Dr. Henry Sampson (ca. 1629-1700)

The intellectual geography of Henry Sampson, ejected fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge, and silenced rector of Framlingham, Suffolk, reached far beyond the borders of Anglo-Dutch dissent. Turning to medicine, Sampson studied at the Italian University of Padua (near Venice), where he matriculated on 27 August 1666, before transferring to the Dutch University of Leiden via Schaffhausen (near Zurich) in 1667. Sampson entered Leiden University on 30 December 1667. He was inscribed in the matriculation register as 35 years old, a student of medicine, and living with Domine Matthew Newcomen op de Papengracht, a canal (by then filled in) parallel with part of the Rapenburg, one of the town’s principal canals, or grachten, on which the main university building (Academiegebouw) is located. Together with fellow Bartholomeans such as Robert Brinsley, Edward Hulse, and George Long, Sampson studied iatrochemistry with Franciscus Sylvius, botany with Florentius Schuyl, and anatomy and surgery with Johannes van Horne.

From Leiden Sampson shared the latest Dutch medical ideas and practices with the Swiss physician Johann Jakob Wepfer, with whom he had studied in Schaffhausen as a private student. Sampson also exchanged praxeos medicae idea nova with Johann von Muralt, who, after studying in Switzerland, Holland, England, and France, went on to become professor of medicine at the University of Zurich. Muralt finished his studies in medicine at Leiden one month before Sampson, with whom he remained closely connected for the rest of the century.

After seven months of medical training at Leiden, Sampson produced a doctoral thesis on chemical processes. As a student of Sylvius, Sampson proposed to cure contraries by contraries, Contraria Contrariis Curari, a title no doubt drawn from Hippocrates. Published by the printer to the university, the thesis had a traditional format, although its length made it one of the thicker contemporary theses. Printed in closely spaced Latin, this quarto consisted of twenty-two pages of text divided into thirty-seven propositions that he publicly defended before the Senatus Academicus. Sampson dedicated his dissertation to Newcomen, with whom he lodged, and professors van Horne and Sylvius, who influenced his medical practice. Johannes Cocceius, professor of theology at Leiden and Rector Magnificus of the University that year, seems to have had little to do with this thesis other than to chair the promotion committee. Sampson passed his medical exam on 28 June and, after a public defence, was promoted doctor of medicine on Thursday, 12 July 1668.

Sampson's letter to Dr. Wepfer, dated Feb. 19/29, 1668, is attached below. I came across his letter during the course of my studies at Leiden University, Department of Special Collections. How might a primary source such as this be used in a high school history course? And for what purpose(s)?