He was quoting a line out of the Bible, robomatic... ;-)

You're mistaken to assume that human progress has been a straight line climbing upward from ignorance to knowledge. It's had its hollows, troughs, and major setbacks. The Romans, Greeks, ancient Chinese, and ancient Egyptians were just as brilliant in their own way as anyone is now, and they came up with a lot of things that have not been improved upon since...plus some philosophical ideas that haven't been improved upon either. The main thing they lacked which we have was a powered engine (such as a steam engine, internal combustion engine, jet engine, etc...). This meant they had to do things with muscle power, pulleys and levers, and water power only. With those, they accomplished wonders.

We with our powered engines have polluted the Earth. Are we the wiser?

As for medicine, I regard the medical system of ancient China as considerably superior to the high tech witch doctors and drug-pushing practitioners that are in sway nowadays, but that's just my personal opinion.