310
Mad-houses, for tlie reception of lunatics and the insane,seem to have been first established in the East. Zimmer-man says, that so early as 491, there was a house of thatkind at Jerusalem , the chief object of which was to takecare of such monks as became insane in the monasteries, orsuch hermits who were visited by the same affliction in thedeserts; he, however, asserts this without proof. The Jew ,Benjamin of Tudela , was in Bagdad in the twelfth century,where he found many hospitals having nearly sixty shops ordispensaries belonging to them, which distributed, at thepublic expense, the necessary medicines. A large building,called Dal Almeraphtan, i. e. the House of Grace, was des-tined for the reception of insane people, where they werekept in chains till they were cured ; the magistracy visitingthe house every month, and examining the patients, thosewho were cured they returned to their friends.
To those establishments which form the subject of thisarticle, belong also
Hospitals for Invalids, including all military esta-blishments. Although true, that among many of the ancientnations the soldiers, as also sailors, as we often see amongthe Greeks, there appearing little or no distinction betweenthe marine and land forces; but it often occurs that theyspeak of soldiers on ship-beard, in the oflice for which mo-derns employ sailors only : but it may be true, that somewho served by land, as well as those who fought on theocean, frequently served voluntarily, and, we think, weremember having read that they did so, till the first Pelo-ponnesian war; for to serve their country was regarded asone of the primary duties of a Grecian. Therefore thosewho served so, fought for no other reward than what theyprocured by plunder, and the spoils of the dead, and ran-sacking of cities; whence the so frequent recurrence ofendeavours to procure the arms, &c. of those whom theyhad slain in battle, which, to a modern unacquainted withthose customs, must, on reading the Iliad of Homer , bevery disgusting, remarking that for those mercenary ends,they often let slip an opportunity to serve the common cause,whilst they were engaged in petty thefts from the dead.This example of the common men the chiefs also followed.Mark the conduct of the junto of Ulysses and Diomed, withrespect to the horse of Rhesus , in the xlh Iliad ; and nume-
tom. xiii. ad an 1741, p. 457. See also Sprengel’s Geschichte der Arzneykunst,ii. p. 255. We collect the information from Professor Beckmann, iv. p. 478, utl upra.