18 INTRODUCTION. 
and cure of diseases they followed the opinions of — 
Hippocrates and Galen: not indeed in their native — 
simplicity, but often corrupted bv their own vain and — 
fanciful inventions, by the superstitions of astrology, — 
and the follies of alchemy”. Yet it is admitted that 
the modern science of medicine owes much to their “i 
improvements. ‘They greatly extended the Materia — 
into medicine is wholly theirs®, and many of their 
formulz of compound medicines still retain a place 
in modern dispensatories. In many things of practice — 
they ventured to differ from their masters, as in less” 
copious bleedings, in milder purgatives, in substitut- 
ing sugar for honey in their syrups, and they first 
gratified the eyes and the taste of their patients by 
clothing their prescriptions in gold and silver leaf; ) 
a luxury which continued till within a few years. , 
38 Rhazes is the first medical writer who colt chemical — 
medicines, and the mode of preparing them. He died in 932. 
All the chemistry that is to be found in Greek writers relates t0 a 
7 Freind, p. 479. Gian, vol. ii. p. 119. se | 
the fusion, or transmutation of metals, Freind, p. 213. 
) 
