editors' preface 



Dr. Taylor's volume on " Greek Biology and 

 Medicine " is the third to appear in the new 

 Library, " Our Debt to Greece and Rome." 

 The author has drawn his sketch in such a 

 way as to make clear the influence of ancient 

 biological and medical theories and of the 

 ancient medical practice upon our intellectual 

 life, to-day, giving frequent allusions to that 

 influence as it affected distinguished biologists 

 and men of medicine during the intervening 

 centuries. This is part of the larger plan of 

 the Library as a whole to show in some detail 

 the vitality of the ancient thought and to 

 make more articulate the significance it pos- 

 sesses for us. We all too unconsciously ac- 

 cept a heritage — scientific, intellectual, spir- 

 itual — which hes at the very core of our 

 being and is the real hope of an orderly future. 



This book takes no formal account of the 

 famous Pompeian medical instruments, and 

 only further study of the Ebers papyrus and 

 in particular of the Edwin Smith papyrus may 

 lead to a new estimate of the progress of 

 medicine in ancient Egypt; but we are not yet 

 in a position to estimate the truth contained 

 in these venerable documents. And, for us, 

 Greece still stands as the pioneer in a science 



[ix] 



