DEVELOPMENT IN NINETEENTH CENTURY 309 



among the sciences. Medicine, on the other hand, had a well-de- 

 fined and honorable status. It received abundant help and liberal 

 support from kings and rulers. Thus it becomes evident how bitter 

 the struggle has been for surgery to establish its claim to honorable 

 and dignified recognition. Thus it becomes apparent that the 

 difficulties to be overcome to establish that recognition were then 

 insurmountable. This is not to be wondered at when pain in 

 surgical operations, inability to control hemorrhage, and preven- 

 tion of blood-poisoning, were the obstacles to the successful practice 

 of the art. These evils retarded the growth of surgery. Their 

 removal since 1800, and chiefly during the past quarter of a century, 

 has cleared the way for the achievements of the present day. From 

 Hippocrates, who was born 460 B. c., to 1800 A. D., surgery made 

 little advance. It was practiced by illiterate men, with here and 

 there a masterful mind groping in the dark for light. There were 

 two great discoveries prior to 1800 that had an influence on the 

 progress of surgery after that time, and without which surgery 

 could never have become a recognized science. The first discovery 

 refers to the circulation of the blood, which was made by Harvey 

 in 1628, and the further discovery of the capillary system by Mal- 

 pighi in 1661. The fearful dread of hemorrhage from an unknown 

 source prevented any operations except those of dire necessity, 

 which were generally performed through dead and gangrenous 

 tissue. The second discovery refers to inflammation, the healing 

 of wounds by blood-clot, and the ligation of the vessels in their 

 continuity, by John Hunter, who was born in 1728. These two 

 great discoveries prior to 1800, like the two great discoveries after 

 1800, viz., anesthesia and antiseptics, have enabled surgery to 

 establish its just claim to recognition among the sciences. These 

 four great discoveries, the circulation of the blood, the repair of 

 wounds, anesthesia, and antiseptics, are the four corner-stones 

 upon which a superstructure has been erected that has become 

 a veritable temple of science, the dimensions of which eclipse in 

 grandeur all other temples. 



The progress has been greater during the past century than in all 

 the preceding centuries since the beginning of the world. This pro- 

 gress which surgery has made is due, in great part, to the dissemina- 

 tion of medical literature, to the formation of medical libraries, to 

 the organization of modern hospitals, to the equipment of scientific 

 laboratories, to the foundation of medical schools, to the estab- 

 lishment of medical museums, to the organization of training-schools 

 for nurses, and, finally, to the two transcendent discoveries 

 anesthesia and antiseptics. That medical literature has had much 

 to do with the advance of surgery during the past century is evi- 

 dent when it is shown that at the beginning of the Revolutionary 



