The medical works of Francisco López de Villalobos : the celebrated court physician of Spain / now first translated, with commentary and biography, by George Gaskoin.

  • Francisco López de Villalobos
Date:
1870
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The medical works of Francisco López de Villalobos : the celebrated court physician of Spain / now first translated, with commentary and biography, by George Gaskoin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    16/330 page 4
    in translating an author like Villalobos, than a poetic or literary faculty far in advance of medical experience ; only a doctor could do the work well: far above all quali- fications for task is an acquaintance with the subject matter; but beyond this there are, I confess, other difficulties of a literary and linguistic character enough to send a man crazy, and that twenty times a day, arising out of the early period at which the poem was written, when idiom, orthography, and punctuation were wholly unsettled and capricious. I had already before under- taking this task, some small acquaintance with the early syphilographers, and I set the higher value on this writer from • their facts and assertions being not invariably correct; on the contrary those of Villalobos wear always the stamp of truth. Among them he stands pre-eminent by whatever rule we judge them, whether it be of letters or physic. The exaggeration and passion of Van Hiitten have here no place; the elegant poetastry of Fracastorius, who had so much rather seem a literate than a physician, is here put plainly to rebuke, contrasting as it does very strongly, and I presume to say disadvantageously, with the close doctrines and nice precepts of this staid young Spanish physician, full of practical hints and of sly and ingenious wit, wherein we really fail to see whether art or nature has the upper hand, so happily are they blended and balanced in the treatment of the matter before him; his episodes are fully as didactic as his story ; every article is ad rem ; for acquaintance with his subject, and for power in expressing the fruits of his observation, Villalobos is truly incomparable; in this he has the poet's gift, in this only Ricord can compare with him and Hunter on a lower form, he leaves all others far behind ; but I need say the less on this score, since in the spring of the year i86(S, at
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3