and we shall leave the thoughtful reader to decide for himself wherein any of these terms differ from physis of Hippocrates, or pneuma of Galen. The love of being original leads to the multiplication of terms and phrases without materially adding to the stock of general knowledge. The seventeenth century was also a period of great men and of great physicians.

FIFTH: PERIOD OF THE RENAISSANCE

A

(Continued)

CHAPTER VII

MEDICINE IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

CURSORY glance at the history of medicine

during the last century shows a great advance in the progress of all the sciences to which it is related. It is a long stride of development from Guy Patin and Sylvius de la Boë to Boerhaave; from the speculations of Stahl and Hoffman to the expositions of Haller. The advance has been marvellous; and it has been conducted by men with a genius for work, for toil-toil without hope of reward, except it be the love of truth, unmasking fiction, and establishing the verities. During this period there have been men, brilliant in the profession, grasping the discoveries of others and using them to further their own ends, and winning for themselves fame and glory which wealth brings-making no discoveries themselves whereby to enrich the profession. Kings and nobles have vied with each other to endow colleges and universities as never before, and by such worthy objects multiplied many fold the means of invention and discovery and the progress of science and

philosophy. Great events convulsed the moral and political world, of which the profession was apparently oblivious. The map of Europe was again changed. The civilized world was still in a state of intellectual ferment; the profession, over the action of acids and alkalies; forces, natural and supernatural, chemical and vital; humoralism and solidism; contraria contrariis, and similia similibus, etc. The theological fraternity were in acrid dispute over questions of equal non-importance, such as the Trinity; Transubstantiation, the doctrine of the Presence; the amount of blood shed at the Crucifixion that was needed for the purpose of redemption, and what to do with what remained, etc. The first specific against an epidemic disease had been discovered and fortunes made by its sale and use. Many men of great ability and distinguished repute won fame and fortune in the practice of medicine, without adding any contribution to the profession of medicine except writing ponderous quartos of opinions and theories of which the medical world was growing weary. The medical luminaries of this period were chiefly men of this sort, learned men, excellent men, men who would honor any position in which fortune might place them. In medicine they took advantage of the occasion to appropriate to themselves, in the practice of the art, the labors and discoveries of other men, on which they wrote voluminously books which may be found on the library shelves, and which are never read except