Volume 1

Professional anecdotes, or ana of medical literature.

Date:
1825
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Professional anecdotes, or ana of medical literature. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    17/320 (page 3)
    below, or undeserving of their attention, or such as would defile their hands. But the close of the fifteenth century gave birth to two men who were destined to produce great alterations in two of the professions of the clergy. Luther was born in 1483, and effected what is called the reformation of the Catholic Church; or, more properly, gave rise in the northern parts of Europe to a number of new religions. In 1493, Paracelsus came into the world, and produced as great a convulsion in the medical opinions of the age. Although both Luther and Paracelsus wrote much in Latin, as the common language of the learned, yet they also first used the vulgar tongue, that their respective opinions might not be confined to the learned, but be propagated amongst the unlearned also. Both were equally convinced, that the errors, against which they wrote, were so deeply rooted in the minds of the generality of the two professions, that it would be in vain to expect them to give them up, un- less compelled by the voice of an enlightened public. Paracelsus loudly proclaimed the insuffi- ciency of the Galenical practice; and, in this, he was followed by Van Helmont, who ably assisted in the reformation of medicine. The public, as was expected, took part in the coirU n 2