In his Lectures on the Duties and Qualifications of a Physician (1770) Doctor John Gregory sympathized with students who were forced to study medical history, claiming, ‘It is indeed an unpleasant task, and, at first view, seems a useless one, to enquire into the numerous theories that have influenced the practice of physic in different ages’. Nevertheless, he maintained, the subject did have some redeeming value; certain forgotten historical remedies could have real therapeutic importance, and the study of ‘fanciful hypotheses’ adopted by physicians of earlier ages could encourage modern practitioners to be more discerning in their own adherence to new medical theories. To historians, the study of medical history has yet a greater significance. As Gregory noted in his earlier publication, A Comparative View of the State and Faculties of Man with Those of the Animal World (1765), doctors create medical theories by drawing upon all avenues of knowledge. Consequently, Gregory explained, ‘the history of Medicine does not so much exhibit the history of a progressive art, as a history of opinions’. As many historians have argued, when viewed in a cultural context, medical theory can tell us much about the ideas, beliefs and prejudices of the society in which it was born. Nervous disease – including the conditions of hysteria, hypochondria and melancholy – has proven a virtual goldmine for historians who have successfully proven its relationship to larger themes including fashion, literature, gender and class.