upon God that his hands may take effect 7. He professeth that what he doth is by the special gift and calling of God and that he doth but his duty in these practices 8. In touching he never useth the blessed name of Jesus or Jesus Christ and denies to give his reason thereof 9. After his touching he enjoins that neither the Patient nor any other touch it till he himself take off the cloth 10. In touching of Sores if the circled cloth do touch the Sore then his touching is in vain for that time and he must touch again 11. He commandeth the Patient that during the time of his cure no oils ointments or salve touch the cloth or the part affected 12. He commands the Patient to eat the best meat and to drink strong beer and to wash his hands and face in warm water and in no case to touch cold water 13. He saith he is the Seventh Son of the Eight his Father had To this superstition he adds first this blasphemy viz. That upon touching he doth find virtue to go out of him so as he is weakened more by touching 30 or 40 in a day than when he digged 8 rods of ground in a day And it is credibly affirmed to us by a person of good reputation that the said Leverett hath said that if he touch a Female he is much more weakened And lastly he adds scorn and contempt towards those whom the Sacred hand of his Majesty hath touched for the Evil as appeareth by the Certificate of Mr. Edward Pate We therefore the President and Fellows of the College of Physicians in contemplation of the premisses since it hath pleased your Lordships by your foresaid Order to command us to deliver our opinions therein do conceive the said Leverett to be an Impostor and a deceiver of over credulous people who are heartened in their credulity by an erroneous opinion of some prodigious virtue inherent in a Seventh Son which yet this Leverett is not Also we conceive his pretended Cures with the manner of them to be full of Superstition and Sorcery and not to savour of any skill of Physick or Surgery or the operation of natural causes All which notwithstanding we in all humility submit to your Honours grave wisdomes and considerations c. Simon Fox Iohn Argent Tho. Winston El. Hodson Otwell Meverell Ric. Spicer Censors Dat. 6. Dec. 1637. A Doctour in Physick attempting a project to procure the sole and absolute power either to License or approve of all the Midwives practising in and about London before their admittance They presented a Petition to the President and College of Physicians the Copy of which is the following To the Right Worshipfull the President and other Doctours of Physick Fellows of the College of Physicians within the City of London The humble Petition of divers ancient Midwives in the City of London Sheweth THat through the molestation of a Doctour in Physick by appointing them to meet at his house once every month without authority and with intention as they suppose to bring about a project of his to have the sole Licensing of them or approving of all such as shall hereafter be Licensed out of an opinion of himself and his own ability in the Art of Midwifery implying a necessity of using him and no other both in those
his hand and not by the drinks and liquours he gave This he understood by his mother who wished him having a scald head to stroke his head with his own hand whereby he was cured And therefore sometimes he used onely his hand sometimes he gave Wine whereinto he dipped his finger that the people might have somewhat to take but the virtue came from his hand Barton was censured to pay 20 l. and to remain a prisoner in Woodstreet Compter till released by the President where he continued till the 19th of October following never having all that time petitioned the College for his liberty And then by virtue of a Writ of Habeas Corpus which he had sued forth of the King's Bench he was carried with his cause to the King's Bench Bar at Westminster The Copy of which Warrant and the Return thereof here immediately ensue NOs Johannes Warner Thomas Adams Vic' Civitat ' London Serenissimo Domino Regi in brevi huic schedul ' annex ' nominat ' ad diem locum in eodem brevi content ' Certificamus quod ante adventum nobis praedict ' brevis scil ' duodecimo die Septembris Anno regni dicti domini Regis nunc Anglie c. decimo quinto Christoferus Barton in dicto brev ' nominat ' commissus fuit Prisone dom ' Regis scil ' Computator ' scituat ' in Woodstreet London praedict ' in eadem Prisona sub custodia Isaaci Pennington Johannis Woollaston tunc vic' Civitat ' praedict ' in eorum exit ' ab officio suo sub custodia nostra detent ' virtute cujusdam Warranti Otwelli Meverell Laurentii Wright Edmundi Smith Willielmi Goddard in Medicinis Doctor Censor ' Collegii Medicor ' in London sub sigillo communi Collegii Medicor ' London praedict ' custodi praedict ' Computatorii London praedict ' vel ejus deputat ' direct ' Cujus quidem Warranti tenor sequitur in hec verba ss We Otwell Meverell Laurence Wright Edmund Smith and William Goddard Doctors in Physick and Censors of the College of Physicians in London being chosen by the President and College of Physicians aforesaid to govern and punish for this present year all offenders in the faculty of Physick within the City of London and the Suburbs thereof and seven miles compass of the said City according to the authority in that behalf to us duly given by certain Letters Patents under the great Seal of England made and granted to the said College and Comminalty by the late King of famous memory King Henry the Eighth bearing date the 23th day of September in the Tenth year of his Raigne And one Act of Parliament made in the 14th year of the said late King Henry the Eighth concerning Physicians Whereby the Letters Patents aforesaid and every thing therein are granted and confirmed And by virtue of the said Act of Parliament and Letters Patents aforesaid and one other Act of Parliament made in the first year of the Raigne of our late Soveraigne Lady Queen Mary intituled An Act touching the Corporation of Physicians in London did cause to be brought before us the sixth day of this instant September at our College house in Pater noster Rowe in London one Christofer Barton and we have examined the said Christofer Barton and upon his examination and other due proofs we have found that the said Christofer Barton hath unskilfully practised the Art of Physick within the City of London and Precinct aforesaid upon the bodies of Richard Ballady of Aldermary Parish London Michael Knight of St. Buttolphs Parish Aldgate London and the child of one Iane Bigge and some others in the month of Ianuary in the year 1638. contrary to the Laws in that behalf made and provided whereupon we have imposed upon the said Christofer Barton a fine of 20 l. for his evil practice in Physick aforesaid and we have also for the same cause sent you the body of the said Christofer Barton Willing and requiring you in the Kings Majesties name to receive and keep him in safe custody as Prisoner there to remain at his own costs and charges without bail or mainprize untill he shall be discharged of his said imprisonment by the President of the said College and by such persons as by the said College shall be thereunto authorised according to the Statute in that behalf made And this our Warrant shal be your discharge Given at the said College the eleventh day of September in the 15th year of the Raigne of our Soveraigne Lord King Charles Otwell Meverell Law Wright Edm. Smith William Goddard To the Keeper of Woodstreet Compter London or his Deputy To Mr. John Penyall one of the Messengers of his Majestie 's Chamber in Ordinary to execute this Warrant ET hec est causa acceptionis detentionis praefati Christoferi Barton in Prisona praedict ' sub custodia nostra Corpus cujus quidem Christoferi coram praefat ' domino Rege apud Westm ' parat ' habemus Being at the Bar the said 19th of October for that the Lord Chief Justice Sir Iohn Brampston was not present the other Judges present would not accept of bail which the said Barton tendered but suspended the matter untill Tuesday the 12th of October following Barton for that time was returned back and coming to the Bar again on the said Tuesday with his Councel and Bail the Lord Brampston being then present my Lord demanded the return of the Warrant which was neglected by the Clerks of the Court and left in the Crown Office in the Temple so my Lord would not proceed but respited the cause untill Thursday the 24th of October following when all parties appearing with Councel on both sides the Warrant and Return was read and the Cause debated and there the Court plainly declared that he should not be Bailed it being against the Law and the Letter of the Warrant grounded upon the Statutes Then it was desired by Barton's Councel that he might go over to the King's Bench which also was denied because he was committed originally to the Compter and willed if he would have liberty to submit to the College and make his peace there Barton being in custody of the Serjeant that carried him up to the Bar exhibited his humble Petition to the President and Censors the 25 of October signed with his own hand for abatement of part of his fine and for his enlargement submitting in all things unto them Whereupon the President and Dr. Meverell one of the Censors were contented to abate the half of his fine of 20 l. and to accept of 10 l. the one half to be paid in hand which was paid and the other half at our Lady day next And so upon the 29th of October signed his discharge and set him at liberty he being put again before his enlargement into the said Prison Mr. President gave order that upon the commitment of any Offender the name of the
forfeiture of such as being elect refuse to be sworn or to make search Any of the Physicians in London may practise Surgery The authority and liberties of Barbers and Surgeons in London being made of one Company By whom and at what time the Barbers of London were incorporate The benefit like to ensue by joyning the Barbers and Surgeons in one Company The Barbers and Surgeons of London made one Company and incorporated The Barbers and Surgeons in London shall be exempt from bearing of armes or to be in Watches or Inquests 5 H. 8. 6. 19 H. 7. 7. The Surgeons may take yearly four condemned Persons for Anatomies No Barber in London shall use Surgery No Surgeon in London shall use the craft of shaving Every Surgeon in London shall have a Sign at his door None shall be a Barber in London but a Freeman of that Company Four Wardens shall be chosen and their authority The forfeitures of the Offenders Any person may keep a Barber or Surgeon as his Servant Any person being no common Surgeon may minister outward Medicines By what means the Surgeons of London have abused the Statute of 3 H. 8. 11. for their own gain It shall be lawfull for any person to cure outward sores notwithstanding the Statute of 3 H. 8. 11. A confirmation of the Statute of 14 H. 8. 5. touching the corporation of Physicians in London Whosoever shall be committed to Prison by the President of the Colledge of Physicians in London shall be received and kept thereby The offendours forfeiture and who shall have it and by what meanes Searching in London for Apothecary wares The penalty for resisting of search of Apothecary wares Other Magistrates shall assist the Physicians in their search * supple * rect Collegio sive Communitati * Collegio * Communitatis * Communitatis * Collegio Preamble Recitall of the Patent of Incorporation And that the same was confirmed by Act of Parliament And whereas by other Acts other Priviledges are given and yet divers Enormities abound His Majestie hereby Approves of and confirms the Premises Power to sue for the Penalties And to retayne them to their owne use Power to the Censors to examine and Correct Physicians Apothecaries c. and their Medicines And to punish them by fine imprisonment or otherwise Power granted to the Censors to call before them Physicians and examine them and to fine them that refuse to come To impose a fine upon such as practise without licence and to imprison them Apothecaryes c. to testify against undue practisers of Physick If they refuse to testify they are to forfeit twenty Shillings Power to search and destroy The Drugs and Medicines of Apothecaries c. And to examine them upon Oath or otherwise concerning the same Power to convent Apothecaries c. And to fine them for Non-appearance 20 s. And to fine them for defective Medicines 3 l. and Imprisonment Grant of fines c. to the Colledge To have an Hall And call a Convocation To make Ordinances To have a Register Who shall be sworn for the true performance of his Office Power to appoint other Officers and to give them an Cath. And them upon just cause to remove Power to take Recognizances to his Majesties use To purchase Lands Discharged from bearing Armes To have this confirmed the next Parliament To pay to his Majestie 6 l. per ann Grant of H. 8. Power to choose a President Perpetual succession A Common Seal Several Priviledges Letters Patents c. Confirmed Ao. 14 H. 8. by Act of Parliament Best construction to be made thereof Several other Powers given by several Acts of Parliament Preamble to the Grant of K. James Grant of K. James Confirmation Grant of several other Priviledges Preamble to this Grant The Grant Body Politique Perpetual succession Capable to purchase To grant and dispose To sue and be sued Common Seal Forty fellows constituted One President Ten Elects and four Censors To be chosen as hereafter mentioned The first forty Fellows For life if not removed for cause Sir Edward Alston to be the first President Ten first Elects For lives if c. Four Censors to continue till the morrow of St. Michael Elections duely to be made Power to make a Vice-President To exercise the place and power of the President in his absence Censors to be chosen out of the Fellows How New Election of Censors in case of death or removal New Elects to be chosen on death or removall How the Fellows are to be chosen Power to remove any of the Elects Fellows or Censors for cause Each person his single voice in Election Where voices even a casting voice to the President The President and all Fellows and Officers to be sworn duely to execute c. And to take the Oaths of Obedience and Supremacy Three persons to swear the present President Elects Censors and Fellows Power to the Elects or any two of them to swear the Presidents hereafter chosen Power to the President to swear the Fellows and all other Officers hereafter chosen To have a Hall President to call a Court. Not less than 15. President one of them To treat of matters c. To make Laws To punish by fine or imprisonment So as not repugnant to the Laws of the Kingdom None to practise in London or within seven miles except licensed as herein expressed Under pain of 10 l. for every Month. Power to sue for the same Power to the President Vice-President and Censors or any three of them to supervise practisers c. Power in them to summon censure and punish any Practisers offending To examine Refuse to answer Not to exceed 40 s. Power to fine for giving unwholsome Physick at will not exceeding 10 l. Also to imprison not exceeding 14 dayes Power to summon persons by Precept under hand and Seal To give an Oath The person summoned as a Witness to forfeit 20 s. if not appear or not depose or refuse the Oath c. Power to the Censors to enter houses and search To examine upon Oath To burn or destroy such Medicines c. as they find defective or corrupted Power to summon all Druggists c. If not appear To fine them at pleasure not exceeding 20 s. Bad Medicines Medicines not made according to direction c. To fine the party not exceeding 3 l. for any one offence To imprison him till payment All practisers of Physick in the Country out of the limits aforesaid to be licensed by the President and Elects or any four of them First to be examined If able approved c. By testimonial under the hands of the particular tryers Power to the President and Elects c. to summon examine and give Testimonials c. Reject persons unfit None to practise in the Country till licensed under pain of 5. l. per Mensem except Graduates in the Universities To be recovered as the 10 l. forfeiture All Fines Forfeitures and Amerciaments to be