GREEK BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE 



in saying that it has been accepted by the best 

 medical practice from the time of Hippocrates 

 to our own day! 



One might write an interesting history of 

 medicine, as the story of the conflicts and 

 alliances between theory and practice. One 

 should, however, bear in mind that the differ- 

 ences among the doctors of any period in the 

 actual treatment of disease have been less 

 marked than their controversies might seem to 

 indicate. 



Celsus told us of the Empirics who pro- 

 tested that they would have nothing to do with 

 remote and hidden causes; of the Methodists 

 who were partial to generalizations. More 

 interesting were the Pneumatics, with their 

 vital principle of the Pneuma, an idea almost 

 as old as man. Yet these ancient schools were 

 not so very wide apart in practice. 



A century later, Galen, sagaciously survey- 

 ing the medicine of his own time and the older 

 teachings, strove to make a system from his 

 conceptions of the medical wisdom of Hippo- 

 crates and the biology of Aristotle. Although 

 a great observer, he was in love with logical 

 a priori construction: with him, intelligent 

 people were " those who understand the conse- 

 quences of their hypotheses." 



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