Chapter IV: JOHN GREGORY (1724-1773), Scottish physician, grandson of James

Gregory (1638-1675) and youngest son of Dr James Gregory (d. 1731), professor of medicine in King's College, Aberdeen, was born at Aberdeen on the 3rd of June 1724. He received his early education at the grammar school of Aberdeen and at King's College in that city, and in 1741 he attended the medical classes at Edinburgh university. In 1745 he went to Leiden to complete his medical studies, and during his stay there he received without solicitation the degree of doctor of medicine from King's College, Aberdeen. On his return from Holland he was elected professor of philosophy at King's College, but in 1749 he resigned his professorship on account of its duties interfering too much with his private practice. In 1754 he proceeded to London, where he made the acquaintance of many persons of distinction, and the same year was chosen fellow of the Royal Society. On the death in November 1755 of his brother Dr James Gregory, who had succeeded his father as professor of medicine in King's College, Aberdeen, he was appointed to that office. In 1764 he removed to Edinburgh in the hope of obtaining a more extended field of practice as a physician, and in 1766 he was appointed professor of the practice of medicine in the university of Edinburgh, to whose eminence as a medical school he largely contributed. He died of gout on the 10th of February 1773.

He is the author of _A Comparative View of the State and Faculties of
Man with those of the Animal World_ (1765); _Observations on the
Duties, Offices and Qualifications of a Physician_ (1772); _Elements
of the Practice of Physic_ (1772); and _A Father's Legacy to his
Daughters_ (1774). _His Whole Works_, with a life by Mr Tytler
(afterwards Lord Woodhouselee), were published at Edinburgh in 1788.