This salve was applied to the weapon, bludgeon, sword 

 or axe, with which a wound had been made, and the weapon 

 thus anointed was wrapped up in a clean linen cloth and put 

 aside in a cool place. A carpenter cut himself with an axe; 

 the cutting instrument was sent for, cleansed of the blood, 

 besmeared with the weapon-salve, covered with linen and 

 hung up in a closet; the workman was immediately relieved, 

 and all went well until one day the wound became exceedingly 

 painful, when it was found that the axe had fallen from its 

 place and become uncovered: the axe was restored to its 

 place and the man was restored to health. Nothing was 

 done to the patient except to wash the wound and this 

 allowed nature to perform the cure; surgeons employ the 

 same method to-day barring the care of the weapon. 



"But she has ta'en the broken lance 

 And washed it from the clotted gore, 

 And salv'd the splinter o'er and o'er." 



Notwithstanding the degradation of medicine by magic, 

 astrology and superstitious practices, the sixteenth century 

 saw an upward movement towards a rational system ; medi- 

 cine began to cast off the shackles of blind authority under 

 the influence of free investigation, overthrowing Galen, the 

 ''Medical Pope of the Middle Ages", and the Arabian school, 

 and to replace these tyrannical masters by Hippocratic 

 doctrines and independent methods. This advance was made 

 in spite of the conservative universities instead of through 

 them, for the curriculum of medical students embraced little 

 more than discussions and explanations of certain works of 

 the Greeks and Arabians, with no opportunity of practical, 

 experimental methods. Even anatomy was studied as taught 

 in Galen's writings, although the golden age of the great 

 anatomists, Yesalius, Pallopius and Eustachius was close at 

 hand. 



105 



