Thus Hippocrates, the father of European medicine, must have derived his knowledge not merely from his own observations, but from the writings of men unknown to us and from systems practised for an indefinite period.  The real founders of Greek medicine are fabled characters, like Hercules and Aesculapius,—­that is, benefactors whose fictitious names alone have descended to us.  They are mythical personages, like Hermes and Chiron.  Twelve hundred years before Christ temples were erected to Aesculapius in Greece, the priests of which were really physicians, and the temples themselves hospitals.  In them were practised rites apparently mysterious, but which modern science calls by the names of mesmerism, hydropathy, the use of mineral springs, and other essential elements of empirical science.  And these temples were also medical schools.  That of Cos gave birth to Hippocrates, and it was there that his writings were begun.  Pythagoras—­for those old Grecian philosophers were the fathers of all wisdom and knowledge, in mathematics and empirical sciences as well as philosophy itself—­studied medicine in the schools of Egypt, Phoenicia, Chaldaea, and India, and came in conflict with sacerdotal power, which has ever been antagonistic to new ideas in science.  He travelled from town to town as a teacher or lecturer, establishing communities in which medicine as well as numbers was taught.

The greatest name in medical science in ancient or in modern times, the man who did the most to advance it, the greatest medical genius of whom we have any early record, was Hippocrates, born on the island of Cos, 460 B.C., of the great Aesculapian family.  He received his instruction from his father.  We know scarcely more of his life than we do of Homer himself, although he lived in the period of the highest splendor of Athens.  Even his writings, like those of Homer, are thought by some to be the work of different men.  They were translated into Arabic, and were no slight means of giving an impulse to the Saracenic schools of the Middle Ages in that science in which the Saracens especially excelled.  The Hippocratic collection consists of more than sixty works, which were held in the highest estimation by the ancient physicians.  Hippocrates introduced a new era in medicine, which before his time had been monopolized by the priests.  He carried out a system of severe induction from the observation of facts, and is as truly the creator of the inductive method as Bacon himself.  He abhorred theories which could not be established by facts; he was always open to conviction, and candidly confessed his mistakes; he was conscientious in the practice of his profession, and valued the success of his art more than silver and gold.  The Athenians revered Hippocrates for his benevolence as well as genius.  The great principle of his practice was trust in Nature; hence he was accused of allowing his patients to die.  But this principle has many advocates among scientific men