The evening tribune. (Pawtucket, R.I.) 189?-190?, 1897-02-02
NOT NEW AFTER ALL.
SUPPOSED DISCOVERIES THAT WERE
KNOWN AGES AGO.
uRhdoo Claim That the Ancients Knew
Far More Than Ii Credited to Them.
Reference to Wendell Phillips Lecture
ON 'srhe Lost Arts.~


Reference TO Wendell Phillips Leetur.
ON ''The Lost Arts"
A learned Indian prince, Thakore Sahit
% Gondal, Is the author of a history OF
Aryan medical science issued from the
London press. This book advances some
remarkable claims on behalf of Hindoc
science and civilization.
Prince Thakore asserts that the grandest
discoveries of western medical genius, such
as vaccination, anasthesia and antiseptic
surgery, were all practiced among the Hin
docs many centuries ago. He declares that
in the "Ayur Veda," or Science of Life, +"
which Is the most ancient Of all Brahmin
books on medicine, nearlyRl the best
modern methods of medical <iiagnosis as
well as of practical surgery are fully set
forth. The circulation of the blood, which
we say was discovered by Harvey, is said
to be fully set forth in this ancient volume
OF the Hindoo scriptures. Prince Thakore
also cites historical evidence TO show that
cranial and abdominal surgical operations
of the most difficult kind such as we have
supposed were never performed until with
in the last 30 years, were done l 900 years
ago in the land of Buddha. He points to
the record of the trephining of King Bhoja
q,
lieve him of severe pains in his head. Tho
record clearly states that the king was rem
dered unconscious, his Uranium opened, the
cause of the trouble removed from the
brain, the wound closed up and his trouble
completely cured. Jivaka, who was Bud
dha's own physician, performed similar
operations.
Such claims tend to shake the self esteem
of western peoples as the wisest and most
highly inventive that have ever occupied
the earth and to cast doubt upon their
boast that they arc 1.-THE heirs of all the
ages in the foremost files of time" 1t is
no new thing, however, for us to be told
that all light travels from the east to the
west and not from the west to the east.
We speak of Asia as "the cradle Of the
race" and 50 it undoubtedly was. We
need not be surprised therefore If, as Asia
becomes better known and its antiquities
more closely inquired into, we should find
ahnt much of the supposed new knowledge
Of the west was familiar in the east when
tho world was young. Wendell Phillips
most celebrated lecture was entitled 1.-THE
Lost Arts" Curiously enough, it is not
Included in the standard edition of his pub
aished works. A pamphlet copy Of 1t, pub
lishcd 90 years ago, is hard 70 find. The
forestalled the claims of Prince Thakore
He boldly declared that Of 100 marvellous
shings known to the nineteenth century 80
OF them had been anticipated by the an
clients. He pointed more particularly to
mechanical arts and inventions. he
quoted Pliny to show that Nero had
ring with q gem in 1t through which |
he looked and watched the sword play of |
the glsdiators in the arena more clearly |
than with the naked eye-a style Of opera
glass unknown to us modcrns.
The use of microscopes Of immense
power In ancient Egypt, Persia and Greece
is fairly presumable, because there is a gem
shown at Parma, once worn on the finger |
of Michael Angelo, the engraving wbereon /
Is 1000 years old and which reveals the |
figures Of seven women only with the aid |
of strong magnifying glass. Sir Henry
Rawlinson brought home from Nineveh a
stone about 20 inches long and 10 inches
wide containing whole treatise on mathe-
matics that was utterly illcgible without a
microscope. And IL it cannot be read with.
out microscope it could not have been
engraved without similar aid. Mr.. Phillips
averred that the art of coloring reached a
perfection among the ancients far beyond
our own. The burned city of Pompeii was
walls and all its buildings were of
stucco, and the stucco was stained with
tyrian purple, the royal color of an ,
tiquity. The city has been buried ], 800
years, yet whenever the walls Of one of its
houses arc dug out the royal purple flames
mp TO view with n great deal richer hue
than any We can produce. Evidently the
Pompciians possessed n secret for making
fast colors that we have not When the
English despoiled the summer palace of
the emperor of China, they brought home
curiously wrought metal vessels of every
kind, and European metal workers con-
fessed their inability to reproduce them.
Sheffield steel IS an English boast, but
1t will not bear the atmosphere of India
without gliding. Yet the Damascus blades
used in the crusades were not gilded, and
they ere es bright and keen today as they
were eight centuries ago There was one
shown at the London exhibition in 1862
the point Of which could be made to touch
the hilt and which could be put into the
scabbard hko corkscrew and bent every
way without breaking. The best steel In
the world today does not come from either
Europe or America, but from the Punjab
Sir Walter Scott In his "Tales Of the
Crucaders" describes o meeting between
Richard Crur dc Lion and Saladin, in
which the English monarch is made to
Hhink that Saladin practices the black art
because the latter takes an eiderdown pil.
VOW rom the sofa and causes IL to fall In
sWo pieces BY drawing his keen blade
ocroes II Travellers In India tell of socina
u1indooe throw handfuls OF fioss silk into
The air and cut them In pieces with the,,
Ane edged sabers There In no steel made
An WESTERN workshops OF that quality. So.
100, with tho art Of glass cutting. 1t was
supposed 30 years ago that there were NO
ancient glass factories, but the Pompeiian
excavations revealed workshop FUN of
ground glass, window glass, cut glass and
colored glass Of every variety. Baltimore
Sun.
Mr. and Mrs. Zangwill.
HI waa married. I'm Venfnor at loaet .x> \