PITCAIRNE, Archibald, a physician of great eminence, was born at Edinburgh on the 25th of December 1652. FIis father, Alexander Pitcairne, who was engaged in trade, and became one of the city magistrates, derived his lineage from the ancient family of Pitcairne of Pitcairne in the county of Fife. His mother, whose name was Sydserf, belonged to a good family in the county of Haddington, descended from Sydserf of Ruthlaw. After having been initiated in classical learning at Dalkeith school, he was sent to the university of Edinburgh in 1668, being then sixteen years of age. ln 1671 he took the degree of A. Μ. It was the wish of his family that he should devote himself to the study of divinity: but for the office of a minister he seems to have had no vocation; and his father, not without some degree of reluctance, permitted him to direct his next views to the profession of law. To this new pursuit he betook himself with all the ardour of a young and ambitious mind; but his intensity of application produced such an effect upon his health, that the physicians, apprehensive of his being visited with consumption, advised him to try the effect of a residence in the south of France.

On his arrival at Paris, he found his health so much improved, that he judged it unnecessary to visit Montpellier; and after having formed some pleasant acquaintances among his young countrymen engaged in the study of physic, he determined to prosecute his own studies without seeking for any other school. They however persuaded him that Paris could not boast of any able professors of law; and he was easily induced to listen to their advice of relinquishing all thoughts of the bar.

Scire potestates herbarum usumque medendi Maluit, et mutas agitare inglorius artes.

After he had for several months attended the hospitals, his father deemed it expedient to recall his wandering footsteps. He accordingly returned to Scotland; and being in this state of preparation for any one of the learned professions, divinity, law, or physic, he continued to enlarge his fund of knowledge, and to cultivate his excellent talents. The mathematical sciences were however his favourite pursuit; and this propensity is supposed to have been fostered by his intimacy with David Gregory, who became professor of mathematics at Edinburgh, and afterwards Savilian professor of astronomy at Oxford. Of his learned friend Dr Gregory, who belonged to a very remarkable family, he has made honourable mention in his works. In this department of study, we are informed, “he made a great progress in a short time; and meeting with the lately invented method of infinite series, he made some improvements thereon, which were afterwards published by Dr Wallis.”^[1. Biographia Britannica, vol. v. p. 33G0. ] He is further said to have perceived the necessary connexion between physic and geometry, and thus to have fixed his choice unalterably upon that profession.

He now applied himself to the study of botany, pharmacy, and materia medica, in which branches he could at that time receive no public instruction in Edinburgh. It appears to have been the usual method to attend the private instructions of some established practitioner. In the year 1675 he returned to Paris; and having prosecuted his studies with great ardour and success, he took the degree of Μ. D. at Reims on the 13th of August 1680. He entered upon his professional career in his native city; and of the Royal College of Physicians, incorporated by a charter bearing date the 29th of November 1681, he was one of the original fellows. His talents and learning were such as could not fail to attract the attention of those among whom he lived. He was a scholar and a wit, as well as a man of science; and he so completely deserted the beaten track of medical speculation, that he was soon regarded as no ordinary? character.

After his first settlement in Edinburgh, he married Margaret the daughter of Colonel James Hay of Pitfour. She bore him a son and a daughter; but the mother and her children did not long survive, and he devoted an elegiac poem to her memory. He continued to rise in professional reputation; and this was greatly encreased by the publication of his “Solutio Problematis de Inventoribus,” which was printed at Edinburgh in 1688, and again at Leyden in 1693. The object of this tract is to vindicate to Harvey the honour of having discovered the circulation of the blood; an honour of which many attempts had been made to deprive him. According to the notion of Vander Linden, and various other writers, this great fact in the animal economy was known to Hippocrates; but their opinion is very scientifically refuted by Dr Pitcairne. There seems to be much more reason to believe that the unfortunate Servetus “had imperfect glimmerings of that light which afterwards Dr Harvey communicated with so bright a lustre to the learned world.”^[2. See Dr Wotton’s Reflections upon Ancient and Modern Learning, p. xxiii. 210. 3d edit. Lond. 1705, 8vo. ]

An attempt to found a medical school in the university had been made in the year 1685. The first professor in that faculty was Sir Robert Sibbald, who was appointed on the 24th of March. Dr Halket and Dr Pitcairne were appointed on the 9th of September; but it has not been ascertained that they read any lectures. Of the estimation in which Pitcairne was held, we find a more striking proof in the circumstance of his being invited by the curators of the university of Leyden to accept a professorship of physic. Of this invitation he did not hesitate to avail himself; and his inaugural oration was delivered on the 26th of April 1692.^[3. Archibald Pitcarnii, Μ. D. et Regii Collegii Medicoum Edinburgensium Socii, Oratio, qua ostenditur Medicinam ab omni Philosophorum Secta esse liberam, habita Lugduni Batavorum die 2G Aprilis CI0I3CXCII. cum ordinariam Facultatis Medicae Praxeosque docendae Professionem solenniter auspicaretur. Lugd. Bat. 1692, 4to. This oration was reprinted in 1695, and again in 1G96. γ He inserted it in both editions of his Dissertationes Medicae. ] The oration, we are informed, was highly applauded, and the ordinary salary of his professorship was augmented by one half. We however learn from a passage in Bayle’s correspondence, that his lectures were too abstruse, and contained too large an infusion of geometry, to be altogether popular.^[4. Oeuvres Diverses de Bayle, torn. iv. p. 732 ] In this university “he con-tinned[7:17:753] little more than a year, during which he read lectures on the works of Bellini, such as were then published. While he was professor here, he printed several dissertations which were drawn from his lectures: in these he attempts to explain the circulation of the blood, and some of the principal parts of the animal oeconomy mechanically, as had been done by Bellini, whom he places next to Harvey upon the bench of inventors of physic.” Lorenzo Bellini, who was a professor in the university of Pisa, testified his gratitude by dedicating to Pitcairne a collection of his Opuscula.^[5. Laurentii Bellini Opuscula aliquot, ad Archibaldum Pitcarnium, Professorem Lugduno-Batavum, in quibus praecipue agitur de Motu Cordis, &c. Lugd. Bat. 1737, 4to. There are several editions of an earlier date. A long and remarkable dedication, “Viro meritissimo Arcliibaldo Pitcarnio,” is dated at Florence on the 20th of March J693. It commences thus: “Rapiunt me mores tuí, vir meritissime; tua enim illa to gerendi ratio, qua me per literas compellare voluisti, ad omnem optimi et magni viri speciem est ita comparata, ut per universum vitae meae spatium vix quicquam mihi contigerit, quod fuerit tam apte factum ad genium meum.” In this dedication he introduces Pitcairne’s letter, dated at Leyden on the 22d of June 1692. ] One of his pupils at Leyden was Dr Mead, who always retained the highest regard.for his master.

Before he quitted Edinburgh, he had made an engagement to marry a daughter of Sir Archibald Stevenson, one of the king’s physicians. In the course of the year 1693 he accordingly returned, with the intention of fulfilling his promise, and immediately resuming his academical duties; but the reluctance of the parents to part with their daughter, placed him in a situation of embarrassment, as he was neither disposed to relinquish the professorship nor the young lady. He however adopted the former alternative; and having married Elizabeth Stevenson, he resigned his chair, and finally settled in Edinburgh, where he speedily found himself engaged in very extensive practice. He acquired the reputation of a very skilful practitioner, and indeed his name became more celebrated than that of any other physician then residing in Great Britain. In addition to his more ordinary employment, he received frequent consultations from England, and even from Holland.

With this extensive practice his time was so much occupied, that it did not leave him any abundant leisure for other pursuits. He however continued to gratify his taste by the composition of Latin verses, which were alike calculated to please his friends, and to expose his enemies. His satirical propensities, added to his unrivalled success in a lucrative profession, rendered his enemies somewhat numerous. The violence of his prejudices as a Jacobite and an episcopalian must have had no tendency to recommend him to the best supporters of the existing government. But his friends were likewise numerous; and he pursued his career with great alacrity, and apparently with a great disregard of personal animadversion.

He was fiercely attacked in a little volume, published under the title of “Apollo Mathematicus ; or the Art of Curing Diseases by the Mathematicks, according to the Principles of Dr Pitcairn: a work both profitable and pleasant, and never published in English before. To which is subjoined a Discourse of Certainty, according to the Principles of the same Author.”. Printed in the year 1695, 8vo. This sarcastic work, according to the statement of Dr Oliphant, was the production of Dr, afterwards Sir Edward Eyzat.^[6. Oliphant’s Short Discourse∙to prove the Usefulness of Vomiting in Fevers, pref. Edinb. 1699, 8vo. See likewise Melius Inquirendum, or, an Answer to Dr Olyphant’s Discourse of the Usefulness of Vomiting in Fevers, p. 18. Edinb. 1699, 8vo. Here the authorship of Apollo Mathematicus is not denied by the answerer, who is sufficiently known to have been Dr Eyzat. He is designated in the title of Dr Andrew Brown’s Epilogue to the five Papers lately past betwixt the two Physicians, Dr O. and Dr. E. containing some Remarks, pleasant and profitable, concerning the Debate, and the Usefulness of Vomiting and Purging in Fevers. Edinb. 1699, 8vo. He is more directly mentioned in a facetious letter from a London physician, inserted in An Answer to the pretended Refutation of Dr Olyphant’s Defence. Edinb. 1699, 8vo. “I have seen the Melius Inquirendum, and am too well acquainted with the stile and spelling, not to know that it is Dr Eyzat’s.” ] It was speedily followed by “Tarrugo Unmasked; or an Answer to a late Pamphlet intituled Apollo Mathematicus, by George Hepburn, M.D. and Member of the Colledge of Phisicians at Edinburgh. To which is added by Doctor Pitcairne, the Theory of the internal Diseases of the Eye demonstrated mathematically.” Edinb. 1695, 4to. This title bears an allusion to “Tarugo’s Wiles, or the Coffee-House, a Comedy,” written by Thomas Sydserf, or St Serfe, and printed at London in the year 1668. The author of the first tract escaped without any censure from the College of Physicians, of which he was likewise a fellow; but Dr Hepburn, who had been Pitcairne’s pupil, and who then resided in Haddington, was not treated with the same degree of forbearance. On the 7th of November a committee was appointed to examine his pamphlet, and on the 3d of December he was suspended from the exercise of his right to sit and vote as a fellow. The proceedings against him appear to have been very arbitrary and irregular: “though a day was allowed him to answer a libel to be given him, and six free days to see it, yet before any libel was given him, or the day of compearance come,’ they hastened to pass a vote of suspension. During the interval, namely on the 18th of November, Dr Pitcairne had tendered a protest against the admission of certain fellows, one of whom was Eyzat, as having been conducted in an irregular manner. It was then referred to a committee, who on the 22d delivered a report, “that the protestation given in and subscribed by Dr Pitcairn was a calumnious, scandalous, false, and arrogant paper ;” and the meeting having unanimously approved of this report, did thereupon suspend him “from voting in the college, or sitting in any meeting thereof.” It was even proposed to prohibit him from the practice of physic. At the meeting which suspended Dr Hepburn, four fellows, Melville, Eccles, Oliphant, and Smelholme, were ordered “to compear next day, to hear and see themselves suspended, for adhering to the protestation presented by Dr Pitcairn.” The object of all this indecent violence was to deprive them of the right of voting at the ensuing election; “but they having presented a bill of advocation, and obtained a sist for some days, in which the day of election was included, that project was baulked.” A double election ensued: Dr Trotter was re-elected president by his adherents, while the opposite party elected Sir Archibald Stevenson. The meeting was attended by one of the bailies; and Pitcairne was removed by the town-officers, after having protested against this unwarrantable interference. He and his friends withdrew to Stevenson’s house, and there elected the president and other officebearers for the ensuing year. These violent animosities produced several applications to the privycouncil and the court of session. Another fierce contention arose from the question of publishing a Dispensatory, which had been prepared under the sanction of the college. Stevenson’s party opposed its publication, on the ground of its being “barely a transcript of the London one, ill copied, and worse explained.” Dr Pitcairne was attacked in a virulent pamphlet, which charged him with the inconsistency of having written a commendatory preface to a book which he afterwards represented as worthless.^[7. Information for Dr Archibald Pitcairn, against the abdicate Professor; or, a Mathematical Demonstration that Liars should have good Memories: «’hereby the Colledge of Physicians is vindicat from the Calumnies contain’d in Dr Stevenson’s last Informa tion, relating to the Dispensatory. Printed in the year 1696, 4to. The writer alludes to a folio paper of six pages, printed for the privy council, under the title of “Information for Sir Archibald Stevinson, and other Physitians who adhere to him, against Doctor Trotter and others.” ] On [7:17:754]the 3lst of January 1700 an overture towards reconciliation was made to him and other six fellows who had been suspended. Another pacific resolution was passed on the 7th of January 1703; but only three of the seven were disposed to avail themselves of this second opportunity. On the 4th of January 1704 an act of oblivion was proposed by the president, Dr Dundas, and was received with unanimous approbation. It was confirmed at two subsequent meetings, held on the 11th and 12th of the same month. After this period Pitcairne resumed his seat in the college; but after the 6th of March 1706 he was not present at any of their meetings, and was repeatedly fined for non-attendance.^[8. To the kindness of Richard Poole, Μ. D. we are indebted for ample materials for the history thofe College of Physicians, so far as it is connected with the personal history of Pitcairne. ]

Other learned bodies had treated him with more respect. On the /th of August 1699 the university of Aberdeen conferred upon him the degree of Μ. D. On the 16th of October 1701 the College of Surgeons admitted him a fellow. This last honour, which was unsolicited, had never been bestowed upon any other physician. He was gratified by so unusual a mark of respect, and attended the meetings of the college. He appears to have retained his station as a professor in the university. After the appointment of Carstares to the office of principal, which took place in the year 1703, he was regular in his attendance when the Latin oration was annually delivered at the opening of the session. Between the principal and the professor there was no sympathy of political feeling; but Pitcairne “used to observe that when Mr Carstares began to address his audience, he could not help fancying himself transported to the forum in the days of antient Rome.”^[9. alaccormick’s Life of Carstares, þ. 7θ∙ prefixed to his State-Papers. Edinb. 1774, 4to∙ ]

Sir Robert Sibbald was one of those who chiefly felt the edge of his sarcastic humour. He was a man considerable for his learning, and is still remembered as an industrious labourer in the department of Scotish antiquities: but he was neither conspicuous for the strength of his judgment nor the elegance of his taste; and with the weapons of wit and sarcasm he was but an unequal match for Dr Pitcairne. He was a member of the committee which prepared so strong a report against the protest; and he incurred the suspicion of having had some concern in the publication of Apollo Mathematicus. In the preface to Dr Hepburn’s answer, he is designated in a manner sufficiently intelligible: “W hoever Tarrugo be, yet it’s known that the papers which I call Tarrugo’s were revised, corrected, and approven by one who twice in one year changed his religion, upon how honest and religious principles, I doe not determine.” During the reign of the late popish king, Sibbald had been induced by the earl of Perth, lord chancellor, to change his religion; but having more maturely studied the controversy between the two churches, he returned to the profession of the faith which he had renounced.^[10. Burnet’s Hist, of his own Time, vol. iii. p. 108. Cunningham’s Hist, of Great Britain, vol. i. p. 66. FountainhalΓs Historical Notices, vol. i. p. 220. Autobiography of Sir Robert Sibbald, p. 35. Edinb. 1833, 8vn. On Sibbald’s conversion, an English poem of Dr Pitcairne may be found in the Scotish Pasquils, b. iii. p. 62. ] To this passage of his personal history Pitcairne makes the following allusion:

Dum procul a Geneva se summovet inclyta Roma, Quod quam sit longum scit Cyphianus iter.

Sibbald, who is thus styled Cyphianus in allusion to his villa of Kipps, was a man of too much candour and moderation to approve of all the violent measures which brought so much discredit on the College of Physicians; and when the president, Dr Sinclair, and only five fellows, had in a very summary manner suspended Stevenson and several others, he concurred with Sir Thomas Burnet in preparing a formal declaration against such unwarrantable proceedings. It is dated on the 20th of Novembér 1699. In the year 1684 he had published a folio volume entitled “Scotia Illustrata, sive Prodromus Historiae Naturalis.” This work was attacked, with sufficient violence, in a tract of nearly a hundred pages, « Archibaldi Pitcarnii Dissertatio de Legibus Historiae Naturalis.” Edinb. 1696, 8vo. As this title includes the author’s name at length, it is not easy to explain the origin of Dr Webster’s statement that the work was published anonymously. Charges of plagiarism, ignorance, and something little short of stupidity, are plentifully scattered through the dissertation. Nor is the knight of Kipps the only individual who is here subjected to his animadversion: he has likewise bestowed some castigation on Dr Cockburn, of whose treatise on the animal economy he avers, that it contains nothing new but what the author has either borrowed from Bellini or himself, although he has never mentioned the name of the one or of the other. After a long interval appeared “A Letter from Sir R

S to Dr Archibald Pitcairn.” Edinb. 1709, 8vo.

The author, whoever he may have been, attacks various positions in the medical dissertations of his antagonist. This publication was speedily followed by “A Letter from Dr James Walkinshaw to Sir Robert Sibbald.” Lond. 1709, 8vo. The writer’s name is known to be supposititious; and, according to a contemporary notice preserved in a copy of the pamphlet, it was understood to be written by Dr Bower with the assistance of Dr Pitcairne. The internal evidence is sufficient to convince us that the other tract was not written by Sibbald, of whose name it exhibits the initials. This answer ascribes it in the most unequivocal terms to Dr Cockburn, of whose reputation as a medical writer it indeed contains a zealous defence. Both tracts include various topics of mathematical controversy. Sibbald at length interfered in the controversy, by publishing “Vindiciae Scotiae Illustratae, sive Prodromi Naturalis Historiae Scotiae, contra Prodromomastiges, sub larva Libelli de Legibus Historiae Naturalis latentes.” Edinb. 1710, fol. According to a statement contained in this work, Dr Pitcairne’s dissertation had been so carefully suppressed, that for twelve years after its first impression, his antagonist was unable to procure a copy either for love or money. He mentions it as the joint production of several individuals; and moreover avers, what is pointedly denied in a private letter,^[11. This letter accompanied a copy of Sibbald’s Vindiciae, sent to Dr Gray of London: “Sir, you know the bearer: he brings you the rarest piece of lies and nonsense I ever saw. ‘ Scribit et in tergo, necdum finivit.’ The author gave me 3 copies in a compliment, of which I send one to you, and one to Dr Arbuthnot as an answer to his modest examination. The author told me that by my telling him I was not author of the Dissertatio de Legibus Historiae Naturalis (which he tels indeed, and lyes), he meant, in alledging this upon me, onlie to hinder me from answering him, since he in his Vindiciae had commended me so much: an excellent reasoning, and which made me smile in place of being angrie. He told me he would let no body else see it till he had got the approbation of all the learned to it. My papers are in the press on the first of this year. Your ] that Pitcairne disavowed being the author; “nihil unquam a se editum fuisse in meum Historiae Naturalis Prodromum.” If indeed the printed copies were carefully withheld from circulation, he might [7:17:755]with a safe conscience aver that he had published no such worκ. It however suited his adversary’s plan to consider this as the work of some person or persons unknown; and that plan he even carried so far as to prefix a parenetic ode, not very poetical, in which the talents of Pitcairne are mentioned in terms of no parcimonious commendation.

Dr Pitcairne had published seven medical dissertations in a separate form; and to these he added another, and collected them into a volume, bearing the title of “Archibald! PitcarniiDissertationes Medicae.” Roterodami, 1701, 4to. The volume, dedicated to Bellini, was inaccurately printed in consequence of the author’s distance from the press. Not long afterwards it was assailed in a “Dissertatio de Salute quam ferunt Aegrotantibus Dissertationes Archibald! Pitcarnii.” Edinb. 1702, fol. This anonymous dissertation, it was sufficiently ascertained, was the production of Dr Oliphant, whom he had formerly ranked among his friends. An answer, written in English, was immediately published by some individual, who conceals his name, and exhibits the initials J. J. The author of the dissertation replied without delay, nor did his adversary leave him in possession of the field.^[12. A short iknswer to a late Pamphlet against Doctor Pitcairn’s Dissertations. By J. J. MD. Edinb. 1702, 8vo. A Refutation of the Short Answer to the Examination of Dr Pitcairn’s Dissertations. Edinb. 1702, 8vo. A Reply to Dr Oliphant’s Refutation of the Short Answer, &c. By J. J. AI.D. Edinb. 1702, 8vo. ] This adversary, we are inclined to believe, was Dr Bower. In a letter which Dr Drummond addressed to him soon after the death of Pitcairne, we find the subsequent passage: “I cannot but admire and applaud your steady and constant adherence to him in his greatest difficulties, and in the weakness and infirmities of old age. What excellent things you have done in his defence, are particularly known to me; and if they are as well understood by the learned world, they would certainly set your true merits in a clear light, and eternally recommend your unspotted fidelity and friendship.” These expressions are evidently applicable to unavowed services, and they appear too strong to be merely applicable to his pamphlet against Cockburn. The two tracts in controversy with Oliphant bear internal evidence of having been written by a mathematician. On the same occasion, another tract was written by Dr Cheyne, who afterwards rose to great eminence in the profession.^[13. Remarks on two late Pamphlets written by Dr Oliphant, against Dr Pitcairn’s Dissertations, and The new Theory of Fevers: wherein, besides an Explication of C. O. and his Interpreters, several other surprising Appearances of Nature are mechanically accounted for.. By George Cheyne, Μ. D. and Fellow of the Royal Society. Edinb. 1702, 8vo. Dr Cheyne’s previous work was published without the author’s name: “A new Theory of Continu’d Fevers,” &c. Edinb. 1701, 8vo. ] He had been a pupil of Pitcairne, of whom he always retained a high admiration; and he now defended his master with a degree of violence, which, at more mature age, he had himself the candour to condemn.^[14. Cheyne’s Essay of Health and long Life, p. vii. 4t^h edit. Lond. 1725, 8vo. ]

About this period of his life, he was involved in proceedings of a different nature. In a private letter addressed to his friend Dr Gray, a physician in London, he had testified his Jacobitical zeal by giving a highly-coloured and exaggerated statement of some transactions connected with a petition for assembling a parliament. This letter appears to have been intercepted, and to have been transmitted to the crown lawyers, who prosecuted the writer before that anomalous tribunal the privy council, on a charge of “leising making.” According to the record, “he falsely represents that the said address for the parliament goes on unanimously throw the whole nation, and that only a few courtiers and presbyterian ministers oppose it, but in vain, and that twice so many have signed since the proclamation anent petitioning as signed it before; and bids him take notice that there is one sent to court with a title different, to beguile the elect of the court, if it were possible; and that all the corporationes and all the gentlemen have signed the address, and himselfe among the rest; and, by Jove, it would, produce a nationall and universali

This blank, it is subsequently stated, “cannot from such premisses be construed to have a less import then a nationall and universali overturning.” On the 25th of January 1700 he appeared before the board, attended by David Dalrymple, David Cunningham, and James Nasmyth, his counsel learned in the law. The lord advocate and solicitor general were likewise present. A petition was presented by the defendant, “acknowledging his fault and folly in writing the letter lybelled upon, and declaring it was in cups, and without any design either against

. his Majesty or the government, and absolutely submitting to the privy councill.” He received a reprimand from the lord chancellor; and having recovered the bond which he had previously given for his peaceable behaviour, and for his appearance, whenever he should be required, before the privy council, under the penalty of two hundred pounds sterling, he escaped from any further consequences of this frivolous prosecution.

In another action he appeared in the character of plaintiff. James Webster, one of the ministers of Edinburgh, and Robert Freebairn, an eminent printer and bookseller, “being accidentally in company of the magistrates, Mr Webster complained that Freebairn in his auctions sold wicked and prohibited books, and particularly Philostratus’s life of Apollonius Tyanaens, wherein that vile impostor and magician is equalised, if not preferred to our blessed Saviour and his miracles, and which were greedily bought up by atheists and deists; and Mr Freebairn bidding him condescend, Mr Webster answered, Such as Doctor Pitcairn, who is known to be a professed deist; and for farther proof of it, in that same auction, many striving for that infamous book, one regretted that there were none bidding for the Bible, the doctor scoffingly answered, that it was no wonder it stuck in their hands, for ‘ verbum Dei manet in aeternum which was a direct ridiculing the scriptures, and the Christian religion.” When the bookseller communicated this information to Pitcairne, he lost no time in bringing an action against Webster before the sheriff, “for the redress of that atrocious injury, as tending to make him odious to all who own a God and revealed religion, and to ruin and break his employment.” The action was removed by advocation to the court of session; and on the 18th of July 1712, “the Lords considered this process was managed with much zeal [apparently meaning heat, or animosity], and that Mr Webster was willing to give reasonable satisfaction; therefore, they recommend to the Justice Clerk, ordinary in the cause, to endeavour to settle the parties amicably.”^[15. Fountainhall s Decisions, vol. ii. p. 75G. ]

These judicial records furnish sufficient confirmation of the traditionary account, which imputes to Pitcairne the character of a profane jester. Dr Hutcheson has thought proper to supply us with another example of his indecent levity. “Many an orthodox Scotch presbyterian, which sect few accuse of disregard for the holy scriptures, has been put to it to preserve his gravity, upon hearing the application of scripture made by his countryman Dr Pitcairn, as he observed a croud in the streets about a mason, who had fallen along with his scaffold, and was over-whelmed with the ruins of the chimney which he had been building, [7:17:756]and which fell immediately after the fall of the poor mason; ‘ thessed are the dead which die ip the Lord, for they rest from their labours, and their works follow them.’”^[16. Hutcheson’s Reflections upon Laughter, and Remarks upon the Fable of the Bees, p. 9. Glasgow, 1750, 12mo. ] Such a story as this reflects but little credit on him who made, or who thus repeats the jest. “For the honour of the learned physician’s memory,” says Dr Beattie, “I hope the story is not true. Such wantonness of impiety, and such barbarity of insult, is no object of laughter, but of horror. And I confess, I should have no good opinion of any presbyterian, or of any person, who could find it difficult to preserve his gravity on hearing it.”^[17. Beattie’s Essay on Laughter and Ludicrous Composition, p. 399. ]

From these unedifying details, we return to the prosecution of his literary history. His next publication was an ingenious lucubration, bearing the title of “Epistola Archimedis ad Regem Gelonem, Albae Graecae reperta anno aerae Christianae 1688.” This tract, consisting of 48 pages in octavo, has no imprint; but a copy belonging to the library of the College of Physicians contains in manuscript, “Amstelodami, typis Georgii Gallet, 1706.” After this period he occupied himself with the preparation of a new edition of his dissertations; but before he could finish his task, his health was so much impaired, that he found himself incapable of effecting all that he intended. The edition was however published a few months before his death: “Archibald! Pitcarnii Scoti Dissertationes Medicae, quarum multae nunc primum prodeunt. Subjuncta est Thomae Boeri, Μ. D. ad Archibaldum Pitcarnium Epistola, qua respondetur Libello Astrucii Franci.” Edinb. 1713, 4to. This volume contains fourteen dissertations. Prefixed is a dedication which the Jacobites must doubtless have construed in their own way: “Deo suo et Principi opus hoc consecrat Archibaldus Pitcarnius Scotus.” The author’s speculations on the subject of digestion had been controverted by Astruc; and here he receives an elaborate answer from Dr Bower, professor of mathematics in King’s College, Aberdeen. The writer was evidently a man of learning, and Pitcairne has mentioned him in terms of particular friendship. The preface to the volume contains an extract of a letter from the second James Gregory, relating to the subject of contraction and compression, as discussed by Astruc. Of these dissertations an English translation was soon afterwards published by Dr Sewell and Dr Desaguliers.^[18. The whole Works of Dr Archibald Pitcairn, published by himself: wherein are discovered the true Foundation and Principles of the Art of Physic; with Cases and Observations upon most Distempers and Medicines. Done from the Latin original, by George Sewell, Μ. D. and J. T. Desaguliers, LL. D. & F. R. S. With some account of the author. The second edition. Lond. 1727, 8vo. ]

Dr Pitcairne died on Friday the 20th of October 1713, in the sixty-first year of his age. His remains were interred in Greyfriars churchyard, where his monument, a plain stone, was repaired in 1800. By his second wife, who survived till the year 1734, he left a son and four daughters. Before he attained the age of majority, the son engaged in the rebellion of 1715; and having been imprisoned in the Tower, he obtained his release in consequence of Dr Mead’s very earnest intercession with Walpole. His letter, which mentions the father in terms of high admiration and gratitude, appears to have been entrusted to the distressed mother. Her son entered into the Dutch service; and, “on account of his own merit, and the memory of his father, he would probably have arrived at great promotion, had he not died soon after.”^[19. Webster’s Account of the Life and Writings of Dr Archibald Pitcairne, p. 34. Edinb. 1781, 8vo. ] The second daughter, Janet, was married on the 12th of October 1731, to Alexander fifth earl of Kelly. She died on the 7th of June 1775. Two of her sons, Thomas Alexander and

Archibald, succeeded to the title. The former was very eminent for his skill in music, and some of his compositions have very recently been published by Mr Sharpe.^[20. Minuets, &c. composed by the Right Honourable Thomas Earl of Kelly. Edinb. 1838, 4to. In the Biographie Medicale, tom. vi. p. 428, other editions of Pitcairne’s works arc mentioned: “Opera omnia. Venise, 1793, in 4°. Leyde, 1797, in 4o.” ] His youngest brother, Andrew Erskine, was known as a man of wit and literature. All the three died unmarried; and the earldom of Kelly is now conjoined with that of Mar.

Four years after the death of the author, appeared “Archibald!, Pitcarnii Medici celeberrimi Scoto-Britanni, Elementa Medicinae physicomathematica, libris duobus, quorum prior Theoriam, posterior Praxim exhibet, in Medicinae Studiosorum gratiam delineata. Nunc primum in lucem edita.” Lond. 1717, 8vo. Hagae Com. 1718, 4to. Of the first book the concluding chapter had already been printed at the end of the Praxis Medica Boer-haaveana. The entire volume was “printed from a copy compiled out of the notes that had been taken by some of his pupils, together with some rough draughts taken from his papers, which, as they were never revised by him, he was always very careful to suppress during his life-time.” It is therefore evident that this work was produced under very unfavourable circumstances. A collection of all his works in Latin prose, with the addition of a few poems, was afterwards published, under the title of “Archibald! Pitcarnii, Medici celeberrimi Scoto-Britanni, Opera omnia Medica.” Lugd. Bat. 1737, 4to. 6

A posthumous production of a different class is commonly ascribed to the same learned author: “The Assembly; a Comedy. By a Scots Gentleman.” Loud. 1722, 8vo. After an interval of many years, the same drama was again printed, and without any reference to a former edition: “The Assembly; or, Scotch Reformation; a Comedy, as it was acted by the Persons in the Drama. Done from the original manuscript, written in the year 1692.” Edinb. 1766, 12mo. This edition contains a long preface, omitted in the first. Of the two editions, the Biographia Dramatica, vol. ii. p. 40, has made two distinct comedies. The preface represents this comedy as the composition of more than one author. “This play was begun just after the king of France took Mons, as is clearly intimated in the first scene; but, by reason of some gentlemens going to the country, who were concerned in it, it lay dormant four months; then it was set about again,' and was very soon compleated. We confess it was hastily huddled together; for we were not a fortnight about the whole work, by reason of multitude of business the authors were entangled in.” According to this account, Pitcairne is only entitled to a share in the honour or discredit of such a production. It is a rabid effusion of Jacobitism, less remarkable for wit and humour than for ribaldry and profanity. He is likewise supposed to be the author of another work, which has recently been edited by Mr Kinloch: “Babell; a Satirical Poem, on the Proceedings of the General Assembly in the year m.dc.xcii.” Edinb. 1830, 4to. The manuscript copies, of which several have been preserved, bear the initials of his name. The poem relates to the same subject as the comedy, and it evinces the same spirit of animosity to the Whigs and presbyterians. The author’s rhymes are sufficiently familiar and negligent.

As a writer of Latin verses, he appears to much more advantage. Many of his poems were printed in a fugitive form, but not published by himself. There is however a [7:17:757]collection of his “Poemata Selecta,” consisting of fourteen pages in folio, but without a d^te, and without any formal title. An edition was afterwards published by Ruddiman;^[21. Selecta Poemata Archibald! Pitcarnii, Med. Doctoris, Gulielmi Scot aThirlestane, Equitis, Thomae Kincadii, civis Edinburgensis, et aliorum. Edinb. 1727, 12mo. Sir William Scott, Bart, was the ancestor of Lord Napier in the male line. (Wood’s Peerage of Scotland, vol. ii. p. 299.) Thomas Kincaid was a surgeon in Edinburgh. ] with whom he had accidentally become acquainted at Laurencekirk, and whom he had liberally encouraged to transfer his residence to Edinburgh. On the death of his friend and benefactor the editor has inserted an elegy, which concludes with this distich:

Ergo λ r ale, lux Scotigenum, princepsque medentum, Musarum columen deliciaeque, vale.

The Latin poems of Pitcairne have been extravagantly extolled by some of his countrymen.^[22. “Ipsum equidem ego existimo ingenti adeo ingenio, et labore non paenitendo, versus fecisse, ut non verear eum anteferre omnibus lyricis, qui ab Horatii temporibus ad nostrum usque aevum vixere.” (Dissertatio de Scriptis Pitcarnianis, auctore Roberto Hepburnio, Scoto, J. C. Lond. 8vo.) The dedication to Joseph Addison is dated at Amsterdam on the 1st of March 1715. ] They are chiefly to be commended for their epigrammatic merit, their point and pungency. Many of his verses are elegantly turned; but they are frequently rendered obscure by his allusions to circumstances of too private a nature to admit of easy explanation, after an interval of more than a century. Some of the allusions are explained by himself, in a curious paper which has recently been printed for the first time; others by Lord Hailes, in an article communicated to a periodical work.^[23. Edinburgh Magazine and Review, vol. i. p. 235. ] This eminent person, whose extensive learning was founded on very accurate and critical scholarship, entertained the design of publishing an edition of Pitcairne’s Latin poems, with annotations; and some of the materials which he collected have fortunately been preserved in this form. Several of those poems were written in the name of Walter Danistone, who appears to have been one of the author’s friends. His epitaph on Viscount Dundee was translated by Dryden. Another of his poems became very conspicuously known by the easy and elegant paraphrase of Prior, whom Dr Drummond has described as his old comrade. It commences with these verses:

Studious the busy moments to deceive, That fleet between the cradle and the grave, I credit what the Grecian dictates say, And Samian sounds o’er Scotia’s hills convey.^[24. Prior’s Poems on several Occasions, p. 297∙ Lond. 1718, fol. ]

The personal character of Dr Pitcairne has been variously represented. That he was a man of a liberal and benevolent disposition, is sufficiently established by the testimony of his contemporaries. “In the business of his profession,” says Dr Sewell, “he was always ready to serve every one to the utmost of his power, and even to contribute to their health at the danger of his own. He was a man of too good sense to be a humourist in physic, or refuse attendance out of pique, or prejudice, or affectation: he understood the value of life too well to sacrifice it to caprice and humour. There is one thing more remarkable of him; that he was not at all concerned about fees, and frighted from his duty by the sight of poverty in his patient; nay, he went with greater chearfulness to those from whom he could expect nothing but good will, than to persons of the highest condition. Besides, in cases which seemed to require that assistance, he not only gave away his skill and medicines, but extended his generosity for the provision of other conveniences for the sick, and left the marks of his charity, as well as of the liberality of his art, behind him. The virtue of charity was really so much his own, in the use of it, that he contrived a most secret and decent manner of conveying his benevolence, and relieved many who knew not their benefactor. In short, he was one of the greatest and most useful men in his profession this age has produced; of a free and universal genius, a good orator, poet, and philosopher. He was of a pleasant, engaging humour. Life sate very easy upon him in all its circumstances. He despised many, but hated none. He loved his friends, and laughed at his enemies.” This characteristic account, written in 1715, is confirmed by Dr Drummond, who soon after the death of Pitcairne wrote in the following terms to their mutual friend Dr Bower: “Though he got much money by his extraordinary skill and practice in physic, yet he did not hoard up riches, but dealt liberally to his poor friends and relations, and also gave frankly and generously to young men of good spirits, who were in narrow circumstances. So he was not only a learned man, but a Maecenas too, and an encourager of learning through the whole course of his life. His great care and commiseration of the poor ought not to he omitted. He not only gave them medicine freely, but money too, for their relief and support; and this kind of charity is one of the best effects of pure and undefiled religion. Besides, he did not spend all his money on his pleasure and freaks, but erected a most noble library, which, for the great variety and excellent collection of books, is one of the finest I have seen belonging to any private man in the kingdom.”^[25. Dr Drummond’s letter may be found in Mr Kinloch’s preface to Babell, p. îv. ] After his death, his library was purchased by the czar of Muscovy. In his personal habits, he appears to have been somewhat inclined to jovialty. At that period, professional men were more accustomed to frequent taverns than they are at present; and his poems contain various allusions to bis social haunts and companions. Of the levity of his conversational wit we have already seen more than one specimen. His profane jests exposed him to the most injurious imputations, and he was very frequently represented as a professed unbeliever. But whatever doubts might be entertained as to the soundness of his creed, they are completely removed by his verses written on Christmas-day; and Dr Drummond has stated that, during his last illness, he continued in the greatest tranquillity of mind, and evinced just apprehensions of God and religion. His political sentiments do not here seem to require much notice. It is not easy to admire the political wisdom or moral perception of a man whose heroes were King James, Viscount Dundee, and Sir George Mackenzie.

As a medical practitioner, he attained to much more extensive and lucrative employment than any former physician resident in Scotland. He left behind him a reputation which was not confined to his native country. He belongs to the mathematical and mechanical school of physic; and, in the annals of medicine, his name is honourably mentioned with those of Borelli, Bellini, and other great masters of the -mathematicomedical art.^[26. See Petri Antonii Michelotti Tridentini de Separatione Fluidorum in Corpore Animali Dissertatio phvsicomechanicomedica, p. 13. Venetiis, 1721, 4to. ] They all contended for the application of mathematical reasoning and demonstration to subjects of anatomy and physiology. John Bernoulli, who belonged to a very distinguished family, not only adopted their method in his treatise De Motu Musculorum, but he even maintained in verse the cause of the mathematical physicians.
[7:17:758]

Nunc eat indoctus, doctoque is suadeat orbi, Nullam arti medicae ferre mathesin opem:

Scilicet ut vulpes, caudam quae .amiserat, illa Ne pudibunda foret syrmate sola carens.

Vestrum, ait, O sociae, deponite inutile membrum! Ast abiit salsis exagitata jocis.

Dr Pitcairne seems to have improved both the theory and the practice of physic. He made some advances in completing Harvey’s speculations on the circulation of the blood, and in explaining the process of secretion. He laboured with great energy to explode the errors of former writers, who maintained the chemical doctrines of a corrosive menstruum in the stômach, and a certain acidity in the blood that required to be corrected by an alkali. If he relied too much on the aid of mathematics as an instrument of medical science, he at least contributed, by his conspicuous example, to recommend a clear and concise mode of reasoning, to which preceding writers did not usually attain. Boerhaave, the most illustrious of his successors in the chair at Leyden, bestowed very high commendation on his first collection of dissertations;^[27. “Haec scripta optima sunt et perfecta, sive legas dissertationem de motu sanguinis per pulmones, sive alia opuscula, sive ultimum tractatum de opio.” (Boerhaave Methodus Studii Medici, emaculata et accessionibus locupletata ab Haller, tom. i. p. 569. Amst. 1751, 2 tom. 4to.) Haller describes him as “acris homo et confidens, iatro-mathematicus, Jacobo II. addictissimus.” (Bibliotheca Anatomica, tom. i. p. 761. Lugd. Bat. 1774-7, 2 tom. 4to∙) ] x and Dr Mead, whose name stood unrivalled in his own age and nation, evidently regarded his works as exhibiting a model of disquisition in their own department of science.^[28. The Dissertations of Dr Pitcairne, the honour of the profession of Scotland, are a convincing proof of the advantage of such a mechanical way of reasoning; nor could malice itself deny this, were not ignorance in confederacy with it, which will secure any one from being benefited by the most useful demonstrations.” (Mead’s Mechanical Account of Poisons, p. xvii.) ] (χ,)