The Evolution of Modern Medicine: A Series of Lectures Delivered at Yale University on the Silliman Foundation in April, 1913Osler, William, Sir
History
The Evolution of Modern Medicine: A Series of Lectures Delivered at Yale University on the Silliman Foundation in April, 1913
Osler, William, Sir
Medicine -- History
A still greater name in the history of this school is Guy de Chauliac,
whose works have also been edited by Nicaise (Paris, 1890). His
"Surgery" was one of the most important text-books of the late Middle
Ages. There are many manuscripts of it, some fourteen editions in the
fifteenth century and thirty-eight in the sixteenth, and it continued to
be reprinted far into the seventeenth century. He too was dominated
by the surgery of the Arabs, and on nearly every page one reads of
the sages Avicenna, Albucasis or Rhazes. He lays down four conditions
necessary for the making of a surgeon--the first is that he must be
learned, the second, expert, the third that he should be clever, and the
fourth that he should be well disciplined.
You will find a very discerning sketch of the relation of these two men
to the history of surgery in the address given at the St. Louis Congress
in 1904 by Sir Clifford Allbutt.(20) They were strong men with practical
minds and good hands, whose experience taught them wisdom. In both there
was the blunt honesty that so often characterizes a good surgeon, and I
commend to modern surgeons de Mondeville's saying: "If you have operated
conscientiously on the rich for a proper fee, and on the poor for
charity, you need not play the monk, nor make pilgrimages for your
soul."
(20) Allbutt: Historical Relations of Medicine and Surgery,
London, Macmillan Co., 1905.
One other great mediaeval physician may be mentioned, Peter of Abano (a
small town near Padua, famous for its baths). He is the first in a long
line of distinguished physicians connected with the great school of
Padua. Known as "the Conciliator," from his attempt to reconcile the
diverse views on philosophy and medicine, he had an extraordinary
reputation as a practitioner and author, the persistence of which
is well illustrated by the fact that eight of the one hundred and
eighty-two medical books printed before 1481 were from his pen. He seems
to have taught medicine in Paris, Bologna and Padua. He was a devoted
astrologer, had a reputation among the people as a magician and, like
his contemporary, Arnold of Villanova, came into conflict with the
Church and appears to have been several times before the Inquisition;
indeed it is said that he escaped the stake only by a timely death.
He was a prolific commentator on Aristotle, and his exposition of the
"problems" had a great vogue. The early editions of his texts are among
the most superb works ever printed. He outlived his reputation as a
magician, and more than a century after his death Frederick, Duke of
Urbino, caused his effigies to be set up over the gate of the palace at
Padua with this inscription:
PETRUS APONUS PATAVINUS PHILOSOPHIAE MEDICINAEQUE
SCIENTISSIMUS, OB IDQUE, CONCILIATORIS NOMEN
ADEPTUS, ASTROLOGIAE VERO ADEO PERITUS,
UT IN MAGIAE SUSPICIONEM INCIDERIT,
FALSOQUE DE HAERESI POSTULATUS,
ABSOLUTUS FUERIT.(21)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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