being rash. He knows, above all, how to choose what is best in
everything." Verneuil, in his "Conference sur Les Chirurgiens Erudits,"
says, "The services rendered by the 'Great Surgery' were immense; by it
there commenced for France an era of splendor. It is with justice, then,
that posterity has decreed to Guy de Chauliac the title of Father of
French surgery."

The more one reads of Chauliac's work the less is one surprised at the
estimation in which he has been held wherever known. It would not be
hard to add a further sheaf of compliments to those collected by
Nicaise. Modern writers on the history of medicine have all been
enthusiastic in their admiration of him, just in proportion to the
thoroughness of their acquaintance with him. Portal, in his "History of
Anatomy and Surgery," says, "Finally, it may be averred that Guy de
Chauliac said nearly everything which modern surgeons say, and that his
work is of infinite price but unfortunately too little read, too little
pondered." Malgaigne declares Chauliac's "Chirurgia Magna" to be "a
masterpiece of learned and luminous writing." Professor Clifford
Allbutt, the Regius Professor of Physic at the University of Cambridge,
says of Chauliac's treatise: "This great work I have studied carefully
and not without prejudice; yet I cannot wonder that Fallopius compared
the author to Hippocrates or that John Freind calls him the Prince of
Surgeons. It is rich, aphoristic, orderly, and precise."[25]

If to this account of his professional career it be added that
Chauliac's personality is, if possible, more interesting than his
surgical accomplishment, some idea of the significance of the life of
the great father of modern surgery will be realized. We have already
quoted the distinguished words of praise accorded him by Pope Clement
VI. That they were well deserved, Chauliac's conduct during the black
death which ravaged Avignon in 1348, shortly after his arrival in the
Papal City, would have been sufficient of itself to attest. The
occurrence of the plague in a city usually gave rise to an exhibition of
the most arrant cowardice, and all who could, fled. In many of the
European cities the physicians joined the fugitives, and the ailing were
left to care for themselves. With a few notable exceptions, this was
the case at Avignon, but Guy was among those who remained faithful to
his duty and took on himself the self-sacrificing labor of caring for
the sick, doubly harassing bec