"Chevalier" John Taylor (1703–1772) was the first in a long line of British eye surgeons. While there is some evidence that he showed promise as an eye surgeon early in his career, it became evident that his major talent was that of self-promotion.

Dubbing himself "Chevalier

Knight

A knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior....

" and "Ophthalmiater Royal," Taylor became the self-proclaimed personal eye surgeon to King George II

George II of Great Britain

George II was King of Great Britain and Ireland, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg and Archtreasurer and Prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire from 11 June 1727 until his death.George was the last British monarch born outside Great Britain. He was born and brought up in Northern Germany...

, the Pope and number of European royal families. He was as famous for his womanizing as for his surgical skills. Prior to performing each surgical procedure, he would deliver a long, self-promoting speech in an unusual oratorial style. (John Barrell, London Review of Books, 2004)

He was a coucher, or cataract surgeon, who performed removal of cataracts by breaking them up into pieces. He has been accused by some for accelerating the process by which composer George Handel

George Frideric Handel

George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...

 became blind. Many (including his contemporaries) believe that Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...

 also died of complications due to his surgery. (Trevor-Roper, Documents of Ophthalmology, 1989) Though one dissenting view concerning Bach is presented in a recent article by Dutch ophthalmologist Dr. R. Zegers. Zegers writes that "After his training, Taylor started practicing in Switzerland, where he blinded hundreds of patients, he once confessed". But "It is very difficult to make a clear connection between the operations and the illness that killed him [Bach]... Certainly the [Taylor's] operations, bloodletting, and/or purgatives would have weakened him and predisposed him to new infections".

He traveled throughout Europe in a coach painted with images of eyes. His arrival in a town would be publicised several days in advance to draw the largest crowd and he claimed to be able to cure misaligned eyes with his surgical skills. His trick was to make a small incision in the conjunctiva of the eye and cover the other eye. He would then instruct the patient to leave the eye covered for seven days, during which interval he would contrive to leave town and be as far away as possible, when the eye covering was removed.

Writer Samuel Johnson

Samuel Johnson

Samuel Johnson , often referred to as Dr. Johnson, was an English author who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer...

 uses Taylor's life and career as an example of "how far impudence may carry ignorance."

It seems he died in obscurity in 1772, after spending the last years of his life completely blind. However, the musicologist Dr. Charles Burney

Charles Burney

Charles Burney FRS was an English music historian and father of authors Frances Burney and Sarah Burney.-Life and career:...

claims that he died on the morning of Friday 16 November 1770 in Rome, also claiming to have had "dined with him at my table d'hote a few days before his death".