Note 60 — Chapter I · ON THE PHYSIOLOGICAL ACTION OF POISONS.

It is not any part of the object of this work to enter into the history of toxicology, more especially in early times. But it may be well here to state, that the claim which has been made by some for Dr. Barry, of having discovered this mode of treatment, is groundless. It is distinctly laid down by Nicander, Celsus, Dioscarides, Galen, and others who lived in their times; and among the moderns who have mentioned it, Gräter, in 1767, notices it in his thesis, “de venenis in genere,” printed at Frankfort. On the ancient history of toxicology the reader will find an excellent summary by Mr. Adams in the Edinburgh Medical and Surgical Journal, xxxiii. 315, and a full exposition in Professor Marx’s elaborate work, “die Lehre von den Giften.”