SCIENCE AT THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITIES 445 



SCIENCE AT THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITIES 



By JAMES J. WALSH, M.D., Ph.D., Litt.D. 



DEAN AND PBOFESSOE OF THE HISTOET OF MEDICINE AND OF NEBVOUS DISEASES 

 AT FOBDHAM DNIVEESITT SCHOOL OF MEDICINE, NEW TOEK 



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ITH the growth of interest in science and in nature study in 

 our own day, one of the expressions that is probably oftenest 

 heard is surprise that the men of preceding generations and especially 

 university men did not occupy themselves more with the world around 

 them and with the phenomena that are so tempting to curiosity. Sci- 

 ence is usually supposed to be comparatively new and nature study only 

 a few generations old. Men are supposed to have been so much inter- 

 ested in book knowledge and in speculations and theories of many 

 kinds, that they neglected the realities of life around them while spin- 

 ning fine webs of theory. Previous generations, of course, have in- 

 dulged in theory, but then our own generation is not entirely free from 

 that amusing occupation. Nothing could well be less true, however, 

 that the men of preceding generations were not interested in science 

 even in the sense of physical science, or that nature study is new, or 

 that men were not curious and did not try to find out all they could 

 about the phenomena of the world around them. 



The medieval universities and the school-men who taught in them 

 have been particularly blamed for their failure to occupy themselves 

 with realities instead of with speculation. We are coming to recognize 

 their wonderful zeal for education, the large numbers of students they 

 attracted, the enthusiasm of their students since they made so many 

 hand-written copies of the books of their masters, the devotion of the 

 teachers themselves, who wrote at much greater length than do our 

 professors even now and on the most abstruse subjects, so that it is all 

 the more surprising to think they should have neglected science. The 

 thought of our generation in the matter, however, is founded entirely 

 on an assumption. Those who know anything about the writers of the 

 Middle Ages at first hand are not likely to think of them as neglectful 

 of science even in our sense of the term. Those who know them at sec- 

 ond hand are, however, very sure in the matter. 



The assumption is due to the neglect of science that came in the 

 seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. "We have many other similar 

 assumptions because of the neglect of many phases of mental develop- 

 ment and applied science at this time. For instance, most of us are 

 very proud of our modern hospital development and think of this as a 

 great humanitarian evolution of applied medical science. We are very 



