Jacob de Castro Sarmento



Jacob (Henriquez) de Castro Sarmento (ca. 1691, Bragança, Portugal&mdash;1761, London) was a Portuguese physician, naturalist, poet and Deist.

At the age of seventeen he entered the University of Évora to study philosophy, and later studied medicine at Coimbra, receiving his baccalaureate in 1717. In order to escape the persecutions of the Inquisition, Henriquez &mdash; so-called as a Marrano &mdash; went into voluntary exile in London in 1720. There he continued his studies in medicine, physics, and chemistry, and passed his examinations in the theory and practice of medicine. He became a member of the Royal College of Physicians and was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of London about 1725, in recognition of his having introduced a new medicine for curing fevers.

In 1731 he elaborated a plan for a botanical garden in Coimbra. Castro Sarmento corresponded with many scholars, among others with Prof. Mendes Sanchetto Barbosa of Lisbon, who reported to him the terrible earthquake that destroyed the capital of Portugal in 1755, and with the Jesuit B. Suarez, who communicated to him his astronomical observations made in Brazil. He was a strong proponent of Newtonianism and made efforts to integrate it with Jewish theology. He published Tratado da Verdadeira Theoria dos Mares (Treatise on the True Theory of Tides), the first book in Portuguese to advocate Newton ideas (London, 1737).

The literary activity of Castro Sarmento began with a treatise on vaccination, Dissertatio in Novam, Tutam, ac Utilem Methodum Inoculationis seu Transplantationis Variolorum (London, 1721; German translation, Hamburg, 1722; Supplement, London, 1731; anonymously, Leyden). Other works are: Historia Medica Physico-Hist.-Mechanica, part i, London, 1731; part ii, London 1735; Syderohydrologia ó Discurso das Aguas Mineraes Espadañas ou Chalibeadas, London 1736, identical with Da Uso e Abuso das Minhas (Minerales) Aguas da Inglaterra, London, 1756; and a Portuguese translation of the treatise of the surgeon Samuel Sharp: Surgical Operations, with Plates and Descriptions of the Instruments Used (London, 1744).

In recognition of his services to medicine the University of Aberdeen awarded him a medical degree in July 1739. Castro Sarmento was also a poet and a preacher. In Spanish, he published Exemplar de Penitencia, Dividido en Tres Discursos Para ó dia Santo de Kipur (London, 1724); Extraordinaria Providencia Que el Gran Dios de Ysrael Uso con su Escogido Pueblo en Tiempo de su Mayor Afflicion por Medio de Mordehay y Ester Contra los Protervos Intentos del Tyrano Aman, Deducida de la Sagrada Escritura en el Sequinte Romance (London, 1728); "Sermão Funebre as Memorias do . . . Haham Morenu a R. e Doutor David Neto" (London, 1728).