Another reproach to which the medical profession was exposed arose from the preparatory studies which it required. The natural but unreflecting sentiment of horror with which anatomy is everywhere regarded by the populace, was unfortunately sanctioned by the highest authorities of the Roman Church. Absolutely necessary for the general good as that branch of science indisputably is, it was reprobated by some of the Fathers in the strongest and most unqualified terms; they called it butchering the bodies of the dead; and all persons who should disinter a corpse for this purpose, were excommunicated by a decree of Boniface the 8th, wherein the science itself was pronounced abominable both in the eyes of God and man. In addition to this cause of obloquy, there was a notion that cruel experiments, such as are now made upon animals, and too often unnecessarily, and therefore wickedly repeated, were sometimes performed upon living men. The Egyptian Physician who is believed first to have taught that the nerves are the organs of sensation, is said to have made the discovery by dissecting criminals alive. The fact is not merely stated by Celsus, but justified by him. Deducing its justification as a consequence from the not-to-be disputed assertion _cum in interioribus partibus et dolores, et morborum varia genera nascantur, neminem his adhibere posse remedia, quæ ipse ignoret:—necessarium ergo esse,_ he proceeds to say, _incidere corpora mortuorum, eorumque viscera atque intestina scrutari._ LONGEQUE OPTIME FECISSE _Herophilum et Erasistratum, qui nocentes homines à regibus ex carcere acceptos,_ VIVOS INCIDERINT; _considerarintque,_ ETIAM SPIRATU MANENTE, _ea quæ natura antea clausisset, eorumque posituram, colorem, figuram, magnitudinem, ordinem, duritiem, mollitiem, lævorem, contactum; processus deinde singulorum et recessus; et sive quid inseritur alteri, sive quid partem alterius in se recipit._ As late as the sixteenth century surgeons were wont to beg (as it was called) condemned malefactors, whom they professed to put to death in their own way, by opium before they opened them. It might well be suspected that these disciples of Celsus were not more scrupulous than their master; and they who thus took upon themselves the business of an executioner, had no reason to complain if they shared in the reproach attached to his infamous office.