5. The influence of Galen both advanced and restrained the practice of medicine
Galen was a Greek surgeon and philosopher of the second century, widely considered the most advanced practitioner of the art of medicine of his day. Born into wealth, Galen was trained in anatomy and in the study of humors, and researched what became the fields of physiology, neurology, pharmacology, and many others while serving as the personal physician to several of the Emperors of Rome. During the Medieval period, Galen’s collected works were the definitive texts on human anatomy, though many of his postulations were wrong. Galen lived in a period when the dissection of a human body was forbidden, and he derived his theories on human anatomy from the dissection of animals, including pigs and monkeys.
It was Galen who connected the human soul and the human heart. He believed that the soul, the source of emotion, resided in the heart, which was red as a result. He also believed that blood transported in the veins was sourced in the liver rather than the heart. Eventually, Galen grew to believe that the soul was divided into three parts; the rational soul resided in the brain; the spiritual soul in the heart; the soul responsible for the functions of the body was to be found in the liver. Galen was also a pioneer in the practice of psychotherapy, describing the means by which a counselor could free a patient of uncontrolled passions through discussion. In Galen’s view, a successful counselor had to be a male of advanced age, free from any such passions himself. Women were too ruled by emotion to qualify in his estimation.