38 A Short History of Nursing Roman ladies, to whom we shall come presently, had no field in nursing under the old regime, but found one under the new order of the Christian era. In looking back from this point, having regard to the slendemess of our sources, it may be con- Summary of ceded that the care of the sick in an- P^®" cient days compares favourably with Christian , . care of the that of more recent periods. It is not only historically incorrect to assume that all neighbourly kindness and charity began with the Christian era; it is also a temperamental error that narrows the mind by shutting out the view of the essential humanness of the whole human race. The older religions had their merci- ful aspects, as shown in India and among the Jews. The Pagan Greeks and Romans had, in the cult of Orpheus, a softening spiritual influence which, so far as it reached, inculcated kindness and a horror of suffering. Perhaps the chief deficiency to our eyes in the ancient nursing systems is the small part taken by women, yet we know on the whole too little as to this; There may have been more than has been told. There are allusions to the eminence of women among the Norsemen, Teutons, and Druids, and to their superior skill in medicine and surgery, that suggest a larger field for women in the western world than in the Orient.
