The growth of medicine from the earliest times to about 1800Buck, Albert H. (Albert Henry)
History
The growth of medicine from the earliest times to about 1800
Buck, Albert H. (Albert Henry)
Medicine -- History
the Forefathers in Medicine” (I-Tsung-Kin-Kien); and, finally, the
very popular modern work (in forty volumes) entitled “The Trustworthy
Guide in the Science and Art of Medicine” (“Ching-Che-Chun-Ching”). Of
these forty volumes, seven are devoted to nosology, eight to pharmacy,
five to pathology, six to surgery, and the remainder to children’s and
women’s diseases.
Anatomy, it appears, has never played other than a very insignificant
part in the Chinese system of medicine. This is not to be wondered
at when we remember that their religion makes the dissection of a
human body a sin worthy of punishment. No mutilated person, the
Chinese believed, would be permitted, upon reaching the domain of
the dead, to rejoin his ancestors. About the year 1700 A. D. the
Emperor Kang-Hi made the attempt to incorporate anatomy as a part
of the regular study of medicine in the Chinese Empire; his first
step being the authorization of P. Perennin, a Jesuit Father, to
translate Dionis’ work on anatomy into the Chinese. His efforts were,
however, unsuccessful, owing to the strong opposition offered by the
native physicians. And the attempts made during more recent times
to accomplish the desired reform by introducing copies of European
anatomical illustrations do not appear, as yet, to have produced any
appreciable impression. In very recent years, however, the medical
missionaries, sent out, if I am rightly informed, from the United
States, are giving excellent instruction in anatomy.
Physiology, as taught by the Chinese, is something beyond the
comprehension of modern Europeans. Neuburger explains their views
in the following manner: “The cosmos is the product of the combined
action of two dissimilar forces--the male (Yâng) and the female (Yin).
When these forces work in harmony a state of equilibrium results....
Matter consists of five elements, viz., wood, fire, earth, metal, and
water; and all things are composed of these elements. In sympathetic
relationship with these five elements stand the five planets (Jupiter,
Mars, Saturn, Venus, Mercury), the five different kinds of air (wind,
heat, moisture, dryness, cold), the five quarters of the globe (east,
south, west, north and the equator), the five periods of the year (in
addition to the four which we recognize, the Chinese make a fifth
period out of the last eighteen days of spring, summer, autumn and
winter), the five times of day, the five colors (green or blue, red,
yellow, white and black), the five musical tones, etc.... As in the
cosmos, so in man the two primeval forces--Yâng and Yin--underlie all
his vital processes. Thus, his body is made up of the five elements of
which all matter is composed, and health depends upon the maintenance
of a state of equilibrium between the male and the female forces,
etc.” After this brief exposition it seems unnecessary to devote any
further space to the consideration of the physiological doctrines of
the Chinese.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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