Page:A short history of nursing - Lavinia L Dock (1920).djvu/44

28 It appears that the young men nurses described in this article belonged to sub-castes of the Brahmins, or priestly orders. Thus the organization of the nursing profession as a semi-priestly caste is of high antiquity, and India lent its pattern to the religious orders of the Christian era, whose "lay brothers" in hospital work corresponded to the sub-castes of the older systems. The brilliant period of Hindu medicine began to fade a century or two before Christ. With the fall of Buddhism hospitals were abandoned. The religion of Brahma in its later manifestations intensified caste and created numerous taboos, so that intelligent medical and nursing care gradually became impossible. This, with political events, reduced the ancient glory of India and she sank into a state of bondage and darkness.

In the time before Christ the Jews formed a striking contrast to the nations around them, for they discarded the many deities and myths of Egypt, Assyria, and Babylon and, under the leadership of Moses, declared their adherence to one God. However, the myth of the serpent, symbol of wisdom and knowledge, always closely related to the progress of medicine, is met with a number of times in the books of Moses, as all will