Hippocrates, although he appears to have been familiarly acquainted with the properties of most of the vegetable substances of the Old World, still employed in the practice of medicine, has left no regular treatise on the Materia Medica and pharmacy of his time. Theophrastus has treated more fully and ingeniously of botany and vegetable physiology than any other Greek writer; but except in two or three instances he scarcely alludes to the medicinal powers of the articles which he describes. In short, Dioscorides is the first and great authority on the Materia Medica,—his contributions to which can never be too highly appreciated; for, as Alston justly remarks, the science in ancient times remained ever after in nearly the same state as he left it. The genius of Galen, it is true, shed a considerable degree of lustre over the subject by his philosophical theory regarding the general actions of medicines; but his descriptions of particular substances, and even his detail of their properties, are mostly borrowed from Dioscorides. The Greek authors, subsequent to his time, can scarcely be said to have added one single article to the list of medicinal substances described by him. Aëtius, however, although he can advance no great claim to originality, has given, as we shall see presently, a remarkably lucid exposition of the Galenical principles of therapeutics. Of Pliny’s great work, so replete with the most rare and curious information on almost every department of ancient literature, we feel reluctant to speak otherwise than in terms of unqualified eulogy, and yet candour obliges us to admit that on all medical subjects this writer is but a very indifferent authority. For, being evidently possessed of no practical acquaintance with professional matters, he appears to have been wholly incapable of discriminating real from pretended facts in medicine, and has accordingly jumbled important and useless matter together in many instances with very little judgment, nor can his opinions be much relied upon except when he copies closely from Dioscorides. The same objection cannot be made to his countryman Celsus; but the plan of his work being limited, the account which he gives of these matters is confined to a classification of simple substances, and a few formulæ for the formation of the more important pharmaceutical compounds. The Arabians added camphor, senna, musk, nux vomica, myrobalans, tamarinds, and a good many other articles to the Materia Medica; but, upon the whole, they transmitted the science to us in much the same shape as regards arrangement and general principles as they received it from their Grecian masters. At the same time it is impossible to take even a cursory view of the great work of Ebn Baithar, now fortunately rendered accessible to many European scholars by Dr. Sontheimer’s translation of it into German, without being struck with the amazing industry, enterprise, and talent displayed by that wonderful