To Benjamin Franklin from Joseph Philip, [before 28 December 1780]
From Joseph Philip8
D:9 American Philosophical Society
[before December 28, 1780]
M. MALOUIN, Médecin ordinaire de la Reine, Lecteur & Professeur en Médecine au Collége Royal de France, de l’Académie Royale des Sciences;1 ayant légué à la Faculté de Médecine, dont il étoit Membre, une somme annuelle, aux conditions qu’elle tiendra chaque année une Séance Publique pour y faire l’exposé de ses Travaux relatifs aux progrès de l’Art, & l’Eloge de ses Membres décédés.2
La Faculté tiendra cette Séance le Jeudi 28 du mois de Décembre 1780, dans les Ecoles extérieures de Sorbonne, à quatre heures précises.3
Joseph PHILIP, Doyen.
Addressed: M franklin de lacademie des / sciences, a Passi
8. This printed announcement was issued by Philip as dean of the Faculté de médecine, an elective position usually held for two years and whose duties included calling all general and committee meetings of the faculty. He was also a professor of pharmacy: Almanach royal for 1778, p. 417; for 1780, p. 456; for 1781, p. 471.
9. Printed, with a handwritten address.
1. Paul-Jacques Malouin (1701–1777 or 1778) was also a professor of chemistry at the Jardin du Roi. He provided important articles on milling and baking to the Académie’s series Description des arts et métiers (for which see Morellet’s letter of April 26, below), and also contributed to the Encyclopédie: Institut de France, Index biographique des membres et correspondants de l’Académie des Sciences de 1666 à 1939 (Paris, 1939), pp. 302–3; Dictionary of Scientific Biography.
2. For a description of the first of these public meetings held in French rather than Latin and their role in the rivalry between the Faculté de médecine and the Société royale de médecine see the Jour. de Paris of Nov. 12, 1778; Bachaumont, Mémoires secrets, XII, 157–160. See also our discussion of the dispute in XXXI, 229–30n.
3. BF did attend this public meeting where he heard the eulogy of Barbeu-Dubourg; see BF’s Journal, printed under Dec. 18, above, where he mistakenly noted his attendance on Dec. 29. The meeting, announced in the Jour. de Paris of Dec. 27, is described in detail in the Jan. 10, 1781, issue.