subject (except the
Ayur Veda)--as we shall see when we come to consider the science of the
Hindoos--this in itself would be sufficient to show that the Arabians
were certainly not the originators of either medical or chemical
science.

We should not forget that it is only to their own works and their
translations, chiefly by the Greeks, we owe our knowledge of the state
of Arabian science, and that it is only in rare cases that we have given
a list of works consulted, so that we can gather the sources from which
their knowledge was derived. It would scarcely be imagined, from reading
the works of Roger Bacon, or of Newton, that they had derived some, at
least, of their knowledge from Arabian sources; and yet such is known to
have been the case with them both.

Let us now glance backwards from the Arabians to the Greeks.

It is supposed that the first translations from the Greek authors were
made for the Caliphs about 745 A.D., and were first translated into
Syriac, and then into Arabic. The works of Aristotle, Euclid, Ptolemy,
Hippocrates, Galen, and Dioscorides are known to have been translated
under the reign of Al-Mansour.

Granting for the moment that the first knowledge of the sciences was
obtained by the Arabians from the Greeks, we are at once face to face
with the question. From whence did the Greeks obtain their knowledge? To
any careful reader it will be clear that Grecian science and philosophy,
like Grecian theology, was not of native birth. It is comparatively well
known that the Greeks were indebted to the Egyptians for much of their
theology as well as science. The great truths which really underlay the
mysterious religious rites of Egypt seem to have been altogether lost
when the Greeks wove their complicated system of theology; and we read
that the Egyptian priests looked on the Greeks as children who failed to
understand the great mysteries involved in their religious rites,
disguised as they were in symbolic form. But, besides their indebtedness
to Egypt, we will find that they also owed much to Persia, and through
it again to Indian sources of knowledge.

There was constant communication between the Grecian and Persian
nations. We learn that it was not uncommon for Grecian generals to take
service under the Persian Satraps, tempted by the liberal recompence
with which their services were rewarded. About the year 356 B.C. this
system of Greeks accepting service under Persian Satraps nearly caus