The stone,which Diomedthrew at iEneas, is said tohave broken the iteetabillum, and to have torn both the ligaments which connect th.e thigh in its situation. These particulars are not mentioned in Mr. Pope's translation, we therefore cite the original : Tar ACCAEP EILLO ;407' ta-zgov, er.9c4 AVG5 cpiv5pEO.roti• xortdep 75 FLO, xaM8c-t• 01karc-i C3‘E zerruAnv, .23-p05 d' /41.44, p4E -rue:girt.
II. 5.1. 305.
From the sources which have been just enumerated was derived the anatomical knowlege of early times. This know ledge was general or popular. .i-natomy, properly so called, VIZ. the knowledge of the structure of the body, obtained by dissections expressly, instituted for that purpose, is of much more recent origin.
eiVi tization and improvement of every ki ud would naturally begin in fertile coun tries and healthful climates, where there would he leisure for reflection, mid an ap petite for amusement. It seems now to be clearly cr,ade out, that writing, and ma ny otheruseful and ornamental inventions and arts, were cultiviPed in the eastern parts of Asia, longbefore the earliest times that are treated of by the Greek or other European writers ; and that the arts and learning of those eastern people were, in suhsecpient times, gradually communica. ted to adjacent countries, especially by the medium of traffic. The customs, su perstitions, and climates of eastern coun tries, .appear, however, to have been as unfavourable to practical anatomy', as they were inviting to the study of astronomy, geometry-, poetry, and all the softer arts of peace. In those warm climates, animal bodies run so quickly-into nauseous putre faction, that the early inhabitants tnust have avoided such offensive employments as anatomical inquiries, like their posteri ty at this day. And, in fact, it does not ap pear, by the writings ofthe Grecians, .1 ews, or Phicnicians, that anatomy was particu larly culti vatcd by any of' those nations. The progress of anatomy in the early ages of the world wa.s more particularly prevented by a very generally prevalent opinion, that the touch of a dcad bocly communicated a moral pollution. When we consider the extent and inveteracy of this prejudice, we shall cease to wtinder at the imperfect state of anatomical know ledge in the periods now tinder review. The practice of.emli aiming the bodies of the dead did not at all reconcile the Egyp tians to dissections. The person who made
the ineisiori, through which the viscera were removed, immediately ran away, fol lowed by the imprecations and even vio lence of the bye-standers, who considered him to have violated the body of' a friend. The ceremonial law of the Jews was very rigorous in this respeet. To tclu.Oh sove' ral animals which they necounted unclean, subjected the person to the necessity of purifications, &c. To touch a dead body made a person unclean for seven days. " Whosoever (says the Jewish lawgiver) touched] the body of any man that is dead and purified] not himself, defileth the ta bernacle of the Lord ; and that soul shall lie cut oiffrom Israel." hi tracing it backwanls in its infancy, we cannot go farther into antiquity than the times of the Grecian philosophers. As an art in the state of some cultivation, it may lie said to have been brought forth and bred up among them, as a branch of natural knowledge. We discover in the writings of Plato, that lie had paid atten tion to the organization and functions of the human body.
Hippocrates, who lived about four hun dred years before Christ and was reckon ed the eighteenth in descent from ./Escu !aphis, was the alltest who separated the professions of philosophy and physic, and devoted himself exclusively to the latter pursuit He is generally supposed to be the first who wrote upon anatomy. After the restoration of Greek learning, in the fifteenth century, it WAS so fashionable for two hundred years together, to extol the knowledge of the ancients in anatomy, as in other things, that anatomists seem to have made it a point of emulation, who should be most lavish in their pmise ; some from diffidence in themselves ; others through the love of detracting from the merit of contemporaries ; many from having laboriously studied ancient learn ing, and liming become enthusiasts in Greek literature ; butmore, perhaps, be cause it was the fashionable turn of the times, and was held up as the mark of good education and fine taste. If, how ever, we read the works of Hippocrates with impartiality, and apply his accounts of the parts to what we now know of the human body, we must allow his descrip tions tobe imperfect, incorrect, sometimes extravagant and often unintelligible, that of tile bones only excepted.