Talk:History of Medicine (United States)

The Use and Importance of the Practice of PHYSIC; together with the Difficulty of the Science, and the dismal Havock made by Quacks and Pretenders. A. The Independent Reflector (1752-1753). New York: Feb 15, 1753. p. 47 (4 pages) This article from 18th Century New York City describes the ideal physician as one learned in the liberal arts, fluent in Latin, educated in Science, Logic, and Mathematics, and bewails the great number of physicians then practicing in the city who were "ignorant as the little boys in the lowest class of reading school", whose very advertisements prove them ignorant of the names of drugs,that they are unable to hold a conversation, and that these illiterate mountebankes are"murderous quacks" who extort fees from the widows and orphans of their patients, to deprive them of the only solace left to them. (language updated)