Читать книгу Medicine in the Middle Ages. Extracts from "Le Moyen Age Medical" by Dr. Edmond Dupouy; translated by T. C. Minor онлайн

9 страница из 45

Why the poet of the Roman du Renard was so full of rancor against the doctors of his time is a problem too difficult to solve; yet, while he considered them no better than criminals and dangerous men to society, he did not fail to call a doctor before dying. Physicians, for some strange and unknown reason, have always been criticised by French literary men in modern as well as ancient times. Our French authors have never, as did the masters of Greek poesy, recognized us as brothers in Apollo. Permit me here to call their attention to one of the writers of Greek anthology, who said of physicians:

“The son of Phœbus himself, Æsculapius, has instilled into thy mind, O Praxagorus, the knowledge of that divine art which makes care to be forgotten. He has given into thy hands the balm that cures all evils. Thou, too, hast learned from the sweet Epion what pains accompany long fevers, and the remedies to be applied to divided flesh; if mortals possessed medicines such as thine, the ferry of Charon would not be overloaded in crossing the Styx.”