244 



HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



this was the firfr. gold and the firft filver which was fent 

 from New to Old Spain ; a fmall prefage of the immenfe 

 treafures it was to fend in future. 



Amongft other arts exercifed by the Mexicans, that of 

 medicine has been entirely overlooked by the Spanifh 

 hiftorians, although it is certainly not the leafl elfential 

 part of their hiftory. They have contented themfelves 

 with faying, that the Mexican phyficians had a great 

 knowledge of herbs, and that by means of thefe they 

 performed miraculous cures ; but do not mark the pro- 

 grefs which they made in an art fo beneficial to the human 

 race. It is not to be doubted, that the fame neceffities 

 which Simulated the Greeks to make a collection of ex- 

 periments and obfervations on the nature of difeafes, and 

 the virtue of fimples, would alfo have in time led the 

 Mexicans to the knowledge of thofe two mofl important 

 parts of medicine. 



We do not know whether they intended by their 

 paintings, like the Greeks by their writings, to com- 

 municate their lights to pofterity. Thofe who followed 

 the profeffion of medicine inftru&ed their fons in the 

 nature and differences of the difeafes to which the human 

 frame is fubjett:, and of the herbs which Providence has 

 created for their remedy, the virtues of which had been 

 experienced by their anceftors. They taught them the 

 art of difcerning the fymptoms and progrefs of different 

 diftempers, and to prepare medicines and apply them. 

 We have ample proofs of this in the natural hiflory of 

 Mexico, written by Dr. Hernandez (<:). This learned 



and 



(c) Hernandez who was phyfician to Philip II. king of Spain, and much re- 

 nowned for the works he publifhed concerning the Natural Hiftory of Pliny, 

 was fent by that monarch to Mexico, to ftudy the natural hiftory of that king- 

 dom. He employed himfelf there with other able learned naturalifts for feveral 

 years, aflifted by the Mexican phyficians. His work, worthy of the expenfc 



which 



