CEAP. If.] PHYSICIANS* tfEGLECT OF PATHOLOGY. 159 



There is nothing more variable than men s faces, yet we can 

 remember infinite distinctions of them ; and a painter with a 

 few colours, the practice of the hand and eye, and help of the 

 imagination, could imitate thousands if brought before him. 

 As variable as voices are, yet we can easily distinguish them 

 in different persons, and a mimic will express them to the life. 

 Though the sounds of words differ so greatly, yet men can 

 reduce them to a few simple letters. And certainly it is not 

 the insufficiency or incapacity of the mind, but the remoteness 

 of the object that causes these perplexities and distrusts in 

 the sciences : for as the sense is apt to mistake at great 

 distances, but not near at hand, so is the understanding. 

 Men commonly take a view of nature as from a remote emi 

 nence, and are too much amused with generalities : whereas, 

 if they would descend, and approach nearer to particulars, 

 and more exactly and considerately examine into things 

 themselves, they might make more solid and useful disco 

 veries. The remedy of this error, therefore, is to quicken or 

 strengthen the organ, and thus to approach the object. No 

 doubt, therefore, if physicians, leaving generalities for a 

 while, and suspending their assent, would advance towards 

 nature, they might become masters of that art of which the 

 poet speaks : 



&quot; Et quoniam variant morbi, variabimus artes 

 Mille mail species mille salutis erunt. * 



They should the rather endeavour this, because the philo 

 sophies whereon physicians, whether methodists or chemists, 

 depend, are trifling, and because medicine, not founded on 

 philosophy, is a weak thing. Therefore, as too extensive 

 generals, though true, do not bring men home to action, 

 there is more danger in such generals as are false in them 

 selves, and seduce instead of directing the mind. Medicine, 

 therefore, has been rather professed than laboured, and yet 

 more laboured than advanced, as the pains bestowed thereon 

 were rather circular than progressive ; for I find great repe 

 tition, and but little new matter, in the writers of physic. 



We divide medicine into three parts, or offices : viz., 1st, 

 the preservation of health; 2nd, the cure of diseases; and 3rd, 

 Uie prolongation of life. For this last part, physicians seem 



v Ovid, Bemedia Amoris, 625. 



