Het Nut der Mechanistische Methode in de Geneeskunde

In the great hall of Leiden University, a distinguished professor steps to the podium in September 1703, addressing the university’s curators, statesmen and civic leaders. He opens with a reverent acknowledgement of the audience before launching into a bold defence of the “mechanistic method” – the idea that the forces governing bodies can be described by their mass, shape and motion, just as a physicist would calculate them. The lecture is rooted in the Enlightenment belief that mathematics can illuminate the hidden workings of nature, and it frames medicine as a science that should be no different.

Boerhaave argues that physicians who ignore these principles are denying a powerful tool that already benefits civil and military engineering. He presents the mechanistic approach as simple yet profound, promising clearer diagnoses and more predictable treatments. Delivered in plain language without ornate rhetoric, the speech invites listeners to reconsider how the laws of motion might reshape the practice of healing.