CHAPMAN, J., — Herman Boerhaave M.D.

26x22cm, stipple engraved portrait of Herman Boerhaave M.D. by John Chapman (active 1792-1823), engraver, artist associated with 52 portraits. One of the most gifted stipple engravers of the late eighteenth century, relatively little is known of the life of John Chapman. He is thought to have been mostly self-taught. This portrait not in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery. Herman Boerhaave (31 December 1668 - 23 September 1738) was a Dutch botanist, chemist, Christian humanist, and physician of European fame. He is regarded as the founder of clinical teaching and of the modern academic hospital and is sometimes referred to as \"the father of physiology,\" along with Venetian physician Santorio Santorio (1561-1636). Boerhaave introduced the quantitative approach into medicine, along with his pupil Albrecht von Haller (1708-1777) and is best known for demonstrating the relation of symptoms to lesions. He was the first to isolate the chemical urea from urine. He was the first physician to put thermometer measurements to clinical practice. His motto was Simplex sigillum veri: 'Simplicity is the sign of the truth'. He is often hailed as the \"Dutch Hippocrates\". Published London, by J. Wilkes, December 8, 1798.