At the commencement of the Erudite Period Arabic literature still predominated in medicine. Rhazes, Haly-Abbas, and Avicenna were universally invoked and explained. But a taste for Greek literature began to prevail in the universities of Italy, and was finally extended to every part of Europe, especially after the taking of Constantinople by Mahomet II, Emperor of the Turks, in 1453. This disaster, which at first bade fair to be a mortal blow to Greek literature and language, strange to say, served only to hasten their resurrection in the Occident. Constantinople having been given over to pillage at this time, most of its learned men escaped, carrying with them all manuscripts that could be seized; most of these found refuge in Italy, and enlightened protectors in the allpowerful prince of the house of Medici, in Florence, in the popes at Rome, and in Alphonso, of Arragon, King of Naples and Sicily. Everywhere these fugitives spread the knowledge of the masterpieces of Greek literature and art, and in this way a taste for books, libraries, and sound erudition was diffused, while the Greek and Latin classics were hunted up and published with great patience and ardor; thus the works of the old writers were edited, translated, commented upon, and everywhere disseminated throughout Europe.

Among those who devoted themselves to the thankless task of editing, and purifying from interpolations, the works of the classic writers was Nicholas Léonicenus, born near Vincenza in the year 1428, who studied medicine at Padua and taught it for more than sixty years at Ferrara. He possessed great vigor of mind, with purity of manners and serenity of soul, and was the first to translate directly from Greek into Latin the aphorisms of Hippocrates and portions of the writings of Galen. He combated in every way the infatuation of his contemporaries for the Arabians and their lore, and called attention to many of the errors of men who, like Pliny the naturalist, had fallen for lack of fully understanding the Greek authors they compiled. At the ripe age of ninety-six he died, regretted by all.

Thomas Linacre, of Canterbury, a contemporary of Léonicenus, though younger (1461-1524), studied first at the University of Oxford, went to Italy in 1484, and in Florence attracted the attention of Lorenzo de Medici, who made him the companion of his own children, to whom he gave the best possible advantages. In due time he returned to England, where his talents speedily won him high station, and he became physician to King Henry VIII, and later to Queen Mary. Linacre was the first Englishman, it is said, who spoke purely the language of the Romans. He translated several books of Galen that are still esteemed; and caused the founding of two chairs, one at Oxford, the other at Cambridge, whose incumbents were charged with the duty of explaining the works of Hippocrates and Galen. But he is most entitled to the gratitude of his countrymen for his influence in founding the College of London. To appreciate properly its importance and his merits, we must remember the obstacles that had to be surmounted; for at that time bishops alone had the right to accord, in their own dioceses, permission to practice medicine, and, consequently, the healing art was abandoned entirely to monks and illiterate empirics. It was well that Linacre had influence at court, else he could never have obtained the reform of such overwhelming abuses; but he triumphed in spite of powerful opposition, and secured the issue of letters patent which prohibited the practice of medicine by any one who had not received a degree in one of the two universities in the kingdom, and been examined by the President of the College of London assisted by three others. This was the achievement which gave this learned man the title of "Restorer of Medicine" in England.

Léonicenus and Linacre, who were of the early Erudite Period, also merit mention not merely because of literary talents, but because they were the first eminent physicians to embrace the study of Greek classics, and to propagate the knowledge therein contained. Subsequently others followed the same course,—too many, in fact, to be enumerated; but it was easy to follow after such leaders. From the time when men began to realize the superiority of Greek models over prolix Arabian commentaries, they were anxious to seek the light at its source, and applied themselves with avidity to the study of the originals. At this time copies of Greek authors were few in number and in a deplorable condition, owing to neglect. To rediscover them, to purify, to eliminate what was not original, to rearrange, and finally to multiply by the aid of the printing-press was an extended labor requiring great knowledge, rare sagacity, and commendable patience. One of the greatest publications in medical literature belonging to this epoch was a complete edition of the Hippocratic writings, translated into Latin by Anuce Foes,—a poor, but learned, practitioner, who lived on the products of his business as pension physician in the city of Metz,—and issued from Frankfort-on-the-Main in 1495. To this master-work Foes consecrated forty years of his life. Another treatise belonging to this same time, less important, perhaps, from a medical point of view, but nevertheless showing great erudition, was a treatise on the gymnastics of the ancients, by Jerome Mercurial is, a work said to be not less precious to historians than antiquarians. It was by such intense zeal and hard labor that true erudition was restored in Europe.

Following now some of the special branches of medical learning and their development, let us look first at anatomy and physiology. I have already related the salient points of the life and labors of Mondino, of whom it is said that, about the year 1315, while professor at Bologna, he dissected the bodies of two women, and shortly after published an epitome of anatomy illustrated with wood-cuts. Also has been mentioned the prohibition of anatomical study pronounced by Pope Boniface VIII, in 1300. It was only toward the close of the fifteenth and the early years of the sixteenth century that this prejudice began to abate; the popes, who then stood at the head of scientific movements, withdrew their interdictions, and the universities of Italy gave public dissections. Achillini, Benedetti, and Jacques Berenger dissected at Bologna, Padua, and Pavia, previous to the year 1500; soon afterward their example was generally followed.

Jacques Dubois, whose name was Latinized into Jacobus Sylvius, was born in 1478, in a village near Amiens; he studied in Paris, where he worked most industriously at anatomy, which later he was so successful in teaching. He was the first to arrange all the muscles of the human body, to determine their functions, and to give names to those of them which had not yet been so designated. He discovered the valves of the large veins, and was the first to study the blood-vessels by means of colored injections. He gave the same careful attention to pharmacy, and in Paris, before a large class of students, began lectures, on anatomy, physiology, hygiene, pathology, and therapeutics; these he continued until the faculty, on account of jealousy, interrupted them. He then, in 1529, went to Montpellier, but returned two years later to become a member of the faculty, and once more lectured with the greatest eclat. Later yet he became a successor to Vidius in the Royal College,—a position he retained up to his death in 1555. His medical writings were extensive and marked by great accuracy, while for anatomy he did a great deal, contributing much to popularize it. He dissected a great number of animals and as many human cadavers as he could procure, the number, however, being small. Unfortunately, he subordinated all his own research to the authority of Galen, being himself among those anatomists who permitted themselves to be so far misled.

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The man of genius and courage, who accepted the truth of what his eyes revealed to him, and who was the true reformer in anatomy, was Andreas Vesalius, born at Brussels, in 1514, of a family already illustrious in medicine. He studied at the University of Louvain, where he early revealed the inclinations of the anatomist, since in his leisure moments he was wont to amuse himself in dissecting small animals. Near Louvain was a place where criminals were executed; and Vesalius, having observed the body of one from which the soft parts had all been cleaned away by ravenous birds, only the bones and ligaments remaining, detached the extremities separately, and then carried off the trunk by night, thus possessing himself of his first skeleton. Attracted by the fame of Sylvius, lie afterward went to Paris to become his pupil, but, not content with the lessons of his master, continued to observe for himself. On the hill Montfauçon, where executions took place, he disputed with dogs and vultures for the remains of criminals, or by stealth disinterred bodies from the cemeteries at the greatest personal risk. So great was his application that his progress became rapid, and at the age of twenty he gave instruction to fellow-students; at twenty-two he became Professor of Anatomy at Padua, being appointed by the Senate of Venice; at twenty-nine he issued his great work on anatomy, which showed a completeness that left far in the rear all that had hitherto been published on this subject. The following year he was called by the Emperor Charles V to the court of Madrid, then the most brilliant in Europe, where he became the first physictan, and from this time abandoned his anatomical labors.