who had travelled widely and acquired vast information from distant sources. The history manufactured for him is plainly an imitation from that of our Lord, concocted by persons interested in degrading the character of Christ.[487] PLINY THE ELDER (23-79 A.D.), the author of the immense encyclopædic work, his famous _Natural History_, was not a man of genius, nor even an original observer, his work is but a compilation, and contains more falsehood than fact, and more absurdities than either. He cannot be called a naturalist, though he wrote on natural history; nor a physician, though he wrote of diseases and their remedies. His work is valuable chiefly as a picture of the general knowledge of his time. The following is an example of the medical lore of the period. Pliny says that a woman dreamt that some one was directed to send to her son, a soldier in Spain, some roots of the dog-rose. It happened that exactly at that time her son had been bitten by a mad dog, and had received a letter from his mother, who had dreamt about him, and she begged him to use these roots as she directed. He did so, and was “protected” from hydrophobia, as were many others of his friends who adopted the same treatment. Thus it was that the wild-rose was called the dog-rose. DIOSCORIDES lived in the first or second century of our era. He was a physician who rendered greater services than any other to Materia Medica. His work on this subject was the result of immense labour and research, and remained for ages the standard authority; it contained a description of everything used in medicine, and is a most valuable document for the historian of the healing art of the period. Galen highly valued the work of Dioscorides, which must have been of the greatest use to the doctors of the time, who were obliged to prepare their own medicines. Drugs were so much adulterated that it was unsafe to procure them from the stores in Rome. MARINUS was a famous anatomist, who lived in the first and second centuries after Christ. Galen’s tutor Quintus was one of his pupils. He wrote many works on anatomy, which Galen abridged and praised, saying that he was one of the restorers of anatomical science. QUINTUS, an eminent Roman physician of the second century, was a pupil of Marinus. He was celebrated for his knowledge of anatomy. ZENON lived in the fourth century, and taught medicine at Alexandria. Julian (A.D. 361 _circ._) wrote in very high terms of the medical skill of this physician. MAGNUS OF ALEXANDRIA was a pupil of the above, who lectured on medicine at Alexandria, where he was very famous. He wrote a work on the urine. IONICUS OF SARDIS studied under Zenon. He was not only distinguished in all branches of medicine, but was versed in rhetoric, logic, and poetry. THEON OF ALEXANDRIA, of very uncertain period, probably in the fourth century after Christ, wrote a celebrated book on _Man_, in which he treated of diseases in a systematic order, and also of pharmacy.