AGAINST THE STREAM. 145 



it to the press was altogether humbled 1 . Many years after- 

 wards, when he re-issued the work with the number of 

 its sections increased to a hundred, having spent twenty- 

 eight days in correcting what he had written in fifteen, 

 he refers in this way to its first appearance : " I blush to 

 acknowledge that there were more than even three hun- 

 dred blunders of mine in this book, exclusive of mis- 

 prints. And I long since had it in my mind to blot it 

 out from the number of my offspring : but to that course 

 there was the objection of a certain special usefulness con- 

 nected with it, by which it had been made so saleable that 

 in its second year the printer would have issued it again 

 to the public if I had not resisted his desire." 



But the sound part of the book which, in many points, 

 condemned and opposed prevailing practices, of course 

 received from the doctors of Milan, hostile enough already, 

 the strongest condemnation and opposition. The cry was 

 raised against its author that he did not practice his 

 profession, and it was asked, how then could he presume 

 to teach it to the men who did 2 . The unlucky title of 

 his book was quoted constantly against him, and if any- 

 body thought of seeking medical assistance from Jerome 



1 See the dedication to the revised issue of the book, Opera, Tom. 

 Tii. 



2 " In artis autem operibus negligerer, cur erat ut alios docere 

 vellem." De Libris Propr. (ed. 1557) p. 29. "Et modum alium me- 

 dendi observans ex titulo libri nuper edito, jam prope ab omnibus 

 habebar," p. 32. 



VOL. I. L 



