Chapter XI: Pearson’s Examination.128

A few weeks after the award of £10,000 to Jenner by the House of Commons, Dr. Pearson published _An Examination_ of the report of the committee. He did not contest Jenner’s claim to consideration, but the ground on which it was advanced, and on which it was conceded; drawing attention to the manner in which the claims set forth in Jenner’s petition had been reduced to “inoculation from one human being to another,” whilst a new claim was invented for him, “to wit, the mode of transferring, indefinitely, the vaccine matter without any diminution of its specific power.”

What Pearson held, and rightly held, was, that the public acceptance of the New Inoculation was due to Woodville and himself, and not to Jenner--

The Cowpock Inoculation (after Dr. Jenner’s book was published
in June, 1798, which contained seven or eight cases, the whole
result of his experience) was not practised by any person that I
know of, till January, 1799, neither Dr. Jenner, nor any person
that I could find being in possession of matter; but, in January,
1799, in consequence of a general inquiry, which I had instituted
immediately after Jenner’s publication, information was given
of the Cowpock Disease breaking out in two Cow-stables near
London, and from these sources Dr. Woodville and myself collected
matter, by which, in the course of three months, 300 persons (not
fewer, I think) were inoculated for the Cowpock in addition to
the seven or eight cases of Dr. Jenner, then the whole stock of
facts of Inoculation before the public. Besides carrying on the
Inoculation ourselves in this manner, we disseminated the matter
throughout the country, in particular to Dr. Jenner himself; and
especially, I within that time issued a printed letter, directed
to upwards of two hundred practitioners in different parts of
the kingdom, containing thread impregnated with the Cowpock
matter.... By the close of 1799 about 4000 persons had been
inoculated by Dr. Woodville, myself, and our correspondents.

Pearson also claimed to have cleared away difficulties created by Jenner’s statements, some of which were most prejudicial to the public acceptance of the New Inoculation--

I published experiments of inoculating persons with the Cowpock
to show that _they could not take the Cowpock after the
Smallpox_, contrary to Dr. Jenner. Secondly, experiments to
show that persons could not take the Cowpock who had already
gone through the Cowpock, also contrary to Dr. Jenner.[129]
Thirdly, many persons had at this period made experiments to
show that _the Cowpox did not originate in the grease of Horses’
heels_, as Dr. Jenner had asserted. In the spring of 1799, a
second publication appeared from Dr. Jenner recommending caustic
or escharotics to the inoculated parts in Cowpox, which we
found wholly unnecessary in practice; and I consider that the
distinctive characters of the Cowpock were better understood by
some of us than by Dr. Jenner himself.

One can only say of these statements of Pearson as against Jenner, that they are simple matters of fact, impugn them whoso list. It is impossible to controvert Pearson’s assertion--

That the whole of Jenner’s experience extended to seven or eight
cases, and a part only of these--namely, four--were from human
subject to human subject; and not until long after Dr. Woodville
and myself had published several hundred instances of vaccine
virus transmitted from arm to arm, had he any experiments to set
alongside ours.

They had to find out for themselves when to take virus from the cow, how to preserve it when taken, how to dress inoculated arms, when to take virus from the arm, and, in short, to do everything that constitutes the difference between a suggestion and an art.

Pearson, too, as we have seen, had a leading part in the formation of the first Institution for the Inoculation of the Vaccine Pock, with which Jenner had not only nothing to do, but _would_ have nothing to do: concerning which wrote Pearson--

The Vaccine Inoculation was next considerably established by
the Cowpock Institution, of which I was one of the founders,
commencing at the close of 1799; which Institution has been the
principal office for the supplying the world in general, and the
Army and Navy in particular, with matter; and where a regular
register is kept of each of the cases inoculated.

As to Jenner keeping the secret of Cowpox and making a great fortune out of it, Pearson replied, first, that he had not proved his remedy; second, that he would have had to persuade the public to believe in him; and, third, that too much was known about Cowpox to have made a secret possible. Moreover, the assertion that he might have earned £10,000 a year and a fortune of £150,000 was absurd--

Such a fortune no one ever acquired by physic in this or any
other country--far exceeding the greatest ever known, those of
Sir Theodore Mayerne in the first half of the 17th century, and
of the still greater one of Dr. Ratcliffe in the early part of
last century.

When it was further said, that experiments in Vaccine Inoculation had occupied twenty years of Jenner’s life, that they had cost him £6000, and that he had surrendered a practice of £600 a year in the populous neighbourhood of Berkeley for the public benefit--he would not trust himself to characterise the allegations.

His own position, Pearson thus defined--

I have admitted that Dr. Jenner first set on foot the inquiry
into the advantages of Vaccine Inoculation; but I apprehend
that the practice has been established almost entirely by other
practitioners; and that his new facts, or which I consider to be
new, have been, in my opinion, disproved by subsequent observers;
and that in consequence of those facts being disproved, together
with the very ample experiences of other persons, we owe the
present extensive practice of the Vaccine Inoculation.

Pearson further indicated on what conditions he would have been satisfied to see Jenner rewarded--

A much more dignified and more just ground of claim, and an
equally favourable one for remuneration, would have been in
terms denoting that the Petitioner had proposed a new kind of
Inoculation, and actually furnished some instances of the success
of it, founded upon facts; of which some were brought to light
and use, which heretofore had only been locally known to a very
small number of persons; and others were discoveries of the
Author: further, that in consequence of considerable subsequent
investigation, by the Author and others, such a body of evidence
had been obtained, and such further facts had been discovered, as
demonstrated the advantages of the new practice.

Whilst willing that Jenner should be rewarded, for Woodville and for himself, Pearson wanted nothing: he simply maintained that the judgment of the House of Commons Committee should have recognised the facts of the situation. He observed--

I have some authority for stating that the members of the
Committee _did not unanimously_ think such exclusive claims were
just. I had some reason to expect that the representation of
the Committee in their Report would have been such as to have
satisfied the expectations, not exorbitant, of Dr. Woodville
and myself; such as would have cost the Petitioner nothing, _to
wit_, a mere acknowledgment of services. The most unqualified and
exclusive claims having been decreed, this bounty of course has
been withheld, either because it was judged to be not owing, or
from some other motive which I will not name; but it is fitting
that I disclaim any insinuation of unworthy motives actuating
those with whom judgment was invested.

Considering the injustice to which Pearson had been subjected, and the provocation he had received, it is impossible to refrain from admiration of the serene and impartial temper in which he composed his _Examination_. Had he sat as judge between Jenner and himself, he could not have stated the case with greater accuracy and absence of bias. He fell into no exaggeration; he indulged in no sarcasm; he descended to no abuse. He set forth the incidents of the New Inoculation with the imperial simplicity and dignity of truth. Where others had gone crazed, he preserved some degree of sanity. He held it to be premature to proclaim the extinction of Smallpox, or to say with Jenner that reports of failure and injury from inoculated Cowpox were beneath contempt. It was only time and experience that could warrant such absolute assertion and prediction.

It is said that in hurricanes of panic or enthusiasm, wise men go home and keep quiet until the sky clears, resistance being folly. For immediate effect resistance may be folly, but the protest of truth is sometimes imperative, whatever the disposition of the mob. Pearson took little at the time by his _Examination_: it entered into far too many details for general apprehension; and it was convenient to account for his opposition as due to jealousy and envy. Jenner attempted no reply, and assumed profound disdain. His silence was judicious, but it was not from disdain.

* * * * *

At this day it is easy to see that Pearson as against Jenner played his part badly, failing to recognise his proper advantage. Jenner’s prescription in the _Inquiry_ of 1798 was not Cowpox. It was Horsegrease Cowpox. It was a disease of the horse inoculated on the cow. Cowpox _per se_ he expressly rejected as useless, having no specific effect on the human constitution. Pearson and Woodville entertained Jenner’s prescription in good faith. They tried to generate pox on the cow with grease from the horse, but did not succeed. Reluctantly they abandoned Jenner’s prescription, and resorted to Cowpox.

Whilst Pearson and Woodville were without prejudice against Horsegrease Cowpox, it was otherwise with the public. The origin of Cowpox in Horsegrease was voted detestable, and had the origin been maintained, it is not improbable that the New Inoculation would have proved abortive.

This difficulty Pearson and Woodville, the chief promoters of the New Inoculation, cleared away. They had tried Horsegrease; they considered they had disproved Jenner’s assertion concerning it; and they were able to assure the public that they inoculated with Cowpox, and nothing but Cowpox, and had no connection with Horsegrease whatever. The public were satisfied; and Inoculation with Cowpox became the rage, fashionable and philanthropic.

What did Jenner do? Did he vindicate his prescription, the fruit of thirty years of incessant thought, observation and experiment? He did not. On the contrary he dropped it. He said not another word about it; and proceeded to claim Cowpox as employed by Pearson and Woodville as his discovery. In his petition to Parliament there was no mention of Horsegrease Cowpox; but Cowpox, with “its beneficial effect of rendering the persons inoculated therewith perfectly secure through life from the infection of Smallpox,” was set forth as the result of his most attentive and laborious investigation at the sacrifice of time, money, and professional advancement. We have to recollect that Jenner was inspired with what he called “the fond hope of enjoying independence,” and he was not slow to recognise, that if he stood by Horsegrease Cowpox his “fond hope” would be wrecked. The statement may seem incredible, but the fact of the transformation is manifest at large to any one who will take the trouble to compare Jenner’s _Inquiry_ of 1798 with his Petition to the House of Commons in 1802.

Pearson failed to arrest the imposture. He might have said to Jenner, “Your discovery was not Cowpox: that was well known to every dairymaid in your neighbourhood. Your prescription was Horsegrease Cowpox. You condemned Cowpox, which Cowpox has nevertheless been brought into use by Woodville and me. Keep to your Horsegrease Cowpox; make what you can of it; and leave us alone.”

Had Pearson taken this course, he would have fixed Jenner to his discovery, such as it was, and have clearly defined and established his own and Woodville’s service in rendering the New Inoculation practicable and popular. But he failed to draw a firm line between Woodville and himself and Jenner, and to insist that they were operating, not only with a different pox, but with a form of pox by him rejected as useless. Through this default, he enabled Jenner to intrude into a province that was not his own, and to reap where he had not sown, and gather where he had not strawed. It is to be admitted that the facts as stated were all involved in Pearson’s _Examination_, but they were _involved_, and required picking out and sharper definition to give them effect. Truth is truth, but truth to have its rightful influence has to be made plain. It is of little avail to have a good cause at law if the means are wanting to place its goodness manifest and paramount over contention to the contrary.

This, too, may be observed: Pearson was not in condition to offer the manner of resistance specified. To have turned Jenner’s flank, it would have been necessary to discredit Cowpox; and Pearson was committed to Cowpox. Jenner had been familiar from youth with the dairymaids’ faith in Cowpox. Why then did he not advertise its virtue? Because it had been proved to him that the dairymaids’ confidence was illusory. His recommendation of Horsegrease Cowpox attested his distrust in Cowpox. If Pearson had asked himself, What induced Jenner to set aside Cowpox for Horsegrease Cowpox? the answer would have revealed to him a whole series of facts to the discredit of that prophylaxy of which he and Woodville had constituted themselves advocates. Thus, fettered by his own prepossession, Pearson was unable to deal effectually with Jenner without incurring a disenchantment fatal to his own enterprise.

* * * * *

When we recognise that Jenner’s prescription was a disease of the horse communicated to the cow, which Pearson and Woodville set aside for Cowpox, the controversy as to the originator of the use of Cowpox for inoculation loses significance. We have to assert peremptorily that Jenner had no claim to the use of Cowpox whatever. It is true that he advanced the claim in his _Origin of the Vaccine Inoculation_ in 1801, and in his Petition to Parliament in 1802; but those who refer to his _Inquiry_ of 1798 will require no further proof of his mendacity. That his claim to the use of Cowpox was entertained can only be ascribed to that indolence, ineptitude and ignorance on the part of the world whereon quacks presume and prosper.

It was Pearson and Woodville, I once more repeat, who diffused and popularised Cowpox; and Pearson’s inquiries left no doubt that the faith in Cowpox as a preventive of Smallpox was widely entertained; and that the substitution of Cowpox for Smallpox in inoculation was a mere question of time and accident. Mr. Downe of Bridport informed Pearson that a surgeon in his neighbourhood suffered discredit in practice because it was reported that he inoculated with Cowpox instead of Smallpox; and the papers of Mr. Nash, surgeon, of Shaftesbury proved that in 1781 he had the project of Cowpox Inoculation distinctly before him. The evidence of Benjamin Jesty, farmer of Downshay in the Isle of Purbeck, has usually been taken as most conclusive in relation to the immanence of the New Inoculation in the common mind. Jesty was invited to London by the conductors of the Original Vaccine Pock Institution, 44 Broad Street, Golden Square; and in August, 1805, they had him with his wife and two sons under examination. In their report[130] it is said--

We think it a matter of justice to Mr. Jesty, and beneficial to
the public, to attest, that among other facts he has afforded
decisive evidence of his having vaccinated his wife and two sons,
Robert and Benjamin, in the year 1774; who were thereby rendered
insusceptible of the Smallpox, as appears from the frequent
exposure of all three to that disorder during the course of 31
years, and from the inoculation of the two sons for the Smallpox
15 years ago.

It is to be observed that insusceptibility to Smallpox was by no means infrequent apart from Cowpox; and as fear of Smallpox predisposes to attack, so, on the other hand, confidence in security, whether by Cowpox or other charm, would tend to exemption.

Jesty’s reasons for his experiment were thus specified--

He was led to undertake the novel practice in 1774 to counteract
the Smallpox, at that time prevalent at Yetminster, from
knowing the common opinion of the country ever since he was a
boy (now 60 years ago) that persons who had gone through the
Cowpock naturally, that is to say by taking it from cows, were
insusceptible of the Smallpox.

By himself being incapable of taking the Smallpox, having gone
through the Cowpock many years before.

From knowing many individuals who after the Cowpock could not
have the Smallpox excited.

From believing that the Cowpock was an affection free from
danger; and from his opinion that by the Cowpock Inoculation
he should avoid engrafting various diseases of the human
constitution, such as “the Evil, madness, lues, and many bad
humours,” as he called them.

In these reasons we have the Cowpox doctrine as prevalent in Dorsetshire, which Jesty developed in family practice. The report proceeds--

The remarkably vigorous health of Mr. Jesty, his wife, and two
sons, now 31 years subsequent to the Cowpock, and his own healthy
appearance, at this time 70 years of age, afford a singularly
strong proof of the harmlessness of that affection; but the
public must, with particular interest, hear that during the late
visit to town, Mr. Robert Jesty submitted publicly to inoculation
for the Smallpox in the most rigorous manner; and that Mr. Jesty
also was subjected to the trial of inoculation for the Cowpock
after the most efficacious mode, without either of them being
infected.

It is curious how evidence conforms to prepossession. Dr. Pearson and his associates were persuaded that as no one could have Smallpox twice, neither could any one have Cowpox twice. Jesty had Cowpox when young, and when at three score they found him insusceptible, they took it for granted that re-vaccination was impossible. Robert Jesty, who had Cowpox thirty-one years before was at the same time inoculated with Smallpox, and as that likewise failed to take, the experiment enforced the desired conclusion.

Having turned out so well, praise and portraiture were bestowed on Jesty--

The circumstances in which Mr. Jesty purposely instituted the
Vaccine Pock Inoculation in his own family, namely, without
any precedent, but merely from reasoning upon the nature of
the affection among cows, and from knowing its effects in the
casual way among men, his exemption from the prevailing popular
prejudices, and his disregard of the clamorous reproaches of his
neighbours, will entitle him, in our opinion, to the respect
of the public for his superior strength of mind. Further, his
conduct in again furnishing such decisive proofs of the permanent
anti-variolous efficacy of the Cowpock, in the present [1805]
discontented state of mind in many families, by submitting to
Inoculation, justly claims at least the gratitude of the country.

As a testimony of our personal regard, and to commemorate so
extraordinary a fact as that of preventing the Smallpox by
inoculating for the Cowpock 31 years ago, at our request, a
three-quarter length picture of Mr. Jesty is painted by that
excellent artist, Mr. Sharp, to be preserved at the Original
Vaccine Pock Institution.

GEO. PEARSON, }
LAW. NIHELL, } _Physicians_.
THOS. NELSON, }

T. KEATE, } _Consulting
T. FOSTER, } Surgeons_.

J. C. CARPUE, }
J. DORATT, } _Surgeons_.

FRAS. RIVERS, }
EV. A. BRANDE, } _Visiting
PH. DE BRUYN, } Apothecaries_.

JOHN HEAVISIDE, }
THOMAS PAYNE, } _Treasurers_.

WILLIAM SANCHO, _Secretary_.

_6th September, 1805._

In the church-yard of Worth Matravers, Dorset, there is a grave-stone with this inscription--

SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF
BENJAMIN JESTY, OF DOWNSHAY,
WHO DEPARTED THIS LIFE
APRIL 16TH, 1816, AGED 79 YEARS.

He was born at Yetminster, in this County, and was an upright
honest man, particularly noted for having been the first person
known that introduced

THE COWPOX BY INOCULATION,

and who, from his great strength of mind, made the experiment
from the Cow on his Wife and two Sons in the year 1774.

Jesty is frequently played off against Jenner, as having anticipated him, but under a misapprehension. Jesty inoculated with Cowpox, sharing the dairymaids’ faith that it prevented Smallpox. Jenner knew that the dairymaids were wrong, and that Cowpox did not avert Smallpox. What he recommended was Cowpox produced by Horsegrease. Pearson and Woodville disregarded Jenner’s recommendation and made use of Cowpox like Jesty, which substitution Jenner did not resist; and not only did not resist, but claimed as the fulfilment of his programme! Jenner should never be suffered to get mixed up with Jesty, and the course of his procedure be thereby obscured.

I am explicit to iteration because the truth is not recognised and may be accounted incredible. In another way the facts may be thrown into relief if we inquire, How would Jenner have fared had he applied for a patent? Suppose his several publications were submitted to a patent-agent, In what manner could a tenable specification be evolved from these materials?

1798.--_The Inquiry._ { Prescribes Horsegrease
{ Cowpox.

{ Slackens off from
{ Horsegrease Cowpox;
{ ascribes its
1799.--_Further Observations._ { efficacy to common
1800.--_Continuation of Observations._ { repute; and recommends
{ escharotics to arrest
{ its virulence.

{ Claim of discovery and
1801.--_Origin of Vaccine Inoculation._ { use of Cowpox, previously
1802.--Petition to Parliament. { condemned as spurious,
{ and Horsegrease Cowpox
{ dropped.

By no ingenuity could a valid patent be got out of these documents. If Horsegrease Cowpox were selected as the basis of claim, what of the repudiation of Cowpox? and if Cowpox, what of Horsegrease Cowpox? And if Horsegrease Cowpox, what of the ascription of its virtue to common repute? And if Cowpox, was not the committee of the House of Commons in 1802 compelled to disallow Jenner’s claim to the discovery, and to define and limit his merit to the propagation of its virus from arm to arm? It was, however, Pearson and Woodville who first propagated Cowpox from arm to arm: Jenner’s start being made with Horsegrease Cowpox. But allowing him so much credit, it is nevertheless to be remembered that it was at that time a frequent practice to inoculate with Smallpox from arm to arm; and the substitution of Cowpox for Smallpox was a trifle for which to pay £10,000 and dissolve in ecstasies of admiration.

FOOTNOTES:

[128] _An Examination of the Report of the Committee of the House of Commons on the Claims of Remuneration for the Vaccine Pock Inoculation: containing a Statement of the Principal Historical Facts of the Vaccinia._ By George Pearson, M.D., F.R.S. London, 1802. 8vo. Pp. 196.

[129] Such was the logic, but such was not the fact. If no one could have Smallpox twice, and if inoculated Cowpox was equivalent to Smallpox, no one could have Cowpox twice. Such was the argument. Pearson did not foresee its systematic refutation exemplified in Re-Vaccination, septennial, triennial, annual.

[130] _Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal_, October, 1805. P. 513.