GREGORY, Dr James, professor of the Practice of Medicine in the University of Edinburgh, and eldest son of the subject of the preceding notice, was born at Aberdeen in the year 1753, and there received the rudiments of his education. He accompanied his father to Edinburgh in 1764; and after going through the usual course of literary studies at Edinburgh, was for a short time a student at Christ Church College, Oxford, of which his relation Dr David Gregory had been dean. It was there probably that he acquired that taste for classical learning, and that admiration for the character of an accomplished classical scholar, which ever afterwards distinguished him. He entered early on the study of medicine at Edinburgh, and was a student in that faculty at the time of his father's sudden death, in February 1773. The extraordinary exertion which he then made to complete his father's course of lectures, was regarded by many of his friends as sufficient indication of his ability to continue and extend the hereditary reputation of his family. He took the degree of doctor of medicine at Edinburgh in 1774, and spent the greater part of the next two years in Holland, France, and Italy. It is worthy of notice, that his most intimate friend and companion on the Continent was Mr A. Macdonald, afterwards lord chief baron of the Court of Exchequer, in London.
After the death of Dr John Gregory, the chair of the Institutes of Medicine (then finally separated from that of the Practice of Medicine, of which Dr Cullen remained professor) was offered to Dr Drummond, who was at that time abroad, and who ultimately declined accepting it. For two winters the class was taught by Dr Duncan, whose appointment, however, was only temporary. In 1776 the chair was again declared vacant, and on the 1st of August of that year Dr Gregory was appointed professor. He began to lecture on the Institutes the next winter session, and in the succeeding year he commenced also the duty of teacher of Clinical Medicine in the Royal Infirmary, and continued to deliver at least one course of clinical lectures annually, for more than twenty years.
From the time of commencing his duties as professor Dr Gregory was continually engaged in medical practice; but his practice amongst the higher ranks of society was not extensive until many of his pupils had been settled in bu-
siness, and were desirous of availing themselves of his assistance. For the last twenty-five years of his life he was much engaged in consulting practice; and for the last ten he was decidedly at the head of his profession in Scotland. Indeed, the boldness, originality, and strength of his intellect, and the energy and decision of his character, were so strongly marked in his conversation, that, wherever his professional character was known, it could hardly fail to inspire general confidence.
In 1778 he published his Conspectus Medicina Theoretica, as a text-book for his lectures on the Institutes. This work passed through several editions, both during his lifetime and since his death, and has been very generally admired, partly on account of the accurate view which it affords of the state of medical science at the period when it was composed, and partly for the ease, perspicuity, and elegance of its Latinity. The greater part of the work is occupied by the principles of Therapeutics; and as it must be confessed that there has been less improvement since that time in the investigation of the powers of remedies, than of the principles either of Physiology or Pathology, that portion of it may still be studied with advantage by all medical men.
On the illness of Dr Cullen in 1790, he was appointed joint-professor of the Practice of Medicine; he became sole professor on the death of Dr Cullen in the same year; and continued to deliver lectures on that subject, to audiences almost regularly increasing, until his last illness in 1821. He died on the 2d of April of that year.
As a practitioner and teacher of medicine, it may be stated that Dr Gregory was chiefly distinguished by his clear perception, and constant application, of the truth contained in a maxim which he was accustomed to quote from a favourite Greek author: "The best physician is he who can distinguish what he can do from what he cannot do." He distrusted all theories in regard to the intimate nature of diseased actions, as premature and visionary; but he had early and carefully studied the diagnostic and prognostic symptoms, and the various forms of the most important diseases, and the agency of the most powerful remedies; and, without entering into the minutiae of morbid anatomy, he had a clear understanding of the changes of structure to be apprehended from disease in the different internal parts of the body. On these points, and their immediate practical bearing, he fixed all his attention. When he thought that these changes were approaching, and could be arrested by active treatment, he urged the truly effectual remedies with the peculiar energy of his character; restrained only by his strong good sense and ample experience, and despising all parade of nicety, or variety of prescription. When he was satisfied that the nature or the stage of the disease did not admit of effectual cure, his decision of character was equally shown in abstaining from useless interference, and confining his views to the relief of suffering.
As a teacher, he was always strongly impressed with the duty of fixing the attention of his pupils on those points in the history of disease, and in the application of remedies, the knowledge of which he had found by experience to be most practically important, and the ignorance of which he thought practically dangerous. The characteristic symptoms and varieties of inflammatory diseases, and the extent to which the antiphlogistic treatment might be carried in opposing them, were, therefore, subjects on which he dwelt with peculiar earnestness; and in regard to the use of those remedies in such diseases, he had acquired, by long and keen observation, a tact and decision which probably were never surpassed. On the other hand, in regard to those numerous chronic diseases, where remedies are so frequently ineffectual, he was equally zealous in inculcating those means of prevention which he thought most effectual and most attainable; and whilst he was incredulous as to the alleged virtue of most medicines in such diseases,
Gregory. he omitted no opportunity of illustrating the efficacy of temperance, even of abstinence, of bodily exertion without fatigue, and mental occupation without anxiety, in averting their approach, or even arresting their progress. From these great practical objects of his labours as a teacher, no consideration ever turned him aside. His extensive reading, particularly of the older authors, never led to pedantic displays of learning; his logical acuteness never beguiled him into useless controversies; his fertility of imagination never carried him beyond the simplest and most practical views of the subjects of which he treated.
As a lecturer, he possessed the great advantages of a command of language, which made him almost independent of any written notes, and of a tenacity of memory which enabled him to detail cases, in illustration of his principles, year after year, from the whole range of his experience, merely from having the names of the patients before him, without the slightest inaccuracy or omission. The commanding energy and quickness of intellect which his lectures displayed, the frank and fearless exposition of his opinions which they contained, the classical allusions with which they abounded, and the genuine humour by which they were often enlivened, rendered them peculiarly attractive and interesting, and acquired for him a remarkable ascendancy over the minds of his pupils.
In the practice of the profession he was remarkable for the frankness and candour of his communications with the relations and friends of the sick; and for the zealous and even tender interest, always increasing with the difficulty and danger of the case, which he took in his patients. This made the more impression, as it contrasted with a certain roughness of external manner, and a constitutional hilarity and whimsical humour, which on some occasions, it must be owned, like that of a celebrated fictitious character, made him "not hesitate between his friend and his joke."
His conduct with his professional brethren in consultation was eminently distinguished by candour and liberality, and the total absence of all professional trick. He never attempted to make himself of importance, but was ever ready to give the strongest commendation to the treatment previously pursued, when he thought it judicious; always laying stress on the great and essential points of practice, and never giving an undue importance to favourite nostrums, or remedies of a secondary or frivolous kind. Thus the young practitioner, who was attentive to his duties, and honourable in his conduct, always found in him a zealous friend; those only had to dread coming into collision with him, who were wanting in professional zeal or professional integrity.
Dr Gregory's more intimate friends and connections were strongly attached to him on account of the warmth and steadiness of his attachments, of a generosity of disposition bordering on profusion, and of a high and somewhat aristocratic sense of honour, which made him instinctively shrink from any proceeding liable to the slightest imputation of meanness, selfishness, or duplicity.
He had therefore an utter detestation for all those professional arts by which the favour of the public is sometimes too successfully propitiated; and this was the true origin of various controversies in which he was at different times engaged with his professional brethren, and to which his strong sense of humour, his fondness for logical disputation, and (it must be confessed) a somewhat irascible temper, led him to devote more of his time and attention than their importance deserved. For the interests of the Medical School, and of the medical profession of Edinburgh, the continuance of these disputes was a matter of serious regret; but the feelings which led him to engage in them were too well understood and appreciated, to permit them to occasion him any loss, either of private friendships or of public estimation.
Gregory. No medical teacher or practitioner of eminence was ever more ready to acknowledge the imperfection of his art, more distrustful of medical theories, or even of the alleged results of medical practice, when not in accordance with his own experience; or more careless of posthumous reputation. But none was ever more solicitous to give, both to his pupils and his patients, the full benefit of those principles of medical science, of the truth and importance of which he was himself convinced; and on this account his professional character had assumed, long before his death, a superiority over most of his contemporaries, of which those who judge of it only from his own contributions to medical science or literature cannot form an adequate conception.
Dr Gregory used to say, that whilst physic had been the business, metaphysics had been the amusement, of his life. Of this predilection we have a highly honourable testimony, in Dr Reid's Dedication to him and to his illustrious friend Mr Dugald Stewart, of his Essays on the Intellectual Powers, published in 1785; and, at a much later period of his life, in the cordial friendship which united him with the late Dr Thomas Brown, and the warm interest which he took in the appointment of that eminent metaphysician to the Chair of Moral Philosophy, on Mr Stewart's resignation of it, and retirement from the University. It is proper to add, however, that on some important metaphysical questions the opinions of Dr Brown were different from those of Dr Gregory, and probably never were the subject of discussion between them.
His own metaphysical and literary works are, A Theory of the Moods of Verbs, published in the Edinburgh Philosophical Transactions for 1787; and his Literary and Philosophical Essays, in two volumes, published in 1792. The main object of the latter work was to explain and defend a new argument on the old controversy as to the liberty or necessity of human actions; and whatever may be thought of the soundness of the argument, no one has ever disputed the acuteness and power of logical reasoning which he displayed in defence of it. It must be admitted, however, that his ideas of metaphysical inquiry were in some respects limited. He regarded metaphysics rather as a field for syllogistic reasoning, than as a subject of inquiry directed to the establishment of general principles by induction; and one of his favourite doctrines, that metaphysics admit of no discoveries, if admitted as literally correct, would almost imply that the study can lead to no useful practical results.
He retained throughout life a fervent admiration for the classical authors, and a severe and somewhat fastidious taste in literature, which was formed on the classical models. Several of the lighter and controversial writings with which he amused himself, particularly his Memorials on certain changes in the arrangements of the Royal Infirmary in 1800 and 1803, exhibit very numerous examples of his ready recollection and happy application of quotations from the classics; and a number of Latin epitaphs and inscriptions of various kinds, which he composed at different periods of his life, attest an accuracy of knowledge of the Latin language, and a purity of taste in Latin composition, which few men have the faculty of retaining throughout a lifetime of incessant professional labour.
Dr Gregory was married in 1782, to Miss Mary Ross; but within a few months after her marriage, this lady, to the extreme regret of all her friends, became decidedly consumptive, and survived only two years. After her death her two sisters continued to reside with their brother-in-law, until they both successively sunk under the same cruel disease. In 1796, he married one of the daughters of the late Mr McLeod of Geanies, by whom he had a large family. His second son devoted himself with zeal and ability to the profession of medicine. He had entered on
Gregory practice, had already been placed in several responsible situations in Edinburgh, and distinguished himself by some papers on medical subjects, when he was unfortunately carried off by a fever contracted in the course of his duties in 1832. (W. P. A.)