GALEN. 49 



this wonderful man. His authority was estimated at a 

 much higher rate than that of all the biological writers 

 combined who flourished during a period of more than 

 twelve centuries, and it was often considered a sufficient 

 argument against a hypothesis, or even an alleged matter 

 of fact, that it was contrary to Galen. 



Endowed by nature with a penetrating genius and a 

 mind of restless energy, he was eminently qualified to 

 profit by a comprehensive and liberal education. And 

 such he received. His father, Nicon, an architect, was 

 a man of learning and ability a distinguished mathe- 

 matician and an astronomer and seems to have devoted 

 much time and care to the education of his son. 

 The youth appears to have studied philosophy suc- 

 cessively in the schools of the Stoics, Academics, 

 Peripatetics, and Epicureans, without attaching himself 

 exclusively to any one of these, and to have taken from 

 each what he thought to be the most essential parts 

 of their system, rejecting, however, altogether the tenets 

 of the Epicureans. At the age of twenty-one, on the 

 death of his father, he went to Smyrna to continue the 

 study of medicine, to which he had now devoted himself. 

 After leaving this place and having travelled extensively, 

 he took up his residence at Alexandria, which was then 

 the most favourable spot for the pursuit of medical 

 studies. Here he is said to have remained until he was 

 twenty-eight years of age, when his reputation secured 



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