Dr. Benjamin Rush (1745-1813)

In many ways, Benjamin Rush was a man before his time. He was an outspoken opponent of slavery, a vocal proponent of equal education for women, a supporter of the rights of the mentally challenged, and a generous provider of health care to the indigent in Philadelphia. Known as "the Father of American Psychiatry," Rush was one of the most prominent physicians and authors of his day. He was in constant attention to the wounded in the battles of Trenton, Princeton, the Brandywine, Germantown, and in the sickness at Valley Forge. He signed the Declaration of Independence.

Benjamin Rush was born in 1745 in Byberry Township near Philadelphia. His father died when Benjamin was six, and so he was raised by his mother and stepfather. He began school under the tutelage of his uncle, Reverend Samuel Finley at the boarding school West Nottingham Academy. Coincidentally, his future father-in-law, Richard Stockton was also a graduate of Nottingham. He graduated in 1760 and made plans to study law, though he changed his mind and began an education medicine. He began his studies in Philadelphia, but completed them in Edinburgh and London. He attended medical lectures in England and Paris and enjoyed the friendship of Benjamin Franklin.

Upon his return to America, Benjamin Rush began his practice in Philadelphia and quickly took up the cause of liberty. He wrote constantly to the newspapers and in one of his more exuberant displays of enthusiasm for the colonial cause, Rush rode out of Philadelphia to meet the Massachusetts delegation to Congress. Indeed, during the next few years he established a deep friendship with John Adams. As a member of the provincial conference of Pennsylvania, he strongly advocated the need for the Continental Congress to declare independence.

In January of 1776, at the age of 30, Dr. Rush married Julia Stockton, daughter of Richard Stockton, who was a delegate to the Continental Congress from New Jersey. He was elected to Congress on July 20, 1776, after the declaration was adopted, but probably there were few others who signed it with such enthusiasm.

The influence of his uncle was evident in Dr. Rush's beliefs about religion. "The only foundation for a republic," he later wrote, "is to be laid in Religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican governments."

After some months in Congress he became the surgeon general of the armies of the Middle Department (generally the states from Maryland to New York) and in the winter of 1777-1778 he was in constant attendance to the army at Valley Forge. Rush was a very impatient man, a problem noticed by everybody who knew him including John Adams, and was led into some indiscreet remarks about George Washington. This unfortunately clouded his fame to some extend, and undoubtedly led him to resign as surgeon general after less than a year. Though he was without an income at the time, he refused all compensation for his service to the army. In the years that followed, Rush resumed his medical practice, and for many years thereafter was surgeon to the Pennsylvania Hospital.

He was impulsive and indiscreet, but his enthusiasm for public causes was extensive. He was gifted from heaven with a lively imagination, a retentive memory, a discriminating judgment, and be made the most of all these advantages. He taught at the College of Philadelphia, he attacked slavery, strong drink and tobacco. After the war, he was the founder of Dickenson College (named after another signer of the Declaration of Independence, John Dickenson). He was interested in the establishment of public schools and was instrumental in the founding of the College of physicians. In 1793 he was credited with ending an epidemic of yellow fever in Philadelphia, and later was honored by the King of Prussia, the Emperor of Russia and the Queen of Etruria for his replies to their questions about the fever.

Benjamin Rush was a founder of the Philadelphia Bible Society, a principal promoter of the American Sunday School Union and extensively advocated the use of the Bible as a textbook in public schools. ""…let us not be wiser than our maker," he wrote in 1798. "If moral precepts alone could have reformed mankind, the mission of the Son of God into all the world would have been unnecessary." He wrote a pamphlet giving twelve reasons why the Bible needs to be the central textbook is schools. "I lament that we waste so much time and money in punishing crimes and take so little time to prevent them," he wrote. "We neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government; that is, the universal education of our youth in the principals of Christianity by means of the Bible."

Though Benjamin Rush was not part of the Constitutional Convention, he was part of the Pennsylvania convention which ratified it. His political views were an enigma. An ardent supporter of the constitution, he was none the less active in Jefferson's Democratic Party. Perhaps his own description of himself is best. He said, "I have alternatively been called an Aristocrat and a Democrat. I am neither. I am a Christocrat."

It was not only by words, but in deeds, that he expressed his reverence for God. He made a regular practice to close the day by reading to his collected family a chapter in the Bible, and afterwards by prayer, devoutly acknowledging God's goodness for favors received, and humbly imploring his continued protection and blessing. Dr. Benjamin Rush was at the height of his fame in 1813 when he died in Philadelphia at the age of sixty-eight. During his final illness, he wrote his wife, "My excellent wife, I must leave you but God will take care of you. By the mystery of Thy holy incarnation… by Thy precious death and burial; by Thy glorious resurrection and ascension, and by the coming of Holy Ghost, blessed Jesus, wash away all my impurities, and receive me into Thy everlasting kingdom."

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