Domestic Medicine: Or, A Treatise on the Prevention and Cure of Diseases by Regimen and Simple Medicines.

BUCHAN, William [William Safire].

$300.00

Item Number: 129584

London: Printed for A. Strahan; T. Caldwell and W. Davies, Strand; and J. Balfour, and W. Creech, Edinburgh, 1803.

Early printing of the book that brought detailed descriptions of the causes and prevention of diseases to the domestic home for the first time. Octavo, bound in three quarter morocco with gilt ruling to the spine in six compartments within raised gilt bands, red morocco spine label lettered in gilt. Title page, advertisement and preface supplied in facsimile. From the library of William Safire, although not marked. William Safire was an important American author, columnist, journalist, and presidential speechwriter. He joined Nixon’s campaign for the 1960 Presidential race, and again in 1968. After Nixon’s 1968 victory, Safire served as a speechwriter for him and Spiro Agnew. He authored several political columns in addition to his weekly column “On Language” in The New York Times Magazine from 1979 until the month of his death and authored two books on grammar and linguistics: The New Language of Politics (1968) and what Zimmer called Safire’s “magnum opus,” Safire’s Political Dictionary. Safire later served as a member of the Pulitzer Prize Board from 1995 to 2004 and in 2006 was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George W. Bush. In good condition.

Published in 1769, Domestic Medicine was printed in Britain until 1846 and in the Americas until 1913. Catherine the Great, Czar of Russia, was so impressed by the work that she sent Buchan a gold medal and personal letter. It was the first text of its kind. Previous to Buchan's work, most medical texts either were theoretical and written for the more educated, or were short manuals not descriptive enough to help diagnose illnesses. A combination of these two styles, Domestic Medicine was written in lay terms in order to reach a wider audience. It described the diseases and treatments thoroughly enough to allow people to create cures themselves. Only Swiss physician Samuel-Auguste Tissot’s Avis au peuple was of similar style, and Buchan acknowledged it influenced his writing.