Page:The Hunterian Oration, delivered before the Royal College of Surgeons ... February 14, 1817 (IA b22009358).pdf/24

16 praise and of admiration down to the present time. An ecclesiastic by profession, yet he was a very profound philosopher for the period at which he lived, and has displayed more medical knowledge than any of his contemporaries. The taste for inquiry which he excited, would alone intitle him to the grateful respect of every lover of natural knowledge ; and reflects lasting honour upon this his native land.

John of Ardern and John of Gaddesden were surgeons who had attained to a degree of celebrity in England ; but their works are only deserving of being mentioned, inasmuch as they prove the wretched state of the art (science it could not be called) at that time. This is, not to be wondered at, as so generally illiterate were the people, that, even �