Excerpt from Modern Medicine, Its Theory and Practice, Vol. 1: In Original Contributions by American and Foreign Authors; Evolution of Internal Medicine, Predisposition and Immunity, Diseases Caused by Physical, Chemical and Organic Agents, by Vegetable Parasites, by Protozoa, by Animal Parasites, NutritionIn the intellectual capture of Rome by the Greeks, medicine played a not inconsiderable part, and Greek physicians rose to positions of dignity and importance which have rarely since been equalled in any country or at any period by the leaders of our profession. One of these, Asclepiades the founder, of the school of Methodists, opposed the prevailing humoral pathology and placed the changes met with in, diseases largely in the solids of the body. The Methodists made no special contribution to diagnosis, but Asclepiades seems to have been a shrewd and careful physician, placing greater stress upon exercise, baths, massage, and diet than upon the treatment of disease by medicines. The centuries imme diately preceding and following the birth of Christ saw medicine flourish remarkably throughout the Roman world. In addition to the Methodists there were the Dogmatists, the Eclectics, the Pneumatists, from none of whom did medicine receive any very fertile contributions. Clinically one of the most interesting figures of this period is Aretaeus, whose works have a strong Hippocratic flavor and whose clinical pictures of disease have rarely been equalled. The student who wishes to get a picture of greco-roman medicine of this period should read, on the one hand, Celsus, who gives a remarkable summary of the medical and surgical knowledge of the day, and, on the other, Pliny, whose descriptions abound with the fads and fancies of popular medicine.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.