Part 2

Pope Innocent III., the Father of City Hospitals. Santo Spirito at Rome. Virchow on the effect of this in Germany. French hospitals and the Hotel Dieu. English hospitals. The five royal hospitals. Virchow's tribute to Pope Innocent III. Hospital regulation. Care for the poor. Longings of patients. Religious nurses and modern nursing. Virchow's opinion. Contemporaries on hospital accomplishment. Magnificent hospital building. Models for all future time. A modern architects's opinion. Hospital decoration. Siena Hospital. Hospital abuses. Problem of malingerers. Leper hospitals. The eradication of leprosy. Lesson for our generation as to tuberculosis. Special hospitals for erysipelas. Benefit of segregation. The religious dress and its anticipation of aseptic needs. Hospitals ruined when taken from the Church and the religious.

THE CHURCH AND THE EXPERIMENTAL METHOD. 281

The doubting mood so important for science supposed to preclude faith. Most great scientists Catholics. Francis Bacon, the supposed Father of Inductive Science. Only the popularizer of the experimental method. Bacon and Copernicus. Gilbert of Colchester before Bacon. Friar Bacon on the experimental method. Peregrinus and the value of experiments. Bacon's four grounds of human ignorance. Bacon's great teacher, Albertus Magnus, and the experimental method. Christian tradition as to scientific inquiry as begun by Augustine. Albert's place in the history of inductive science. Interest of the Middle Ages in physical science.

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CHURCHMEN AND PHYSICAL SCIENCE IN THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITIES. 302

The Popes and the medieval universities. What the scholastic philosophers did for science. Scientific teaching at the early universities. "Foundations of knowledge for Galileo, Harvey, Newton and Darwin." (Allbutt.) Magnetics. Philosopher's stone and the transmutation of metals. Constitution of matter. Matter and form. Indestructibility of matter. Conservation of energy. Albertus Magnus on the antipodes. Humboldt's appreciation of Albert. Albert's scientific accomplishments. Astronomy, botany, geography and biological sciences. Roger Bacon and explosives; achievements in optics and astronomy. Aquinas and chemistry. The relations of these men to the Popes. Bacon's difficulties. Medieval accomplishments in applied science. Scientific applications in medieval cities (Kropotkin). Decadence in science after Middle Ages. The place of the reformation so-called. The first encyclopedia. Vincent of Beauvais and interest in his work. Thomas of Cantimprato and Bartholomaeus Anglicus. Craving for information in natural science.

THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITY MAN AND SCIENCE. 340

Dante a type of the medieval university student. His knowledge a proof of how he was taught. Dante as a student of nature. Ruskin's opinion. Trobridge's suggestions. Dante's early education. Azarias and Kropotkin on the public schools of Florence and Nuremberg. Kuhns on Dante's science. Optics. Astronomy. Humboldt's praise of Dante's scientific knowledge. Dante the observer, phosphorescence, flies, bees and ants. Dante knew more science than any modern poet. His contribution to the science of education.

THE CHURCH AND THE MENTALLY AFFLICTED. 363

Disease and supernatural agency. Denial of disease. Scientists and spiritualism. Reaction in recent years. Anticipations in psychiatry. Supposed evolution of treatment of the mentally diseased. Medieval care of the insane. Psychopathic wards in hospitals. The open door treatment. After-care of the insane. The colony system. Religious suggestion and cure--ancient and modern. Prayer and mental disease. Care of the insane at Gheel. Neglect {xii} of insane not exclusively medieval. Milder measures quite modern. Spiritual agencies in life. Alfred Russell Wallace, Sir William Crookes, Sir Oliver Lodge, Prof. Charles Richet, Lombroso.

APPENDIX I.

OPPOSITION TO SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS. 390

The Popes as patrons of scientific education. Swift on genius and assinine opposition. Allston on truth in unusual form. "Nonsense" and "absurd" on scientists' tongues. Jordan on human conservatism. Galileo's letter to Kepler, on "logic" and science. Huxley on Galileo. De Morgan on other cases. Dogmatism and folly. Persecution of scientists. Harvey, Vesalius, Servetus, Steno. Not confined to old times, Jenner, Auenbrugger, Laennec, Thomas Young, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Semmelweiss. Opposition in other sciences. Ohm. Young men and discoveries. Pasteur and rabies. Our universities and economics. Conservatism still active. The lesson.

APPENDIX II.

LATIN TEXT OF PAPAL BULLS AND DECREES. 413

_De Sepulturis._ _De Crimine Falsi._ _Super Illius specula._ Bulls for erection of Universities of Perugia and Cahors.

APPENDIX III. 419

Emperor Frederick's Law Regulating the Practice of Medicine (1231)

APPENDIX IV.

CHURCH DECREES RELATING TO MEDICINE. 424

Prohibition of the study and practice of medicine and law to members of religious orders. Text of the decrees. Significance of the prohibition. Not all priests, but only members of religious orders involved. Church decrees as to the physician's duty in securing the last rites of the Church for his patients when in danger of death. Text of the decrees. Misunderstanding.

APPENDIX V.

PAPAL PHYSICIANS. 431

The principal Papal Physicians, their careers, and their chief works. Ursus, Guy of Montpellier, Ricardus Anglicus, Taddeo {xiii} Florentinus, Simon Januensis, William of Brescia, Arnold of Villanova, Petrus Aichspadius, Gentilis Gentilis, Dino del Garbo, Guy de Chauliac, Jean de Tornemire, Francis Casinus, John Baptist Verallus, Ludovicus Scarampus, Bernard Garzonius, Laurentius Roverella, Joannes Serninus, Simon Tebaldi, Jacobus Gottifredus, Joannes Burgius, Sanctes Floccus, Sebastianus Veteranus, Onofrio de Onofriis, John Philip de Lignamine, Benedict of Nursia, Petrus Leonius, Alexander de Espinosa, Gaspar Torella, Petrus Pintor, Horatio and Scipio Lancillotti, Joannes Bodier, Samuel Sarfati, Antonius Petrutius, Dioscorides da Velletri, Bartholomeo of Pisa, Bernardinus Speronius, Jerome Sessa, Clementius Clementinus, Bartholomeo Montagnana, Giovanni Antracino, John de Vigo, Francesco Fusconi, Andreas Cibbo, Andrea Turini, Ludovico Augeni, Paulus Jovius, Matteo Corti (Curtius), Antonio Musa Brasavola, Silvius Zeffiri, Jacobus Bonacossus, Joannes Manovelli, Thomas Cadimustus, Tiberius Palella, Alfonso Ferri, Franciscus Frigimelica, Maggi, John Baptist Cananus, Augustino Ricchi, Altamare, Bianchi, Simon Pasqua, Pompeius Barba, Franciscus Gymnasius, Jerome Cardan, Mercurialis, Placidus Fuscus, Andreas Baccius, Demetrius Canevarius, Malpighi, Jerome Provenzalis, Jerome Rubeus, Jerome Cordella, Zecchius, Caesalpinus, Michael Mercatus, Nicholas Masinus, Jacobus Bonaventura, Julius de Angelis, Pompeius Caimus, Vincentius Crucius, Giovanni and Bernardino Castellani, Julius Mancinus, Sylvester and Thaddeus Collicola, Baldus Baldi, Paul Zacchias, Gabriel Fonseca, Matthias Naldius, Borelli, Lancisi, Salvatorius, Romulus Spezioli, Lucas Tozzi, Morgagni, Cotugno, Giambattista Bomba, Antonio Baccelli, Flajani, Paolo Baroni, Pier Luigi Valentini, Giuseppe Constantini, Castracane, Lapponi, Marchiafava.

APPENDIX VI.

ASTRONOMY AND THE CHURCH; SOME ROMAN ASTRONOMERS. 469

No formal list of Papal astronomers available. The roll of names in astronomy connected in some way with the Popes almost as distinguished as that of Papal Physicians: Roger Bacon, Albertus Magnus, Nicholas of Cusa, Regiomontanus, Toscanelli, Archbishop Antoninus, Clavius, the Roman College, Scheiner, Ricci, Athanasius Kircher, Thomas Leseur, Franz Jacquier, Boscovitch, Le Maire, Gilii, Beccaria, Piazzi, Secchi, De Vico, Sestini, Denza, Lais, Rodriguez, Hagan.

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APPENDIX VII.

THE FATHERS OF THE CHURCH AND SCIENCE. 484

Supposed opposition of the Fathers of the Church to science. Father Leahy on the true relations. Defence of the Fathers. Supposed opposition to science. No opposition to true science. Position as regards astrology. What the Fathers did for science.

APPENDIX VIII.

SCIENCE IN AMERICA. 492

Spanish Catholic America far outdistanced English Protestant America in the cultivation of science before our time.

Professor Bourne, on science at the Spanish-American Universities, "Spanish-American science of the sixteenth century only reached in English America in the nineteenth."

Dr. Chanca's letter.

Priority in medical education.

Bourne on Spanish-American anticipations.

Reasons for decadence.

APPENDIX IX.

THE DANGER OF A LITTLE KNOWLEDGE. 500

Professor Draper's "History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science." The tradition of Church opposition to science founded on ignorance of the Middle Ages. The "Bright," not the "Dark" Ages. Draper's career. "History of the Intellectual Development of Europe." Acceptance of his writings as authoritative. Lack of scholarship. Medieval achievements. "Lazy monks." Wonderful work of the monks. Monasteries as agricultural colleges. The Arabs in science. Medieval prophylaxis. Magnificent hospitals. Halley's comet. The Popes of the beginning of the Renaissance: Nicholas V, Calixtus III, Pius II (AEneas Sylvius Piccolomini). Draper's summaries of history, caricatures. Contrast between Spanish and English America. Professor Bourne. Sir Sidney Lee. Professor Draper's philosophy of history. The Church and social conditions. Draper's surprising ignorance of the history of medicine. Objections to the Church in her relations to science always founded on lack of knowledge.

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Guy de Chauliac _Frontispiece_

FACING PAGE

Guy de Chauliac's cauteries 182

Guy de Chauliac's cauteries 183

Guy de Chauliac's instruments 186

Guy de Chauliac's instruments 187

Hospital at Luebeck 252

Hospital at Tonnerre 268

Hospital, Mexico 272

Ferri's instruments _Page_ 447

Maggi's instruments _Page_ 448

Maggi's instruments _Page_ 449

Maggi's instruments _Page_ 450

Hospital, Mexico _Opp. Page_ 495

{1}

INTRODUCTION.

When, some years ago, the announcement of the prospective opening of the medical school at Fordham University, New York City, was made, the preliminary faculty were rather astonished to find that a number of intelligent physicians expressed surprise that there should be any question of the establishment of a medical school in connection with a Catholic institution of learning, since, as they understood, the Church forbade the practice of dissection, and in general was distinctly unfavorable to the development of medical science. Most of us had already known of the false persuasion existing in some minds, that by a Papal decree the practice of dissection had been forbidden during the Middle Ages, but it was hard to understand how men should think, in this day of general information, that Catholics were not free to pursue the study of any true science, and above all medical science, without let or hindrance from ecclesiastical authorities. In a word, though we live in what we are pleased to call an enlightened age with the schoolmaster abroad in the land, as is so proudly proclaimed, we encountered the most childish simplicity of belief in a number of old-time prejudices as to the position of the Church with regard to the study of science.

We found such a curious state of positive ignorance and such an erroneous, pretentious knowledge with regard to the supposed attitude of the Church to medicine especially, that we realized that the first thing that the {2} new medical department would have to do would be to set about correcting authoritatively the false notions which existed with regard to the Popes and medical science. Most of the misinformation in this matter in American minds, we soon found, had its origin in Dr. Andrew D. White's volumes, "On the History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom." It is impossible for anyone to read Dr. White's chapter on from Miracles to Medicine in this work without coming to the conclusion that the constant policy of the Church for all the centuries down practically to our own time was to prevent the progress of medicine as far as possible. The reason for this policy, presumably, must be taken to be that it was to the interest of the ecclesiastics to have people apply to them for healing. Sufferers were to look to miracles rather than to drugs for their relief from ailments of any and every kind. Prayers were to be considered as much more efficacious than powders, and Masses much more likely to do good than the most careful nursing. These ecclesiastical offices had to be paid for. Accordingly, people had to be discouraged from applying to physicians, medical schools were kept under an ecclesiastical ban, "dissection was prohibited," anatomy declared "a sin against the Holy Ghost," "chemistry forbidden under the severest penalties," "the medieval miracles of healing checked medical science," "the practice of surgery was relegated mainly to the lowest orders of practitioners and confined strictly to them," "as the grasp of theology upon education tightened, medicine declined," and every possible means was employed to keep the popular mind in subjection to the clergy, and to prevent physicians from getting so much knowledge as would enable them {3} to help free the people from the bondage of superstition, of which they were the victims and the slaves.

We do not think that we exaggerate the impression likely to be obtained from Dr. White's book in stating the ordinarily accepted opinions thus baldly, and as a matter of fact, as the quotation marks are intended to show, most of the strongest phrases that we have used are Dr. White's own. For those who can take such statements in good faith, it must be a very genuine surprise to learn a few facts from the history of medicine in the Middle Ages. Before the beginning of the sixteenth century, that is, before the religious revolt in Germany, which has been dignified by the name of reformation, altogether some twenty medical schools were founded in various parts of Europe. Of these, the best known in the order of their foundation were Salerno, Bologna, Naples, Montpelier, Paris, Padua and Pisa. Excellent schools, however, were established also at Oxford, Rome, Salamanca, Orleans and Coimbra. Even early in the fourteenth century such unimportant towns as Perugia, Cahors and Lerida had medical schools. These schools were usually established in connection with the universities. It was realized that this would make the teaching of medicine more serious and keep the practical side of medicine from obscuring too much the scientific and cultural aspects of the medical training. In modern times in America we made the mistake of having our medical schools independent of universities, but with the advance in education and culture we have come to imitate the custom of the thirteenth and the fourteenth century in this regard.

The universities, as is well known, were the outgrowth of cathedral schools. Practically all those in authority {4} in them, by far the greater number of teachers and most of the pupils, were of the clerical order, that is, had assumed some ecclesiastical obligations and were considered to be churchmen. At these universities, if we can trust the example of England as applicable to the Continent also, there were, according to trustworthy, conservative statistics, more students in attendance in proportion to the population than there has been at any period since, or than there are even at the present time in the twentieth century in any country of the civilized world. From this we can readily appreciate the enthusiastic ardor of those seeking education. Of these large numbers, the medical schools had their due proportion. [Footnote 1]

[Footnote 1: This subject of the attendance at the universities of the Middle Ages is discussed, and authorities quoted, in my book "The Thirteenth, Greatest of Centuries," published by the Catholic Summer School Press, N. Y.]

Of course it will be said at once that though there were medical schools and medical professors and students, what was taught and studied at this time was so far distant from anything like practical knowledge of medicine, that it does not tell against the argument that medical education was practically non-existent. Some people will perhaps harbor the thought, if they do not frankly express it, that very probably these schools were organized under ecclesiastical authority, only in order to enable the Church and the clergy to maintain their control of medical education and keep the people from knowledge that might prove dangerous to Church authority. They were thus able to satisfy some of men's cravings for information in these matters, and yet prevent them from making such advances as would endanger the Church's policy of having them apply for prayers and Masses rather than for more physical remedies, {5} except possibly for certain minor ailments. We do not doubt that there are many educated people who would be quite satisfied to accept this as a complete explanation of the situation in medical education at the medieval universities. Those who have read Dr. White's "History of the Warfare of Theology with Science" and have placed any faith in his really amusing excursions into a realm of which apparently he knows nothing-- the history of medicine--must believe something like this. For them a little glance at even a few of the realities of medical teaching in the thirteenth century will show at once what a castle of the imagination they have been living in.

Only those who are thoroughly and completely ignorant of the real status of medical teaching in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries continue to hold these absurd opinions as to the nullity of medieval medicine and surgery. The reading of a single short recent contribution to medical history, the address of Professor Clifford Allbutt, Regius Professor of Physic at the University of Cambridge, England, before the Congress of Arts and Sciences at the Exposition held in St. Louis in 1904, "On the Historical Relations of Medicine and Surgery down to the Sixteenth Century," would suffice to eradicate completely such traditional errors. He pointed out some surprising anticipations of what is most modern in medicine and surgery in the teachings of William of Salicet and his pupil Lanfranc, Professors of Medicine and Surgery in the Italian Universities and in Paris during the thirteenth century. As these two professors were the most distinguished teachers of surgery of the period and the acknowledged leaders of thought in their time, their teaching may fairly be taken as {6} representative of the curricula of medieval medical schools. William of Salicet, according to Professor Allbutt, taught that dropsy was due to a hardening of the kidneys; _durities renum_ are his exact words. He insisted on the danger of wounds of the neck. He taught the suture of divided nerves and gave explicit directions how to find the severed ends. He made a special study of suppurative disease of the hip and taught many practical things with regard to it. He taught, though this is a bit of knowledge supposed to come three centuries later into medicine and history, the true origin of chancre and phagedena. Most surprising of all, however, remains. William substituted the use of the knife for the abuse of the cautery, which had been introduced by the Arabs because they feared hemorrhage, and he insisted that hemorrhage could be controlled by proper means without searing the tissues, and that the wounds made by the knife healed ever so much more kindly and with less danger to the patient. In the matter of wound healing, he investigated the causes of the failure of healing by first intention, and expressed on this subject some marvelous ideas that are supposed to be of late nineteenth century origin.

While it is usually said that whatever teaching of science was done at medieval universities, was so entirely speculative or purely theoretic and so thoroughly impractical as not to be of any serious use for life and its problems, the utter falsity of such declarations can be seen from the fact that William of Salicet insisted on teaching medicine by clinical methods, always discussed cases with his students, and his medical and surgical works contain many case histories. This is just what pretentiously ignorant historians of medical education {7} have often emphatically declared that medieval teachers did not do, but should have done, in the Middle Ages. It is not surprising then to find that William himself, and his great pupil Lanfranc, insisted on the utter inadvisability of separating medicine and surgery in such a way that the physician would not have the opportunity to be present at operations, and thus gain more definite knowledge about the actual conditions of various organs which he had tried to investigate from the surface of the body. It is a very curious coincidence that both the Regius Professors of Physic in England at the present time, our own Professor Osler, now at Oxford, as well as his colleague, Professor Allbutt, of Cambridge, have within the last five years emphasized this same idea in almost the very words which were used by William and Lanfranc nearly seven hundred years ago. Lanfranc went even beyond his master in practical applications of important scientific principles to medicine and surgery. He added to the means of controlling hemorrhage. In arterial hemorrhage he suggested digital compression for an hour, or in severe cases ligature. His master had studied wounds of the neck. Lanfranc has a magnificent chapter on injuries of the head, which Professor Allbutt does not hesitate to call one of the classics of surgery. Lanfranc was thoroughly appreciated by his contemporaries. After years of study and teaching in Italy he was invited to Paris, where he became one of the lights of that great university. Both Salicet and Lanfranc did their wonderful work in scientific medicine down in Italy where ecclesiastical influence was strongest. Italy continued to be for the next six centuries always the home of the best medical schools in the world, to which the most ardent students from {8} all over the continent and even England went for the sake of the magnificent opportunities provided. It was literally true, in spite of the tradition of Church opposition to medical science, that the nearer to Rome the university the better its medical school; and as we shall see, Rome itself had the best medical school in the world for two centuries, while its greatest rival, often ahead of it in scientific achievement, always its peer, was the medical school of Bologna in the Papal States, directly under the control of the Popes since the beginning of the sixteenth century.

Dr. White has said just the opposite of this in a well-known passage of his book, in which he assures his readers that "in proportion as the grasp of theology upon education tightened, medicine declined; and in proportion as that grasp relaxed, medicine has been developed." The reason for such a statement is that he knew nothing about the history of medicine and surgery in these medieval centuries and thought there was none. This is a characteristic example of his mode of writing the History of the (Supposed) Warfare of Theology with Science in Christendom. This much will give some idea of the value of his book as a work of reference.

After knowing something of these wonderful developments of medieval medical science, it is to be hoped that no one will listen hereafter to the ignorant assertions of those who talk of the suppression of medical knowledge at this time. _William of Salicet and Lanfranc were both of them clerics,_ that is, they belonged to the ecclesiastical body and had taken minor orders, though they were not priests, as priests were for obvious reasons not allowed to do surgical operations, it being as repugnant to human feelings in the Middle Ages as it is now, that {9} the messenger of Divine Mercy should handle the knife and spill blood, or that the pastor of souls should come straight from the operating room to bring consolation to the afflicted and the dying.

Much more might be said about the wonderful medical teaching of the thirteenth century. The men who made the universities what they have continued to be down to the present time, had open minds for any great advances that might come. Accordingly, when the histories of anesthesia tell us that there was a form of anesthesia introduced during the thirteenth century by Ugo da Lucca, and that even some method of inhalation was employed for this purpose, it will be a surprise only to those who have never properly realized all that our educational forefathers of the early university days succeeded in accomplishing.