was not restricted by the regulations which
all Establishments employed to preserve their status, block opposition,
and prevent competition. In many fields the Establishment took the form
of a guild organization--in medicine, the Royal College of
Physicians.[47]

Boyle was a wealthy and highly talented man who could pursue his own
bent without needing to make concessions merely to earn a living. He
remained quite independent of the cares which oppressed those less well
endowed in worldly goods or native talent. Sometimes, of course,
necessity can impose a discipline and rigor which ultimately may serve
as a disguised benefit, but in the seventeenth century, when Boyle was
active, the lack of systematic training and rigorous background seemed
actually an advantage. Clinical chemistry and the broad areas which we
can call experimental medicine had no tradition. Work in clinical
chemistry, clinical pharmacology, and experimental physiology was
essentially innovation. And since innovations are often made by those
who are outside the Establishment and not bound by tradition, we need
feel no surprise that the experimental approach could make great
progress under the aegis of amateurs. Necessarily the work was rather
unsystematic and undisciplined, but system and discipline could arise
only when the new approach had already achieved some measure of success.
Through the casual approach of amateurs this necessary foundation could
be built.

Boyle, as a clinician, remained on excellent terms with medical
practitioners. For one thing, he took great care not to compete with
them. As stated,[48] he "was careful to decline the occasions of
entrenching upon their profession." Physicians would consult him freely.
As a chemist and experimental pharmacologist, he prepared various
remedies. Some of these he tried out on patients himself, others he gave
to practitioners who might use them. Boyle seems to have abundantly
provided what we today call "curbstone consultations."

In no way bound by guild rules and conventions or by rigid educational
standards, Boyle was free to learn from whatever sources appealed to
him. Repeatedly he emphasized the importance of learning from
experience, both his own and that of others, and by "others" he included
not only physicians and learned gentlemen, but even the meanest of
society, provided they had experience in treating disease. This
experience need not be restricted to treatment of humans but sho