19 - Evolution of Modern Medicine by Sir William Osler

Dive into the insightful manuscript of Sir William Oslers lectures on the Evolution of Modern Medicine, delivered at Yale University in 1913. As the father of modern clinical medicine, Osler masterfully guides us through the fascinating history of medicine, tracing its journey from ancient practices to contemporary advancements, including the significant rise of preventive medicine. Written for a general audience, this classic work is both captivating and enlightening, making it a must-read for anyone interested in the realms of healthcare, medicine, and history. - Summary by Cao Yuqing

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Section eighteen of the Evolution of Modern Medicine. This is
a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
Recording by Rita Boutros. The Evolution of Modern Medicine by
Sir William Osler, Section eighteen, Chapter four The Renaissance and

(00:25):
the rise of anatomy and Physiology. The reconquest of the
classic world of thought was by far the most important
achievement of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. It absorbed nearly
the whole mental energy of the Italians. The revelation of
what men were and what they wrought under the influence

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of other faiths and other impulses in distant ages with
a different ideal for their aim not only widened the
narrow horizon of the Middle Ages, but it also restored
self confidence to the reason of humanity. Everywhere throughout the
Middle Ages, learning was the handmaid of theology. Even Roger Bacon,

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with his strong appeal for a new method, accepted the
dominant medieval conviction that all the sciences did but minister
to their queen theology. A new spirit entered man's heart
as he came to look upon learning as a guide
to the conduct of life. A revolution was slowly effected
in the intellectual world. It is a mistake to think

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of the Renaissance as a brief period of sudden fruitfulness
in the North Italian cities. So far as science is concerned,
the thirteenth century was an aurora followed by a long
period of darkness. But the fifteenth was a true dawn
that brightened more and more unto the perfect day, always
a reflex of its period. Medicine joined heartily, though slowly,

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in the revolt against medievalism. How slowly I did not
appreciate until recently. Studying the earliest printed medical works to
catch the point of view of the men who were
in the thick of the movement up to fourteen eighty,
which may be taken to include the first quarter of
a century of printing, one gets a startling record the

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medieval mind still dominates. Of the sixty seven authors of
one hundred and eighty two editions of early medical books,
twenty three were men of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries,
thirty men of the fifteenth century, eight wrote in Arabic.
Several were of the school of Salernum, and only six

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were of classical antiquity, viz. Pliny, Hippocrates, Haine, Galen, Aristotle, Celsus,
and Diascorides. The medical profession gradually caught the new spirit.
It has been well said that Greece arose from the dead,
with the New Testament in the one hand and Aristotle

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in the other. There was awakened a perfect passion for
the old Greek writers, and with it a study of
the original sources, which had now become available in many manuscripts. Gradually,
Hippocrates and Galen came to their own again. Almost every
professor of medicine became a student of the manuscripts of

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Aristotle and of the Greek physicians, And before fifteen thirty
the presses had poured out a stream of additions. A
wave of enthusiasm swept over the profession, and the best
energies of its best minds were devoted to his study
of the fathers. Galen became the idol of the schools.

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A strong revulsion of feeling arose against the Arabians and Avicenna,
the prince, who had been clothed with an authority only
a little less than divine became anathema. Under the leadership
of the Montpellier School. The Arabians made a strong fight,
but it was a losing battle. All along the line,

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this group of medical humanists, men who were devoted to
the study of the old humanities, as Latin and Greek
were called, has had a great and beneficial influence upon
the profession. They were, for the most part, cultivated gentlemen
with a triple interest literature, medicine, and natural history. How

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important is the part they played may be gathered from
a glance at the lives given by Bale in his
biographic Medical Paris eighteen fifty five. Between the years fifteen
hundred and fifteen seventy five. More than one half of
them had translated or edited works of Hippocrates or Galen.

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Many of them had made important contributions to general literature,
and a large proportion of them were naturalists Leones, Senas,
Linacar Champier, Farnell, Fracastorius, Gauntier, Caius j. Silvius, Brassavola, Fusius, Matthiolus,

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Conrad Gessner. To mention, only those I know best form
a great group. Linekar edited Greek works for Aldus translated
works of Galen, taught Greek at Oxford, wrote Latin grammars,
and founded the Royal College of Physicians. Caius was a
keen Greek scholar, an ardent student of natural history, and

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his name is enshrined as co founder of one of
the most important of the Cambridge colleges. Gauntier, Fernell, Fux
and Mattioli were great scholars and greater physicians. Champier, one
of the most remarkable of the group, was the founder
of the Hotel Dieu at Lyons and author of books

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of a characteristic Renaissance type and of singular bibliographical interest
in many ways. Greatest of all was Conrad Gesner, whose
mors Inopinata at forty nine, bravely fighting the plague, is
so touchingly and tenderly mourned by his friend Caius, physician, botanist, mineralogist, geologist, chemist,

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the first great modern bibliographer. He is the very embodiment
of the spirit of the age. On the fly leaf
of my copy of the Biblioteca Universalis fifteen forty five
is written a fine tribute to his memory. I do
not know by whom it is, but I do know
from my reading that it is true Conrad Gesner, who

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kept open house there for all learned men who came
into his neighborhood. Gesner was not only the best naturalist
among the scholars of his day, but of all men
of that century. As the pattern man of letters, he
was faultless in private life, assiduous in study, diligent in
maintaining correspondence and good will with learned men in all countries, hospitable,

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though his means were small, to every scholar that came
into Zurich, prompt to serve all. He was an editor
of other men's volumes, a writer of prefaces for friends,
a suggestor to young writers of books on which they
might engage themselves, and a great helper to them in
the progress of their work. But still, while finding time

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for services to other men, he could produce as much
out of his own study as though he had no
part in the life beyond its walls. A large majority
of these early naturalists and botanists were physicians. The Greek
art of observation was revived in a study of the
scientific writings of Aristotle, Theophrastus, and Dioscorides, and in medicine

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of Hippocrates and of Galen, all in the Greek originals.
That progress was at first slow was due in part
to the fact that the leaders were too busy scraping
the Arabian tarnish from the pure gold of Greek medicine
and correcting the anatomical mistakes of Galen to bother much
about his physiology or pathology. Here and there, among the

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great anatomis of the period, we read of an experiment,
But it was the art of observation, the art of Hippocrates,
not the science of Galen, not the carefully devised experiment
to determine function that characterized their work. There was, indeed,
every reason why men should have been content with the

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physiology and pathology of that day. As from a theoretical standpoint,
it was excellent. The doctrine of the four humors and
of the natural animal and vital spirits afforded a ready
explanation for the symptoms of all diseases, and the practice
of the day was admirably adapted to the theories. There

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was no thought of, no desire for change, but the
revival of learning awakened in men, at first a suspicion
and at last a conviction. That the ancients had left
something which could be reached by independent research, and gradually
the paralytic like torpor passed away. The sixteenth and seventeenth

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centuries did three things in medicine. Shattered authority, laid the
foundation of an accurate knowledge of the structure of the
human body, and demonstrated how its functions should be studied intelligently.
With which advances as illustrating this period may be associated
the names of Paracelsus, Vesalius, and Harvey end of Section eighteen.