work on the fabric of the human body. The most surprising chapter
in the history of the book is that for some two centuries, in quite
modern times, it was used as a text-book of anatomy at the University of
Paris. It was printed in a number of editions early in the history of
printing, at least one very probably before 1500, and several later.

There are very interesting phases of medicine delightfully surprising in
their modernity to be found here and there in many of these early
Christian writers on medicine. For instance, in a compend of medicine
written by one Leo, who, under the Emperor Theophilus, seems to have
been a prominent physician of Byzantium (the compend was written for a
young physician just beginning practice), we find the following
classification of hydrops or abdominal dilatation: "There are three
kinds; the first is ascites, due to the presence of watery fluid, for
which we do paracentesis; second, tympany, when the abdomen is swollen
from the presence of air or gas. This may be differentiated by
percussion of the belly. When air is present the sound given forth is
like that of a drum, while in the first form ascites the sound is like
that from a sack [the word used is the same as for a wine sack]; the
third form is called anasarca, when the whole body swells."

It has often been the subject of misunderstanding as to why medicine
should have developed among the Latin Christian nations so much more
slowly than among the Arabs during the early Middle Ages. Anyone who
knows the conditions in which Christianity came into existence in Italy
will not be surprised at that. The Arabs in the East were in contact
with Greek thought, and that is eminently prolific and inspiring. At the
most, the Christians in Italy got their inspiration at second hand
through the Romans. The Romans themselves, in spite of intimate contact
with Greek physicians, never made any important contributions to medical
science, nor to science of any kind. Their successors, the Christians of
Rome and Italy, then could scarcely be expected to do better, hampered
especially, as they were, by the trying social conditions created by the
invasion of the barbarians from the North. Whenever the Christians were
in contact with Greek thought and Greek medicine, above all, as at
Alexandria, or in certain of the cities of the near East, we have
distinguished contributions from them.

ARABIAN CHRISTIAN PHYSICIANS

That this is not a partial vi