The followers of the Arabian prophet dissipated the little remains of learning that were left in Asia and Egypt. A con tempt of all human knowledge, and the religious obligation of extending the 'Ma hometan faith by means of the sword,made these ignorantbarbarians the most danger ous and destructive foes to sci ence and the arts. The city of Alexandria, the school of which had been the resort attic learn ed for centuries, was taken in the year 640,by Amrou, the general of the Caliph Omar: the celebrated library WaS burnt, with the exception of those books w hich related to medicine, which the love of life induced the Arabians to spare.
When the Saracens were established in their new conquests they began to dis cern the utility of learning in the arts and sciences, and particularly in physic. Ma hornet had made it death for any Mussul man to learn the liberal arts : this prohi bition was gradually neglected, and inany of the caliphs distinguished themselves by their love of letters, and the munificent institutions which they founded for the pmpagation of learning. The Greek au thors were collected, translated, and com mented on ; but there was no improve ment nor extension of science made. In anatomy, the Arabians went no further than Galen, the perusal of whose works sup plied the plac e ofdissection.Theywere prevented from touchingthe dead by their tenets respecting uncleanness and tion, which they had derived from the Jews The Arabian enipire in the east W35 overturned by the Turks, who, still more barbarous and illiterate than the Sara cens, carried ignorance and oppression wherever they directed their footsteps. They soon destroyed all the institutions which the Saracens had formed for the propagation of science, and threatened Constantinople itself, which still retained the faint and almost dying embers of Greek knowledge. This city was taken and sacked in the middle of the fifteenth century ; and the learned Greeks fled for safety to -the western nations of Eu rope, bringing with them the Grecian au thors on medicine,-and translating them which works, the invention of printing, that happened about the same time, greatly contributed to disperse throughout Europe. People had now an opportunity of becoming acquainted with the writings of Galen and the ancients, and, by these means, of arriving at the source of that knowledge which they had hitherto ob tained only through the char.nel of the Arabian physicians. The superiority of the forrner U'LLS soon discovered, and the opinions ofthe Grecian writers were consi dered, even in anatomy, as unimpeachable Far the restoration of anatomy, as well as that of science in general, we are in debted to the Italians. But the first men who signalized themselves in this path partook of that blind reverence for the words of Galen, which had reigned uni versally in medicine since his death, and which concurred with the universally pre vailing prejudices of those times, con cerning the violation of the dead, to ob struct all advancement of the science. As
an instance of the latter circumstance, we may mention a decree of I'ope Boniface VIII. prohibiting the boiling and preparing of bones, which put a stop to the research es of Mundinus.
Among the circumstances which contri buted to the restoration of anatomy is to be reckoned, the assistance which it deri ved from the great painters and sculptors of this rtge. A knowledge of th e anatomy of the sin-face of the body, at least, is es sential to the prosecution of these arts. Michael Angelo dissected men and ani mals, in order to learn the muscles which lie underthe skin. A collectionof anato mical drawings made by Leonardo da Vinci at this period, is still extant, and, with subjoined explanations, are found in the library of the king. Dr. Hunter bears witness to the minute and accurate know ledge a Inch thete sketches discover, and does not hesitate in considering Leonardo as the best anatomist of that time.
About the middle of the sixteenth cen the great Vesalius appeared,. He was born at Brussels, and studied successive ly at the different universities of France and ltaly. Thus he acquired all the know ledge of antiquity. Not contented with this, he took every opportunity of examin ing the human body, and followed the army of the emperor Charles V. into France for that purpose. Vesalius was the first who maintained that dissection was the proper way of learning anatomy, in opposition to the study of the works of Galen. His extensive researches into the structure of man and animals led him to detect the errors of Gale n, which he freely exposed, sheaving from many parts of his works, that this great man had described the human body from the dissection of brutes. This conduct, which should have excited the admiration and esteem of his contemporaries, served only to rouse in their minds the base and sordid passions of jealousy and envy. Galen had held an. undisputed sway over the minds of men formally centuries. His works were re garded as the only source of anatomical knowledge, and his opinion on medical subjects, like that of Aristotle in philoso phy, was resorted to in all disputes as final and decisive proof. The first man who penetrated this intellectual mist, and erected the standard of reason and truth, in opposition to that of prejudice and au thority, might naturally expectto encoun ter the opposition of those who had been contented to go on in the beaten track. The anatomists, who had always held op Galen in their lectures as the source of all information, were indignant that his faults should be discovered and laid open by so young a man as Vesalius. The con troversies which arose from this cause were favourable to the progress of anato my, as the several disputants were obliged to confirm their own opinions, or invali date those of their opponents, by argu ments drawn from dissection.