From the Alchemist Johann Samuel Carl to the Statesman Struensee

<p><span>Johann Samuel Carl (1676-1757) studied medicine and chemistry in Halle under the famous pietist physicians Friedrich Hoffmann and Georg Ernst Stahl (known for the phlogiston theory) and graduated Lic.Med. under Stahl in 1699. Carl became a radical ”inspired” or ”enthusiastic” Pietist, like Stahl but unlike Hoffmann deeply antagonistic towards Descartes’ dualism of body and mind and <span>&nbsp;</span>his mechanical concept. He described a pest essence of sulfuric acid and distilled brandy [ethanol] much like the <i>elixir cum</i> <i>acido</i> of the radical pietist and would-be gold maker Johann Conrad Dippel, whom he got to know in 1705-7. Carl believed the transmutation of metals was possible, but in practice almost impossible. He knew chemistry well but nonetheless believed the story of Moses as an alchemist and failed in his attempts to make drinkable gold. When Carl became the personal physician of the pietist Landgrave Casimir zu Zayn-Wittgenstein in Berleburg, he renewed his friendship with Dippel, who after his imprisonment on Bornholm and a short stay in Sweden was expelled and found asylum in Berleburg, where <span>&nbsp;</span>Carl published a radical, inspired magazine <i>Geistliche Fama</i>, but neither this nor their friendship survived long.</span></p> <p>After Dippel’s death 1734 Carl was called to Altona to treat King Christian VI of Denmark, whereupon he became the king’s personal physician. However, a dispute with the first court priest, Johann Bluhme, led to Carl’s dismissal in 1742, and he returned to his daughter Maria Dorothee and grandson Johann Friedrich Struensee in Berleburg. Maria married Adam Struensee (1708-91), who became priest in Altona 1757. Johann Friedrich became Dr.Med. in Halle and in 1758 <i>Fysicus</i> in Altona. Due to his successful treatment of the mentally ill King Cristian VII he became the personal physician and soon after councillor of state, whereupon he usurped the authority of the king and became de facto ruler of Denmark as well as the queen’s lover for which he was executed in 1772. Queen Caroline gave birth to Princess Louise Augusta of Denmark, who was declared the king’s legitimate daughter, although Struensee most likely was the father. People called her <i>la petite Struensee</i>, and as such she was Carl’s great granddaughter.</p> <p><span>I sharp contrast to the radical-pietistic, enthusiastic Carl, Struensee was an enlightened reformer, who in his short reign abolished torture and the slave trade, created freer conditions for the feudal peasants and freedom of the press.</span></p>