Page:Reflections upon ancient and modern learning (IA b3032449x).pdf/187

 And therefore whatsoever can be said of Chinese Knowledge can never be of any Weight, as long as small Skill in Physick and Mathematicks shall be enough to protect the European Missionaries in a Court where they themselves are esteemed the greatest Scholars, and honoured accordingly.

But the Chinese Physick is wonderfully commended by Dr. Vossius and Sir William Temple (b): The Physicians excel in the Knowledge of the Pulse, and of all simple Medicines, and go little further: Neither need they; for in the first, they are so skillful, that they pretend not only to tell by it, how many Hours or Days a sick Man may last; but how many Years a Man in perfect seeming Health may live, in Case of no Accident or Violence; and by Simples they pretend to relieve all Diseases that Nature will allow to be cured. What this boasted Skill is, may be seen in the little Tracts of the Chinese Physick published by Andrew Cleyer (c); but because few will in all Probability have Patience to go through with them, since they are not very pleasant to read, I shall give a short Specimen of them, by which one may judge of the rest.

The most Ancient Chinese Discourse of Physick, Intituled, Nuy Kim (d), gives