52 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVII. No. 680 



the time when the latter became fully inde- 

 pendent at the close of the seventeenth cen- 

 tury, will show with what propriety medi- 

 cine has been called the "mother of the 

 sciences. ' ' 



Physical science has derived from the 

 Greeks no such extensive records of sound 

 observation and experience as those which 

 medicine has inherited from the writings 

 of Hippocrates and his followers. Physical 

 theories embodied in the speculations of the 

 nature-philosophers concerning the consti- 

 tution and properties of matter furnished 

 the starting point for the Hippocratic doc- 

 trine of the four humors and other gen- 

 eralizations, but these theories sat so lightly 

 upon Hippocrates that his name is attached 

 to that method of medical study which 

 rejects dogma, authority and speculation 

 and confines itself to the observation and 

 record of clinical facts. As Gomperz in 

 his admirable work on the "Greek Think- 

 ers" has clearly pointed out the age of 

 enlightenment in scientific thought was 

 inaugurated by Hippocrates and his med- 

 ical contemporaries. 



The influence of physical theories upon 

 medical thought in antiquity can be traced 

 not only in the humoral doctrines of Hip- 

 pocrates and of Galen, but also in rival 

 schools, and especially in the so-called 

 methodic school founded upon the atomistic 

 philosophy of Democritus, which is so in- 

 teresting in the history of scientific the- 

 ories. As this school produced such ad- 

 mirable physicians as Asclepiades, Soranus 

 and Aretffius it is to be regretted that their 

 solidistic pathology was so completely dis- 

 placed by the authority of Galen. 



The large body of medical knowledge 

 and doctrine which had grown up during 

 the six centuries since Hippocrates was 

 further developed and fixed by Galen at 

 the end of the second century after Christ 

 into a system not less complete in its field, 

 nor less satisfying to the minds of men for 



nearly fifteen centuries, nor scarcely less 

 remarkable as a product of the human 

 mind than the physical and philosophical 

 systems of Aristotle. Within their re- 

 spective spheres the system of doctrine of 

 each of these great men has exerted a 

 similar dominating infiuence upon human 

 thought and has met a similar fate through 

 influences almost identical. 



Although the contributions of the Greeks 

 to mathematics were of the highest order, 

 and the names of Aristarchus, Eratosthe- 

 nes, Hipparchus and Ptolemy attest the 

 great debt of astronomy to the school of 

 Alexandria, and Archimedes had founded 

 one branch of mechanics, and the works of 

 Aristotle on "the history" and on "the 

 parts of animals" entitle him to be called 

 the "father of zoological science," I think 

 that it is safe to say that the largest body 

 of ordered natural knowledge in any single 

 domain bequeathed by the ancients to pos- 

 terity was represented by medicine. The 

 botanists trace the beginnings of their sci- 

 ence to the physicians, Theophrastus and 

 Dioscorides, but botany was then, as it long 

 remained, an integral part of pharmacy. 



As medicine, practically in the shape in 

 which it left the hands of Galen, continued 

 for many centuries to be the shelter for 

 most of the natural sciences, it is worth 

 considering how worthy a home it fur- 

 nished. For this purpose it is not neces- 

 sary to enter into details of doctrine or 

 even the state of existing knowledge. A 

 few words concerning the general scope 

 and spirit of medicine, as conceived and 

 transmitted by the Greek physicians, must 

 suffice. 



Gomperz formulates the ideal of these 

 physicians as regards their conception of 

 the relation of medicine to the philosophy 

 of nature in these words: 



The human being is a part of the whole of 

 nature, and can not be understood without it. 

 What is wanted is a satisfactory general view of 



