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THOMAS BEDDOES (1760-1808)

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Originally appearing in Volume V03, Page 614 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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THOMAS See also:BEDDOES (1760-1808)  , See also:English physician and scientific writer, was See also:born at Shiffnall in See also:Shropshire on the 13th of See also:April 176o . After being educated at See also:Bridgnorth See also:grammar school and at See also:Pembroke See also:College, See also:Oxford, he studied See also:medicine in See also:London under See also:John See also:Sheldon (1752-1808) . In 1784 he published a See also:translation of L . See also:Spallanzani's See also:Dissertations on Natural See also:History, and in 1785 produced a translation, with See also:original notes, of T . O . See also:Bergman's Essays on Elective Attractions . He took his degree of See also:doctor of medicine at Oxford in 1786, and, after visiting See also:Paris, where he became acquainted with See also:Lavoisier, was appointed reader in See also:chemistry at Oxford University in 1788 . His lectures attracted large and appreciative audiences; but his sympathy with the See also:French Revolution exciting a clamour against him, he resigned his readership in 1792 . In the following See also:year he published Observations on the Nature of See also:Demonstrative See also:Evidence, and the History of See also:Isaac See also:Jenkins, a See also:story which powerfully exhibits the evils of See also:drunkenness, and of which 40,000 copies are reported to have been sold . About the same See also:time he began to See also:work at his project for the See also:establishment of a " Pneumatic Institution " for treating disease by the inhalation of different gases . In this he was assisted by See also:Richard See also:Lovell See also:Edgeworth, whose daughter, See also:Anna, became his wife in 1794 . In 1798 the institution was established at See also:Clifton, its first See also:superintendent being See also:Humphry See also:Davy, who investigated the properties of nitrous See also:oxide in its laboratory .

The original aim of the institution was gradually abandoned; it became an See also:

ordinary sick-See also:hospital, and was relinquished by its projector in the year before his See also:death, which occurred on the 24th of See also:December ,8o8 . See also:Beddoes was a See also:man of See also:great See also:powers and wide acquirements, which he directed to See also:noble and philanthropic purposes . He strove to effect social See also:good by popularizing medical knowledge, a work for which his vivid See also:imagination and glowing eloquence eminently fitted him . Be-sides the writings mentioned above, he was the author of See also:Political See also:Pamphlets (1795-1797), a popular See also:Essay on See also:Consumption (1799), which won the admiration of See also:Kant, an Essay on See also:Fever (1807), and Hygeia, or Essays Moral and Medical (1807) . He also edited John See also:Brown's Elements of Medicine (1795), and Contributions to See also:Physical and Medical Knowledge, principally from the See also:West of See also:England (1799) . A See also:life of Beddoes by Dr John E . Stock was published in 181o .

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