of the word, and they are the men who formed the traditions on which the greater Arabian physicians from Rhazes onward were educated.

It would be easy to think that these men, or cupied so much with translations, and intent on the re-introduction of Greek medicine, might have de pended very little on their own observations, and been very impractical. Ail that is needed to coun-teract any such false impression, however is to know something definite about their books. Gurth in his Eistory of Surgery has some quotations from Seranion the elder mio is often quoted Rhazes. In the treatment of aemorhoids. Serbe picn advises ligature and insists hat hoe hist tied with a sik bread or with some other #vivrig thread, and heartier will come to are some people mr hem medicins ritis Conching"

with acis is sorte to eps pet, mid some situa them vul mufe de orfork he iestūre inevor Ze altar fisenasen. he imoral it done

m the dne v reision of La joditas vť Tize Idner "trast, en mening i 1. in titers Le vention vert fartsveling eve? wit Link he Moornd. E E HAR SIVIL THE Dauer i ntler azarle jeboseline He Recrutar sum of ha pohränge về he wear it & vattutier and ICES mill t a arall dari & Ande fern fi:fonit: Ha it hiresing.

Eu sempeta ha moning of her wasdelen? at the inclinar ine. most latuman 1e sidian and the altES. aut tie paping of è salla herifi, & as to posmit arannage til aling wRGIS,

Liver Me With Invest of the adleets and the

writings of the physicians of early Christian times shows how well the tradition of old Greek medicine was being carried on. There was much to hamper the cultivation of science in the disturbances of the time, the gradual breaking up of the Roman Empire, and the replacement of the peoples of southern Europe by the northern nations, who had come in, yet in spite of all this, medical tradition was well preserved. The most prominent of the conservators were themselves men whose opinions on problems of practical medicine were often of value, and whose powers of observation frequently cannot but be admired. There is absolutely no trace of anything like opposition to the development of medical science or medical practice, but, on the contrary, everywhere among political and ecclesiastical authorities, we find encouragement and patronage. The very fact that, in the storm and stress of the succeeding centuries, manuscript copies of the writings of the physicians of this time were preserved for us in spite of the many vicissitudes to which they were subjected from fire, and war, and accidents of various kinds for hundreds of years, until the coming of printing, shows in what estimation they were held. During this time they owed their preservation to churchmen, for the libraries and the copying-rooms were all under ecclesiastical control.

(the Ghettos have only disappeared in the nineteenth century), it would seem almost impossible for them to have done great intellectual work. It is one of the very common illusions, however, that great intellectual work is accomplished mainly in the midst of comfortable circumstances and as the result of encouraging conditions. Most of our great makers of medicine at all times, and never more so than during the past century, have been the sons of the poor, who have had to earn their own living, as a rule, before they reached manhood, and who have always had the spur of that necessity which has been so well called the mother of invention. Their hard living conditions probably rather favored than hampered their intellectual accomplishments.

It is not unlikely that the difficult personal circumstances in which the Jews were placed had a good deal to do at all times with stimulating their ambitions and making them accomplish all that was in them. Certain it is that at all times we find a wonderful power in the people to rise above their conditions. With them, however, as with other peoples, luxury, riches, comfort, bring a surfeit to initiative and the race does not accomplish so much. At various times in the early Middle Ages, particularly, we find Jewish physicians doing great work and obtaining precious acknowledgment for it in spite of the most discouraging conditions. Later it is not unusual to find that there has been a degeneration into mere money-making as the result of opportunity and consequent ease and luxury. At a number of times, however, both in Christian and in Moham

medan countries, great Jewish physicians arose whose names have come to us and with whom every student of medicine who wants to know something about the details of the course of medical history must be familiar. There are men among them who must be considered among the great lights of medicine, significant makers always of the art and also in nearly all cases of the science of medicine.

A little consideration of the history of the Jewish people and their great documents eliminates any surprise there may be with regard to their interest in medicine and successful pursuit of it during the Middle Ages. The two great collections of Hebrew documents, the Old Testament and the Talmud, contain an immense amount of material with reference to medical problems of many kinds. Both of these works are especially interesting because of what they have to say of preventive medicine and with regard to the recognition of disease. Our prophylaxis and diagnosis are important scientific departments of medicine dependent on observation rather than on theory. While therapeutics has wandered into all sorts of absurdities, the advances made in prophylaxis and in diagnosis have always remained valuable, and though at times they have been forgotten, re-discovery only emphasizes the value of preceding work. It is because of what they contain with regard to these two important medical subjects that the Old Testament and the Talmud are landmarks in the history of medicine as well as of religion.

Baas, in his "Outlines of the History of Medi