The learned Philo of Alexandria, who lived A.D. 40, has given us an interesting account of the very remarkable sect living in Egypt in his day, known as the “Theraputæ,” or “healers.” He describes them as a confraternity who, after having received a special training in the University of Alexandria, devoted themselves to the healing art; they led a secluded, contemplative life, and laid the foundation of the monastic system. Eusebius calls them Christians, but this is not confirmed by Philo, who was a member of the sect; they were, probably, Platonists, or philosophical pagans. They ascribed their cures to prayers, fastings, and incantations, eschewed all material remedies, and medicaments, but made free use of magical rites of both forms—the leucomancy, or white magic, used in invoking the gods, and necromancy when the demons were to be propitiated or coerced. St. Luke, before his conversion, is supposed to have been a Therapeut; and St. Paul denounces some of their errors. Of their faults we cannot judge, but we may admire the benevolence with which they devoted themselves alike to the physical and moral welfare of their fellow men—in this respect, no unworthy forerunners of Him who commanded his disciples, not only to “instruct the ignorant,” but to “heal the sick.” We pass over three centuries to come to the time of Celsus, who, in the reign of Tiberius and the first century of our Lord, was established at Rome; where he acquired great honour and renown. To these he was fairly entitled by the extent of his learning and the especial attention he paid to surgery and medicine. His principles governed the medical world without a rival until the time of Galen, who divided the empire with him for centuries. Celsus was the first native Roman physician whose name has been transmitted to us: the practice of medicine and surgery being, prior to his time, in the hands of eminent Greeks and Asiatics, excepting that there existed in Rome (at that period) a race of native practitioners, who belonged to the class of slaves[9] or persons of low degree; and to whom were entrusted only the subordinate branches of the healing art. ----- Footnote 9: See Notes and Letters of Pliny. ----- The great proficiency of Celsus on the subjects of rhetoric, philosophy, military tactics, and rural economy, as mentioned by Quintilian, has induced many of our older writers to doubt whether he ever really practised medicine and surgery, or, whether, like the elder Cato, he simply studied them as a branch of general knowledge; and this scepticism has been favoured by the fact of his name being omitted by Pliny, in his “Treatise on the History of Medicine.” On the other hand, no one, I think, can rise from the perusal of his celebrated work, “De Medicina,” without being thoroughly convinced that his intimate acquaintance with the theory and practice of medicine, surgery, and pharmacy, could only have resulted from close bedside observation.