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When I was in Holland, I had a slow fever that hung upon me a great while; I consulted Boerhaave, who prescribed me what I suppose was proper, for it cured me; but he added, by way of postscript to his prescription, 'Venus rarius colatur'; which I observed, and perhaps that made the medicines more effectual.
What country, then, could so rapidly afford such a course of legal study as the Protestant and commercial Holland? The reputation of Boerhaave had drawn medical students from all quarters, and Boswell's uncle John, and the celebrated Monro primus of the Edinburgh Medical School had been among the number.
Boerhaave informs us, that some boys eating some seeds of the thorn-apple which were thrown out of a garden, were seized with giddiness, horrible imaginations, terrors, and delirium. Those that did not soon vomit, died. HYOSCYAMUS niger. HENBANE. Henbane is a very dangerous poison. The seeds, leaves, and root, received into the human stomach, are all poisonous.
It would be an injury to the memory of Boerhaave, not to mention what was related by himself to one of his friends, that when he lay whole days and nights without sleep, he found no method of diverting his thoughts so effectual, as meditation upon his studies, and that he often relieved and mitigated the sense of his torments, by the recollection of what he had read, and by reviewing those stores of knowledge, which he had reposited in his memory.
Boerhaave sat, and attended silently to this discourse for some time, till one of the company, willing to distinguish himself by his zeal, instead of confuting the positions of Spinosa by argument, began to give a loose to contumelious language, and virulent invectives, which Boerhaave was so little pleased with, that, at last, he could not forbear asking him, whether he had ever read the author he declaimed against.
I have never been accustomed to sleep more than four or five hours, so that through life I have allowed time for paying visits and receiving company. I have still had sufficient for study and improvement. Hyndford was my instructor in politics; Boerhaave, then physician to the court, my bosom friend, my tutor in physic and literary subjects.
He should begin in the natural way, by taking care of poor patients in one of the public charities, and work his way up to a better kind of practice, better, that is, in the vulgar, worldly sense. The great and good Boerhaave used to say, as I remember very well, that the poor were his best patients; for God was their paymaster.
He had a strange kind of religion; but I flatter myself he will be ere long, if he is not already, in Heaven. Letters of Boswell, p. 258. Johnson had written the Life of 'the great Boerhaave, as he called him. Works, vi. 292.
When I was in Holland, I had a slow fever that hung upon me a great while; I consulted Boerhaave, who prescribed me what I suppose was proper, for it cured me; but he added, by way of postscript to his prescription, 'Venus rarius colatur'; which I observed, and perhaps that made the medicines more effectual.
He breakfasted at Dr. Webster's, at old Mr. Drummond's, and at Dr. Blacklock's; and spent one forenoon at my uncle Dr. Boswell's , who shewed him his curious museum; and, as he was an elegant scholar, and a physician bred in the school of Boerhaave , Dr. Johnson was pleased with his company.
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