This school, however, was opposed by another, known as the Methodic, which had arisen under the leading of Themison, also of Laodicea, about the period of Pompey the Great. Asclepiades paved the way for the " meth- od" in question, finding a theoretic basis in the corjjus- cular or atomic theory of physics which he borrowed from Heraclides of Pontus. He had passed some early years in Alexandria, and thence came to Rome shortly before Cicero's time ("Quo nos medico amicoque usi
MEDICINE
30
MEDICINE
sumus," Cicero, de Orat. i, 14). He was a transitional link between the Dogmatic and Empiric schools and this later, or :VIethodic (Sprengel, ut sup. pt. v, Ifi), that sought to rescue medicine from the bewildering mass of particulars into wliich empiricism had plunged it. He reduced diseases to two classes, chronic and acute, and endeavored likewise to simplify remedies. In the mean- while, the most judicious of medical theorists since Hip- pocrates, Celsus, of the Augustan period, had reviewed medicine in the light which all these schools afforded, and, not professing any distinct teaching, but borrowing from all, may be viewed as eclectic. He translated Hip- pocrates largely eerbalim, quoting in a less degree Ascle- piades and others. Antonius ]Musa, whose "cold-water cure," after its successful trial on Augustus himself, be- came generally pojjular, seems to have had little of scientilic basis, but by the usual method, or the usual accidents, became merely the fashionable practitioner of his tlay in Kome. Attalia, near Tarsus, furnished also, shortly after the period of Celsus, Athen.-eus, the leader of the last of the schools of medicine which di- vided the ancient world, under the name of the " Pneu- matic," holding the tenet "of an etherial principle (Tri/fyjua) residing in the microcosm, by means of which the mind performed the functions of the body." This is also traceable in Hippocrates, and was an established opinion of the Stoics. It was exemplified in the innate heat, Oipfii) tfKpvToc (Aret. Je Cans, et Sir/ii. .\fotb.Ch7-oii. ii, 13), and the ralidinn innutum of modern physiologists, especially in the 17th century (Dr. Adams, Pre/. A retmis, ed. Sydenh. Soc).
4. Kfject of these Systems. — It is clear that all these schools may easily have contributed to form the med- ical opinions current at the period of the N.T.; that the two earlier among them may have influenced rabbinical teaching on that subject at a much earlier period ; and that, especially at the time of Alexander's visit to Jeru- salem, the Jewish people, whom he favored and protect- ed, had an opportunity of largely gathering from the medical lore of the West. It was necessary, therefore, to pass in brief review the growth of the latter, and es- pecially to note the points at which it intersects llio medical progress of the Jews. Greek Asiatic medicine culminated in Galen, who was, however, still but a com- mentator on his Western predecessors, and who stands literally without rival, successor, or disciple of note, till the period when Greek learning was reawakened by the Aral)ian intellect. The Arabs, however, continued to build wholly upon Hippocrates and (Jalen, save in so far as their advance in chemical science improved their pharmacopoeia: this mav be seen on reference to the works of Rhazes, A.D. i)30, and Haly Abbas, A.D. 980. The first mention of small-pox is ascribed to Khazes, who, however, quotes several earlier writers on the sub- ject. Mohammed himself is said to have been versed in medicine, and to have compiled some aphorisms upon it; and a herbalist literature was always extensively followed in the East from the days of Solomon down- wards (Freind's llistoi-y of Medicine, ii, .5, 27). Galen himself belongs to the period of the Antonines, but he appears. to have been acquainted with thA writings of Moses, and to liavc travelled in quest of medical expe- rience over Egyjjt, Syria, and Palestine, as well as Greece, and a large part of the West, and. in particular, to have visited the banks of the Jordan in quest of opo- balsanuim, and the coasts of the Dead Sea to obtain samples of bitumen. He also mentions Palestine as producing a watery wine, suitable for the tlrink of fe- brile patients.
II. Historical Xotices. — Having thus described the external influences which, if any, were probably most l)otent in forming the medical practice of the Hebrews, we may trace next its internal growtli. Tlic cal)alistic legends mix up the names of Slicm and Heber in their fal)l( s about healing, and ascribe to those patriarchs a knowledge of simples ai\d rare roots, with, of course, magic spells and occult powers, such as have clouded
' the hist orj' of medicine from the earliest times down to the 17th centur}'.
I 1. In the Old Testament. — So to Abraham is ascribed a talisman, the touch of which healed all disease. We know that such simple surgical skill as the operation for circumcision implies was Abraham's: but severer op- I erations than this are constantly required in the flock j and herd, and those who watch carefully the habits of animals can hardly fail to amass some guiding princi- ples applicable to man and beast alike. Beyond this, there was probal)ly nothing but such ordinary obstetri- ' cal craft as has always been traditional among the wom- ' en of rude tribes, that could be classed as medical h)re ' in the family of the patriarch, until his sojourn brought him among the more cultivated Philistines and Egyp- tians, The only notices which Scripture aflTords in con- nection with the subject are the cases of difficult mid- wifery in the successive households of Isaac, Jacob, and Judah (Gen. xxv, 26; xxxv, 17; xxxviii, 27), and so, I later, in that of Phinehas (1 Sam. iv, 19). Doubts liave been raised as to the possibility of twins being born, one holding the other's heel ; but there does not seem to be any such limit to the operations of nature as an objection on that score would imply. After all, it was perhaps only just such a relative position of the limbs of the infants at the mere moment of birth as would suggest the " hold- ing by the heel." The midwives, it seems, in case of twins, were called upon to distinguish the first-born, to whom important privileges appertained. The tying on of a thread or ribbon was an easy way of preventing mis- take, and the assistant in the case of Tamar seized the earliest possible moment for doing it. " Wlien the hand or foot of a living child protrudes, it is to be pushed up . . . and the head made to present" (f «!//.. AV/iw.ed Syd- enh. Soc. I, 048, Hippocr. quoted by Dr. Adams). This probably the midwife did, at the same time marking him as first-born In virtue of being thus "presented" first. The precise meaning of the doubtful expression in Gen. xxxviii, 27 and marg. is discussed by Wundcr- bar, vt sup. p. 50, in reference both to the children and to the mother. Of Kachel a Jewish commentator says, "Multis etiam ex itinere difficultatibus pra?gressis,viri- busque post diu protractos dolores exhaustis, atonia uteri, forsau quidcm liajmorrhagia in pariendo mortua est" {ibid.). Tlie traditional value ascribed to the man- drake, in regard to generative functions, relates to the same branch of natural medicine; but tliroughout this period there occurs no trace of any attempt to study, digest, and systematize the subject.