therefore, means the separation of bodies previously united. Coelius Aurelianus uses the words recorporate and recorporatio. The chief works of

Thessalus, quoted by Coelius Aurelianus, relate to diet; but Galen mentions his name on a subject of surgery, which leads us to suppose that he wrote some chirur-gical tracts.

Among those who recommended themselves by the novelty of their fancies rather than their improvements, we may mention Crinas, of Marseilles, who only allowed food when the horoscope of the patient permitted; a system sarcastically hinted at by Juvenal; and Charmis, from the same city, who, with less discrimination and more eagerness than A. Musa, allowed only of cold baths and cold drinks. Authors of a superior character, in this era, were Rufus Ephesius, who was perhaps the first medical lexicographer, and who wrote De Nominibus Partium, and Erotian, whose Lexicon Hippocraticum is still a work of great value. Rufus, v ho is placed by some historians in the time of Trajan, wrote many other works, particularly one on the affections of the bladder. His poem, in hexameter verse, on plants, is wholly lost, unless, as has been suspected, the lines on the plants consecrated to the gods, added by Aldus to his edition of Dioscorides, and preserved in the Greek bibliotheca, be a part of it, as Fabricius suspects.

In this era also, from the age of Nero to that of Trajan, Dioscorides and Pliny lived. The vast work of the latter has furnished many parts of this history, and the materia medica is indebted to each author for the most important aid. We have mentioned them more particularly in another place. From the Preface to Arius it is probable that he was himself a practitioner of medicine, though to no great extent; and, from the predilection he seems to feel for the sect of Asclepiades, if we may guess from his almost exclusively quoting his followers, he was probably a Methodic.

It will be obvious, from this history, that the doctrine of the Methodics had, at no period, a very general currency, and about this time the Asclepiades were divided into many subordinate sects. One of these, the Episynthetics, endeavoured to reconcile the various discordant opinions of different authors; and another, the Eclectics, to select from each system what was most probable. The chief of the first was Leonides of Alexandria, whose works are lost, and from the quotations which remain in other authors, it is not easy to ascertain his peculiar opinions. The chief of the eclectics was Archigenes of Apamea,a most excellent author, highly commended by Haller in all the different departments of medicine. He was a scholar of Agathinus, one of the chiefs of the Episynthetics.

Another sect into which the Methodics divided, and which was at last absorbed in, or absorbed, them, the pneumatic, merits more particular notice. The chief of this sect was Athenaeus of Attalia, a man whose system, according to Galen, was polished with greater skill than that of any of his cotemporaries. The philosophy of the Pneumatics was derived from the Porch, since they allowed Chrysippus to be their great prototype. Athenaeus supposed that fire, air, water, and earth were not really elements, but that their qualities, heat, cold, dry, and moist, merited this title. Following the Stoics, he introduces a fifth principle, viz. a spirit governing and directing every thing, and occasionally, when offended, inducing diseases. From this new principle they were styled Pneumatics. Agathinus, already mentioned among the Episynthetics, was in a subsequent period a Pneumatic, in consequence of his attending Athenaeus. He explained, if appears, at some length, the principles of his sect, in a tract on Discoveries since the time of Themison. He wrote also on the pulse. Herodotus, Archigenes, and other physicians of character, were followers and pupils of Athenaeus; but the fame of each was eclipsed by that of Aretaeus. It is singular that he never mentions Galen, nor is mentioned by him; and, at the same time, the quotations of AEtius from Archigenes bear a considerable resemblance to the observations of Aretaeus on the same subjects. Was the Attic dialect of Archigenes more, agreeable to the Roman ear than the Ionic of Aretaeus ? or were they one and the same, differing only by a change of dialect? We must, for want of further information, leave this subject in its former obscurity.

The language of Aretaeus is distinguished by a luminous terseness, which impresses the idea with considerable force. He can scarcely be styled a Methodic, and indeed bears few marks of that sect, and particularly differed from them in investigating the causes of diseases by anatomical dissections. The nerves, he supposed, did not run from their origin to (heir termination in straight lines, but crossed each other in the form of an X, passing in this way to different sides; and he thus explains the disease felt on the side opposite to that where the head was injured. His practice was that of the most judicious of the ancient physicians, and he was particularly fond of exciting vomiting by white hellebore. This operation, he remarked, relieves the breathing, changes what was of a bad colour to a good one, and restores plumpness to those who were emaciated. He used the most active purgatives, bled frequently and freely from different parts, though he argues very forcibly against the refinement of some practitioners, who prefer small veins, which are the branches only of those from which blood is usually taken. He employed arteriotomy, cupping glasses, and leeches; but preferred curing acute diseases by diet. He gave wine more freely than former physicians allowed, and employed opiates with little reserve. He was peculiarly partial to castor, as a nervous and antispasmodic medicine, thinking it also an assistant of digestion. He recommended asses',mares', sheeps', and women's milk, used frictions and the actual cautery, and advised the operation of lithotomy. In short, practitioners of any age will derive from Aretaeus the most sagacious and useful medical observations. His practice is active, enlightened, and discriminated. Aretaeus is, by some authors, referred to the age of Nero. His era is, indeed, uncertain; but the Ionic dialect was not wholly disused even in the time of Hadrian.