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THE MEDICAL PROFESSION IN ROME. I 23
limits of good behaviour were passed. The dissimilar
scientific, training is illustrated by the fact that educated
and experienced doctors like GALEN, in disgust at the
ignorance and want of ability of their colleagues, passed
a sharp judgment upon their views and medical directions*
TiiEODORUS PRISCIANUS has left us a realistic
description of such consultations.f " While the patient "
he writes " racked by his pains, tosses himself to and
fro on his bed, doctors in crowds rush in, each one of
whom is only concerned to fix the attention of the rest
upon himself, and cares but little for the condition of the
patient. In a spirit of emulation like that displayed in a
circus or at a pugilistic contest, one endeavours to gain
extraordinary fame by his oratory or his dialectics, another
by the artistic building up of theses—a structure which his
adversary soon levels with the ground." The popular
humour made merry over these things and invented the
anecdote mentioned by PLINY that in an epitaph it was set
forth how the deceased expired in the midst of the doctors
who were treating him.
The medical profession did not at first enjoy that respect
which the strenuous, self-sacrificing activity of its members
deserved. Romans of rank had even at the best only a
patronizing regard for medicine and looked upon the
practice of it as a business which was fitted for persons
of low birth, for servants or slaves.J When at a later
period the immigration of foreign doctors came about
and practitioners of medicine from Greece, Egypt, Asia
Minor and Palestine settled in Rome, the narrow-minded
bias and civic prejudice with which all foreigners were
regarded were obstacles in the way of any improvement
in the social position of doctors.
It is true that the doctors themselves were largely responsible
for this. The boastfulness, covetousness and vice by
which some among them made themselves scorned, afforded
* GALEN viii, 357. x, 910. xiv, 623 et seq.
f THEOD. PRESCIANUS i, Prsef.
X PLINIUS op. cit. xxix, 8.