Medicine
2 of the 7 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Medicine. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a remedy, a remedial agent, an antidote to disease; any substance prescribed for the alleviation or removal of disease. Medicines are administered, as a rule, by the mouth, but sometimes also by the rectum, by inhalation into the lungs, by hypodermic injection into the cellular tissue, or in some rare cases by injection into the veins. The Egyptians are credited with some proficiency in the art; their embalming of bodies must have taught them the elements of anatomy. The medical and sanitary arrangements of the Mosaic law are well known. Chiron, the fabled Centaur, is said to have brought some knowledge of medicine from Egypt to Greece. His pupil was Esculapius, said to have lived previously to the Trojan war [about 1500 b. c. (?)]. He was so eminent a physician that he was, on his death, deified, and became the Greek god of medicine, under whose auspices all further made. Pythagoras, researches were about 529 B. c., studied the human frame; but the "father" of Greek medicine was Hippocrates, 460-357 b. c. He is by some considered the founder of the dogmatic school. About 332 B. c. the Alexandrian school arose, under Eratosthenes and Hierophilus. The latter was opposed by Chrysippus, and the empiric school arose. The Romans were long in entering the field. The greatest Roman physician was Galen, A. D. 165. The Methodics had arisen shortly before, and the Eclectics were ramifications of the former. From the 7th to the 12th century the Arabs cultivated medicine; their greatest name was Avicenna, about A. D. 1020. The Italians next assumed the lead. The dogmatic school of medicine was assailed by Paracelsus (1493-1541) and Vesalius (1514-1564). The discovery by Harvey, in 1628, of the circulation of the blood, gave a great impulse to medical science. Modern medicine owes its greatest debt to Virchow, Pasteur, and Lister. They first determined that tissues were composed of various cells and that types of diseased structure of tissues could be identified by the predominating cell form in each. Pasteur founded ded the science of bacteriology, and Lister, who died in 1912, was the apostle of antiseptics, revolutionizing surgery. By insisting that wounds should be kept clean, and the operator and instruments, as well, the use of carbolic to purify the air, and antiseptic dressings, surgeons carried out successfully operations never attempted before. Transfusion of blood, which saved many lives, marked another triumph against disease. Tuberculosis is yielding to medical science. The discovery of X or Roentgen Rays for photographing invisible organs has been a great aid in disease. The bacterial origin of typhus, transmitted by body lice and insects, was made known in 1915. In the World War only 4 per cent. died of disease.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
med'i-sin, a substance used as a remedy for disease; also a study of remedies. Scientific medicine is thought to have taken its rise in Egypt. Papyrus records found at Thebes, thought to be of great antiquity, possibly 7,000 years, name 400 diseases and 700 remedies. Many ridiculous remedies are of record. As late as 1620 a powder of mummy dust and dried rhubarb was regarded as a remedy for epilepsy; human fat for rheumatism; ear-wax for defective eyesight, and the liver of a lizard for toothache. Various theories of medicine have been and still are prevalent. The Galenists recommend vegetable remedies. The Arabs were Galenists. They introduced rhubarb, cassia, senna, and camphor to the knowledge of western Europe. The use of sarsaparilla for purifying the blood is in accordance with the Galenic idea. The housewife, with her old-fashioned bundles of dried herbs, as sage, pennyroyal, and boneset, is a genuine Galenist. Decoctions of sassafras and slippery elm bark are of this nature. We import from $15,000,000 to $20,000,000 worth of medicinal plants and vegetable drugs annually. The chemical school, on the other hand, held that mineral remedies were the more effective. Many of the mineral remedies, as mercury and strychnine, are dangerous poisons and must be taken in minute doses. An extreme view of the chemical school was that diseases are either acid or alkaline in their nature. An acid disease is to be cured by the administering of an alkali; an alkaline disease by the administering of an acid. At the present day, it is unnecessary to say, physicians prescribe both vegetable and chemical remedies. Other remedies, as cod liver oil, are of animal origin. Materia Medica, is a general term for the various remedies known to the physician. See Aesculapius ; Avicenna; Hippocrates ; Galen; Harvey ; Jenner ; Hahnemann ; Finsen ; Pasteur ; Drugs ; Surgery ; Alchemy ; Disease ; Sarsaparilla ; Arnica ; Asafoetida; Boneset ; Sage ; Quinine ; Poison , etc.