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literature, and since their relative situation with Europe somewhat resembled the relative situation between Egypt and Greece, they are entitled to a portion of our respect and gratitude. When the princes of the west began to emerge from barbarism, they correctly acknowledged the Moors to be the great depositaries of knowledge. Many useful treatises, now lost in the original, for example the fifth, sixth, and seventh books of the Conic Sections of Appollonius Pergamus, and some of the commentaries of Galen and Hippocrates, were preserved in the language of the Saracens. Through Italy the sciences travelled to the other European states;-the Provencial and Castilian poets owe some of their most beautiful images to their acquaintance with the poetry of the Saracens; and rhyme, the great characteristic of modern verse, was derived by these bards from the Arabic measure. The romance of the dark ages was embellished by oriental fictions, and the literature of the Arabians was well known in Europe before the Christian armies invaded Asia. The' establishment of the Saracens in Spain was in the eighth century; po wonder, therefore, that the elder Spanish romances have professedly more Arabian allusions than any other. By the command of Charlemagne, the principal Arabic books, both original and versions, were translated into Latin, for the use of the people in the various provinces of his empire. The philosophy of Aristotle was diffused through western Europe. In the dialectics of the stagrite the Musselmen had found the keenest weapons of dispute; and the monks, in their controversies with heretics and Jews, formed, from the writings of the same Grecian sage, that wonderful system of ingenious folly the scholastic divinity. To the rich and fertile country of Naples and Magna Græcia, the followers of the Arabian prophet in Sicily and Africa had often been attracted; and the page of the Italian historian is full of the wars which these invaders occasioned. But the maritime city of Salernum seems to have been a favourite object of their attention: the coffers of the Salernians were exhausted in the purchase of peace. The Musselmen and the Christians gradually intermixed, and the literature of the Saracens was insensibly communicated to Italians. So early as the ninth century, a college was founded in Salernum by Charlemagne, and this was the first Christian university where medicine was taught. For the next three centuries, Salernum, the fountain of physic, as it was called by the old writers, was the celebrated school to which the students of medicine resorted from every quarter of Europe; and the works of Galen and Hippocrates became known to the Christians, The aphorisms of the physicians of Salernum were addressed to Robert Duke of Normandy, son of William the Conqueror; and, agreeably to the practice of an age when poetry was made the vehicle of theology and rhetoric, these medical precepts were written in verse.

In addition to this account of Arabian medicine, we have extracted the following passage from Dr. Mead's translation of Rhazes's Treatise on the Small-pox and Measles,

CHAP.

CHAP. I. Of the Causes of the Small-pox; and how it comes to pass that no Mortal, except by chance here and there one, escapes from this Disease: Also, a Brief Account of what Galen has mentioned concerning it. By RHAZES.

As to those physicians who affirm, that the most excellent Galen has made no mention of the small-pox, and therefore that he did not know this distemper; surely they have either never read his works at all, or only very cursorily; nay, most of them do not know, whether what he plainly says of it is to be understood of that diseasé. For Galen, in a certain treatise, says, this ***† does good this and that way, and also against the small-pox. And in the beginning of the fourteenth book, of pulses, that the blood is putrefied in an extraordinary degree, and that the inflammation runs so high, that it burns the skin; so that the small-pox, and pestilent carbuncle, are bred in it, and quite consume it.

And in the ninth treatise of the book of the use of the parts, he observes, that the superfluous parts of aliments, which are not turned into blood, and remain in the members, putrefy, and in time increasing do ferment; whence, at last, are generated the pestilential carbuncle, the small-pox, and confluent inflammations.'

Lastly, in the fourth part of his Commentary upon the Timæus of Plato, he says, that the ancients gave the name gayporn to every thing which produces redness, as the carbuncle, and small-pox; and that these diseases are bred in those in whom bile abounds.

But as for those who alledge, that he has proposed no remedy or cure, nor explained the nature of this distemper, they indeed say what is true: for he mentions no more than what we have cited. But God knows, whether he might not have done it in some other books, which have not yet appeared in Arabic.

As for my own part, I have with great diligence inquired of those who understand both the Syriac and Greek language, and desired them to inform me concerning this matter; but not one of them could tell me more than what I have set down. But this indeed I very much wonder at, and why he passed over this distemper in silence; especially since it was frequent in his time, and therefore there was great reason for his prescribing remedies against it, as he was so diligent in finding out the causes and cures of diseases.

The moderns have, it is true, proposed some medicines for the cure of the small-pox, but not distinctly and clearly enough; neither has any one of them explained the cause of it, and why, except here and there one, no body escapes it; nor shewed the methods of cure in a right order. Upon which account, I hope that the good man who encouraged me to undertake this work will have his re

+ Mr. Channing supplies this hiatus with Galen's words in his own language, xala y, and adds the following note: ovvbeosWS φαρμακων των κατα γενηεςι δε και τοις ιονθοις το φαρμακον χρησιμον, Edit. Aldi, tom. ii. fol. 6. liú, 5.

compence;

compence; and that my reward will be doubled, when I shall have described whatever is necessary to the cure of this disease in due method, assigning to every thing its proper place, by the help of God.

Wherefore let us begin to recite the efficient cause of this distem per; and why it happens, that scarcely any one mortal escapes it. And then we will pursue separately, in the subsequent chapters, the other things which relate to it; and, with God's assistance, shall say on each head whatever is necessary for its cure.

*

I say then, that the body of man, from the time of his nativity, till he arrives at old age, continually tends to dryness; and that therefore the blood of infants and children, and in proportion, the blood of young men, abounds much more with humidity than the blood of old men, and is also hotter. And this indeed Galen teaches us, in his Commentaries upon the Aphorisms, where he says, The heat of children is indeed greater in quantity than the heat of young men; but the heat of young men is more violent in quality. This also is evident from the force of their natural actions, as the digestion of their food, and accretion in children.

Therefore, the blood of children may be compared to new wine, in which the fermentation leading to ripeness is not yet begun; and the blood of young men to the same, fermenting and emitting steams, till it is quiet and ripe. And, lastly, the blood of old men is like to wine whose strength is gone, so that it becomes vapid, and begins to grow sour.

Now, the small-pox arises when the blood putrefies and ferments, and the fermenting particles are thrown out of it; the blood of children, like to new wine, being changed to that of young men, which is as wine perfectly ripened. And this fermentation and

ebullition is the disease.

And this is the reason why children, especially males, rarely escape being seized with it. For, without doubt, as the wine naturally ferments till it comes to perfection; so the blood undergoes the same alteration, in passing from its first to its second state. And there seldom happens a temperament in an infant or child, in which such a change can be made in a small time, and without manifest signs of it: as may be judged from their diet, which in infants is milk; and in children, not milky, but their food is stronger, in proportion, than that of other ages, and more compounded. To which it may be added, that in these there is, after food, a greater motion of the humours. For these reasons, very few children go into life without this distemper. Besides this, great alterations are made here, by different temperaments, manners of life, and habits; as also by the constitution of the ambient air, and state of the blood, both as to quantity and quality: for in some this flows quicker, in others slower; in some it abounds, in others it is deficient; in some it is very bad, in others in a better condition.

* Here begins the translation of the anonymous Greek interpreter.

As

As to young men, whereas the change in their blood is already made, its maturation finished, and the particles of moisture, which should cause putrefaction, are now exhaled; hence it follows, that this disease cannot be generated in them, at least but very seldom, that is, in such whose blood still abounds with too much humidity, or is very corrupt, with a violent inflammation; or who, perhaps, when they were children, had been attacked with the chicken pox, when their blood had not yet passed from the first state to the second; or, lastly, who have a moderate heat, that is, without much moisture; and when they had the chicken-pox, were of a dry tenperament, and lean.

In an advanced age, the distemper will scarcely appear, unless perhaps in putrid, malignart, and pestilential constitutions of the air, in which this disease chiefly rages. For such an air disposes bodies very much to heat and moisture; and an inflamed air promotes eruptions, by blowing up the spirit in the ventricles of the heart, and communicating to it the like disposition, which, by the force of the heart, is sent into the blood which is in the arteries; and brings it into the same state of corruption,

CHAP. IX. Of destroying the Marks of the Small-pox.

The marks of the small-pox are of two sorts: for they are either. in the eye, or on the rest of the body. Now, with respect to the eye, the part on which the small-pox broke out has an opaque whiteness in it, as we have already observed. If this happens in the eyes of children, or young persons of a moist constitution of body, and tender skin, it will be the more easily deterged.

Now, the medicines which deterge the eye, and take off the whitemess, are these: borax, or nitre made into cakes, Andarene salt, salammoniac, glass, the scoria of glass, coral, tutty, lapis hæmatites, verdigrease; bastard sponge, the sea crab, the dungs or excrements of sparrows, swallows, starlings, mice, bats, and of the Arabian or Lybian lizard; musk, the sediment of urine; the acorus, ebony, cornel-water, Arabian sugar, dregs of vinegar burnt, myrrh, sanda. racha or juniper-gum, commonly called varnish, gums of the olive and bitter almond trees, and the milky juice of wild lettuce. It will be best to use these, when the patient is just come out of the bath, or after holding his head over the steam of hot water. But mild medicines alone, nay the mildest of these, are to be employed, especially in soft and moist bodies.

The description of a mild medicine, which removes the white specks from the eye.

Let the eye be sprinkled with sarcocol, and white sugarcandy. Another more efficacious.

Let the eye he sprinkled with bastard sponge, sarcocol, and sugar. Another, still more powerful.

Take of verdigrease ten drachms; myrrh, sagapenum, sal-ammoniac, sarcocol, of each two drachms and a half; bastard sponge, scoriæ of glass, and borax, or nitre in cakes, of each three drachms. Then take of sweet cane ten drachms, and the same quantity of cor

nel-water,

nel-water. Boil these in ten times the weight of water, till the decoction becomes thick: then dissolve the gums in it, and mix all well together into an ophthalmie collyrium. Afterwards, as occasion shall require, to this mixture add ebony in an oil-bottle, Cleanse the part affected gently and often with a needle or style; taking care to apply the collyrium frequently, both before and after the operation. And, lastly, sprinkle it with the powder of the milder sort of the medicines. But be sure to look carefully into the eye every day: for, if it be pained, or look angry, omit this treatment for some days, and then repeat it; for this method of cure is very powerful and efficacious.

As to the medicines which take off the marks of the small-pox from the face and the rest of the body, they are these: white litharge, dried reed-roots, rotten bones powdered, bastard sponge, coral, sarcocol, almonds, birthwort, the ben nut, radish-seed, pumpion-seed, rocket-seed, the flower of beans, rice, lupins, and kidney-beans. On these pour the aqua amurcæ, and barley-water.

The description of a liniment which effaces the marks of the small-pox:

Take of the flower of chiches and beans, each three drachms; of pumpion-seed five drachms; of white litharge two drachms; of dried reed-roots three drachms. Pound all together in barley-water: then apply it to the parts several times successively, after the patient has received the steam of hot water, or after coming out of the bath. Then again wash him in a bath made of pumpion-rinds, dried violets, bran, and pounded chiches, boiled in water; rub hin well, and apply the liniment a second time.

The description of another liniment of greater efficacy:

Take of bean-meal five drachms; bitter almonds, sweet costus, rocket-seed, and radish-seed, of each two drachms and a half; apply it as we have already directed.

Another liniment, more efficacious still:

Take of bitter almonds peeled five drachms; radish-seed, rocketseed, roots of costus, and long birthwort, of each two drachms and a half; of borax, or nitre made into cakes, three drachms; of pepper one drachm and a half: use them as we have already directed. Afterwards, wash the parts with radish-water, or with those things which we have ordered. And those are the medicines which efface the marks and scars of the small-pox.

But, in order to efface the pock-holes, and render them even with the rest of the surface of the body, do thus: let the body be anointed with butter, and well tinged with the herb cyperis, or with its powder: let the patient use the bath frequently, and be rubbed down after it.

NO.

223.

Ee

CRITICAL