BALDINGER (ERNEST GODFREY), a German physician of considerable eminence, and the author of a great number of medical publications. He was born near Erfurth, May 13, 17'38, and was originally destined for the church ; but having acquired a strong predilection for medicine, his father yielded to his wishes, and allowed him to embrace that pro fession, and he prosecuted his studies with this view both at Erfurth and at Jena. In 1761, he was en trusted with the superintendence of the military hospitals connected with the Prussian encampment near Torgau ; and he there gave public lectures with great applause. Having acquired considerable ex perience in army practice, by his assiduous atten tion to the duties of his office, he published, in 1762, a dissertation on the diseases of soldiers, which met with so favourable a reception from the public, that he enlarged the plan of his work, and republished it under the title of Treatise on the Diseases that prevail in Armies, Langensalz, 8vo, 1774. It has since gone through another edition. In 1763, he was appointed professor of medicine at Gottingen, where he enjoyed considerable reputation. The Landgrave of Hesse Cassel, Frederic II. invited him to take up his abode at Cassel, conferring upon him the title of first physician to his court, and director general of all his medical establishments. He was afterwards professor of the theory of medicine at Jena ; and in 1785, was promoted to a professorship at Marpurg, where he died of apoplexy on the 2d of January 1804.
His writings are exceedingly numerous ; many of them are scattered in various collections and jour nals ; but besides these, no less than eighty-four dis tinct treatises are mentioned as having proceeded from his pen. He had collected an extensive library, con sisting of 16,000 volumes, of which a catalogue was published after his death. His funeral oration was pronounced by Professor Creutzer. He was well versed in botany, and has published several works on that branch of natural history, of which the prin cipal are the following : Catalogue Dissertationum guff medicamentorum historiam, et vires ezpo nunt. Altemburgi, 1768. 4to. On the Study of Botany, and the method of learning it, in German. Jena, 1770. 4W. He was for many years the editor of a periodical work, entitled Magazine for Physi cians, l2mo, Cleves; and afterwards changed its name to the New Magazine, in 8vo, from 1779 to 1799 But the principal work of this kind which he con s ducted, was his Sylloge Opusculorunt Selector:tin Argumenti Medico-Practici, being a collection of detached essays and dissertations, which extended to 6 vols. 8vo. Gottingen, 1766-1782.
His Litteratura universte Materize Mediae, &c. Marpurg, 1793, 8vo, is a work of great labour, but little discrimination.- He edited Barnes's Lives o Physicians, in German. The only other work of his deserving notice, Is the Historia mercurii et mer eurialium medico. Gotting. 2 tom. 8vo. 1783 and 1785.