writes well can prescribe well, if he has applied himself to the study of both. Befides, when we see a man making profeffion of two different sciences, it is natural for us to believe he is no pretender in that which we are not judges of when we find him fkilful in that which we understand.

Ordinary quacks and charlatans are thoroughly fenfible how neceffary it is to fupport themselves by these collateral affiftances, and therefore always lay their claims to fome fupernumerary accomplishments which are wholly foreign to their profeffion.

About twenty years ago it was impoffible to walk the streets without having an advertisement thrust into your hand of a doctor who was arrived at the knowledge of the green and red dragon, and had discovered the female fern-feed. Nobody ever knew what this meant, but the green and red dragon fo amufed the people that the doctor lived very comfortably upon them. About the fame time there was pafted a very hard word upon every corner of the streets. This, to the best of my remembrance, was TETRACHYMAGOGON, which drew great shoals of spectators about it, who read the bill that it introduced with an unspeakable curiofity, and when they were fick would have nobody but this learned man for their physician.

I once received an advertisement of one who had ftudied thirty years by candle-light for the good of his countrymen, He might have studied twice as long by day-light and never had been taken notice of, but lucubrations cannot be overvalued. There are fome who have gained themselves great reputation for phyfick by their birth, as the seventh son of a seventh fon; and others by not being born at all, as the unborn doctor,' who, I hear, is lately gone the way of his patients, having died worth five hundred pounds per annum, though he was not born to a half-penny.

My ingenious friend, Doctor Saffold, fucceeded my old contemporary, Doctor Lilly, in the ftudies both of phyfick and aftrology, to which he added that of poetry, as was to be seen both upon the fign where he lived, and in the bills which he diftributed. He was fucceeded by Dr. Cafe, who erased the

verfes of his predeceffor out of the sign-post, and substituted in their ftead two of his own, which were as follow:

Within this place
Lives Dr. Cafe.

He is faid to have got more by this distich than Mr. Dryden did by all his works. There would be no end of enumerating the several imaginary perfections and unaccountable artifices, by which this tribe of men enfnare the minds of the vulgar, and gain crowds of admirers. I have seen the whole front of a mountebank's stage, from one end to the other, faced with patents, certificates, medals, and great feals, by which the several princes of Europe have teftified their particular respect and efteem for the doctor. Every great man with a founding title has been his patient. I believe I have feen twenty mountebanks that have given phyfick to the Czar of Muscovy. The great Duke of Tufcany efcapes no better. The Elector of Brandenburgh was likewife a very good patient.

This great condefcenfion of the doctor, draws upon him much good will from his audience; and it is ten to one, but if any of them be troubled with any aching tooth, his ambition will prompt him to get it drawn by a person who has had fo many princes, kings, and emperors, under his hands.

I must not leave this fubject without obferving, that as phyficians are apt to deal in poetry, apothecaries endeavour to recommend themselves by oratory, and are therefore without controverfy the most eloquent perfons in the whole British. nation. I would not willingly difcourage any of the arts, efpecially that of which I am an humble profeffor; but I must confefs, for the good of my native country, I could wish there might be a fufpenfion of phyfick for fome years, that our kingdom, which has been fo much exhausted by the wars, might have leave to recruit itself.

As for myself, the only phyfick which has brought me safe to almost the age of man, and which I prefcribe to all my friends, is abftinence. This is certainly the best phyfick for prevention, and very often the most effectual against a prefent distemper. In short, my recipe is, "Take nothing.”

Were the body politick to be phyficked like particular perfons, I should venture to prescribe to it after the fame manner I remember when our whole island was fhaken with an earthquake fome years ago, there was an impudent mountebank who fold pills which (as he told the country people) were very good against an earthquake. It may perhaps be thought as abfurd to prescribe a diet for the allaying popular commotions and national ferments; but I am verily perfuaded, that if in such a case a whole people were to enter into a courfe of abstinence, and eat nothing but water-gruel for a fortnight, it would abate the rage and animofity of parties, and not a little contribute to the cure of a diftracted nation. Such a fast would have a natural tendency to the procuring of those ends for which a faft is ufually proclaimed. If any man has a mind to enter on fuch a voluntary abftinence, it might not be improper to give him the caution of Pythagoras in particularAbftine a fabis. Abftain from beans.’

That is, say the interpreters, meddle not with elections; beans having been made use of by the voters among the Athenians in the choice of magistrates.

It is not to be imagined, how far the violence of our defires will carry us towards our own deceit in the pursuit of what we wish for. A gentleman here (White's chocolate-house) this evening was giving me an account of a dumb fortuneteller, who out-does Mr. Partridge, myself, or the unborn doctor, for predictions; all his vifitants come to him full of expectations, and pay his own rate for the interpretations they put upon his fhrugs and nods. There is a fine rich city widow ftole thither the other day (though it is not fix weeks fince her husband's departure from her company to rest), and with her trusty maid, demanded of him whether the fhould marry again, by holding up two fingers The wizard held up both his hands forked. The relict defired to know, whether he meant by his holding up both hands to represent that she had one husband before, and that she should have another? or that he intimated she should have two more?