George Berkeley was born in 1685 in Kilkenny county, Ireland, but
claimed to be of English extraction. He graduated at Trinity College,
Dublin, and became a Fellow of that College. His metaphysical
speculations made him famous. He was the originator of the view that
the actual existence of matter was not capable of proof. Having been
appointed Dean of Derry he was well provided for, but just then he
became enthusiastically desirous to convert and civilise the North
American Indians. With this object in view he proposed to establish
a University at Bermuda to train students for the work. He got some
college friends to join him, collected about £5,000 from wealthy
supporters, and after long negotiations persuaded the House of Commons
to recommend George I. to grant him a contribution of £20,000 which
never came. It was during that time that he learned of the medicinal
efficacy of tar water from some of the Indian tribes whom he visited.
Some time after his return he was made Bishop of Cloyne, and worked
indefatigably in his diocese. A terrible winter in 1739-40 caused
great distress and was followed by an epidemic of small-pox. It was
then that the Bishop remembered his American experiences. He gave tar
water as a remedy and tar water as a prophylactic, with the result,
as he reported, that those who took the disease had it very mildly if
they had taken tar water. Convinced of its value he gave it in other
illnesses with such success that with characteristic enthusiasm he
came to believe that he had discovered a panacea. Some reports of this
treatment had been published in certain magazines, but in the spring
of 1744 a little book by the Bishop appeared giving a full account of
his experiences. It was entitled “A Chain of Philosophical Reflections
and Enquiries concerning the virtues of Tar Water, and divers other
subjects connected together and arising one from another.” The treatise
was eagerly read and discussed both in Ireland and England. A second
edition was required in a few weeks, and to this the author gave the
short title “Siris” (Greek for chain).
[Illustration: BERKELEY.
(From the British Museum.)
]
The Bishop’s theory was an attractive one. The pine trees he argued,
had accumulated from the sunlight and the air a large proportion of the
vital element of the universe, and condensed it in the tar which they
yielded. The vital element could be drawn off by water and conveyed to
the human organism.
It is not necessary here to follow out his chain of reasoning from
the vital element in tar up to the Supreme Mind from which that vital
principle emanated. On the way the author quoted freely and effectively
from Plato and Pythagoras, from Theophrastus and Pliny, from Boerhaave
and Boyle, and from many other authorities. He showed how the balsams
and resins of the ancient world were of the same nature as tar. Van
Helmont said, “Whoever can make myrrh soluble by the human body has the
secret of prolonging his days,” and Boerhaave had recognised that there
was truth in this remark on account of the anti-putrefactive power of
the myrrh. This was the power which tar possessed in so large a degree.
Homberg had made gold by introducing the vital element in the form of
light into the pores of mercury. The process was too expensive to make
the production of gold by this means profitable, but the fact showed an
analogy with the concentration of the same element in the tar.
Berkeley’s process for making the tar water was simply to pour 1 gallon
of cold water on a quart of tar; stir it with a wooden ladle for five
or six minutes, and then set the vessel aside for three days and
nights to let the tar subside. The water was then to be drawn off and
kept in well-stoppered bottles. Ordinarily half a pint might be taken
fasting morning and night, but to cure disease much larger doses might
be given. It had proved of extraordinary value not only in small-pox,
but also in eruptions and ulcers, ulceration of the bowels and of the
lungs, consumptive cough, pleurisy, dropsy, and gravel. It greatly
aided digestion, and consequently prevented gout. It was a remedy in
all inflammatory disorders and fevers. It was a cordial which cheered,
warmed, and comforted, with no injurious effects.
The nation went wild over this discovery. “The Bishop of Cloyne has
made tar water as fashionable as Vauxhall or Ranelagh,” wrote Duncombe.
The Bishop’s book was translated into most of the European languages,
and tar water attained some degree of popularity on the Continent.
It owed no little of its success in this country to the opposition
it met with from medical writers. The public at once concluded that
they were very anxious about their “kitchen prospects,” to use the
symbolism of Paracelsus. Every attack on tar water called forth several
replies. Berkeley himself responded to some of the criticisms by very
poor verses, which he got a friend to send to the journals with strict
injunctions to keep his name secret.
Paris in “Pharmacologia” refers to the tar water mania, asking “What
but the spell of authority could have inspired a general belief that
the sooty washings of rosin would act as a universal remedy?” It need
hardly be pointed out that the general belief was rather a revolt
against authority than an acceptance of it.
Dr. Young, the author of “Night Thoughts,” wrote: “They who have
experienced the wonderful effects of tar water reveal its excellences
to others. I say reveal, because they are beyond what any can
conceive by reason or natural light. But others disbelieve them
though the revelation is attested past all scruple, because to them
such excellences are incomprehensible. Now give me leave to say that
this infidelity may possibly be as fatal to morbid bodies as other
infidelity is to morbid souls. I say this in honest zeal for your
welfare. I am confident if you persist you’ll be greatly benefited by
it. In old obstinate, chronical complaints, it probably will not show
its virtue under three months; though secretly it is doing good all the
time.”