The Doctor Will Fleece You Now

Richard Steele goes to Bath for his health, and is cured of more ailments than he had ever had in his life.

1713

Queen Anne 1702-1714

Introduction

Eighteenth-century Bath was a fashionable spa city to which the Quality would retire for ‘the cure’. However, the health-giving waters were seemingly not enough by themselves, and doctors clustered round with all the medical treatments visitors could possibly want or need — plus a good many more.

by Sir Richard Steele 1672-1729

THE physicians here are very numerous, but very good-natured. To these charitable gentlemen I owe, that I was cured, in a week’s time, of more distempers than I ever had in my life. They had almost killed me with their humanity. A learned fellow-lodger prescribed me a little something, at my first coming, to keep up my spirits; and the next morning I was so much enlivened by another, as to have an order to bleed for my fever.* I was proffered a cure for the scurvy by a third, and had a recipe for the dropsy gratis before night.

In vain did I modestly decline these favours; for I was awakened early in the morning by an apothecary, who brought me a dose from one of my well-wishers. I paid him, but withal told him severely, that I never took physic. My landlord hereupon took me for an Italian merchant that suspected poison; but the apothecary, with more sagacity, guessed that I was certainly a physician myself.*

by Sir Richard Steele 1672-1729

From an essay in ‘The Guardian’, No. 174 (September 30th, 1713), by Sir Richard Steele (1672-1729).

Blood-letting involved drawing blood from the arm in the hope that as the body internally replenished the supply the infected system would be purified. It was a risky and almost certainly useless procedure.

Implying that the apothecary (an archaic term for a pharmacist) and the doctors all knew the remedies were useless. In fact Sir Richard Steele (1672-1729) was neither a paranoid Italian nor a cynical MD, but an Irish essayist, soldier and playwright, born in Dublin. Together with his friend Joseph Addison he founded ‘The Tatler’ in 1709, ‘The Spectator’ in 1711 and ‘The Guardian’ (not the newspaper) two years later. He was MP for Stockbridge in Hampshire from 1713, and campaigned for George of Hanover to succeed Queen Anne; when he did so the following year, Steele was rewarded with a knighthood and responsibility for the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. He was elected MP for Boroughbridge, North Yorkshire, in 1715.

Précis

On a visit to the fashionable spa town of Bath in the reign of Queen Anne, Richard Steele found himself plied with medicines by the many doctors who shared his lodgings. Steele politely refused to take any of them, from which the pharmacist who delivered them to his rooms deduced that Steele must himself be a doctor.

Questions for Critics

1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?

2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate his ideas more effectively?

3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?

Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.

Sevens

Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.

For which disease was Steele offered a cure free of charge?

Suggestion

For dropsy, before only his second night.

Jigsaws

Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.

Richard Steele arrived in Bath. A doctor prescribed him a pick-me-up.