TEMPORIS PARTUS MASCULUS. 21 



astri et ignis seditionem avide arripiens et ostentans, 

 ubique humanam potestatem malitiose in ordinem 

 redigis, et ignorantiam desperatione in aeternum mu- 

 nire cupis. Do indignitati tuae ne te amplius morer. 

 Abducas etiam tecum licet socios tuos et foederatos 

 Arabes, dispensatoriorum conditores, qui, pari cum 

 caeteris in theoriis amentia, copiosius quidem e supinis- 

 simis conjecturis medicinarum vulgarium pollicita magis 

 quam auxilia composuere. Nee non cape comites per- 

 functoriam Neotericorum turbam. Heus nomenclator, 

 suggere. Atqui respondet, ne dignos esse quorum 

 nomina teneat. Sane ut inter hujuscemodi nugatores 

 gradus quosdam agnosco, pessimum et absurdissimum 

 genus eorum, qui methodo et acribologia universam 

 artem comprehendunt, quibus vulgo ob elocutionem et 

 ordinem applauditur ; qualis est Fernelius. 1 Minus 

 incommodi sunt, qui majorem observationum et experi- 

 mentorum varietatem et proprietatem ostendunt, licet 

 stultissimis causationibus dilutam et immersam, ut Ar- 

 noldus de Villa Nova, et alii id genus. 2 Intueor ab 



to speak) external operations of art, in his treatise De Natural. Facultati- 

 bus. See vol. ii. p. 82. of Kiihn's edition of Galen. He elsewhere points 

 out the differences which he conceives to exist between animal heat and 

 that of a fire; but I am not aware that he speaks of the heterogeneity of 

 terrestrial and astral heat. See his treatise De Marasmo, c. 4. 



1 Fernelius, who was born near the close of the fifteenth century, and 

 who died in 1558, was physician to Henry II. He was greatly distin- 

 guished both as a writer on medicine and as a physician. He was more- 

 over, notwithstanding the contempt with which he is here mentioned, well 

 seen in mathematical and natural science, .and was the first person who in 

 modern times attempted to determine the magnitude of the earth. He 

 seems to have been singularly diligent in his calling and in his studies; 

 and it is said that when he was advised to give himself more time for re- 

 pose, he would make answer in the words of Ovid, " Longa quiescendi 

 tempora fata dabunt." 



2 Arnaldus de Villa Nova lived towards the end of the thirteenth cen- 

 tury. He was an alchemist, and was accused of being a magician. It i* 



