HUNTERIAN ORATION. 1? 



anatomy and medicine. Therefore, anato- 

 mists again had recourse to the dissection of 

 animals, from which, however, they derived 

 very important advantages. They were 

 thus led to an extensive knowledge of the 

 comparative structure of living beings in 

 general, and to make observations and 

 experiments illustrative of function. So 

 that by these means, were all the paths 

 leading to medical science fairly thrown 

 open to enquirers. 



1 must now relate some ridiculous cir- 

 cumstances, which, however, gave a con- 

 siderable bias to the progress of the medical 

 sciences. The priests, merely because they 

 were able to read the Greek and Roman 

 authors on medicine, were the principal 

 physicians, during the dark ages, as I may 

 call them, of these sciences. They became 

 intimate with the barbers, because the 

 latter were frequently employed to shave 

 the heads of the priests, according to the 

 uniform of their order. The priests also 

 frequently employed the barbers to shave 

 the heads of patients, before they prescribed 

 washes to cool the fever of the brain, or 



c 



