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Title: On the Natural Faculties
Author: Galen
Language: English
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GALEN
ON THE NATURAL FACULTIES
WITH AN ENGLISH TRANSLATION BY
ARTHUR JOHN BROCK, M.D.
EDINBURGH
LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN
NEW YORK: G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
MCMXVI
PREFACE
The text used is (with a few unimportant modifications) that of Kühn
(Vol. II), as edited by Georg Helmreich; Teubner, Leipzig, 1893. The
numbers of the pages of Kühn’s edition are printed at the side of the
Greek text, a parallel mark (||) in the line indicating the exact
point of division between Kühn’s pages.
Words in the English text which are enclosed in square brackets are
supplementary or explanatory; practically all explanations, however,
are relegated to the footnotes or introduction. In the footnotes,
also, attention is drawn to words which are of particular philological
interest from the point of view of modern medicine.
I have made the translation directly from the Greek; where passages of
special difficulty occurred, I have been able to compare my own
version with Linacre’s Latin translation (1523) and the French
rendering of Charles Daremberg (1854-56); in this respect I am also
peculiarly fortunate in having had the help of Mr. A. W. Pickard
Cambridge of Balliol College, Oxford, who most kindly went through the
proofs and made many valuable suggestions from the point of view of
exact scholarship.
My best thanks are due to the Editors for their courtesy and for the
kindly interest they have taken in the work. I have also gratefully to
acknowledge the receipt of much assistance and encouragement from Sir
William Osler, Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford, and from
Dr. J. D. Comrie, first lecturer on the History of Medicine at Edinburgh
University. Professor D’Arcy W. Thompson of University College,
Dundee, and Sir W. T. Thiselton-Dyer, late director of the Royal
Botanic Gardens at Kew, have very kindly helped me to identify several
animals and plants mentioned by Galen.
I cannot conclude without expressing a word of gratitude to my former
biological teachers, Professors Patrick Geddes and J. Arthur Thomson.
The experience reared on the foundation of their teaching has gone far
to help me in interpreting the great medical biologist of Greece.
I should be glad to think that the present work might help, however
little, to hasten the coming reunion between the “humanities” and
modern biological science; their present separation I believe to be
against the best interest of both.
A. J. B.
22nd Stationary Hospital, Aldershot.
_March_, 1916.
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE v
INTRODUCTION ix
BIBLIOGRAPHY xli
SYNOPSIS OF CHAPTERS xliii
BOOK I 1
BOOK II 115
BOOK III 221
INDEX AND GLOSSARY 333
INTRODUCTION
[Sidenote: Hippocrates and Galen.]
If the work of Hippocrates be taken as representing the foundation
upon which the edifice of historical Greek medicine was reared, then
the work of Galen, who lived some six hundred years later, may be
looked upon as the summit or apex of the same edifice. Galen’s merit
is to have crystallised or brought to a focus all the best work of the
Greek medical schools which had preceded his own time. It is
essentially in the form of Galenism that Greek medicine was
transmitted to after ages.
[Sidenote: The Beginnings of Medicine in Greece.]
The ancient Greeks referred the origins of medicine to a god Asklepios
(called in Latin Aesculapius), thereby testifying to their
appreciation of the truly divine function of the healing art. The
emblem of Aesculapius, familiar in medical symbolism at the present
day, was a staff with a serpent coiled round it, the animal typifying
wisdom in general, and more particularly the wisdom of the
medicine-man, with his semi-miraculous powers over life and death.
“_Be ye therefore wise as serpents and harmless as doves._”
[Sidenote: The Asclepiea or Health-Temples.]
The temples of Aesculapius were scattered over the ancient Hellenic
world. To them the sick and ailing resorted in crowds. The treatment,
which was in the hands of an hereditary priesthood, combined the best
of the methods carried on at our present-day health-resorts, our
hydropathics, sanatoriums, and nursing-homes. Fresh air, water-cures,
massage, gymnastics, psychotherapy, and natural methods in general
were chiefly relied on.
[Sidenote: Hippocrates and the Unity of the Organism.]
Hippocrates, the “Father of Medicine” (5th to 4th centuries, B.C.) was
associated with the Asclepieum of Cos, an island off the south-west
coast of Asia Minor, near Rhodes. He apparently revitalized the work
of the health-temples, which had before his time been showing a
certain decline in vigour, coupled with a corresponding excessive
tendency towards sophistry and priestcraft.
Celsus says: “_Hippocrates Cous primus quidem ex omnibus memoria
dignis ab studio sapientiae disciplinam hanc separavit._” He means
that Hippocrates first gave the physician an independent standing,
separating him from the cosmological speculator. Hippocrates confined
the medical man to medicine. He did with medical thought what Socrates
did with thought in general—he “brought it down from heaven to
earth.” His watchword was “Back to Nature!”
At the same time, while assigning the physician his post, Hippocrates
would not let him regard that post as sacrosanct. He set his face
against any tendency to mystery-mongering, to exclusiveness, to
sacerdotalism. He was, in fact, opposed to the spirit of
trade-unionism in medicine. His concern was rather with the
physician’s duties than his “rights.”
At the dawn of recorded medical history Hippocrates stands for the
fundamental and primary importance of _seeing clearly_—that is of
_clinical observation_. And what he observed was that the human
organism, when exposed to certain abnormal conditions—certain
stresses—tends to behave in a certain way: that in other words, each
“disease” tends to run a certain definite course. To him a disease was
essentially a process, one and indivisible, and thus his practical
problem was essentially one of _prognosis_—“what will be the natural
course of this disease, if left to itself?” Here he found himself to
no small extent in opposition with the teaching of the neighbouring
medical school of Cnidus, where a more static view-point laid special
emphasis upon the minutiae of _diagnosis_.
Observation taught Hippocrates to place unbounded faith in the
recuperative powers of the living organism—in what we sometimes call
nowadays the _vis medicatrix Naturae_. His observation was that even
with a very considerable “abnormality” of environmental stress the
organism, in the large majority of cases, manages eventually by its
own inherent powers to adjust itself to the new conditions. “Merely
give Nature a chance,” said the father of medicine in effect, “and
most diseases will cure themselves.” And accordingly his treatment
was mainly directed towards “giving Nature a chance.”
His keen sense of the solidarity (or rather, of the constant
interplay) between the organism and its environment (the “conditions”
to which it is exposed) is instanced in his book, “Airs, Waters, and
Places.” As we recognise, in our popular everyday psychology, that “it
takes two to make a quarrel,” so Hippocrates recognised that in
pathology, it takes two (organism and environment) to make a disease.
As an outstanding example of his power of clinical observation we may
recall the _facies Hippocratica_, an accurate study of the countenance
of a dying man.
His ideals for the profession are embodied in the “Hippocratic oath.”
[Sidenote: Anatomy.]
Impressed by this view of the organism as a unity, the Hippocratic
school tended in some degree to overlook the importance of its
constituent _parts_. The balance was re-adjusted later on by the
labours of the anatomical school of Alexandria, which, under the aegis
of the enlightened Ptolemies, arose in the 3rd century B.C. Two
prominent exponents of anatomy belonging to this school were
Herophilus and Erasistratus, the latter of whom we shall frequently
meet with in the following pages (_v._ p. 95 _et seq._).
[Sidenote: The Empirics.]
After the death of the Master, the Hippocratic school tended, as so
often happens with the best of cultural movements, to show signs
itself of diminishing vitality: the letter began to obscure and hamper
the spirit. The comparatively small element of theory which existed in
the Hippocratic physiology was made the groundwork of a somewhat
over-elaborated “system.” Against this tendency on the part of the
“Dogmatic” or “Rationalist” school there arose, also at Alexandria,
the sect of the Empiricists. “It is not,” they said, “the cause but
the cure of diseases that concerns us; not how we digest, but what is
digestible.”
[Sidenote: Greek Medicine in Rome.]
Horace said “_Graecia capta ferum victorem cepit_.” Political
domination, the occupation of territory by armies, does not
necessarily mean real conquest. Horace’s statement applied to medicine
as to other branches of culture.
The introducer of Greek medicine into Rome was Asclepiades (1st
century B.C.). A man of forceful personality, and equipped with a
fully developed philosophic system of health and disease which
commended itself to the Roman _savants_ of the day, he soon attained
to the pinnacle of professional success in the Latin capital: he is
indeed to all time the type of the fashionable (and somewhat “faddy”)
West-end physician. His system was a purely mechanistic one, being
based upon the atomic doctrine of Leucippus and Democritus, which had
been completed by Epicurus and recently introduced to the Roman public
in Lucretius’s great poem “_De Rerum Natura_.” The disbelief of
Asclepiades in the self-maintaining powers of the living organism are
exposed and refuted at considerable length by Galen in the volume
before us.
[Sidenote: The Methodists.]
Out of the teaching of Asclepiades that physiological processes depend
upon the particular way in which the ultimate indivisible molecules come
together (ἐν τῇ ποίᾳ συνόδῳ τῶν πρώτων ἐκείνων σωμάτων τῶν άπαθῶν) there
was developed by his pupil, Themison of Laodicea, a system of medicine
characterised by the most engaging simplicity both of diagnosis and
treatment. This so-called “Methodic” system was intended to strike a
balance between the excessive leaning to apriorism shown by the
Rationalist (Hippocratic) school and the opposite tendency of the
Empiricists. “A pathological theory we must have,” said the Methodists
in effect, “but let it be simple.” They held that the molecular groups
constituting the tissues were traversed by minute channels (πόροι,
“pores”); all diseases belonged to one or other of two classes; if the
channels were constricted the disease was one of _stasis_ (στέγνωσις),
and if they were dilated the disease was one of _flux_ (ῥύσις). Flux and
stasis were indicated respectively by increase and diminution of the
natural secretions; treatment was of opposites by opposites—of stasis
by methods causing dilatation of the channels, and conversely.
Wild as it may seem, this pathological theory of the Methodists
contained an element of truth; in various guises it has cropped up
once and again at different epochs of medical history; even to-day
there are pathologists who tend to describe certain classes of disease
in terms of vaso-constriction and vaso-dilatation. The vice of the
Methodist teaching was that it looked on a disease too much as
something fixed and finite, an independent _entity_, to be considered
entirely apart from its particular setting. The Methodists illustrate
for us the tyranny of _names_. In its defects as in its virtues this
school has analogues at the present day; we are all acquainted with
the medical man to whom a name (such, let us say, as “tuberculosis,”
“gout,” or “intestinal auto-intoxication”) stands for an entity, one
and indivisible, to be treated by a definite and unvarying formula.
To such an individual the old German saying “_Jedermann hat am Ende
ein Bischen Tuberkulose_” is simply—incomprehensible.
[Sidenote: Galen.]
All the medical schools which I have mentioned were still holding
their ground in the 2nd century A.D., with more or less popular
acceptance, when the great Galen made his entry into the world of
Graeco-Roman medicine.
[Sidenote: His Nature and Nurture.]
Claudius Galenus was born at Pergamos in Asia Minor in the year 131
A.D. His father was one Nicon, a well-to-do architect of that city. “I
had the great good fortune,” says Galen,[1] “to have as a father a
highly amiable, just, good, and benevolent man. My mother, on the
other hand, possessed a very bad temper; she used sometimes to bite
her serving-maids, and she was perpetually shouting at my father and
quarrelling with him—worse than Xanthippe with Socrates. When,
therefore, I compared the excellence of my father’s disposition with
the disgraceful passions of my mother, I resolved to embrace and love
the former qualities, and to avoid and hate the latter.”
Nicon called his son Γαληνός, which means _quiet, peaceable_, and
although the physician eventually turned out to be a man of elevated
character, it is possible that his somewhat excessive leaning towards
controversy (exemplified in the following pages) may have resulted
from the fact that he was never quite able to throw off the worst
side of the maternal inheritance.
His father, a man well schooled in mathematics and philosophy, saw to
it that his son should not lack a liberal education. Pergamos itself
was an ancient centre of civilisation, containing, among other
culture-institutions, a library only second in importance to that of
Alexandria itself; it also contained an Asclepieum.
Galen’s training was essentially eclectic: he studied all the chief
philosophical systems of the time—Platonic, Aristotelian, Stoic, and
Epicurean—and then, at the age of seventeen, entered on a course of
medical studies; these he pursued under the best teachers at his own
city, and afterwards, during a period of _Wanderjahre_, at Smyrna,
Alexandria, and other leading medical centres.
Returning to Pergamos, he received his first professional
appointment—that of surgeon to the gladiators. After four years here
he was drawn by ambition to Rome, being at that time about thirty-one
years of age. At Rome the young Pergamene attained a brilliant
reputation both as a practitioner and as a public demonstrator of
anatomy; among his patients he finally numbered even the Emperor
Marcus Aurelius himself.
Medical practice in Rome at this time was at a low ebb, and Galen took
no pains to conceal his contempt for the ignorance, charlatanism, and
venality of his fellow-practitioners. Eventually, in spite of his
social popularity, he raised up such odium against himself in medical
circles, that he was forced to flee the city. This he did hurriedly
and secretly in the year 168 A.D., when thirty-six years of age. He
betook himself to his old home at Pergamos, where he settled down once
more to a literary life.
His respite was short, however, for within a year he was summoned back
to Italy by imperial mandate. Marcus Aurelius was about to undertake
an expedition against the Germans, who at that time were threatening
the northern frontiers of the Empire, and he was anxious that his
consulting physician should accompany him to the front. “Patriotism”
in this sense, however, seems to have had no charms for the Pergamene,
and he pleaded vigorously to be excused. Eventually, the Emperor gave
him permission to remain at home, entrusting to his care the young
prince Commodus.
Thereafter we know little of Galen’s history, beyond the fact that he
now entered upon a period of great literary activity. Probably he died
about the end of the century.
[Sidenote: Subsequent History of Galen’s Works.]
Galen wrote extensively, not only on anatomy, physiology, and medicine
in general, but also on logic; his logical proclivities, as will be
shown later, are well exemplified in his medical writings. A
considerable number of undoubtedly genuine works of his have come down
to us. The full importance of his contributions to medicine does not
appear to have been recognized till some time after his death, but
eventually, as already pointed out, the terms Galenism and Greek
medicine became practically synonymous.
A few words may be devoted to the subsequent history of his writings.
[Sidenote: Byzantine Medicine.]
During and after the final break-up of the Roman Empire came times or
confusion and of social reconstruction, which left little opportunity
for scientific thought and research. The Byzantine Empire, from the
4th century onwards, was the scene of much internal turmoil, in which
the militant activities of the now State-established Christian church
played a not inconsiderable part. The Byzantine medical scholars
were at best compilers, and a typical compiler was Oribasius,
body-physician to the Emperor Julian (4th century, A.D.); his
excellent _Synopsis_ was written in order to make the huge mass of
the Galenic writings available for the ordinary practitioner.
[Sidenote: Arabian Medicine.]
Greek medicine spread, with general Greek culture, throughout Syria,
and from thence was carried by the Nestorians, a persecuted heretical
sect, into Persia; here it became implanted, and hence eventually
spread to the Mohammedan world. Several of the Prophet’s successors
(such as the Caliphs Harun-al-Rashid and Abdul-Rahman III) were great
patrons of Greek learning, and especially of medicine. The Arabian
scholars imbibed Aristotle and Galen with avidity. A partial
assimilation, however, was the farthest stage to which they could
attain; with the exception of pharmacology, the Arabians made
practically no independent additions to medicine. They were
essentially systematizers and commentators. “_Averrois che il gran
comento feo_”[2] may stand as the type _par excellence_ of the Moslem
sage.
Avicenna (Ebn Sina), (10th to 11th century) is the foremost name in
Arabian medicine: his “Book of the Canon in Medicine,” when translated
into Latin, even overshadowed the authority of Galen himself for some
four centuries. Of this work the medical historian Max Neuburger says:
“Avicenna, according to his lights, imparted to contemporary medical
science the appearance of almost mathematical accuracy, whilst the art
of therapeutics, although empiricism did not wholly lack recognition,
was deduced as a logical sequence from theoretical (Galenic and
Aristotelian) premises.”
[Sidenote: Introduction of Arabian Medicine to the West.
Arabo-Scholastic Period.]
Having arrived at such a condition in the hands of the Mohammedans,
Galenism was now destined to pass once more to the West. From the 11th
century onwards Latin translations of this “Arabian” Medicine (being
Greek medicine in oriental trappings) began to make their way into
Europe; here they helped to undermine the authority of the one medical
school of native growth which the West produced during the Middle
Ages—namely the School of Salerno.
Blending with the Scholastic philosophy at the universities of Naples
and Montpellier, the teachings of Aristotle and Galen now assumed a
position of supreme authority: from their word, in matters scientific
and medical, there was no appeal. In reference to this period the
Pergamene was referred to in later times as the “Medical Pope of the
Middle Ages.”
It was of course the logical side of Galenism which chiefly commended
it to the mediaeval Schoolmen, as to the essentially speculative
Moslems.
[Sidenote: The Renascence.]
The year 1453, when Constantinople fell into the hands of the Turks,
is often taken as marking the commencement of the Renascence. Among
the many factors which tended to stimulate and awaken men’s minds
during these spacious times was the rediscovery of the Greek classics,
which were brought to Europe by, among others, the scholars who fled
from Byzantium. The Arabo-Scholastic versions of Aristotle and Galen
were now confronted by their Greek originals. A passion for Greek
learning was aroused. The freshness and truth of these old writings
helped to awaken men to a renewed sense of their own dignity and
worth, and to brace them in their own struggle for self-expression.
Prominent in this “Humanist” movement was the English physician,
Thomas Linacre (_c._ 1460-1524) who, having gained in Italy an
extraordinary zeal for the New Learning, devoted the rest of his life,
after returning to England, to the promotion of the _litterae
humaniores_, and especially to making Galen accessible to readers of
Latin. Thus the “_De Naturalibus Facultatibus_” appeared in London in
1523, and was preceded and followed by several other translations,
all marked by minute accuracy and elegant Latinity.
Two new parties now arose in the medical world—the so-called “Greeks”
and the more conservative “Arabists.”
[Sidenote: Paracelsus.]
But the swing of the pendulum did not cease with the creation of the
liberal “Greek” party; the dazzling vision of freedom was to drive
some to a yet more anarchical position. Paracelsus, who flourished in
the first half of the 16th century, may be taken as typifying this
extremist tendency. His one cry was, “Let us away with all authority
whatsoever, and get back to Nature!” At his first lecture as professor
at the medical school of Basle he symbolically burned the works of
Galen and of his chief Arabian exponent, Avicenna.
[Sidenote: The Renascence Anatomists.]
But the final collapse of authority in medicine could not be brought
about by mere negativism. It was the constructive work of the
Renascence anatomists, particularly those of the Italian school, which
finally brought Galenism to the ground.
Vesalius (1514-64), the modern “Father of Anatomy,” for dissecting
human bodies, was fiercely assailed by the hosts of orthodoxy,
including that stout Galenist, his old teacher Jacques Dubois (Jacobus
Sylvius). Vesalius held on his way, however, proving, _inter alia_,
that Galen had been wrong in saying that the interventricular septum
of the heart was permeable (_cf._ present volume, p. 321).
Michael Servetus (1509-53) suggested that the blood, in order to get
from the right to the left side of the heart, might have to pass
through the lungs. For his heterodox opinions he was burned at the
stake.
Another 16th-century anatomist, Andrea Cesalpino, is considered by the
Italians to have been a discoverer of the circulation of the blood
before Harvey; he certainly had a more or less clear idea of the
circulation, but, as in the case of the “organic evolutionists before
Darwin,” he failed to prove his point by conclusive demonstration.
[Sidenote: William Harvey (1578-1657).]
William Harvey, the great Englishman who founded modern experimental
physiology and was the first to establish not only the fact of the
circulation but also the physical laws governing it, is commonly
reckoned the Father of Modern Medicine. He owed his interest in the
movements of the blood to Fabricio of Acquapendente, his tutor at
Padua, who drew his attention to the valves in the veins, thus
suggesting the idea of a circular as opposed to a to-and-fro motion.
Harvey’s great generalisation, based upon a long series of experiments
_in vivo_, was considered to have given the _coup de grâce_ to the
Galenic physiology, and hence threw temporary discredit upon the whole
system of medicine associated therewith.
Modern medicine, based upon a painstaking research into the details
of physiological function, had begun.
[Sidenote: Back to Galen!]
While we cannot sufficiently commend the results of the long modern
period of research-work to which the labours of the Renascence
anatomists from Vesalius to Harvey form a fitting prelude, we yet by
no means allow that Galen’s general medical outlook was so entirely
invalidated as many imagine by the conclusive demonstration of his
anatomical errors. It is time for us now to turn to Galen again after
three hundred years of virtual neglect: it may be that he will help us
to see something fundamentally important for medical practice which is
beyond the power even of our microscopes and _X_-rays to reveal. While
the value of his work undoubtedly lies mainly in its enabling us to
envisage one of the greatest of the early steps attained by man in
medical knowledge, it also has a very definite intrinsic value of its
own.
[Sidenote: Galen’s Debt to his Precursors.]
No attempt can be made here to determine how much of Galen’s work is,
in the true sense of the word, original, and how much is drawn from
the labours of his predecessors. In any case, there is no doubt that
he was much more than a mere compiler and systematizer of other men’s
work: he was great enough to be able not merely to collect, to digest,
and to assimilate all the best of the work done before his time, but,
adding to this the outcome of his own observations, experiments, and
reflections, to present the whole in an articulated “system” showing
that perfect balance of parts which is the essential criterion of a
work of art. Constantly, however, in his writings we shall come across
traces of the influence of, among others, Plato, Aristotle, and
writers of the Stoic school.
[Sidenote: Influence of Hippocrates on Galen.]
Although Galen is an eclectic in the best sense of influence of the
term, there is one name to which he pays a very special tribute—that
of his illustrious forerunner Hippocrates. Him on quite a number of
occasions he actually calls “divine” (_cf._ p. 293).
“Hippocrates,” he says, “was the first known to us of all who have
been both physicians and philosophers, in that _he was the first to
recognise what nature does_.” Here is struck the keynote of the
teaching of both Hippocrates and Galen; this is shown in the volume
before us, which deals with “the _natural_ faculties”—that is with
the faculties of this same “Nature” or vital principle referred to in
the quotation.
[Sidenote: “The Natural Faculties.”]
If Galen be looked on as a crystallisation of Greek medicine, then
this book may be looked on as a crystallisation of Galen. Within its
comparatively short compass we meet with instances illustrating
perhaps most of the sides of this many-sided writer. The “Natural
Faculties” therefore forms an excellent prelude to the study of his
larger and more specialised works.
[Sidenote: Galen’s “Physiology.”]
What, now, is this “Nature” or biological principle upon which Galen,
like Hippocrates, bases the whole of his medical teaching, and which,
we may add, is constantly overlooked—if indeed ever properly
apprehended—by many physiologists of the present day? By using this
term Galen meant simply that, when we deal with a living thing, we are
dealing primarily with a unity, which, _quâ_ living, is not further
divisible; all its parts can only be understood and dealt with as
being _in relation to_ this principle of unity. Galen was thus led to
criticise with considerable severity many of the medical and surgical
specialists of his time, who acted on the assumption (implicit if not
explicit) that the whole was merely the sum of its parts, and that if,
in an ailing organism, these parts were treated each in and for
itself, the health of the whole organism could in this way be
eventually restored.
Galen expressed this idea of the unity of the organism by saying that
it was governed by a _Physis_ or Nature (ἡ φύσις ἥπερ διοικεῖ τὸ ζῷον),
with whose “faculties” or powers it was the province of φυσιολογία
(physiology, Nature-lore) to deal. It was because Hippocrates had a
clear sense of this principle that Galen called him master. “Greatest,”
say the Moslems, “is Allah, and Mohammed is his prophet.” “Greatest,”
said Galen, “is the Physis, and Hippocrates is its prophet.” Never did
Mohammed more zealously maintain the unity of the Godhead than
Hippocrates and Galen the unity of the organism.
[Sidenote: Galen’s Physics.]
But we shall not have read far before we discover that the term
_Physiology_, as used by Galen, stands not merely for what we
understand by it nowadays, but also for a large part of _Physics_ as
well. This is one of the chief sources of confusion in his writings.
Having grasped, for example, the uniqueness of the process of
_specific selection_ (ὁλκὴ τοῦ οἰκείου), by which the tissues nourish
themselves, he proceeds to apply this principle in explanation of
entirely different classes of phenomena; thus he mixes it up with the
physical phenomenon of the attraction of the lodestone for iron, of
dry grain for moisture, etc. It is noteworthy, however, in these
latter instances, that he does not venture to follow out his comparison
to its logical conclusion; he certainly stops short of hinting that
the lodestone (like a living organ or tissue) _assimilates_ the metal
which it has attracted!
Setting aside, however, these occasional half-hearted attempts to
apply his principle of a φύσις in regions where it has no natural
standing, we shall find that in the field of biology Galen moves
with an assurance bred of first-hand experience.
[Sidenote: The Mechanical Physicists.]
Against his attempt to “biologize” physics may be set the converse
attempt of the mechanical Atomist school. Thus in Asclepiades he found
a doughty defender of the view that physiology was “merely” physics.
Galen’s ire being roused, he is not content with driving the enemy out
of the biological camp, but must needs attempt also to dislodge him
from that of physics, in which he has every right to be.
[Sidenote: The Anatomists.]
In defence of the universal validity of his principle, Galen also
tends to excessive disparagement of morphological factors; witness his
objection to the view of the anatomist Erasistratus that the calibre
of vessels played a part in determining the secretion of fluids (p.
123), that digestion was caused by the mechanical action of the
stomach walls (p. 243), and dropsy by induration of the liver (p.
171).
[Sidenote: Characteristics of the Living Organism.]
While combating the atomic explanation of physical processes, Galen of
course realised that there were many of these which could only be
explained according to what we should now call “mechanical laws.” For
example, non-living things could be subjected to φορά (passive motion),
they answered to the laws of gravity (ταῖς τῶν ὑλῶν οἰακιζόμενα ῥοπαῖς,
p. 126). Furthermore, Galen did not fail to see that living things also
were not entirely exempted from the operation of these laws; they too
may be at least partly subject to gravity (_loc. cit._); a hollow organ
exerts, by virtue of its cavity, an attraction similar to that of
dilating bellows, as well as, by virtue of the living tissue of its
walls, a specifically “vital” or selective kind of attraction (p. 325).
As a type of characteristically vital action we may take _nutrition_,
in which occurs a phenomenon which Galen calls _active motion_
(δραστικὴ κίνησις) or, more technically, _alteration_ (ἀλλοίωσις).
This active type of motion cannot be adequately stated in terms of
the passive movements (groupings and re-groupings) of its constituent
parts according to certain empirical “laws.” Alteration involves
_self-movement_, a self-determination of the organism or organic part.
Galen does not attempt to explain this fundamental characteristic of
_alteration_ any further; he contents himself with referring his
opponents to Aristotle’s work on the “Complete Alteration of Substance”
(p. 9).
The most important characteristic of the Physis or Nature is its
τέχνη—its artistic creativeness. In other words, the living organism is
a creative artist. This feature may be observed typically in its primary
functions of _growth_ and _nutrition_; these are dependent on the
characteristic _faculties_ or powers, by virtue of which each part draws
to itself what is proper or appropriate to it (το οἰκεῖον) and rejects
what is foreign (το ἀλλότριον), thereafter appropriating or assimilating
the attracted material; this assimilation is an example of the
_alteration_ (or qualitative change) already alluded to; thus the food
eaten is “altered” into the various tissues of the body, each of these
having been provided by “Nature” with its own specific faculties of
attraction and repulsion.
[Sidenote: The Three Categories.]
Any of the operations of the living part may be looked on in three ways,
either (_a_) as a δύναμις, faculty, potentiality; (_b_) as an ἐνέργεια,
which is this δύναμις in operation; or (_c_) as an ἔργον, the product or
effect of the ἐνέργεια.[3]
[Sidenote: Galen’s Method.]
Like his master Hippocrates, Galen attached fundamental importance to
clinical observation—to the evidence of the senses as the indispensable
groundwork of all medical knowledge. He had also, however, a forte for
rapid generalisation from observations, and his logical proclivities
disposed him particularly to deductive reasoning. Examples of an almost
Euclidean method of argument may be found in the _Natural Faculties_
(_e.g._ Book III. chap. i.). While this method undoubtedly gave him
much help in his search for truth, it also not unfrequently led him
astray. This is evidenced by his attempt, already noted, to apply the
biological principle of the φύσις in physics. Characteristic examples
of attempts to force facts to fit premises will be found in Book II.
chap. ix., where our author demonstrates that yellow bile is
“virtually” dry, and also, by a process of exclusion, assigns to the
spleen the function of clearing away black bile. Strangest of all is
his attempt to prove that the same principle of specific attraction by
which the ultimate tissues nourish themselves (and the lodestone
attracts iron!) accounts for the reception of food into the stomach,
of urine into the kidneys, of bile into the gall-bladder, and of semen
into the uterus.
These instances are given, however, without prejudice to the system of
generalisation and deduction which, in Galen’s hands, often proved
exceedingly fruitful. He is said to have tried “to unite professional
and scientific medicine with a philosophic link.” He objected,
however, to such extreme attempts at simplification of medical science
as that of the Methodists, to whom diseases were isolated entities,
without any relationships in time or space (_v._ p. xv. _supra_).
He based much of his pathological reasoning upon the “humoral theory”
of Hippocrates, according to which certain diseases were caused by one
or more of the four humours (blood, phlegm, black and yellow bile)
being in excess—that is, by various _dyscrasiae_. Our modern
conception of “hormone” action shows certain resemblances with this
theory.
Besides observation and reasoning, Galen took his stand on
_experiment_; he was one of the first of experimental physiologists,
as is illustrated in the present book by his researches into the
function of the kidneys (p. 59 _et seq._). He also conducted a long
series of experiments into the physiology of the spinal cord, to
determine what parts controlled movement and what sensibility.
As a practitioner he modelled his work largely on the broad and simple
lines laid down by Hippocrates. He had also at his disposal all the
acquisitions of biological science dating from the time of Aristotle
five hundred years earlier, and reinforced by the discoveries in
anatomy made by the Alexandrian school. To these he added a large
series of researches of his own.
Galen never confined himself to what one might call the academic or
strictly orthodox sources of information; he roamed the world over for
answers to his queries. For example, we find him on his journeys
between Pergamos and Rome twice visiting the island of Lemnos in order
to procure some of the _terra sigillata_, a kind of earth which had a
reputation for healing the bites of serpents and other wounds. At
other times he visited the copper-mines of Cyprus in search for
copper, and Palestine for the resin called Balm of Gilead.
By inclination and training Galen was the reverse of a “party-man.” In
the _Natural Faculties_ (p. 55) he speaks of the bane of sectarian
partizanship, “harder to heal than any itch.” He pours scorn upon the
ignorant “Erasistrateans” and “Asclepiadeans,” who attempted to hide
their own incompetence under the shield of some great man’s name
(_cf._ p. 141).
Of the two chief objects of his censure in the _Natural Faculties_,
Galen deals perhaps less rigorously with Erasistratus than with
Asclepiades. Erasistratus did at least recognize the existence of a
vital principle in the organism, albeit, with his eye on the
structures which the scalpel displayed he tended frequently to forget
it. The researches of the anatomical school of Alexandria had been
naturally of the greatest service to surgery, but in medicine they
sometimes had a tendency to check progress by diverting attention from
the whole to the part.
[Sidenote: The Pneuma or Spirit.]
Another novel conception frequently occurring in Galen’s writings is
that of the _Pneuma_ (_i.e._ the breath, _spiritus_). This word is
used in two senses, as meaning (1) the inspired air, which was drawn
into the left side of the heart and thence carried all over the body
by the arteries; this has not a few analogies with oxygen,
particularly as its action in the tissues is attended with the
appearance of the so-called “innate heat.” (2) A vital principle,
conceived as being made up of matter in the most subtle imaginable
state (_i.e._ air). This vital principle became resolved into three
kinds: (_a_) πνεῦμα φυσικόν or _spiritus naturalis_, carried by the
veins, and presiding over the subconscious vegetative life; this
“natural spirit” is therefore practically equivalent to the φῦσις or
“nature” itself. (_b_) The πνεῦμα ζωτικόν or _spiritus vitalis_; here
particularly is a source of error, since the air already alluded to
as being carried by the arteries tends to be confused with this
principle of “individuality” or relative autonomy in the circulatory
(including, perhaps, the vasomotor) system. (_c_) The πνεῦμα ψυχικόν
or _spiritus animalis_ (anima = ψυχή), carried by longitudinal canals
in the nerves; this corresponds to the ψυχή.
This view of a “vital principle” as necessarily consisting of matter
in a finely divided, fluid, or “etheric” state is not unknown even in
our day. Belief in the fundamental importance of the Pneuma formed the
basis of the teaching of another vitalist school in ancient Greece,
that of the Pneumatists.
[Sidenote: Galen and the Circulation of the Blood.]
It is unnecessary to detail here the various ways in which Galen’s
physiological views differ from those of the Moderns, as most of these
are noticed in footnotes to the text of the present translation. His
ignorance of the circulation of the blood does not lessen the force of
his general physiological conclusions to the extent that might be
anticipated. In his opinion, the great bulk of the blood travelled
with a to-and-fro motion in the veins, while a little of it, mixed
with inspired air, moved in the same way along the arteries; whereas
we now know that all the blood goes outward by the arteries and
returns by the veins; in either case blood is carried to the tissues
by blood-vessels, and Galen’s ideas of tissue-nutrition were
wonderfully sound. The ingenious method by which (in ignorance of the
pulmonary circulation) he makes blood pass from the right to the left
ventricle, may be read in the present work (p. 321). As will be seen,
he was conversant with the “anastomoses” between the ultimate branches
of arteries and veins, although he imagined that they were not used
under “normal” conditions.
[Sidenote: Galen’s Character.]
Galen was not only a man of great intellectual gifts, but one also of
strong moral fibre. In his short treatise “That the best Physician is
also a Philosopher” he outlines his professional ideals. It is
necessary for the efficient healer to be versed in the three branches
of “philosophy,” viz.: (_a_) _logic_, the science of how to think;
(_b_) _physics_, the science of what is—_i.e._ of “Nature” in the
widest sense; (_c_) _ethics_, the science of what to do. The amount of
toil which he who wishes to be a physician must undergo—firstly, in
mastering the work of his predecessors and afterwards in studying
disease at first hand—makes it absolutely necessary that he should
possess perfect self-control, that he should scorn money and the weak
pleasures of the senses, and should live laborious days.
Readers of the following pages will notice that Galen uses what we
should call distinctly immoderate language towards those who ventured
to differ from the views of his master Hippocrates (which were also
his own). The employment of such language was one of the few
weaknesses of his age which he did not transcend. Possibly also his
mother’s choleric temper may have predisposed him to it.
The fact, too, that his vivisection experiments (_e.g._ pp. 59, 273)
were carried out apparently without any kind of anaesthetisation being
even thought of is abhorrent to the feelings of to-day, but must be
excused also on the ground that callousness towards animals was then
customary, men having probably never thought much about the subject.
[Sidenote: Galen’s Greek Style.]
Galen is a master of language, using a highly polished variety of
Attic prose with a precision which can be only very imperfectly
reproduced in another tongue. Every word he uses has an exact and
definite meaning attached to it. Translation is particularly difficult
when a word stands for a physiological conception which is not now
held; instances are the words _anadosis_, _prosthesis_, and
_prosphysis_, indicating certain steps in the process by which
nutriment is conveyed from the alimentary canal to the tissues.
Readers will be surprised to find how many words are used by Galen
which they would have thought had been expressly coined to fit modern
conceptions; thus our author employs not merely such terms as
_physiology_, _phthisis_, _atrophy_, _anastomosis_, but also
_haematopoietic_, _anaesthesia_, and even _aseptic_! It is only fair,
however, to remark that these terms, particularly the last, were not
used by Galen in quite their modern significance.
[Sidenote: Summary.]
To resume, then: What contribution can Galen bring to the art of
healing at the present day? It was not, surely, for nothing that the
great Pergamene gave laws to the medical world for over a thousand
years!
Let us draw attention once more to:
(1) The high ideal which he set before the profession.
(2) His insistence on immediate contact with nature as the primary
condition for arriving at an understanding of disease; on the need for
due consideration of previous authorities; on the need also for
reflection—for employment of the mind’s eye (ἡ λογικὴ θεωρία) as an aid
to the physical eye.
(3) His essentially broad outlook, which often helped him in the
comprehension of a phenomenon through his knowledge of an analogous
phenomenon in another field of nature.
(4) His keen appreciation of the unity of the organism, and of the
inter-dependence of its parts; his realisation that the vital
phenomena (physiological and pathological) in a living organism can
only be understood when considered in relation to the _environment_ of
that organism or part. This is the foundation for the war that Galen
waged _à outrance_ on the Methodists, to whom diseases were things
without relation to anything. This dispute is, unfortunately, not
touched upon in the present volume. What Galen combated was the
tendency, familiar enough in our own day, to reduce medicine to the
science of finding a label for each patient, and then treating not the
patient, but the label. (This tendency, we may remark in parenthesis,
is one which is obviously well suited for the _standardising_ purposes
of a State medical service, and is therefore one which all who have
the weal of the profession at heart must most jealously watch in the
difficult days that lie ahead.)
(5) His realisation of the inappropriateness and inadequacy of physical
formulae in explaining physiological activities. Galen’s disputes with
Asclepiades over τὰ πρῶτα ἐκεῖνα σώματα τὰ ἀπαθῆ, over the ἄναρμα
στοιχεῖα καὶ ληρώδεις ὄγκοι, is but another aspect of his quarrel with
the Methodists regarding their pathological “units,” whose primary
characteristic was just this same ἀπάθεια (impassiveness to
environment, “unimpressionability”). We have of course our Physiatric
or Iatromechanical school at the present day, to whom such processes
as absorption from the alimentary canal, the respiratory interchange
of gases, and the action of the renal epithelium are susceptible of a
purely physical explanation.[4]
(6) His quarrel with the Anatomists, which was in essence the same as
that with the Atomists, and which arose from his clear realisation
that that primary and indispensable desideratum, a view of the whole,
could never be obtained by a mere summation of partial views; hence,
also, his sense of the dangers which would beset the medical art if it
were allowed to fall into the hands of a mere crowd of competing
specialists without any organising head to guide them.
[1] _On the Affections of the Mind_, p. 41 (Kühn’s ed.).
[2] “Averrhoës who made the great Commentary” (Dante).
It was Averrhoës (Ebn Roshd) who, in the 12th century,
introduced Aristotle to the Mohammedan world, and the
“Commentary” referred to was on Aristotle.
[3] What appear to me to be certain resemblances between
the Galenical and the modern vitalistic views of Henri
Bergson may perhaps be alluded to here. Galen’s vital
principle, ἡ τεχνικὴ φύσις (“creative growth”), presents
analogies with _l’Evolution créatrice_: both manifest
their activity in producing qualitative change
(ἀλλοίωσις, _changement_): in both, the creative change
cannot be analysed into a series of static states, but
is one and continuous. In Galen, however, it comes to an
end with the _development of the individual_, whereas in
Bergson it continues indefinitely as the _evolution of
life_. The three aspects of organic life may be tabulated
thus:—
δύναμις ἐνέργεια ἔργον
Work to be done. Work being done. Work done, finished.
Future aspect. Present aspect. Past aspect.
Function. Structure.
The _élan vital_. A “thing.”
A changing which
cannot be understood
as a sum of static
parts; a constant
becoming, never
stopping—at least
till the ἔργον
is reached.
Bergson’s Bergson’s Bergson’s “outlook
“teleological” “philosophical” of physical
aspect. aspect. science.”
Galen recognized “creativeness” (τέχνη) in the
_development_ of the individual and its parts (ontogeny)
and in the maintenance of these, but he failed to
appreciate the creative _evolution_ of species
(phylogeny), which is, of course, part of the same
process. To the teleologist the possibilities (δυνάμεις)
of the Physis are limited, to Bergson they are
unlimited. Galen and Bergson agree in attaching most
practical importance to the middle category—that of
Function.
While it must be conceded that Galen, following
Aristotle, had never seriously questioned the fixity of
species, the following quotation from his work _On
Habits_ (chap. ii.) will show that he must have at least
had occasional glimmerings of our modern point of view
on the matter. Referring to _assimilation_, he says:
“Just as everything we eat or drink becomes _altered in
quality_, so of course also does the altering factor
itself become altered.... A clear proof of the
assimilation of things which are being nourished to that
which is nourishing them is the change which occurs in
plants and seeds; this often goes so far that what is
highly noxious in one soil becomes, when transplanted
into another soil, not merely harmless, but actually
useful. This has been largely put to the test by those
who compose memoirs on farming and on plants, as also by
zoological authors who have written on the changes which
occur according to the countries in which animals live.
Since, therefore, not only is the nourishment altered by
the creature nourished, but the latter itself also
undergoes some slight alteration, _this slight
alteration must necessarily become considerable in the
course of time_, and thus properties resulting from
prolonged habit must come to be on a par with natural
properties.”
Galen fails to see the possibility that the “natural”
properties themselves originated in this way, as
activities which gradually became habitual—that is to
say, that the effects of _nurture_ may become a “second
nature,” and so eventually _nature_ itself.
The whole passage, however, may be commended to modern
biologists—particularly, might one say, to those
bacteriologists who have not yet realised how
extraordinarily _relative_ is the term “specificity”
when applied to the subject-matter of their science.
[4] In terms of filtration, diffusion, and osmosis.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Codices
Bibliothèque Nationale. Paris. No. 2267.
Library of St. Mark. Venice. No. 275.
Translations
Arabic translations by Honain in the Escurial Library, and
in the Library at Leyden. Hebrew translation in the
Library at Bonn. Latin translations in the Library of
Gonville and Caius College (MSS.), No. 947; also by
Linacre in editions published, London, 1523; Paris,
1528; Leyden, 1540, 1548, and 1550; also by C.G. Kühn,
Leipzig, 1821.
Commentaries and Appreciations
Nic. de Anglia in Bib. Nat. Paris (MSS.), No. 7015; J.
Rochon, _ibidem_, No. 7025; J. Segarra, 1528; J. Sylvius,
1550, 1560; L. Joubert, 1599; M. Sebitz, 1644, 1645;
J.B. Pacuvius, 1554; J.C.G. Ackermann, 1821, in
the introduction to Kühn’s translation, p. lxxx; Ilberg
in articles on “Die Schriftstellerei des Klaudios
Galenos,” in _Rhein. Mus._, Nos. 44, 47, 51, and 52
(years 1889, 1892, 1896 and 1897); I. von Mueller in
_Quæstiones Criticae de Galeni libris_, Erlangen, 1871;
Steinschneider in Virchow’s _Archiv_, No. cxxiv. for
1891; Wenrich in _De auctorum graecorum versionibus
et commentariis syriacis, arabicis, armiacis, persisque_,
Leipzig, 1842.
SYNOPSIS OF CHAPTERS
BOOK I
Chapter I
Distinction between the effects of (_a_) the organism’s
_psyche_ or soul (_b_) its _physis_ or nature. The
author proposes to confine himself to a consideration of
the latter—the vegetative—aspect of life.
Chapter II
Definition of terms. Different kinds of _motion_.
_Alteration_ or qualitative change. Refutation of the
Sophists’ objection that such change is only apparent,
not real. The four fundamental qualities of Hippocrates
(later Aristotle). Distinction between _faculty_,
_activity_ (function), and _effect_ (work or product).
Chapter III
It is by virtue of the _four qualities_ that each part
functions. Some authorities subordinate the dry and the
moist principles to the hot and the cold. Aristotle
inconsistent here.
Chapter IV
We must suppose that there are _faculties_ corresponding
in number to the visible _effects_ (or products) with
which we are familiar.
Chapter V
Genesis, growth, and nutrition. Genesis (embryogeny)
sub-divided into histogenesis and organogenesis. Growth
is a tridimensional expansion of the solid parts formed
during genesis. Nutrition.
Chapter VI
The process of genesis (embryogeny) from insemination
onwards. Each of the simple, elementary, homogeneous
parts (tissues) is produced by a special blend of the
four primary alterative faculties (such secondary
alterative faculties being _ostopoietic_,
_neuropoietic_, etc.). A special _function_ and _use_
also corresponds to each of these special tissues. The
bringing of these tissues together into _organs_ and the
disposal of these organs is performed by another faculty
called _diaplastic_, _moulding_, or _formative_.
Chapter VII
We now pass from genesis to _growth_. Growth essentially
a post-natal process; it involves two factors, expansion
and nutrition, explained by analogy of a familiar
child’s game.
Chapter VIII
Nutrition.
Chapter IX
These three primary faculties (genesis, growth,
nutrition) have various others subservient to them.
Chapter X
Nutrition not a simple process. (1) Need of subsidiary
organs for the various stages of alteration, _e.g._, of
bread into blood, of that into bone, etc. (2) Need also
of organs for excreting the non-utilizable portions of
the food, _e.g._, much vegetable matter is superfluous.
(3) Need of organs of a third kind, for distributing the
pabulum through the body.
Chapter XI
Nutrition analysed into the stages of application
(_prosthesis_), adhesion (_prosphysis_), and
assimilation. The stages illustrated by certain
pathological conditions. Different shades of meaning of
the term _nutriment_.
Chapter XII
The two chief medico-philosophical schools—Atomist and
Vitalist. Hippocrates an adherent of the latter
school—his doctrine of an original principle or
“nature” in every living thing (doctrine of the unity of
the organism).
Chapter XIII
Failure of Asclepiades to understand the functions of
kidneys and ureters. His hypothesis of vaporization of
imbibed fluids is here refuted. A demonstration of
urinary secretion in the living animal; the forethought
and artistic skill of Nature vindicated. Refutation also
of Asclepiades’s disbelief in the special selective
action of purgative drugs.
Chapter XIV
While Asclepiades denies _in toto_ the obvious fact of
specific attraction, Epicurus grants the fact, although
his attempt to explain it by the atomic hypothesis
breaks down. Refutation of the Epicurean theory of
magnetic attraction. Instances of specific attraction of
thorns and animal poisons by medicaments, of moisture by
corn, etc.
Chapter XV
It now being granted that the urine is secreted by the
kidneys, the _rationale_ of this secretion is enquired
into. The kidneys are not mechanical filters, but are by
virtue of their _nature_ possessed of a specific faculty
of attraction.
Chapter XVI
Erasistratus, again, by his favourite principle of
_horror vacui_ could never explain the secretion of
urine by the kidneys. While, however, he acknowledged
that the kidneys do secrete urine, he makes no attempt
to explain this; he ignores, but does not attempt to
refute, the Hippocratic doctrine of specific
_attraction_. “Servile” position taken up by Asclepiades
and Erasistratus in regard to this function of urinary
secretion.
Chapter XVII
Three other attempts (by adherents of the Erasistratean
school and by Lycus of Macedonia) to explain how the
kidneys come to separate out urine from the blood. All
these ignore the obvious principle of attraction.
BOOK II
Chapter I
In order to explain dispersal of food from alimentary
canal _viâ_ the veins (_anadosis_) there is no need to
invoke with Erasistratus, the _horror vacui_, since here
again the principle of specific attraction is operative;
moreover, blood is also driven forward by the
compressing action of the stomach and the contractions
of the veins. Possibility, however, of Erasistratus’s
factor playing a certain minor _rôle_.
Chapter II
The Erasistratean idea that bile becomes separated out
from the blood in the liver because, being the thinner
fluid, it alone can enter the narrow stomata of the
bile-ducts, while the thicker blood can only enter the
wider mouths of the hepatic venules.
Chapter III
The morphological factors suggested by Erasistratus are
quite inadequate to explain biological happenings.
Erasistratus inconsistent with his own statements. The
immanence of the _physis_ or nature; her shaping is not
merely external like that of a statuary, but involves
the entire substance. In genesis (embryogeny) the semen
is the active, and the menstrual blood the passive,
principle. Attractive, alterative, and formative
faculties of the semen. Embryogeny is naturally followed
by growth; these two functions distinguished.
Chapter IV
Unjustified claim by Erasistrateans that their founder
had associations with the Peripatetic (Aristotelian)
school. The characteristic physiological tenets of that
school (which were all anticipated by Hippocrates) in no
way agree with those of Erasistratus, save that both
recognize the purposefulness of Nature; in practice,
however, Erasistratus assumed numerous exceptions to
this principle. Difficulty of understanding why he
rejected the biological principle of attraction in
favour of anatomical factors.
Chapter V
A further difficulty raised by Erasistratus’s statement
regarding secretion of bile in the liver.
Chapter VI
The same holds with nutrition. Even if we grant that
veins may obtain their nutrient blood by virtue of the
_horror vacui_ (chap. i.), how could this explain the
nutrition of nerves? Erasistratus’s hypothesis of minute
elemental nerves and vessels within the ordinary visible
nerves simply throws the difficulty further back. And is
Erasistratus’s minute “simple” nerve susceptible of
further analysis, as the Atomists would assume? If so,
this is opposed to the conception of a constructive and
artistic Nature which Erasistratus himself shares with
Hippocrates and the writer. And if his minute nerve is
really elementary and not further divisible, then it
cannot, according to his own showing, contain a cavity;
therefore the _horror vacui_ does not apply to it. And
how could this principle apply to the restoration to its
original bulk of a part which had become thin through
disease, where more matter must become attached than
runs away? A quotation from Erasistratus shows that he
did acknowledge an “attraction,” although not exactly in
the Hippocratic sense.
Chapter VII
In the last resort, the ultimate living elements
(Erasistratus’s _simple vessels_) must draw in their
food by virtue of an inherent attractive faculty like
that which the lodestone exerts on iron. Thus the
process of anadosis, from beginning to end, can be
explained without assuming a _horror vacui_.
Chapter VIII
Erasistratus’s disregard for the humours. In respect to
excessive formation of bile, however, prevention is
better than cure: accordingly we must consider its
pathology. Does blood pre-exist in the food, or does it
come into existence in the body? Erasistratus’s purely
anatomical explanation of _dropsy_. He entirely avoids
the question of the four qualities (_e.g._ the
importance of innate heat) in the generation of the
humours, etc. Yet the problem of blood-production is no
less important than that of gastric digestion. Proof
that bile does not pre-exist in the food. The four
fundamental qualities of Hippocrates and Aristotle. How
the humours are formed from food taken into the veins:
when heat is in proportionate amount, blood results;
when in excess, bile; when deficient, phlegm. Various
conditions determining cold or warm temperaments. The
four primary diseases result each from excess of one of
the four qualities. Erasistratus unwillingly
acknowledges this when he ascribes the indigestion
occurring in fever to _impaired function_ of the
stomach. For what causes this _functio laesa_? Proof
that it is the fever (excess of innate heat).
If, then, heat plays so important a part in abnormal
functioning, so must it also in normal (_i.e._ causes of
eucrasia involved in those of dyscrasia, of physiology
in those of pathology). A like argument explains the
_genesis of the humours_. Addition of warmth to things
already warm makes them bitter; thus honey turns to bile
in people who are already warm; where warmth deficient,
as in old people, it turns to useful blood. This is a
proof that bile does not pre-exist, as such, in the
food.
Chapter IX
The _functions of organs_ also depend on the way in
which the four qualities are mixed—_e.g._ the
contracting function of the stomach. Treatment only
possible when we know the _causes_ of errors of
function. The Erasistrateans practically Empiricists in
this respect. On an appreciation of the meaning of a
_dyscrasia_ follows naturally the Hippocratic principle
of treating opposites by opposites (_e.g._ cooling the
over-heated stomach, warming it when chilled, etc.).
Useless in treatment to know merely the function of each
organ; we must know the _bodily condition_ which upsets
this function. Blood is warm and moist. Yellow bile is
warm and (virtually, though not apparently) dry. Phlegm
is cold and moist. The fourth possible combination (cold
and dry) is represented by _black bile_. For the
clearing out of this humour from the blood, Nature has
provided the spleen—an organ which, according to
Erasistratus, fulfils no purpose. Proof of the
importance of the spleen is the jaundice, toxaemia,
etc., occurring when it is diseased. Erasistratus’s
failure to mention the views of leading authorities on
this organ shows the hopelessness of his position. The
Hippocratic view has now been demonstrated deductively
and inductively. The classical view as to the generation
of the humours. Normal and pathological forms of yellow
and black bile. Part played by the _innate heat_ in
their production. Other kinds of bile are merely
transition-stages between these extreme types. Abnormal
forms removed by liver and spleen respectively. Phlegm,
however, does not need a special excretory organ, as it
can undergo entire metabolism in the body.
Need for studying the works of the Ancients carefully,
in order to reach a proper understanding of this
subject.
BOOK III
Chapter I
A recapitulation of certain points previously
demonstrated. Every part of the animal has an attractive
and an alterative (assimilative) faculty; it attracts
the nutrient juice which is proper to it. Assimilation
is preceded by adhesion (_prosphysis_) and that again,
by application (_prosthesis_). Application the goal of
attraction. It would not, however, be followed by
adhesion and assimilation if each part did not also
possess a faculty for _retaining in position_ the
nutriment which has been applied. _A priori_ necessity
for this _retentive_ faculty.
Chapter II
The same faculty to be proved _a posteriori_. Its
corresponding _function_ (_i.e._ the activation of this
faculty or potentiality) well seen in the large hollow
organs, notably the uterus and stomach.
Chapter III
Exercise of the retentive faculty particularly well seen
in the uterus. Its object is to allow the embryo to
attain full development; this being completed, a new
faculty—the expulsive—hitherto quiescent, comes into
play. Characteristic signs and symptoms of pregnancy.
Tight grip of uterus on growing embryo, and accurate
closure of os uteri during operation of the retentive
faculty. Dilatation of os and expulsive activities of
uterus at full term, or when foetus dies. Prolapse from
undue exercise of this faculty. _Rôle_ of the midwife.
Accessory muscles in parturition.
Chapter IV
Same two faculties seen in stomach. _Gurglings_ or
_borborygmi_ show that this organ is weak and is not
gripping its contents tightly enough. Undue delay of
food in a weak stomach proved not to be due to
narrowness of pylorus: length of stay depends on whether
_digestion_ (another instance of the characteristically
vital process of _alteration_) has taken place or not.
Erasistratus wrong in attributing digestion merely to
the mechanical action of the stomach walls. When
digestion completed, then pylorus opens and allows
contents to pass downwards, just as os uteri when
development of embyro completed.
Chapter V
If attraction and elimination always proceeded _pari
passu_, the content of these hollow organs (including
gall-bladder and urinary bladder) would never vary in
amount. A _retentive_ faculty, therefore, also logically
needed. Its existence demonstrated. Expulsion determined
by qualitative and quantitative changes of contents.
“Diarrhoea” of stomach. Vomiting.
Chapter VI
Every organic part has an _appetite_ and _aversion_ for
the qualities which are appropriate and foreign to it
respectively. Attraction necessarily leads to a certain
_benefit_ received. This again necessitates _retention_.
Chapter VII
Interaction between two bodies; the stronger masters the
weaker; a deleterious drug masters the forces of the
body, whereas food is mastered by them; this mastery is
an _alteration_, and the amount of alteration varies
with the different organs; thus a partial alteration is
effected in mouth by saliva, but much greater in
stomach, where not only gastric juice, but also bile,
pneuma, innate heat (_i.e._ oxidation?), and other
powerful factors are brought to bear on it; need of
considerable alteration in stomach as a
transition-stage between food and blood; appearance of
faeces in intestine another proof of great alteration
effected in stomach. Asclepiades’s denial of real
qualitative change in stomach rebutted. Erasistratus’s
denial that digestion in any way resembles a _boiling_
process comes from his taking words too literally.
Chapter VIII
Erasistratus denies that the stomach exerts any pull in
the act of swallowing. That he is wrong, however, is
proved by the anatomical structure of the stomach—its
inner coat with longitudinal fibres obviously acts as a
_vis a fronte_ (attraction), whilst its outer coat
exercises through the contraction of its circular fibres
a _vis a tergo_ (propulsion); the latter also comes into
play in vomiting. The stomach uses the oesophagus as a
kind of hand, to draw in its food with. The functions of
the two coats proved also by vivisection. Swallowing
cannot be attributed merely to the force of gravity.
Chapter IX
These four faculties which subserve nutrition are thus
apparent in many different parts of the body.
Chapter X
Need for elaborating the statements of the ancient
physicians. Superiority of Ancients to Moderns. This
state of affairs can only be rectified by a really
efficient education of youth. The chief requisites of
such an education.
Chapter XI
For the sake of the few who realty wish truth, the
argument will be continued. A third kind of fibre—the
_oblique_—subserves _retention_; the way in which this
fibre is disposed in different coats.
Chapter XII
The factor which brings the expulsive faculty into
action is essentially a condition of the organ or its
contents which is the reverse of that which determined
attraction. Analogy between abortion and normal
parturition. Whatever produces _discomfort_ must be
expelled. That discomfort also determines expulsion of
contents from gall-bladder is not so evident as in the
case of stomach, uterus, urinary bladder, etc., but can
be logically demonstrated.
Chapter XIII
Expulsion takes place through the same channel as
attraction (_e.g._, in stomach, gall-bladder, uterus).
Similarly the delivery (_anadosis_) of nutriment to the
liver from the food-canal _viâ_ the mesenteric veins may
have its direction reversed. Continuous give-and-take
between different parts of the body; superior strength
of certain parts is natural, of others acquired. When
liver contains abundant food and stomach depleted,
latter may draw on former; this occurs when animal can
get nothing to eat, and so prevents starvation.
Similarly, when one part becomes over-distended, it
tends to deposit its excess in some weaker part near it;
this passes it on to some still weaker part, which
cannot get rid of it; hence _deposits_ of various kinds.
Further instances of reversal of the normal direction of
anadosis from the food canal through the veins. Such
reversal of functions would in any case be expected _a
priori_. In the vomiting of intestinal obstruction,
matter may be carried backwards all the way from the
intestine to the mouth; not surprising, therefore, that,
under certain circumstances, food-material might be
driven right back from the skin-surface to the
alimentary canal (_e.g._ in excessive chilling of
surface); not much needed to determine this reversal of
direction. Action of purgative drugs upon terminals of
veins; one part draws from another until whole body
participates; similarly in intestinal obstruction, each
part passes on the irritating substance to its weaker
neighbour. Reversal of direction of flow occurs not
merely on occasion but also constantly (as in arteries,
lungs, heart, etc.). The various stages of normal
nutrition described. Why the stomach sometimes draws
back the nutriment it had passed on to portal veins and
liver. A similar ebb and flow in relation to the spleen.
Comparison of the parts of the body to a lot of animals
at a feast. The valves of the heart are a provision of
Nature to prevent this otherwise inevitable
regurgitation, though even they are not quite efficient.
Chapter XIV
The superficial arteries, when they dilate, draw in air
from the atmosphere, and the deeper ones a fine,
vaporous blood from the veins and heart. Lighter matter
such as air will always be drawn in preference to
heavier; this is why the arteries in the food-canal draw
in practically none of the nutrient matter contained in
it.
Chapter XV
The two kinds of attraction—the mechanical attraction
of dilating bellows and the “physical” (vital)
attraction by living tissue of nutrient matter which is
specifically allied or appropriate to it. The former
kind—that resulting from _horror vacui_—acts primarily
on light matter, whereas vital attraction has no
essential concern with such mechanical factors. A hollow
organ exercises, by virtue of its cavity, the former
kind of attraction, and by virtue of the living tissue
of its walls, the second kind. Application of this to
question of contents of arteries; _anastomoses of
arteries and veins_. _Foramina in interventricular
septum of heart_, allowing some blood to pass from right
to left ventricle. Large size of aorta probably due to
fact that it not merely carries the pneuma received from
the lungs, but also some of the blood which percolates
through septum from right ventricle. Thus arteries carry
not merely pneuma, but also some light vaporous blood,
which certain parts need more than the ordinary thick
blood of the veins. The organic parts must have their
blood-supply sufficiently near to allow them to absorb
it; comparison with an irrigation system in a garden.
Details of the process of nutrition in the ultimate
specific tissues; some are nourished from the blood
directly; in others a series of intermediate stages must
precede complete assimilation; for example, marrow is an
intermediate stage between blood and bone.
From the generalisations arrived at in the present work
we can deduce the explanation of all kinds of particular
phenomena; an instance is given, showing the
co-operation of various factors previously discussed.
GALEN
ON THE NATURAL FACULTIES[5]
BOOK I
I
Since feeling and voluntary motion are peculiar to animals, whilst
growth and nutrition are common to plants as well, we may look on the
former as effects[6] of the _soul_[7] and the latter as effects of the
_nature_.[8] And if there be anyone who allows a share in soul to
plants as well, and separates the two kinds of soul, naming the kind
in question _vegetative_, and the other _sensory_, this person is not
saying anything else, although his language is somewhat unusual. We,
however, for our part, are convinced that the chief merit of language
is clearness, and we know that nothing detracts so much from this as
do unfamiliar terms; accordingly we employ those terms which the bulk
of people are accustomed to use, and we say that animals are governed
at once by their soul and by their nature, and plants by their nature
alone, and that growth and nutrition are the effects of nature, not of
soul.
ΓΑΛΗΝΟΥ
ΠΕΡΙ ΦΥΣΙΚΩΝ ΔΥΝΑΜΕΩΝ
Α
I
Ἐπειδὴ τὸ μὲν αἰσθάνεσθαί τε καὶ κινεῖσθαι κατὰ 1
προαίρεσιν ἴδια τῶν ζῴων ἐστί, τὸ δ' αὐξάνεσθαί τε
καὶ τρέφεσθαι κοινὰ καὶ τοῖς φυτοῖς, εἴη ἂν τὰ μὲν
πρότερα τῆς ψυχῆς, τὰ δὲ δεύτερα τῆς φύσεως ἔργα. εἰ
δέ τις καὶ τοῖς φυτοῖς ψυχῆς μεταδίδωσι καὶ
διαιρούμενος αὐτὰς ὀνομάζει φυτικὴν μὲν ταύτην,
αἰσθητικὴν δὲ τὴν ἑτέραν, λέγει μὲν οὐδ' οὗτος ἄλλα,
τῇ λέξει δ' οὐ πάνυ τῇ συνήθει κέχρηται. ἀλλ' ἡμεῖς
γε μεγίστην λέξεως ἀρετὴν σαφήνειαν εἶναι
πεπεισμένοι καὶ ταύτην εἰδότες || ὑπ' οὐδενὸς οὕτως 2
ὡς ὑπὸ τῶν ἀσυνήθων ὀνομάτων διαφθειρομένην, ὡς τοῖς
πολλοῖς ἔθος, οὕτως ὀνομάζοντες ὑπὸ μὲν ψυχῆς θ' ἅμα
καὶ φύσεως τὰ ζῷα διοικεῖσθαί φαμεν, ὑπὸ δὲ φύσεως
μόνης τὰ φυτὰ καὶ τό γ' αὐξάνεσθαί τε καὶ τρέφεσθαι
φύσεως ἔργα φαμέν, οὐ ψυχῆς.
II
Thus we shall enquire, in the course of this treatise, from what
_faculties_ these effects themselves, as well as any other effects of
nature which there may be, take their origin.
First, however, we must distinguish and explain clearly the various
terms which we are going to use in this treatise, and to what things
we apply them; and this will prove to be not merely an explanation of
terms but at the same time a demonstration of the effects of nature.
When, therefore, such and such a body undergoes no change from its
existing state, we say that it is _at rest_; but, if it departs from
this in any respect we then say that in this respect it _undergoes
motion_.[9] Accordingly, when it departs in various ways from its
pre-existing state, it will be said to undergo various kinds of
motion. Thus, if that which is white becomes black, or what is black
becomes white, it undergoes motion in respect to _colour_; or if what
was previously sweet now becomes bitter, or, conversely, from being
bitter now becomes sweet, it will be said to undergo motion in respect
to _flavour_; to both of these instances, as well as to those
previously mentioned, we shall apply the term _qualitative motion_.
And further, it is not only things which are altered in regard to
colour and flavour which, we say, undergo motion; when a warm thing
becomes cold, and a cold warm, here, too we speak of its undergoing
motion; similarly also when anything moist becomes dry, or dry
moist. Now, the common term which we apply to all these cases is
_alteration_.
This is one kind of motion. But there is another kind which occurs in
bodies which change their position, or as we say, pass from one place
to another; the name of this is _transference_.[10]
These two kinds of motion, then, are simple and primary, while
compounded from them we have _growth_ and _decay_,[11] as when a small
thing becomes bigger, or a big thing smaller, each retaining at the
same time its particular form. And two other kinds of motion are
_genesis_ and _destruction_,[12] genesis being a coming into
existence,[13] and destruction being the opposite.
Now, common to all kinds of motion is _change from the pre-existing
state_, while common to all conditions of rest is _retention of the
pre-existing state_. The Sophists, however, while allowing that bread
in turning into blood becomes changed as regards sight, taste, and
touch, will not agree that this change occurs in reality. Thus some of
them hold that all such phenomena are tricks and illusions of our
senses; the senses, they say, are affected now in one way, now in
another, whereas the underlying substance does not admit of any of
these changes to which the names are given. Others (such as
Anaxagoras)[14] will have it that the qualities do exist in it, but
that they are unchangeable and immutable from eternity to eternity,
and that these apparent alterations are brought about by _separation_
and _combination_.
Now, if I were to go out of my way to confute these people, my
subsidiary task would be greater than my main one. Thus, if they do
not know all that has been written, “On Complete Alteration of
Substance”[15] by Aristotle, and after him by Chrysippus,[16] I must
beg of them to make themselves familiar with these men’s writings. If,
however, they know these, and yet willingly prefer the worse views to
the better, they will doubtless consider my arguments foolish also. I
have shown elsewhere that these opinions were shared by Hippocrates,
who lived much earlier than Aristotle. In fact, of all those known to
us who have been both physicians and philosophers Hippocrates was the
first who took in hand to demonstrate that there are, in all, four
mutually interacting _qualities_, and that to the operation of these
is due the genesis and destruction of all things that come into and
pass out of being. Nay, more; Hippocrates was also the first to
recognise that all these qualities undergo an intimate mingling with
one another; and at least the beginnings of the proofs to which
Aristotle later set his hand are to be found first in the writings of
Hippocrates.
As to whether we are to suppose that the _substances_ as well as their
_qualities_ undergo this intimate mingling, as Zeno of Citium
afterwards declared, I do not think it necessary to go further into
this question in the present treatise;[17] for immediate purposes we
only need to recognize the _complete alteration of substance_. In
this way, nobody will suppose that bread represents a kind of
meeting-place[18] for bone, flesh, nerve, and all the other parts, and
that each of these subsequently becomes separated in the body and goes
to join its own kind;[19] before any separation takes place, the whole
of the bread obviously becomes blood; (at any rate, if a man takes no
other food for a prolonged period, he will have blood enclosed in his
veins all the same).[20] And clearly this disproves the view of those
who consider the elements[21] unchangeable, as also, for that matter,
does the oil which is entirely used up in the flame of the lamp, or
the faggots which, in a somewhat longer time, turn into fire.
I said, however, that I was not going to enter into an argument with
these people, and it was only because the example was drawn from the
subject-matter of medicine, and because I need it for the present
treatise, that I have mentioned it. We shall then, as I said, renounce
our controversy with them, since those who wish may get a good grasp
of the views of the ancients from our own personal investigations into
these matters.
The discussion which follows we shall devote entirely, as we
originally proposed, to an enquiry into the number and character of
the _faculties_ of Nature, and what is the effect which each naturally
produces. Now, of course, I mean by an effect[22] that which has
already come into existence and has been completed by the
_activity_[23] of these faculties—for example, blood, flesh, or
nerve. And _activity_ is the name I give to the active change or
_motion_, and the _cause_ of this I call a _faculty_. Thus, when food
turns into blood, the motion of the food is passive, and that of the
vein active. Similarly, when the limbs have their position altered, it
is the muscle which produces, and the bones which undergo the motion.
In these cases I call the motion of the vein and of the muscle an
_activity_, and that of the food and the bones a _symptom_ or
_affection_,[24] since the first group undergoes _alteration_ and the
second group is merely _transported_. One might, therefore, also speak
of the _activity_ as an _effect_ of Nature[25]—for example,
digestion, absorption,[26] blood-production; one could not, however,
in every case call the effect an activity; thus flesh is an effect of
Nature, but it is, of course, not an activity. It is, therefore, clear
that one of these terms is used in two senses, but not the other.
II
Καὶ ζητήσομεν κατὰ τόνδε τὸν λόγον, ὑπὸ τίνων
γίγνεται δυνάμεων αὐτὰ δὴ ταῦτα καὶ εἰ δή τι ἄλλο
φύσεως ἔργον ἐστίν.
Ἀλλὰ πρότερόν γε διελέσθαι τε χρὴ καὶ μηνῦσαι σαφῶς
ἕκαστον τῶν ὀνομάτων, οἷς χρησόμεθα κατὰ τόνδε τὸν
λόγον, καὶ ἐφ' ὅ τι φέρομεν πρᾶγμα. γενήσεται δὲ
τοῦτ' ἐυθὺς ἔργων φυσικῶν διδασκαλία σὺν ταῖς τῶν
ὸνομάτων ἐξηγήσεσιν.
Ὅταν οὖν τι σῶμα κατὰ μηδὲν ἐξαλλάττηται τῶν
προϋπαρχόντων, ἡσυχάζειν αὐτό φαμεν· εἰ δ' ἐξίσταιτό
πῃ, κατ' ἐκεῖνο κινεῖσθαι. καὶ τοίνυν ἐπεὶ πολυειδῶς
ἐξίσταται, πολυειδῶς καὶ κινηθήσεται. καὶ γὰρ εἰ
λευκὸν ὑπάρχον μελαίνοιτο καὶ εἰ μέλαν λευκαίνοιτο,
κινεῖται κατὰ χρόαν, καὶ εἰ γλυκὺ τέως ὑπάρχον αὖθις
|| αὐστηρὸν ἢ ἔμπαλιν ἐξ αὐστηροῦ γλυκὺ γένοιτο, καὶ 3
τοῦτ' ἂν κινεῖσθαι λέγοιτο κατὰ τὸν χυμόν. ἄμφω δε
ταῦτά τε καὶ τὰ προειρημένα κατὰ τὴν ποιότητα
κινεῖσθαι λεχθήσεται καὶ οὐ μόνον γε τὰ κατὰ τὴν
χρόαν ἢ τὸν χυμὸν ἐξαλλαττόμενα κινεῖσθαί φαμεν,
ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ θερμότερον ἐκ ψυχροτέρου γενόμενον ἢ
ψυχρότερον ἐκ θερμοτέρου κινεῖσθαι καὶ τοῦτο
λέγομεν, ὥσπερ γε καὶ εἴ τι ξηρὸν ἐξ ὑγροῦ ἢ ὑγρὸν
ἐκ ξηροῦ γίγνοιτο. κοινὸν δὲ κατὰ τούτων ἁπάντων
ὄνομα φέρομεν τὴν ἀλλοίωσιν.
Ἕν τι τοῦτο γένος κινήσεως. ἕτερον δὲ γένος ἐπὶ τοῖς
τὰς χώρας ἀμείβουσι σώμασι καὶ τόπον ἐκ τόπου
μεταλλάττειν λεγομένοις, ὄνομα δὲ καὶ τούτῳ φορά.
Αὗται μὲν οὖν αἱ δύο κινήσεις ἁπλαῖ καὶ πρῶται,
σύνθετοι δ' ἐξ αὐτῶν αὔξησίς τε καὶ φθίσις, ὅταν ἐξ
ἐλάττονός τι μεῖζον ἢ ἐκ μείζονος ἔλαττον γένηται
φυλάττον τὸ οἰκεῖον εἶδος. ἕτεραι δὲ δύο κινήσεις
γένεσις καὶ φθορά, γένεσις μὲν ἡ εἰς οὐσίαν ἀγωγή,
φθορὰ δ' ἡ ἐναντία.
Πάσαις δὲ ταῖς κινήσεσι κοινὸν ἐξάλλαξις τοῦ || 4
προϋπάρχοντος, ὥσπερ οὖν καὶ ταῖς ἡσυχίαις ἡ φυλακὴ
τῶν προϋπαρχόντων. ἀλλ' ὅτι μὲν ἐξαλλάττεται καὶ
πρὸς τὴν ὄψιν καὶ πρὸς τὴν γεῦσιν καὶ πρὸς τὴν ἁφὴν
αἷμα γιγνόμενα τὰ σιτία, συγχωροῦσιν· ὅτι δὲ καὶ
κατ' ἀλήθειαν, οὐκέτι τοῦθ' ὁμολογοῦσιν οἱ σοφισταί.
οἱ μὲν γάρ τινες αὐτῶν ἅπαντα τὰ τοιαῦτα τῶν
ἡμετέρων αἰσθήσεων ἀπάτας τινὰς καὶ παραγωγὰς
νομίζουσιν ἄλλοτ' ἄλλως πασχουσῶν, τῆς ὑποκειμένης
οὐσίας μηδὲν τούτων, οἷς ἐπονομάζεται, δεχομένης· οἱ
δέ τινες εἶναι μὲν ἐν αὐτῇ βούλονται τὰς ποιότητας,
ἀμεταβλήτους δὲ καὶ ἀτρέπτους ἐξ αἰῶνος εἰς αἰῶνα
καὶ τὰς φαινομένας ταύτας ἀλλοιώσεις τῇ διακρίσει τε
καὶ συγκρίσει γίγνεσθαί φασιν ὡς Ἀναξαγόρας.
Εἰ δὴ τούτους ἐκτραπόμενος ἐξελέγχοιμι, μεῖζον ἄν
μοι τὸ πάρεργον τοῦ ἔργου γένοιτο. εἰ μὲν γὰρ οὐκ
ἴσασιν, ὅσα περὶ τῆς καθ' ὅλην τὴν οὐσίαν ἀλλοιώσεως
Ἀριστοτέλει τε καὶ μετ' αὐτὸν Χρυσίππῳ γέγραπται,
παρακαλέσαι χρὴ τοῖς ἐκείνων αὐτοὺς ὁμιλῆσαι
γράμμασιν· εἰ δὲ γιγνώσκοντες ἔπειθ' ἑκόντες τὰ
χείρω πρὸ τῶν βελτιόνων || αἱροῦνται, μάταια δήπου 5
καὶ τὰ ἡμέτερα νομιοῦσιν. ὅτι δὲ καὶ Ἱπποκράτης
οὕτως ἐγίγνωσκεν Ἀριστοτέλους ἔτι πρότερος ὤν, ἐν
ἑτέροις ἡμῖν ἀποδέδεικται. πρῶτος γὰρ οὗτος ἁπάντων
ὧν ἴσμεν ἰατρῶν τε καὶ φιλοσόφων ἀποδεικνύειν
ἐπεχείρησε τέτταρας εἶναι τὰς πάσας δραστικὰς εἰς
ἀλλήλας ποιότητας, ὑφ' ὧν γίγνεταί τε καὶ φθείρεται
πάνθ', ὅσα γένεσίν τε καὶ φθορὰν ἐπιδέχεται. καὶ
μέντοι καὶ τὸ κεράννυσθαι δι' ἀλλήλων αὐτὰς ὅλας δι'
ὅλων Ἱπποκράτης ἁπάντων πρῶτος ἔγνω· καὶ τὰς ἀρχάς
γε τῶν ἀποδείξεων, ὧν ὕστερον Ἀριστοτέλης
μετεχειρίσατο, παρ' ἐκείνῳ πρώτῳ γεγραμμένας ἔστιν
εὑρεῖν.
Εἰ δ' ὥσπερ τὰς ποιότητας οὕτω καὶ τὰς οὐσίας δι'
ὅλων κεράννυσθαι χρὴ νομίζειν, ὡς ὕστερον ἀπεφήνατο
Ζήνων ὁ Κιττιεύς, οὐχ ἡγοῦμαι δεῖν ἔτι περὶ τούτου
κατὰ τόνδε τὸν λόγον ἐπεξιέναι. μόνην γὰρ εἰς τὰ
παρόντα δέομαι γιγνώσκεσθαι τὴν δι' ὅλης τῆς οὐσίας
ἀλλοίωσιν, ἵνα μή τις ὀστοῦ καὶ σαρκὸς καὶ νεύρου
καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἑκάστου μορίων οἱονεὶ μισγάγκειάν τινα
τῷ ἄρτῳ νομίσῃ περιέχεσθαι κἄπειτ' ἐν || τῷ σώματι 6
διακρινόμενον ὡς τὸ ὁμόφυλον ἕκαστον ἰέναι. καίτοι
πρό γε τῆς διακρίσεως αἷμα φαίνεται γιγνόμενος ὁ πᾶς
ἄρτος. εἰ γοῦν παμπόλλῳ τις χρόνῳ μηδὲν ἄλλ' εἴη
σιτίον προσφερόμενος, οὐδὲν ἧττον ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν
αἷμα περιεχόμενον ἕξει. καὶ φανερῶς τοῦτο τὴν τῶν
ἀμετάβλητα τὰ στοιχεῖα τιθεμένων ἐξελέγχει δόξαν,
ὥσπερ οἶμαι καὶ τοὔλαιον εἰς τὴν τοῦ λύχνου φλόγα
καταναλισκόμενον ἅπαν καὶ τὰ ξύλα πῦρ μικρὸν ὕστερον
γιγνόμενα.
Καίτοι τό γ' ἀντιλέγειν αὐτοῖς ἠρνησάμην, ἀλλ' ἐπεὶ
τῆς ἰατρικῆς ὕλης ἦν τὸ παράδειγμα καὶ χρῄζω πρὸς
τὸν παρόντα λόγον αὐτοῦ, διὰ τοῦτ' ἐμνημόνευσα.
καταλιπόντες οὖν, ὡς ἔφην, τὴν πρὸς τούτους
ἀντιλογίαν, <ἐνὸν> τοῖς βουλομένοις τὰ τῶν παλαιῶν
ἐκμανθάνειν κἀξ ὧν ἡμεῖς ἰδίᾳ περὶ αὐτῶν
ἐπεσκέμμεθα.
Τὸν ἐφεξῆς λόγον ἅπαντα ποιησόμεθα ζητοῦντες ὑπὲρ ὧν
ἐξ ἀρχῆς προὐθέμεθα, πόσαι τε καὶ τίνες εἰσὶν αἱ τῆς
φύσεως δυνάμεις καὶ τί ποιεῖν ἔργον ἑκάστη πέφυκεν.
ἔργον δὲ δηλονότι καλῶ τὸ γεγονὸς ἤδη καὶ
συμπεπλη||ρωμένον ὑπὸ τῆς ἐνεργείας αὐτῶν, οἷον τὸ 7
αἷμα, τὴν σάρκα, τὸ νεῦρον· ἐνέργειαν δὲ τὴν
δραστικὴν ὀνομάζω κίνησιν καὶ τὴν ταύτης αἰτίαν
δύναμιν. ἐπεὶ γὰρ ἐν τῷ τὸ σιτίον αἷμα γίγνεσθαι
παθητικὴ μὲν ἡ τοῦ σιτίου, δραστικὴ δ' ἡ τῆς φλεβὸς
γίγνεται κίνησις, ὡσαύτως δὲ κἀν τῷ μεταφέρειν τὰ
κῶλα κινεῖ μὲν ὁ μῦς, κινεῖται δὲ τὰ ὀστᾶ, τὴν μὲν
τῆς φλεβὸς καὶ τῶν μυῶν κίνησιν ἐνέργειαν εἶναί
φημι, τὴν δὲ τῶν σιτίων τε καὶ τῶν ὀστῶν σύμπτωμά τε
καὶ πάθημα· τὰ μὲν γὰρ ἀλλοιοῦται, τὰ δὲ φέρεται.
τὴν μὲν οὖν ἐνέργειαν ἐγχωρεῖ καλεῖν καὶ ἔργον τῆς
φύσεως, οἷον τὴν πέψιν, τὴν ἀνάδοσιν, τὴν αἱμάτωσιν,
οὐ μὴν τὸ γ' ἔργον ἐξ ἅπαντος ἐνέργειαν· ἡ γάρ τοι
σὰρξ ἔργον μέν ἐστι τῆς φύσεως, οὐ μὴν ἐνέργειά γε.
δῆλον οὖν, ὡς θάτερον μὲν τῶν ὀνομάτων διχῶς
λέγεται, θάτερον δ' οὔ.
III
It appears to me, then, that the vein, as well as each of the other
parts, functions in such and such a way according to the manner in
which _the four qualities_[27] are mixed. There are, however, a
considerable number of not undistinguished men—philosophers and
physicians—who refer action to the Warm and the Cold, and who
subordinate to these, as passive, the Dry and the Moist; Aristotle, in
fact, was the first who attempted to bring back the causes of the
various special activities to these principles, and he was followed
later by the Stoic school. These latter, of course, could logically
make active principles of the Warm and Cold, since they refer the
change of the elements themselves into one another to certain
_diffusions_ and _condensations_.[28] This does not hold of Aristotle,
however; seeing that he employed the four qualities to explain the
genesis of the elements, he ought properly to have also referred the
causes of all the special activities to these. How is it that he uses
the four qualities in his book “On Genesis and Destruction,” whilst in
his “Meteorology,” his “Problems,” and many other works he uses the
two only? Of course, if anyone were to maintain that in the case of
animals and plants the Warm and Cold are _more_ active, the Dry and
Moist _less_ so, he might perhaps have even Hippocrates on his side;
but if he were to say that this happens in all cases, he would, I
imagine, lack support, not merely from Hippocrates, but even from
Aristotle himself—if, at least, Aristotle chose to remember what he
himself taught us in his work “On Genesis and Destruction,” not as a
matter of simple statement, but with an accompanying demonstration. I
have, however, also investigated these questions, in so far as they
are of value to a physician, in my work “On Temperaments.”
III
Ἐμοὶ μὲν οὖν καὶ ἡ φλὲψ καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἁπάντων
ἕκαστον διὰ τὴν ἐκ τῶν τεττάρων ποιὰν κρᾶσιν ὡδί πως
ἐνεργεῖν δοκεῖ. εἰσὶ δέ γε μὴν οὐκ ὀλίγοι τινὲς
ἄνδρες || οὐδ' ἄδοξοι, φιλόσοφοί τε καὶ ἰατροί, τῷ 8
μὲν θερμῷ καὶ τῷ ψυχρῷ τὸ δρᾶν ἀναφέροντες,
ὑποβάλλοντες δ' αὐτοῖς παθητικὰ τὸ ξηρόν τε καὶ τὸ
ὑγρόν. καὶ πρῶτός γ' Ἀριστοτέλης τὰς τῶν κατὰ μέρος
ἁπάντων αἰτίας εἰς ταύτας ἀνάγειν πειρᾶται τὰς
ἀρχάς, ἠκολούθησε δ' ὕστερον αὐτῷ καὶ ὁ ἀπὸ τῆς
στοᾶς χορός. καίτοι τούτοις μὲν, ὡς ἂν καὶ αὐτῶν τῶν
στοιχείων τὴν εἰς ἄλληλα μεταβολὴν χύσεσί τέ τισι
καὶ πιλήσεσιν ἀναφέρουσιν, εὔλογον ἦν ἀρχὰς
δραστικὰς ποιήσασθαι τὸ θερμὸν καὶ τὸ ψυχρόν,
Ἀριστοτέλει δ' οὐχ οὕτως, ἀλλὰ ταῖς τέτταρσι
ποιότησιν εἰς τὴν τῶν στοιχείων γένεσιν χρωμένῳ
βέλτιον ἦν καὶ τὰς τῶν κατὰ μέρος αἰτίας ἁπάσας εἰς
ταύτας ἀνάγειν. τί δήποτ' οὖν ἐν μὲν τοῖς περὶ
γενέσεως καὶ φθορᾶς ταῖς τέτταρσι χρῆται, ἐν δὲ τοῖς
μετεωρολογικοῖς καὶ τοῖς προβλήμασι καὶ ἄλλοθι
πολλαχόθι ταῖς δύο μόναις; εἰ μὲν γὰρ ὡς ἐν τοῖς
ζῴοις τε καὶ τοῖς φυτοῖς μᾶλλον μὲν δρᾷ τὸ θερμὸν
καὶ τὸ ψυχρόν, ἧττον δὲ τὸ ξηρὸν καὶ τὸ ὑγρὸν
ἀποφαίνοιτό τις, ἴσως ἂν ἔχοι καὶ τὸν Ἱπποκράτην
σύμψηφον· εἰ δ' ὡσαύτως ἐν || ἅπασιν, οὐκέτ' οἶμαι 9
συγχωρήσειν τοῦτο μὴ ὅτι τὸν Ἱπποκράτην ἀλλὰ μηδ'
αὐτὸν τὸν Ἀριστοτέλην μεμνῆσθαί γε βουλόμενον ὧν ἐν
τοῖς περὶ γενέσεως καὶ φθορᾶς οὐχ ἁπλῶς ἀλλὰ μετ'
ἀποδείξεως αὐτὸς ἡμᾶς ἐδίδαξεν. ἀλλὰ περὶ μὲν τούτων
κἀν τοῖς περὶ κράσεων, εἰς ὅσον ἰατρῷ χρήσιμον,
ἐπεσκεψάμεθα.
IV
The so-called _blood-making_[29] faculty in the veins, then, as well
as all the other faculties, fall within the category of relative
concepts; primarily because the faculty is the cause of the activity,
but also, accidentally, because it is the cause of the effect. But if
the cause is relative to something—for it is the cause of what
results from it, and of nothing else—it is obvious that the faculty
also falls into the category of the relative; and so long as we are
ignorant of the true essence of the cause which is operating, we call
it a _faculty_. Thus we say that there exists in the veins a
blood-making faculty, as also a digestive[30] faculty in the stomach,
a pulsatile[31] faculty in the heart, and in each of the other parts a
special faculty corresponding to the function or activity of that
part. If, therefore, we are to investigate methodically the number and
kinds of faculties, we must begin with the effects; for each of these
effects comes from a certain activity, and each of these again is
preceded by a cause.
IV
Ἡ δ' οὖν δύναμις ἡ ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν ἡ αἱματοποιητικὴ
προσαγορευομένη καὶ πᾶσα δ' ἄλλη δύναμις ἐν τῷ πρός
τι νενόηται· πρώτως μὲν γὰρ τῆς ἐνεργείας αἰτία, ἤδη
δὲ καὶ τοῦ ἔργου κατὰ συμβεβηκός. ἀλλ' εἴπερ ἡ αἰτία
πρός τι, τοῦ γὰρ ὑπ' αὐτῆς γενομένου μόνου, τῶν δ'
ἄλλων οὐδενός, εὔδηλον, ὅτι καὶ ἡ δύναμις ἐν τῷ πρός
τι. καὶ μέχρι γ' ἂν ἀγνοῶμεν τὴν οὐσίαν τῆς
ἐνεργούσης αἰτίας, δύναμιν αὐτὴν ὀνομάζομεν, εἶναί
τινα λέγοντες ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν αἱματοποιητικήν,
ὡσαύτως δὲ κἀν τῇ κοιλίᾳ πεπτικὴν κἀν τῇ καρδίᾳ
σφυγμικὴν καὶ καθ' ἕκαστον τῶν ἄλλων ἰδίαν τινὰ τῆς
|| κατὰ τὸ μόριον ἐνεργείας. εἴπερ οὖν μεθόδῳ 10
μέλλοιμεν ἐξευρήσειν, ὁπόσαι τε καὶ ὁποῖαί τινες αἱ
δυνάμεις εἰσίν, ἀπὸ τῶν ἔργων αὐτῶν ἀρκτέον· ἕκαστον
γὰρ αὐτῶν ὑπό τινος ἐνεργείας γίγνεται καὶ τούτων
ἑκάστης προηγεῖταί τις αἰτία.
V
The effects of Nature, then, while the animal is still being formed in
the womb, are all the different _parts_ of its body; and after it has
been born, an effect in which all parts share is the progress of each
to its full size, and thereafter its maintenance of itself as long as
possible.
The activities corresponding to the three effects mentioned are
necessarily three—one to each—namely, Genesis, Growth, and
Nutrition. Genesis, however, is not a simple activity of Nature, but
is compounded of _alteration_ and of _shaping_.[32] That is to say, in
order that bone, nerve, veins, and all other [tissues] may come into
existence, the _underlying substance_ from which the animal springs
must be _altered_; and in order that the substance so altered may
acquire its appropriate shape and position, its cavities, outgrowths,
attachments, and so forth, it has to undergo a _shaping_ or
_formative_ process.[33] One would be justified in calling this
substance which undergoes alteration the _material_ of the animal,
just as wood is the material of a ship, and wax of an image.
_Growth_ is an increase and expansion in length, breadth, and
thickness of the solid parts of the animal (those which have been
subjected to the moulding or shaping process). _Nutrition_ is an
addition to these, without expansion.
V
Ἔργα τοίνυν τῆς φύσεως ἔτι μὲν κυουμένου τε καὶ
διαπλαττομένου τοῦ ζῴου τὰ σύμπαντ' ἐστὶ τοῦ σώματος
μόρια, γεννηθέντος δὲ κοινὸν ἐφ' ἅπασιν ἔργον ἡ εἰς
τὸ τέλειον ἑκάστῳ μέγεθος ἀγωγὴ καὶ μετὰ ταῦθ' ἡ
μέχρι τοῦ δυνατοῦ διαμονή.
Ἐνέργειαι δ' ἐπὶ τρισὶ τοῖς εἰρημένοις ἔργοις τρεῖς
ἐξ ἀνάγκης, ἐφ' ἑκάστῳ μία, γένεσίς τε καὶ αὔξησις
καὶ θρέψις. ἀλλ' ἡ μὲν γένεσις οὐχ ἁπλῆ τις ἐνέργεια
τῆς φύσεως, ἀλλ' ἐξ ἀλλοιώσεώς τε καὶ διαπλάσεώς
ἐστι σύνθετος. ἵνα μὲν γὰρ ὀστοῦν γένηται καὶ νεῦρον
καὶ φλὲψ καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἕκαστον, ἀλλοιοῦσθαι χρὴ τὴν
ὑποβεβλημένην οὐσίαν, ἐξ ἧς γίγνεται τὸ ζῷον· ἵνα δὲ
καὶ σχῆμα τὸ δέον καὶ θέσιν καὶ κοιλότητάς τινας καὶ
ἀποφύσεις καὶ συμφύσεις καὶ τἆλλα || τὰ τοιαῦτα 11
κτήσηται, διαπλάττεσθαι χρὴ τὴν ἀλλοιουμένην οὐσίαν,
ἣν δὴ καὶ ὕλην τοῦ ζῴου καλῶν, ὡς τῆς νεὼς τὰ ξύλα
καὶ τῆς εἰκόνος τὸν κηρόν, οὐκ ἂν ἁμάρτοις.
Ἡ δ' αὔξησις ἐπίδοσίς ἐστι καὶ διάστασις κατὰ μῆκος
καὶ πλάτος καὶ βάθος τῶν στερεῶν τοῦ ζῴου μορίων,
ὧνπερ καὶ ἡ διάπλασις ἦν, ἡ δὲ θρέψις πρόσθεσις τοῖς
αὐτοῖς ἄνευ διαστάσεως.
VI
Let us speak then, in the first place, of Genesis, which, as we have
said, results from _alteration_ together with _shaping_.
The seed having been cast into the womb or into the earth (for there
is no difference),[34] then, after a certain definite period, a great
number of parts become constituted in the substance which is being
generated; these differ as regards moisture, dryness, coldness and
warmth,[35] and in all the other qualities which naturally derive
therefrom.[36] These derivative qualities, you are acquainted with, if
you have given any sort of scientific consideration to the question of
genesis and destruction. For, first and foremost after the qualities
mentioned come the other so-called _tangible_ distinctions, and after
them those which appeal to taste, smell, and sight. Now, tangible
distinctions are hardness and softness, viscosity, friability,
lightness, heaviness, density, rarity, smoothness, roughness,
thickness and thinness; all of these have been duly mentioned by
Aristotle.[37] And of course you know those which appeal to taste,
smell, and sight. Therefore, if you wish to know which alterative
faculties are primary and elementary, they are moisture, dryness,
coldness, and warmth, and if you wish to know which ones arise from
the combination of these, they will be found to be in each animal of a
number corresponding to its _sensible elements_. The name _sensible
elements_ is given to all the _homogeneous_[38] parts of the body, and
these are to be detected not by any system, but by personal
observation of dissections.[39]
Now Nature constructs bone, cartilage, nerve, membrane, ligament,
vein, and so forth, at the first stage of the animal’s genesis,[40]
employing at this task a faculty which is, in general terms,
generative and alterative, and, in more detail, warming, chilling,
drying, or moistening; or such as spring from the blending of these,
for example, the bone-producing, nerve-producing, and
cartilage-producing faculties[41] (since for the sake of clearness
these names must be used as well).
Now the peculiar[42] flesh of the liver is of this kind as well, also
that of the spleen, that of the kidneys, that of the lungs, and that
of the heart; so also the proper substance of the brain, stomach,
gullet, intestines, and uterus is _a sensible element_, of similar
parts all through, simple, and uncompounded. That is to say, if you
remove from each of the organs mentioned its arteries, veins, and
nerves,[43] the substance remaining in each organ is, from the point
of view of the senses, simple and elementary. As regards those organs
consisting of two dissimilar _coats_,[44] of which each is simple, of
these organs the coats are the elements—for example, the coats of the
stomach, oesophagus, intestines, and arteries; each of these two coats
has an alterative faculty peculiar to it, which has engendered it from
the menstrual blood of the mother. Thus the _special_ alterative
faculties in each animal are of the same number as the elementary
parts[45]; and further, the _activities_ must necessarily correspond
each to one of the special parts, just as each part has its special
_use_—for example, those ducts which extend from the kidneys into the
bladder, and which are called _ureters_; for these are not arteries,
since they do not pulsate nor do they consist of two coats; and they
are not veins, since they neither contain blood, nor do their coats
in any way resemble those of veins; from nerves they differ still more
than from the structures mentioned.
“What, then, are they?” someone asks—as though every part must
necessarily be either an artery, a vein, a nerve, or a complex of
these,[46] and as though the truth were not what I am now stating,
namely, that every one of the various organs has its own particular
substance. For in fact the two bladders—that which receives the
urine, and that which receives the yellow bile—not only differ from
all other organs, but also from one another. Further, the ducts which
spring out like kinds of conduits from the gall-bladder and which pass
into the liver have no resemblance either to arteries, veins or
nerves. But these parts have been treated at a greater length in my
work “On the Anatomy of Hippocrates,” as well as elsewhere.
As for the actual substance of the coats of the stomach, intestine,
and uterus, each of these has been rendered what it is by a special
alterative faculty of Nature; while the bringing of these
together,[47] the combination therewith of the structures which are
inserted into them, the outgrowth into the intestine,[48] the shape of
the inner cavities, and the like, have all been determined by a
faculty which we call the shaping or formative faculty[49]; this
faculty we also state to be _artistic_—nay, the best and highest
art—doing everything for some purpose, so that there is nothing
ineffective or superfluous, or capable of being better disposed. This,
however, I shall demonstrate in my work “On the Use of Parts.”
VI
Περὶ πρώτης οὖν τῆς γενέσεως εἴπωμεν, ἣν ἐξ
ἀλλοιώσεώς θ' ἅμα καὶ διαπλάσεως ἐλέγομεν γίγνεσθαι.
Καταβληθέντος δὴ τοῦ σπέρματος εἰς τὴν μήτραν ἢ εἰς
τὴν γῆν, οὐδὲν γὰρ διαφέρει, χρόνοις τισὶν
ὡρισμένοις πάμπολλα συνίσταται μόρια τῆς γεννωμένης
οὐσίας ὑγρότητι καὶ ξηρότητι καὶ ψυχρότητι καὶ
θερμότητι καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις ἅπασιν, ὅσα τούτοις
ἕπεται, διαφέροντα. τὰ δ' ἑπόμενα γιγνώσκεις, εἴπερ
ὅλως ἐφιλοσόφησάς τι περὶ γενέσεως καὶ φθορᾶς· αἱ
λοιπαὶ γὰρ τῶν ἁπτῶν ὀνομαζομένων διαφορῶν ταῖς
εἰρημέναις ἕπονται πρῶται καὶ μάλιστα, μετὰ δὲ
ταύ||τας αἱ γευσταί τε καὶ ὀσφρηταὶ καὶ ὁραταί. 12
σκληρότης μὲν οὖν καὶ μαλακότης καὶ γλισχρότης καὶ
κραυρότης καὶ κουφότης καὶ βαρύτης καὶ πυκνότης καὶ
ἀραιότης καὶ λειότης καὶ τραχύτης καὶ παχύτης καὶ
λεπτότης ἁπταὶ διαφοραὶ καὶ εἴρηται περὶ πασῶν
Ἀριστοτέλει καλῶς. οἶσθα δὲ δήπου καὶ τὰς γευστάς τε
καὶ ὀσφρητὰς καὶ ὁρατὰς διαφοράς. ὥστ', εἰ μὲν τὰς
πρώτας τε καὶ στοιχειώδεις ἀλλοιωτικὰς δυνάμεις
ζητοίης, ὑγρότης ἐστί καὶ ξηρότης καὶ ψυχρότης καὶ
θερμότης· εἰ δὲ τὰς ἐκ τῆς τούτων κράσεως γενομένας,
τοσαῦται καθ' ἕκαστον ἔσονται ζῷον, ὅσαπερ ἂν αὐτοῦ
τὰ αἰσθητὰ στοιχεῖα ὑπάρχῃ· καλεῖται δ' αἰσθητὰ
στοιχεῖα τὰ ὁμοιομερῆ πάντα τοῦ σώματος μόρια· καὶ
ταῦτ' οὐκ ἐκ μεθόδου τινὸς ἀλλ' αὐτόπτην γενόμενον
ἐκμαθεῖν χρὴ διὰ τῶν ἀνατομῶν.
Ὀστοῦν δὴ καὶ χόνδρον καὶ νεῦρον καὶ ὑμένα καὶ
σύνδεσμον καὶ φλέβα καὶ πάνθ' ὅσα τοιαῦτα κατὰ τὴν
πρώτην τοῦ ζῴου γένεσιν ἡ φύσις ἀπεργάζεται δυνάμει
χρωμένη καθόλου μὲν εἰπεῖν τῇ γεννητικῇ τε καὶ
ἀλλοιω||τικῇ, κατὰ μέρος δὲ θερμαντικῇ τε καὶ 13
ψυκτικῇ καὶ ξηραντικῇ καὶ ὑγραντικῇ καὶ ταῖς ἐκ τῆς
τούτων κράσεως γενομέναις, οἷον ὀστοποιητικῇ τε καὶ
νευροποιητικῇ καὶ χονδροποιητικῇ· σαφηνείας γὰρ
ἕνεκα καὶ τούτοις τοῖς ὀνόμασι χρηστέον.
Ἔστι γοῦν καὶ ἡ ἰδία σὰρξ τοῦ ἥπατος ἐκ τούτου τοῦ
γένους καὶ ἡ τοῦ σπληνὸς καὶ ἡ τῶν νεφρῶν καὶ ἡ τοῦ
πνεύμονος καὶ ἡ τῆς καρδίας οὕτω δὲ καὶ τοῦ
ἐγκεφάλου τὸ ἴδιον σῶμα καὶ τῆς γαστρὸς καὶ τοῦ
στομάχου καὶ τῶν ἐντέρων καὶ τῶν ὑστερῶν αἰσθητὸν
στοιχεῖόν ἐστιν ὁμοιομερές τε καὶ ἁπλοῦν καὶ
ἀσύνθετον· ἐὰν γὰρ ἐξέλῃς ἑκάστου τῶν εἰρημένων τὰς
ἀρτηρίας τε καὶ τὰς φλέβας καὶ τὰ νεῦρα, τὸ
ὑπόλοιπον σῶμα τὸ καθ' ἕκαστον ὄργανον ἁπλοῦν ἐστι
καὶ στοιχειῶδες ὡς πρὸς αἴσθησιν. ὅσα δὲ τῶν
τοιούτων ὀργάνων ἐκ δυοῖν σύγκειται χιτώνων οὐχ
ὁμοίων μὲν ἀλλήλοις, ἁπλοῦ δ' ἑκατέρου, τούτων οἱ
χιτῶνές εἰσι τὰ στοιχεῖα καθάπερ τῆς τε γαστρὸς καὶ
τοῦ στομάχου καὶ τῶν ἐντέρων καὶ τῶν ἀρτηριῶν, καὶ
καθ' ἑκάτερόν γε τῶν χιτώνων ἴδιος ἡ ἀλλοιωτικὴ
δύναμις ἡ ἐκ τοῦ παρὰ τῆς || μητρὸς ἐπιμηνίου 14
γεννήσασα τὸ μόριον, ὥστε τὰς κατὰ μέρος ἀλλοιωτικὰς
δυνάμεις τοσαύτας εἶναι καθ' ἕκαστον ζῷον, ὅσαπερ ἂν
ἔχῃ τὰ στοιχειώδη μόρια. καὶ μέν γε καὶ τὰς
ἐνεργείας ἰδίας ἑκάστῳ τῶν κατὰ μέρος ἀναγκαῖον
ὑπάρχειν ὥσπερ καὶ τὰς χρείας, οἷον καὶ τῶν ἀπὸ τῶν
νεφρῶν εἰς τὴν κύστιν διηκόντων πόρων, οἳ δὴ καὶ
οὐρητῆρες καλοῦνται. οὗτοι γὰρ οὔτ' ἀρτηρίαι εἰσίν,
ὅτι μήτε σφύζουσι μήτ' ἐκ δυοῖν χιτώνων
συνεστήκασιν, οὔτε φλέβες, ὅτι μήθ' αἵμα περιέχουσι
μήτ' ἔοικεν αὐτῶν ὁ χιτὼν κατά τι τῷ τῆς φλεβός·
ἀλλὰ καὶ νεύρων ἐπὶ πλέον ἀφεστήκασιν ἢ τῶν
εἰρημένων.
Τί ποτ' οὖν εἰσιν; ἐρωτᾷ τις, ὥσπερ ἀναγκαῖον ὂν
ἅπαν μόριον ἢ ἀρτηρίαν ἢ φλέβα ἢ νεῦρον ὑπάρχειν ἢ
ἐκ τούτων πεπλέχθαι καὶ μὴ τοῦτ' αὐτὸ τὸ νῦν
λεγόμενον, ὡς ἴδιος ἑκάστῳ τῶν κατὰ μέρος ὀργάνων
ἐστὶν ἡ οὐσία. καὶ γὰρ καὶ αἱ κύστεις ἑκάτεραι ἥ τε
τὸ οὖρον ὑποδεχομένη καὶ ἡ τὴν ξανθὴν χολὴν οὐ μόνον
τῶν ἄλλων ἁπάντων ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀλλήλων διαφέρουσι καὶ οἱ
εἰς τὸ ἧπαρ ἀποφυόμενοι || πόροι, καθάπερ στόμαχοί 15
τινες ἀπὸ τῆς χοληδόχου κύστεως, οὐδὲν οὔτ'
ἀρτηρίαις οὔτε φλεψὶν οὔτε νεύροις ἐοίκασιν. ἀλλὰ
περὶ μὲν τούτων ἐπὶ πλέον ἐν ἄλλοις τέ τισι κἀν τοῖς
περὶ τῆς Ἱπποκράτους ἀνατομῆς εἴρηται.
Αἱ δὲ κατὰ μέρος ἅπασαι δυνάμεις τῆς φύσεως αἱ
ἀλλοιωτικαὶ αὐτὴν μὲν τὴν οὐσίαν τῶν χιτώνων τῆς
κοιλίας καὶ τῶν ἐντέρων καὶ τῶν ὑστερῶν ἀπετέλεσαν,
οἵαπέρ ἐστι· τὴν δὲ σύνθεσιν αὐτῶν καὶ τὴν τῶν
ἐμφυομένων πλοκὴν καὶ τὴν εἰς τὸ ἔντερον ἔκφυσιν καὶ
τὴν τῆς ἔνδον κοιλότητος ἰδέαν καὶ τἆλλ' ὅσα τοιαῦτα
δύναμίς τις ἑτέρα διέπλασεν, ἣν διαπλαστικὴν
ὀνομάζομεν, ἣν δὴ καὶ τεχνικὴν εἶναι λέγομεν, μᾶλλον
δ' ἀρίστην καὶ ἄκραν τέχνην καὶ πάντα τινὸς ἕνεκα
ποιοῦσαν, ὡς μηδὲν ἀργὸν εἶναι μηδὲ περιττὸν μηδ'
ὅλως οὕτως ἔχον, ὡς δύνασθαι βέλτιον ἑτέρως ἔχειν.
ἀλλὰ τοῦτο μὲν ἐν τοῖς περὶ χρείας μορίων
ἀποδείξομεν. || 16
VII
Passing now to the faculty of Growth[50] let us first mention that
this, too, is present in the foetus _in utero_ as is also the
nutritive faculty, but that at that stage these two faculties are, as
it were, _handmaids_ to those already mentioned,[51] and do not
possess in themselves supreme authority. When, however, the animal[52]
has attained its complete size, then, during the whole period
following its birth and until the acme is reached, the faculty of
growth is predominant, while the alterative and nutritive faculties
are accessory—in fact, act as its handmaids. What, then, is the
property of this faculty of growth? To extend in every direction that
which has already come into existence—that is to say, the solid parts
of the body, the arteries, veins, nerves, bones, cartilages,
membranes, ligaments, and the various _coats_ which we have just
called elementary, homogeneous, and simple. And I shall state in what
way they gain this extension in every direction, first giving an
illustration for the sake of clearness.
Children take the bladders of pigs, fill them with air, and then rub
them on ashes near the fire, so as to warm, but not to injure them.
This is a common game in the district of Ionia, and among not a few
other nations. As they rub, they sing songs, to a certain measure,
time, and rhythm, and all their words are an exhortation to the
bladder to increase in size. When it appears to them fairly well
distended, they again blow air into it and expand it further; then
they rub it again. This they do several times, until the bladder seems
to them to have become large enough. Now, clearly, in these doings of
the children, the more the interior cavity of the bladder increases in
size, the thinner, necessarily, does its substance become. But, if the
children were able to bring nourishment to this thin part, then they
would make the bladder big in the same way that Nature does. As it is,
however, they cannot do what Nature does, for to imitate this is
beyond the power not only of children, but of any one soever; it is a
property of Nature alone.
It will now, therefore, be clear to you that _nutrition_ is a
necessity for growing things. For if such bodies were distended, but
not at the same time nourished, they would take on a false appearance
of growth, not a true growth. And further, to be distended _in all
directions_ belongs only to bodies whose growth is directed by Nature;
for those which are distended by us undergo this distension in one
direction but grow less in the others; it is impossible to find a body
which will remain entire and not be torn through whilst we stretch it
in the three dimensions. Thus Nature alone has the power to expand a
body in all directions so that it remains unruptured and preserves
completely its previous form.
Such then is _growth_, and it cannot occur without the nutriment which
flows to the part and is worked up into it.
VII
Ἐπὶ δὲ τὴν αὐξητικὴν ἤδη μεταβάντες δύναμιν αὐτὸ
τοῦθ' ὑπομνήσωμεν πρῶτον, ὡς ὑπάρχει μὲν καὶ αὐτὴ
τοῖς κυουμένοις ὥσπερ καὶ ἡ θρεπτική· ἀλλ' οἷον
ὑπηρέτιδές τινές εἰσι τηνικαῦτα τῶν προειρημένων
δυνάμεων, οὐκ ἐν αὑταῖς ἔχουσαι τὸ πᾶν κῦρος.
ἐπειδὰν δὲ τὸ τέλειον ἀπολάβῃ μέγεθος τὸ ζῷον, ἐν τῷ
μετὰ τὴν ἀποκύησιν χρόνῳ παντὶ μέχρι τῆς ἀκμῆς ἡ μὲν
αὐξητικὴ τηνικαῦτα κρατεῖ· βοηθοὶ δ' αὐτῆς καὶ οἷον
ὑπηρέτιδες ἥ τ' ἀλλοιωτικὴ δύναμίς ἐστι καὶ ἡ
θρεπτική. τί οὖν τὸ ἴδιόν ἐστι τῆς αὐξητικῆς
δυνάμεως; εἰς πᾶν μέρος ἐκτεῖναι τὰ πεφυκότα.
καλεῖται δ' οὕτω τὰ στερεὰ μόρια τοῦ σώματος,
ἀρτηρίαι καὶ φλέβες καὶ νεῦρα καὶ ὀστᾶ καὶ χόνδροι
καὶ ὑμένες καὶ σύνδεσμοι καὶ οἱ χιτῶνες ἅπαντες, οὓς
στοιχειώδεις τε καὶ ὁμοιομερεῖς καὶ ἁπλοῦς ὀλίγον
ἔμπροσθεν ἐκαλοῦμεν. ὅτῳ δὲ τρόπῳ τὴν εἰς πᾶν μέρος
ἔκτασιν ἴσχουσιν, ἐγὼ φράσω παράδειγμά τι πρότερον
εἰπὼν ἕνεκα τοῦ σαφοῦς. || 17
Τὰς κύστεις τῶν ὑῶν λαβόντες οἱ παῖδες πληροῦσί τε
πνεύματος καὶ τρίβουσιν ἐπὶ τῆς τέφρας πλησίον τοῦ
πυρός, ὡς ἀλεαίνεσθαι μέν, βλάπτεσθαι δὲ μηδέν· καὶ
πολλή γ' αὕτη ἡ παιδιὰ περί τε τὴν Ἰωνίαν καὶ ἐν
ἄλλοις ἔθνεσιν οὐκ ὀλίγοις ἐστίν. ἐπιλέγουσι δὲ δὴ
καί τιν' ἔπη τρίβοντες ἐν μέτρῳ τέ τινι καὶ μέλει
καὶ ῥυθμῷ καὶ ἔστι πάντα τὰ ῥήματα ταῦτα
παρακέλευσις τῇ κύστει πρὸς τὴν αὔξησιν. ἐπειδὰν δ'
ἱκανῶς αὐτοῖς διατετάσθαι δοκῇ, πάλιν ἐμφυσῶσί τε
καὶ ἐπιδιατείνουσι καὶ αὖθις τρίβουσι καὶ τοῦτο
πλεονάκις ποιοῦσιν, ἄχρις ἂν αὐτοῖς ἡ κύστις ἱκανῶς
ἔχειν δοκῇ τῆς αὐξήσεως. ἀλλ' ἐν τούτοις γε τοῖς
ἔργοις τῶν παίδων ἐναργῶς, ὅσον εἰς μέγεθος
ἐπιδίδωσιν ἡ ἐντὸς εὐρυχωρία τῆς κύστεως, τοσοῦτον
ἀναγκαῖον εἰς λεπτότητα καθαιρεῖσθαι τὸ σῶμα καὶ εἴ
γε τὴν λεπτότητα ταύτην ἀνατρέφειν οἷοί τ' ἦσαν οἱ
παῖδες, ὁμοίως ἂν τῇ φύσει τὴν κύστιν ἐκ μικρᾶς
μεγάλην ἀπειργάζοντο. νυνὶ δὲ τοῦτ' αὐτοῖς ἐνδεῖ τὸ
ἔργον οὐδὲ καθ' ἕνα τρόπον εἰς μίμησιν ἐνδεχόμενον
ἀχθῆναι μὴ ὅτι τοῖς || παισὶν ἀλλ' οὐδ' ἄλλῳ τινί· 18
μόνης γὰρ τῆς φύσεως ἴδιόν ἐστιν.
Ὥστ' ἤδη σοι δῆλον, ὡς ἀναγκαία τοῖς αὐξανομένοις ἡ
θρέψις. εἰ γὰρ διατείνοιτο μέν, ἀνατρέφοιτο δὲ μή,
φαντασίαν ψευδῆ μᾶλλον, οὐκ αὔξησιν ἀληθῆ τὰ τοιαῦτα
σώματα κτήσεται. καίτοι καὶ τὸ διατείνεσθαι πάντη
μόνοις τοῖς ὑπὸ φύσεως αὐξανομένοις ὑπάρχει. τὰ γὰρ
ὑφ' ἡμῶν διατεινόμενα σώματα κατὰ μίαν τινὰ
διάστασιν τοῦτο πάσχοντα μειοῦται ταῖς λοιπαῖς, οὐδ'
ἔστιν εὑρεῖν οὐδέν, ὃ συνεχὲς ἔτι μένον καὶ
ἀδιάσπαστον εἰς τὰς τρεῖς διαστάσεις ἐπεκτεῖναι
δυνάμεθα. μόνης οὖν τῆς φύσεως τὸ πάντη διιστάναι
συνεχὲς ἑαυτῷ μένον ἔτι καὶ τὴν ἀρχαίαν ἅπασαν ἰδέαν
φυλάττον τὸ σῶμα.
Καὶ τοῦτ' ἔστιν ἡ αὔξησις ἄνευ τῆς ἐπιρρεούσης τε
καὶ προσπλαττομένης τροφῆς μὴ δυναμένη γενέσθαι.
VIII
We have, then, it seems, arrived at the subject of Nutrition, which is
the third and remaining consideration which we proposed at the outset.
For, when the matter which flows to each part of the body in the form
of nutriment is being worked up into it, this activity is _nutrition_,
and its cause is the _nutritive faculty_. Of course, the kind of
activity here involved is also an _alteration_, but not an alteration
like that occurring at the stage of _genesis_.[53] For in the latter
case something comes into existence which did not exist previously,
while in nutrition the inflowing material becomes assimilated to that
which has already come into existence. Therefore, the former kind of
alteration has with reason been termed _genesis_, and the latter,
_assimilation_.
VIII
Καὶ τοίνυν ὁ λόγος ἥκειν ἔοικεν ὁ περὶ τῆς θρέψεως,
ὃς δὴ λοιπός ἐστι καὶ τρίτος ὧν ἐξ ἀρχῆς προὐθέμεθα.
τοῦ γὰρ ἐπιρρέοντος ἐν εἴδει τροφῆς παντὶ || μορίῳ 19
τοῦ τρεφομένου σώματος προσπλαττομένου θρέψις μὲν ἡ
ἐνέργεια, θρεπτικὴ δὲ δύναμις ἡ αἰτία. ἀλλοίωσις μὲν
δὴ κἀνταῦθα τὸ γένος τῆς ἐνεργείας, ἀλλ' οὐχ οἵαπερ
ἡ ἐν τῇ γενέσει. ἐκεῖ μὲν γὰρ οὐκ ὂν πρότερον
ὕστερον ἐγένετο, κατὰ δὲ τὴν θρέψιν τῷ ἤδη γεγονότι
συνεξομοιοῦται τὸ ἐπιρρέον καὶ διὰ τοῦτ' εὐλόγως
ἐκείνην μὲν τὴν ἀλλοίωσιν γένεσιν, ταύτην δ'
ἐξομοίωσιν ὠνόμασαν.
IX
Now, since the three faculties of Nature have been exhaustively dealt
with, and the animal would appear not to need any others (being
possessed of the means for growing, for attaining completion, and for
maintaining itself as long a time as possible), this treatise might
seem to be already complete, and to constitute an exposition of all
the faculties of Nature. If, however, one considers that it has not
yet touched upon any of _the parts_ of the animal (I mean the stomach,
intestines, liver, and the like), and that it has not dealt with the
faculties resident in these, it will seem as though merely a kind of
introduction had been given to the practical parts of our teaching.
For the whole matter is as follows: Genesis, growth, and nutrition are
the first, and, so to say, the principal effects of Nature; similarly
also the faculties which produce these effects—the first
faculties—are three in number, and are the most dominating of all.
But as has already been shown, these need the service both of each
other, and of yet different faculties. Now, these which the faculties
of generation and growth require have been stated. I shall now say
what ones the nutritive faculty requires.
IX
Ἐπειδὴ δὲ περὶ τῶν τριῶν δυνάμεων τῆς φύσεως
αὐτάρκως εἴρηται καὶ φαίνεται μηδεμιᾶς ἄλλης
προσδεῖσθαι τὸ ζῷον, ἔχον γε καὶ ὅπως αὐξηθῇ καὶ
ὅπως τελειωθῇ καὶ ὅπως ἕως πλείστου διαφυλαχθῇ,
δόξειε μὲν ἂν ἴσως ἱκανῶς ἔχειν ὁ λόγος οὗτος ἤδη
καὶ πάσας ἐξηγεῖσθαι τὰς τῆς φύσεως δυνάμεις. ἀλλ'
εἴ τις πάλιν ἐννοήσειεν, ὡς οὐδενὸς οὐδέπω τῶν τοῦ
ζῴου μορίων ἐφήψατο, κοιλίας λέγω καὶ ἐντέρων καὶ
ἥπατος καὶ τῶν ὁμοίων, οὐδ' ἐξηγήσατο τὰς ἐν αὐτοῖς
δυνάμεις, αὖθις δόξειεν ἂν οἷον προοίμιόν τι μόνον
εἰρῆσθαι τῆς χρησίμου διδασκαλίας. || τὸ γὰρ σύμπαν 20
ὧδ' ἔχει. γένεσις καὶ αὔξησις καὶ θρέψις τὰ πρῶτα
καὶ οἷον κεφάλαια τῶν ἔργων ἐστὶ τῆς φύσεως· ὥστε
καὶ αἱ τούτων ἐργαστικαὶ δυνάμεις αἱ πρῶται τρεῖς
εἰσι καὶ κυριώταται· δέονται δ' εἰς ὑπηρεσίαν, ὡς
ἤδη δέδεικται, καὶ ἀλλήλων καὶ ἄλλων. τίνων μὲν οὖν
ἡ γεννητική τε καὶ αὐξητικὴ δέονται, εἴρηται, τίνων
δ' ἡ θρεπτική, νῦν εἰρήσεται.
X
For I believe that I shall prove that the organs which have to do with
the disposal[54] of the nutriment, as also their faculties, exist for
the sake of this _nutritive faculty_. For since the action of this
faculty[55] is _assimilation_, and it is impossible for anything to be
assimilated by, and to change into anything else unless they already
possess a certain _community and affinity_ in their qualities,[56]
therefore, in the first place, any animal cannot naturally derive
nourishment from any kind of food, and secondly, even in the case of
those from which it can do so, it cannot do this at once. Therefore,
by reason of this law,[57] every animal needs several organs for
_altering_ the nutriment. For in order that the yellow may become red,
and the red yellow, one simple process of alteration is required, but
in order that the white may become black, and the black white, all the
intermediate stages are needed.[58] So also, a thing which is very
soft cannot all at once become very hard, nor _vice versa_; nor,
similarly can anything which has a very bad smell suddenly become
quite fragrant, nor again, can the converse happen.
How, then, could blood ever turn into bone, without having first
become, as far as possible, thickened and white? And how could bread
turn into blood without having gradually parted with its whiteness and
gradually acquired redness? Thus it is quite easy for blood to become
flesh; for, if Nature thicken it to such an extent that it acquires a
certain consistency and ceases to be fluid, it thus becomes original
newly-formed flesh; but in order that blood may turn into bone, much
time is needed and much elaboration and transformation of the blood.
Further, it is quite clear that bread, and, more particularly lettuce,
beet, and the like, require a great deal of alteration in order to
become blood.
This, then, is one reason why there are so many organs concerned in
the alteration of food. A second reason is the nature of the
_superfluities_.[59] For, as we are unable to draw any nourishment
from grass, although this is possible for cattle, similarly we can
derive nourishment from radishes, albeit not to the same extent as
from meat; for almost the whole of the latter is mastered by our
natures[60]; it is transformed and altered and constituted useful
blood; but, in the radish, what is appropriate[61] and able of being
altered (and that only with difficulty, and with much labour) is the
very smallest part; almost the whole of it is surplus matter, and
passes through the digestive organs, only a very little being taken up
into the veins as blood—nor is this itself entirely utilisable blood.
Nature, therefore had need of a second process of separation for the
superfluities in the veins. Moreover, these superfluities need, on the
one hand, certain fresh routes to conduct them to the outlets, so that
they may not spoil the useful substances, and they also need certain
_reservoirs_, as it were, in which they are collected till they reach
a sufficient quantity, and are then discharged.
Thus, then, you have discovered bodily parts of a second kind,
consecrated in this case to the [removal of the] superfluities of the
food. There is, however, also a third kind, for carrying the pabulum
in every direction; these are like a number of roads intersecting the
whole body.
Thus there is one entrance—that through the mouth—for all the
various articles of food. What receives nourishment, however, is not
one single part, but a great many parts, and these widely separated;
do not be surprised, therefore, at the abundance of organs which
Nature has created for the purpose of nutrition. For those of them
which have to do with alteration prepare the nutriment suitable for
each part; others separate out the superfluities; some pass these
along, others store them up, others excrete them; some, again, are
paths for the transit[62] in all directions of the _utilisable_
juices. So, if you wish to gain a thorough acquaintance with all the
faculties of Nature,[63] you will have to consider each one of these
organs.
Now in giving an account of these we must begin with those effects of
Nature, together with their corresponding parts and faculties, which
are closely connected with the purpose to be achieved.[64]
X
Δοκῶ γάρ μοι δείξειν τὰ περὶ τὴν τῆς τροφῆς
οἰκονομίαν ὄργανά τε καὶ τὰς δυνάμεις αὐτῶν διὰ
ταύτην γεγονότα. ἐπειδὴ γὰρ ἡ ἐνέργεια ταύτης τῆς
δυνάμεως ἐξομοίωσίς ἐστιν, ὁμοιοῦσθαι δὲ καὶ
μεταβάλλειν εἰς ἄλληλα πᾶσι τοῖς οὖσιν ἀδύνατον, εἰ
μή τινα ἔχοι κοινωνίαν ἤδη καὶ συγγένειαν ἐν ταῖς
ποιότησι, διὰ τοῦτο πρῶτον μὲν οὐκ ἐκ πάντων
ἐδεσμάτων πᾶν ζῷον τρέφεσθαι πέφυκεν, ἔπειτα δ' οὐδ'
ἐξ ὧν οἷόν τ' ἐστὶν οὐδ' ἐκ τούτων παραχρῆμα, καὶ
διὰ ταύτην τὴν ἀνάγκην πλειόνων ὀργάνων ἀλλοιωτικῶν
τῆς τροφῆς ἕκαστον || τῶν ζῴων χρῄζει. ἵνα μὲν γὰρ 21
τὸ ξανθὸν ἐρυθρὸν γένηται καὶ τὸ ἐρυθρὸν ξανθόν,
ἁπλῆς καὶ μιᾶς δεῖται τῆς ἀλλοιώσεως· ἵνα δὲ τὸ
λευκὸν μέλαν καὶ τὸ μέλαν λευκόν, ἁπασῶν τῶν μεταξύ.
καὶ τοίνυν καὶ τὸ μαλακώτατον οὐκ ἂν ἀθρόως
σκληρότατον καὶ τὸ σκληρότατον οὐκ ἂν ἀθρόως
μαλακώτατον γένοιτο, ὥσπερ οὐδὲ τὸ δυσωδέστατον
εὐωδέστατον οὐδ' ἔμπαλιν τὸ εὐωδέστατον δυσωδέστατον
ἐξαίφνης γένοιτ' ἄν.
Πῶς οὖν ἐξ αἵματος ὀστοῦν ἄν ποτε γένοιτο μὴ
παχυνθέντος γε πρότερον ἐπὶ πλεῖστον αὐτοῦ καὶ
λευκανθέντος ἢ πῶς ἐξ ἄρτου τὸ αἵμα μὴ κατὰ βραχὺ
μὲν ἀποθεμένου τὴν λευκότητα, κατὰ βραχὺ δὲ
λαμβάνοντος τὴν ἐρυθρότητα; σάρκα μὲν γὰρ ἐξ αἵματος
γενέσθαι ῥᾷστον· εἰ γὰρ εἰς τοσοῦτον αὐτὸ παχύνειεν
ἡ φύσις, ὡς σύστασίν τινα σχεῖν καὶ μηκέτ' εἶναι
ῥυτόν, ἡ πρώτη καὶ νεοπαγὴς οὕτως ἂν εἴη σάρξ·
ὀστοῦν δ' ἵνα γένηται, πολλοῦ μὲν δεῖται χρόνου,
πολλῆς δ' ἐργασίας καὶ μεταβολῆς τῷ αἵματι. ὅτι δὲ
καὶ τῷ ἄρτῳ καὶ πολὺ μᾶλλον θριδα||κίνῃ καὶ τεύτλῳ 22
καὶ τοῖς ὁμοίοις παμπόλλης δεῖται τῆς ἀλλοιώσεως εἰς
αἵματος γένεσιν, οὐδὲ τοῦτ' ἄδηλον.
Ἓν μὲν δὴ τοῦτ' αἴτιον τοῦ πολλὰ γενέσθαι τὰ περὶ
τὴν τῆς τροφῆς ἀλλοίωσιν ὄργανα. δεύτερον δ' ἡ τῶν
περιττωμάτων φύσις. ὡς γὰρ ὑπὸ βοτανῶν οὐδ' ὅλως
δυνάμεθα τρέφεσθαι, καίτοι τῶν βοσκημάτων
τρεφομένων, οὕτως ὑπὸ ῥαφανίδος τρεφόμεθα μέν, ἀλλ'
οὐχ ὡς ὑπὸ τῶν κρεῶν. τούτων μὲν γὰρ ὀλίγου δεῖν
ὅλων ἡ φύσις ἡμῶν κρατεῖ καὶ μεταβάλλει καὶ ἀλλοιοῖ
καὶ χρηστὸν ἐξ αὐτῶν αἵμα συνίστησιν· ἐν δὲ τῇ
ῥαφανίδι τὸ μὲν οἰκεῖόν τε καὶ μεταβληθῆναι
δυνάμενον, μόγις καὶ τοῦτο καὶ σὺν πολλῇ τῇ
κατεργασίᾳ, παντάπασιν ἐλάχιστον· ὅλη δ' ὀλίγου δεῖν
ἐστι περιττωματικὴ καὶ διεξέρχεται τὰ τῆς πέψεως
ὄργανα, βραχέος ἐξ αὐτῆς εἰς τὰς φλέβας ἀναληφθέντος
αἵματος καὶ οὐδὲ τούτου τελέως χρηστοῦ. δευτέρας οὖν
αὖθις ἐδέησε διακρίσεως τῇ φύσει τῶν ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶ
περιττωμάτων. καὶ χρεία καὶ τούτοις ὁδῶν τέ τινων
ἑτέρων ἐπὶ τὰς ἐκ||κρίσεις αὐτὰ παραγουσῶν, ὡς μὴ 23
λυμαίνοιτο τοῖς χρηστοῖς, ὑποδοχῶν τέ τινων οἷον
δεξαμενῶν, ἐν αἷς ὅταν εἰς ἱκανὸν πλῆθος ἀφίκηται,
τηνικαῦτ' ἐκκριθήσεται.
Δεύτερον δή σοι καὶ τοῦτο τὸ γένος τῶν ἐν τῷ σώματι
μορίων ἐξεύρηται τοῖς περιττώμασι τῆς τροφῆς
ἀνακείμενον. ἄλλο δὲ τρίτον ὑπὲρ τοῦ πάντη φέρεσθαι,
καθάπερ τινὲς ὁδοὶ πολλαὶ διὰ τοῦ σώματος ὅλου
κατατετμημέναι.
Μία μὲν γὰρ εἴσοδος ἡ διὰ τοῦ στόματος ἅπασι τοῖς
σιτίοις, οὐχ ἓν δὲ τὸ τρεφόμενον ἀλλὰ πάμπολλά τε
καὶ πάμπολυ διεστῶτα. μὴ τοίνυν θαύμαζε τὸ πλῆθος
τῶν ὀργάνων, ὅσα θρέψεως ἕνεκεν ἡ φύσις
ἐδημιούργησε. τὰ μὲν γὰρ ἀλλοιοῦντα προπαρασκευάζει
τὴν ἐπιτήδειον ἑκάστῳ μορίῳ τροφήν, τὰ δὲ διακρίνει
τὰ περιττώματα, τὰ δὲ παραπέμπει, τὰ δ' ὑποδέχεται,
τὰ δ' ἐκκρίνει, τὰ δ' ὁδοὶ τῆς πάντη φορᾶς εἰσι τῶν
χρηστῶν χυμῶν, ὥστ', εἴπερ βούλει τὰς δυνάμεις τῆς
φύσεως ἁπάσας ἐκμαθεῖν, ὑπὲρ ἑκάστου τούτων ἂν εἴη
σοι τῶν ὀργάνων ἐπισκεπτέον.
Ἀρχὴ δ' αὐτῶν τῆς διδασκαλίας, ὅσα || τοῦ τέλους 24
ἐγγὺς ἔργα τε τῆς φύσεώς ἐστι καὶ μόρια καὶ δυνάμεις
αὐτῶν.
XI
Let us once more, then, recall the actual purpose for which Nature has
constructed all these parts. Its name, as previously stated, is
_nutrition_, and the definition corresponding to the name is: _an
assimilation of that which nourishes to that which receives
nourishments_.[65] And in order that this may come about, we must
assume a preliminary process of _adhesion_,[66] and for that, again,
one of _presentation_.[67] For whenever the juice which is destined to
nourish any of the parts of the animal is emitted from the vessels, it
is in the first place dispersed all through this part, next it is
presented, and next it adheres, and becomes completely assimilated.
The so-called white [leprosy] shows the difference between
assimilation and adhesion, in the same way that the kind of dropsy
which some people call _anasarca_ clearly distinguishes presentation
from adhesion. For, of course, the genesis of such a dropsy does not
come about as do some of the conditions of atrophy and wasting,[68]
from an insufficient supply of moisture; the flesh is obviously moist
enough,—in fact it is thoroughly saturated,—and each of the solid
parts of the body is in a similar condition. While, however, the
nutriment conveyed to the part does undergo presentation, it is still
too watery, and is not properly transformed into a _juice_,[69] nor
has it acquired that viscous and agglutinative quality which results
from the operation of _innate heat_;[70] therefore, adhesion cannot
come about, since, owing to this abundance of thin, crude liquid, the
pabulum runs off and easily slips away from the solid parts of the
body. In white [leprosy], again, there is adhesion of the nutriment
but no real assimilation. From this it is clear that what I have just
said is correct, namely, that in that part which is to be nourished
there must first occur presentation, next adhesion, and finally
assimilation proper.
Strictly speaking, then, _nutriment_ is that which is actually
nourishing, while the _quasi-nutriment_ which is not yet nourishing
(_e.g._ matter which is undergoing adhesion or presentation) is not,
strictly speaking, nutriment, but is so called only by an
equivocation. Also, that which is still contained in the veins, and
still more, that which is in the stomach, from the fact that it is
destined to nourish if properly elaborated, has been called
“nutriment.” Similarly we call the various kinds of food “nutriment,”
not because they are already nourishing the animal, nor because they
exist in the same state as the material which actually is nourishing
it, but because they are able and destined to nourish it if they be
properly elaborated.
This was also what Hippocrates said, viz., “Nutriment is what is
engaged in nourishing, as also is quasi-nutriment, and what is
destined to be nutriment.” For to that which is already being
assimilated he gave the name of _nutriment_; to the similar material
which is being presented or becoming adherent, the name of
_quasi-nutriment_; and to everything else—that is, contained in the
stomach and veins—the name of _destined nutriment_.
XI
Αὐτοῦ δὲ δὴ πάλιν ἀναμνηστέον ἡμῖν τοῦ τέλους, οὗπερ
ἕνεκα τοσαῦτά τε καὶ τοιαῦτα τῇ φύσει δεδημιούργηται
μόρια. τὸ μὲν οὖν ὄνομα τοῦ πράγματος, ὥσπερ καὶ
πρότερον εἴρηται, θρέψις· ὁ δὲ κατὰ τοὔνομα λόγος
ὁμοίωσις τοῦ τρέφοντος τῷ τρεφομένῳ. ἵνα δ' αὕτη
γένηται, προηγήσασθαι χρὴ πρόσφυσιν, ἵνα δ' ἐκείνη,
πρόσθεσιν. ἐπειδὰν γὰρ ἐκπέσῃ τῶν ἀγγείων ὁ μέλλων
θρέψειν ὁτιοῦν τῶν τοῦ ζῴου μορίων χυμός, εἰς ἅπαν
αὐτὸ διασπείρεται πρῶτον, ἔπειτα προστίθεται κἄπειτα
προσφύεται καὶ τελέως ὁμοιοῦται.
Δηλοῦσι δ' αἱ καλούμεναι λεῦκαι τὴν διαφορὰν
ὁμοιώσεώς τε καὶ προσφύσεως, ὥσπερ τὸ γένος ἐκεῖνο
τῶν ὑδέρων, ὅ τινες ὀνομάζουσιν ἀνὰ σάρκα, διορίζει
σαφῶς πρόσθεσιν προσφύσεως. οὐ γὰρ ἐνδείᾳ δήπου τῆς
ἐπιρρεοῦσης ὑγρότητος, ὡς ἔνιαι τῶν ἀτροφιῶν τε καὶ
φθίσεων, ἡ τοῦ τοιούτου γένεσις ὑδέρου || 25
συντελεῖται. φαίνεται γὰρ ἱκανῶς ἥ τε σὰρξ ὑγρὰ καὶ
διάβροχος ἕκαστόν τε τῶν στερεῶν τοῦ σώματος μορίων
ὡσαύτως διακείμενον. ἀλλὰ πρόσθεσις μέν τις γίγνεται
τῆς ἐπιφερομένης τροφῆς, ἅτε δ' ὑδατωδεστέρας οὔσης
ἔτι καὶ μὴ πάνυ τι κεχυμωμένης μηδὲ τὸ γλίσχρον
ἐκεῖνο καὶ κολλῶδες, ὃ δὴ τῆς ἐμφύτου θερμασίας
οἰκονομίᾳ προσγίγνεται, κεκτημένης ἡ πρόσφυσις
ἀδύνατός ἐστιν ἐπιτελεῖσθαι πλήθει λεπτῆς ὑγρότητος
ἀπέπτου διαρρεούσης τε καὶ ῥᾳδίως ὀλισθαινούσης ἀπὸ
τῶν στερεῶν τοῦ σώματος μορίων τῆς τροφῆς. ἐν δὲ
ταῖς λεύκαις πρόσφυσις μέν τις γίγνεται τῆς τροφῆς,
οὐ μὴν ἐξομοίωσίς γε. καὶ δῆλον ἐν τῷδε τὸ μικρῷ
πρόσθεν ῥηθὲν ὡς ὀρθῶς ἐλέγετο τὸ δεῖν πρόσθεσιν μὲν
πρῶτον, ἐφεξῆς δὲ πρόσφυσιν, ἔπειτ' ἐξομοίωσιν
γενέσθαι τῷ μέλλοντι τρέφεσθαι.
Κυρίως μὲν οὖν τὸ τρέφον ἤδη τροφή, τὸ δ' οἷον μὲν
τροφή, οὔπω δὲ τρέφον, ὁποῖόν ἐστι τὸ προσφυόμενον ἢ
προστιθέμενον, τροφὴ μὲν οὐ κυρίως, ὁμωνύμως δὲ
τροφή· τὸ δ' ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν ἔτι περιεχόμενον || καὶ 26
τούτου μᾶλλον ἔτι τὸ κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα τῷ μέλλειν
ποτὲ θρέψειν, εἰ καλῶς κατεργασθείη, κέκληται τροφή.
κατὰ ταὐτὰ δὲ καὶ τῶν ἐδεσμάτων ἕκαστον τροφὴν
ὀνομάζομεν οὔτε τῷ τρέφειν ἤδη τὸ ζῷον οὔτε τῷ
τοιοῦτον ὑπάρχειν οἷον τὸ τρέφον, ἀλλὰ τῷ δύνασθαί
τε καὶ μέλλειν τρέφειν, εἰ καλῶς κατεργασθείη.
Τοῦτο γὰρ ἦν καὶ τὸ πρὸς Ἱπποκράτους λεγόμενον·
“Τροφὴ δὲ τὸ τρέφον, τροφὴ καὶ τὸ οἷον τροφὴ καὶ τὸ
μέλλον.” τὸ μὲν γὰρ ὁμοιούμενον ἤδη τροφὴν ὠνόμασε,
τὸ δ' οἷον μὲν ἐκεῖνο προστιθέμενον ἢ προσφυόμενον
οἷον τροφήν· τὸ δ' ἄλλο πᾶν, ὅσον ἐν τῇ γαστρὶ καὶ
ταῖς φλεψὶ περιέχεται, μέλλον.
XII
It is quite clear, therefore, that nutrition must necessarily be a
process of assimilation of that which is nourishing to that which is
being nourished. Some, however, say that this assimilation does not
occur in reality, but is merely apparent; these are the people who
think that Nature is not artistic, that she does not show forethought
for the animal’s welfare, and that she has absolutely no native powers
whereby she alters some substances, attracts others, and discharges
others.
Now, speaking generally, there have arisen the following two sects in
medicine and philosophy among those who have made any definite
pronouncement regarding Nature. I speak, of course, of such of them as
know what they are talking about, and who realize the logical sequence
of their hypotheses, and stand by them; as for those who cannot
understand even this, but who simply talk any nonsense that comes to
their tongues, and who do not remain definitely attached either to one
sect or the other—such people are not even worth mentioning.
What, then, are these sects, and what are the logical consequences of
their hypotheses?[71] The one class supposes that all substance which
is subject to genesis and destruction is at once _continuous_[72] and
susceptible of _alteration_. The other school assumes substance to be
unchangeable, unalterable, and sub-divided into fine particles, which
are separated from one another by empty spaces.
All people, therefore, who can appreciate the logical sequence of an
hypothesis hold that, according to the second teaching, there does not
exist any substance or faculty peculiar either to Nature or to
Soul,[73] but that these result from the way in which the primary
corpuscles,[74] which are unaffected by change, come together.
According to the first-mentioned teaching, on the other hand, Nature
is not posterior to the corpuscles, but is a long way prior to them
and older than they; and therefore in their view it is Nature which
puts together the bodies both of plants and animals; and this she does
by virtue of certain faculties which she possesses—these being, on
the one hand, attractive and assimilative of what is appropriate, and,
on the other, expulsive of what is foreign. Further, she skilfully
moulds everything during the stage of genesis; and she also provides
for the creatures after birth, employing here other faculties again,
namely, one of affection and forethought for offspring, and one of
sociability and friendship for kindred. According to the other school,
none of these things exist in the natures[75] [of living things], nor
is there in the soul any original innate idea, whether of agreement or
difference, of separation or synthesis, of justice or injustice, of
the beautiful or ugly; all such things, they say, arise in us _from
sensation and through sensation_, and animals are steered by certain
images and memories.
Some of these people have even expressly declared that the soul
possesses no reasoning faculty, but that we are led like cattle by the
impression of our senses, and are unable to refuse or dissent from
anything. In their view, obviously, courage, wisdom, temperance, and
self-control are all mere nonsense, we do not love either each other
or our offspring, nor do the gods care anything for us. This school
also despises dreams, birds, omens, and the whole of astrology,
subjects with which we have dealt at greater length in another
work,[76] in which we discuss the views of Asclepiades the
physician.[77] Those who wish to do so may familiarize themselves with
these arguments, and they may also consider at this point which of the
two roads lying before us is the better one to take. Hippocrates took
the first-mentioned. According to this teaching, substance is one and
is subject to _alteration_; there is a consensus in the movements of
air and fluid throughout the whole body;[78] Nature acts throughout in
an artistic and equitable manner, having certain faculties, by virtue
of which each part of the body draws to itself the juice which is
proper to it, and, having done so, attaches it to every portion of
itself, and completely assimilates it; while such part of the juice as
has not been mastered,[79] and is not capable of undergoing complete
alteration and being assimilated to the part which is being nourished,
is got rid of by yet another (an expulsive) faculty.
XII
Ὅτι μὲν οὖν ἀναγκαῖον ὁμοίωσίν τιν' εἶναι τοῦ
τρέφοντος τῷ τρεφομένῳ τὴν θρέψιν, ἄντικρυς δῆλον.
οὐ μὴν ὑπάρχουσάν γε ταύτην τὴν ὁμοίωσιν, ἀλλὰ
φαινομένην μόνον εἶναί φασιν οἱ μήτε τεχνικὴν
οἰόμενοι τὴν φύσιν εἶναι μήτε προνοητικὴν τοῦ ζῴου
μήθ' ὅλως τινὰς οἰκείας ἔχειν δυνάμεις, αἷς χρωμένη
τὰ μὲν ἀλλοιοῖ, τὰ δ' ἕλκει, || τὰ δ' ἐκκρίνει. 27
Καὶ αὗται δύο γεγόνασιν αἱρέσεις κατὰ γένος ἐν
ἰατρικῇ τε καὶ φιλοσοφίᾳ τῶν ἀποφηναμένων τι περὶ
φύσεως ἀνδρῶν, ὅσοι γ' αὐτῶν γιγνώσκουσιν, ὅ τι
λέγουσι, καὶ τὴν ἀκολουθίαν ὧν ὑπέθεντο θεωροῦσι θ'
ἅμα καὶ διαφυλάττουσιν. ὅσοι δὲ μηδ' αὐτὸ τοῦτο
συνιᾶσιν, ἀλλ' ἁπλῶς, ὅ τι ἂν ἐπὶ γλῶτταν ἔλθῃ,
ληροῦσιν, ἐν οὐδετέρᾳ τῶν αἱρέσεων ἀκριβῶς
καταμένοντες, οὐδὲ μεμνῆσθαι τῶν τοιούτων προσήκει.
Τίνες οὖν αἱ δύο αἱρέσεις αὗται καὶ τίς ἡ τῶν ἐν
αὐταῖς ὑποθέσεων ἀκολουθία; τὴν ὑποβεβλημένην οὐσίαν
γενέσει καὶ φθορᾷ πᾶσαν ἡνωμένην θ' ἅμα καὶ
ἀλλοιοῦσθαι δυναμένην ὑπέθετο θάτερον γένος τῆς
αἱρέσεως, ἀμετάβλητον δὲ καὶ ἀναλλοίωτον καὶ
κατατετμημένην εἰς λεπτὰ καὶ κεναῖς ταῖς μεταξὺ
χώραις διειλημμένην ἡ λοιπή.
Καὶ τοίνυν ὅσοι γε τῆς ἀκολουθίας τῶν ὑποθέσεων
αἰσθάνονται, κατὰ μὲν τὴν δευτέραν αἵρεσιν οὔτε
φύσεως οὔτε ψυχῆς ἰδίαν τινὰ νομίζουσιν οὐσίαν ἢ
δύναμιν ὑπάρχειν, || ἀλλ' ἐν τῇ ποιᾷ συνόδῳ τῶν 28
πρώτων ἐκείνων σωμάτων τῶν ἀπαθῶν ἀποτελεῖσθαι. κατὰ
δὲ τὴν προτέραν εἰρημένην αἵρεσιν οὐχ ὑστέρα τῶν
σωμάτων ἡ φύσις, ἀλλὰ πολὺ προτέρα τε καὶ
πρεσβυτέρα. καὶ τοίνυν κατὰ μὲν τούτους αὕτη τὰ
σώματα τῶν τε φυτῶν καὶ τῶν ζῴων συνίστησι δυνάμεις
τινὰς ἔχουσα τὰς μὲν ἑλκτικάς θ' ἅμα καὶ ὁμοιωτικὰς
τῶν οἰκείων, τὰς δ' ἀποκριτικὰς τῶν ἀλλοτρίων, καὶ
τεχνικῶς ἅπαντα διαπλάττει τε γεννῶσα καὶ προνοεῖται
τῶν γεννωμένων ἑτέραις αὖθίς τισι δυνάμεσι,
στερκτικῇ μέν τινι καὶ προνοητικῇ τῶν ἐγγόνων,
κοινωνικῇ δὲ καὶ φιλικῇ τῶν ὁμογενῶν. κατὰ δ' αὖ
τοὺς ἑτέρους οὔτε τούτων οὐδὲν ὑπάρχει ταῖς φύσεσιν
οὔτ' ἔννοιά τίς ἐστι τῇ ψυχῇ σύμφυτος ἐξ ἀρχῆς οὐκ
ἀκολουθίας οὐ μάχης, οὐ διαιρέσεως οὐ συνθέσεως, οὐ
δικαίων οὐκ ἀδίκων, οὐ καλῶν οὐκ αἰσχρῶν, ἀλλ' ἐξ
αἰσθήσεώς τε καὶ δι' αἰσθήσεως ἅπαντα τὰ τοιαῦθ'
ἡμῖν ἐγγίγνεσθαί φασι καὶ φαντασίαις τισὶ καὶ
μνήμαις οἰακίζεσθαι τὰ ζῷα.
Ἔνιοι || δ' αὐτῶν καὶ ῥητῶς ἀπεφήναντο μηδεμίαν 29
εἶναι τῆς ψυχῆς δύναμιν, ᾗ λογιζόμεθα, ἀλλ' ὑπὸ τῶν
αἰσθητῶν ἄγεσθαι παθῶν ἡμᾶς καθάπερ βοσκήματα πρὸς
μηδὲν ἀνανεῦσαι μηδ' ἀντειπεῖν δυναμένους. καθ' οὓς
δηλονότι καὶ ἀνδρεία καὶ φρόνησις καὶ σωφροσύνη καὶ
ἐγκράτεια λῆρός ἐστι μακρὸς καὶ φιλοῦμεν οὔτ'
ἀλλήλους οὔτε τὰ ἔγγονα καὶ τοῖς θεοῖς οὐδὲν ἡμῶν
μέλει. καταφρονοῦσι δὲ καὶ τῶν ὀνειράτων καὶ τῶν
οἰωνῶν καὶ τῶν συμβόλων καὶ πάσης ἀστρολογίας, ὑπὲρ
ὧν ἡμεῖς μὲν ἰδίᾳ δι' ἑτέρων γραμμάτων ἐπὶ πλέον
ἐσκεψάμεθα περὶ τῶν Ἀσκληπιάδου τοῦ ἰατροῦ
σκοπούμενοι δογμάτων. ἔνεστι δὲ τοῖς βουλομένοις
κἀκείνοις μὲν ὁμιλῆσαι τοῖς λόγοις καὶ νῦν δ' ἤδη
σκοπεῖν, ὥσπερ τινῶν δυοῖν ὁδῶν ἡμῖν προκειμένων,
ὁποτέραν βέλτιόν ἐστι τρέπεσθαι. Ἱπποκράτης μὲν γὰρ
τὴν προτέραν ῥηθεῖσαν ἐτράπετο, καθ' ἣν ἥνωται μὲν ἡ
οὐσία καὶ ἀλλοιοῦται καὶ σύμπνουν ὅλον ἐστὶ καὶ
σύρρουν τὸ σῶμα καὶ ἡ φύσις ἅπαντα τεχνικῶς καὶ
δικαίως πράττει δυνάμεις ἔχουσα, καθ' ἃς ἕκαστον τῶν
μορίων ἕλκει μὲν || ἐφ' ἑαυτὸ τὸν οἰκεῖον ἑαυτῷ 30
χυμόν, ἕλξαν δὲ προσφύει τε παντὶ μέρει τῶν ἐν αὑτῷ
καὶ τελέως ἐξομοιοῖ, τὸ δὲ μὴ κρατηθὲν ἐν τούτῳ μηδὲ
τὴν παντελῆ δυνηθὲν ἀλλοίωσίν τε καὶ ὁμοιότητα τοῦ
τρεφομένου καταδέξασθαι δι' ἑτέρας αὖ τινος
ἐκκριτικῆς δυνάμεως ἀποτρίβεται.
XIII
Now the extent of exactitude and truth in the doctrines of Hippocrates
may be gauged, not merely from the way in which his opponents are at
variance with obvious facts, but also from the various subjects of
natural research themselves—the functions of animals, and the rest.
For those people who do not believe that there exists in any part of
the animal a faculty for attracting _its own special quality_[80] are
compelled repeatedly to deny obvious facts.[81] For instance,
Asclepiades, the physician,[82] did this in the case of the kidneys.
That these are organs for secreting [separating out] the urine, was
the belief not only of Hippocrates, Diocles, Erasistratus,
Praxagoras,[83] and all other physicians of eminence, but practically
every butcher is aware of this, from the fact that he daily observes
both the position of the kidneys and the duct (termed the ureter)
which runs from each kidney into the bladder, and from this
arrangement he infers their characteristic use and faculty. But, even
leaving the butchers aside, all people who suffer either from frequent
dysuria or from retention of urine call themselves “nephritics,”[84]
when they feel pain in the loins and pass sandy matter in their water.
I do not suppose that Asclepiades ever saw a stone which had been
passed by one of these sufferers, or observed that this was preceded
by a sharp pain in the region between kidneys and bladder as the stone
traversed the ureter, or that, when the stone was passed, both the
pain and the retention at once ceased. It is worth while, then,
learning how his theory accounts for the presence of urine in the
bladder, and one is forced to marvel at the ingenuity of a man who
puts aside these broad, clearly visible routes,[85] and postulates
others which are narrow, invisible—indeed, entirely imperceptible.
His view, in fact, is that the fluid which we drink passes into the
bladder by being resolved into vapours, and that, when these have been
again condensed, it thus regains its previous form, and turns from
vapour into fluid. He simply looks upon the bladder as a sponge or a
piece of wool, and not as the perfectly compact and impervious body
that it is, with two very strong coats. For if we say that the vapours
pass through these coats, why should they not pass through the
peritoneum[86] and the diaphragm, thus filling the whole abdominal
cavity and thorax with water? “But,” says he, “of course the
peritoneal coat is more impervious than the bladder, and this is why
it keeps out the vapours, while the bladder admits them.” Yet if he
had ever practised anatomy, he might have known that the outer coat of
the bladder springs from the peritoneum and is essentially the same as
it, and that the inner coat, which is peculiar to the bladder, is more
than twice as thick as the former.
Perhaps, however, it is not the thickness or thinness of the coats,
but the _situation_ of the bladder, which is the reason for the
vapours being carried into it? On the contrary, even if it were
probable for every other reason that the vapours accumulate there, yet
the situation of the bladder would be enough in itself to prevent
this. For the bladder is situated below, whereas vapours have a
natural tendency to rise upwards; thus they would fill all the region
of the thorax and lungs long before they came to the bladder.
But why do I mention the situation of the bladder, peritoneum, and
thorax? For surely, when the vapours have passed through the coats of
the stomach and intestines, it is in the space between these and the
peritoneum[87] that they will collect and become liquefied (just as in
dropsical subjects it is in this region that most of the water
gathers).[88] Otherwise the vapours must necessarily pass straight
forward through everything which in any way comes in contact with
them, and will never come to a standstill. But, if this be assumed,
then they will traverse not merely the peritoneum but also the
epigastrium, and will become dispersed into the surrounding air;
otherwise they will certainly collect under the skin.
Even these considerations, however, our present-day Asclepiadeans
attempt to answer, despite the fact that they always get soundly
laughed at by all who happen to be present at their disputations on
these subjects—so difficult an evil to get rid of is this sectarian
partizanship, so excessively resistant to all cleansing processes,
harder to heal than any itch!
Thus, one of our Sophists who is a thoroughly hardened disputer and as
skilful a master of language as there ever was, once got into a
discussion with me on this subject; so far from being put out of
countenance by any of the above-mentioned considerations, he even
expressed his surprise that I should try to overturn obvious facts by
ridiculous arguments! “For,” said he, “one may clearly observe any day
in the case of any bladder, that, if one fills it with water or air
and then ties up its neck and squeezes it all round, it does not let
anything out at any point, but accurately retains all its contents.
And surely,” said he, “if there were any large and perceptible
channels coming into it from the kidneys the liquid would run out
through these when the bladder was squeezed, in the same way that it
entered?”[89] Having abruptly made these and similar remarks in
precise and clear tones, he concluded by jumping up and
departing—leaving me as though I were quite incapable of finding any
plausible answer!
The fact is that those who are enslaved to their sects are not merely
devoid of all sound knowledge, but they will not even stop to learn!
Instead of listening, as they ought, to the reason why liquid can
enter the bladder through the ureters, but is unable to go back again
the same way,—instead of admiring Nature’s artistic skill[90]—they
refuse to learn; they even go so far as to scoff, and maintain that
the kidneys, as well as many other things, have been made by Nature
_for no purpose!_[91] And some of them who had allowed themselves to
be shown the ureters coming from the kidneys and becoming implanted in
the bladder, even had the audacity to say that these also existed for
no purpose; and others said that they were spermatic ducts, and that
this was why they were inserted into the neck of the bladder and not
into its cavity. When, therefore, we had demonstrated to them the real
spermatic ducts[92] entering the neck of the bladder lower down than
the ureters, we supposed that, if we had not done so before, we would
now at least draw them away from their false assumptions, and convert
them forthwith to the opposite view. But even this they presumed to
dispute, and said that it was not to be wondered at that the semen
should remain longer in these latter ducts, these being more
constricted, and that it should flow quickly down the ducts which came
from the kidneys, seeing that these were well dilated. We were,
therefore, further compelled to show them in a still living animal,
the urine plainly running out through the ureters into the bladder;
even thus we hardly hoped to check their nonsensical talk.
Now the method of demonstration is as follows. One has to divide the
peritoneum in front of the ureters, then secure these with ligatures,
and next, having bandaged up the animal, let him go (for he will not
continue to urinate). After this one loosens the external bandages and
shows the bladder empty and the ureters quite full and distended—in
fact almost on the point of rupturing; on removing the ligature from
them, one then plainly sees the bladder becoming filled with urine.
When this has been made quite clear, then, before the animal urinates,
one has to tie a ligature round his penis and then to squeeze the
bladder all over; still nothing goes back through the ureters to the
kidneys. Here, then, it becomes obvious that not only in a dead
animal, but in one which is still living, the ureters are prevented
from receiving back the urine from the bladder. These observations
having been made, one now loosens the ligature from the animal’s penis
and allows him to urinate, then again ligatures one of the ureters and
leaves the other to discharge into the bladder. Allowing, then, some
time to elapse, one now demonstrates that the ureter which was
ligatured is obviously full and distended on the side next to the
kidneys, while the other one—that from which the ligature had been
taken—is itself flaccid, but has filled the bladder with urine. Then,
again, one must divide the full ureter, and demonstrate how the urine
spurts out of it, like blood in the operation of venesection; and
after this one cuts through the other also, and both being thus
divided, one bandages up the animal externally. Then when enough time
seems to have elapsed, one takes off the bandages; the bladder will
now be found empty, and the whole region between the intestines and
the peritoneum full of urine, as if the animal were suffering from
dropsy. Now, if anyone will but test this for himself on an animal, I
think he will strongly condemn the rashness of Asclepiades, and if he
also learns the reason why nothing regurgitates from the bladder into
the ureters, I think he will be persuaded by this also of the
forethought and art shown by Nature in relation to animals.[93]
Now Hippocrates, who was the first known to us of all those who have
been both physicians and philosophers inasmuch as he was the first to
recognize what Nature effects, expresses his admiration of her, and is
constantly singing her praises and calling her “just.” Alone, he says,
she suffices for the animal in every respect, performing of her own
accord and without any teaching all that is required. Being such, she
has, as he supposes, certain _faculties_, one attractive of what is
appropriate,[94] and another eliminative of what is foreign, and she
nourishes the animal, makes it grow, and expels its diseases by
crisis.[95] Therefore he says that there is in our bodies a
concordance in the movements of air and fluid, and that everything is
in sympathy. According to Asclepiades, however, nothing is naturally
in sympathy with anything else, all substance being divided and broken
up into inharmonious elements and absurd “molecules.” Necessarily,
then, besides making countless other statements in opposition to plain
fact, he was ignorant of Nature’s faculties, both that attracting what
is appropriate, and that expelling what is foreign. Thus he invented
some wretched nonsense to explain blood-production and _anadosis_,[96]
and, being utterly unable to find anything to say regarding the
clearing-out[97] of superfluities, he did not hesitate to join issue
with obvious facts, and, in this matter of urinary secretion, to
deprive both the kidneys and the ureters of their activity, by
assuming that there were certain invisible channels opening into the
bladder. It was, of course, a grand and impressive thing to do, to
mistrust the obvious, and to pin one’s faith in things which could not
be seen!
Also, in the matter of the yellow bile, he makes an even grander and
more spirited venture; for he says this is actually generated in the
bile-ducts, not merely separated out.
How comes it, then, that in cases of jaundice two things happen at the
same time—that the dejections contain absolutely no bile, and that
the whole body becomes full of it? He is forced here again to talk
nonsense, just as he did in regard to the urine. He also talks no less
nonsense about the black bile and the spleen, not understanding what
was said by Hippocrates; and he attempts in stupid—I might say
insane—language, to contradict what he knows nothing about.
And what profit did he derive from these opinions from the point of
view of treatment? He neither was able to cure a kidney ailment, nor
jaundice, nor a disease of black bile, nor would he agree with the
view held not merely by Hippocrates but by all men regarding
drugs—that some of them purge away yellow bile, and others black,
some again phlegm, and others the thin and watery superfluity[98]; he
held that all the substances evacuated[99] were _produced by the drugs
themselves_, just as yellow bile is produced by the biliary passages!
It matters nothing, according to this extraordinary man, whether we
give a hydragogue or a cholagogue in a case of dropsy, for these all
equally purge[99] and dissolve the body, and produce a solution having
such and such an appearance, which did not exist as such before![100]
Must we not, therefore, suppose he was either mad, or entirely
unacquainted with practical medicine? For who does not know that if a
drug for attracting phlegm be given in a case of jaundice it will not
even evacuate four _cyathi_[101] of phlegm? Similarly also if one of
the hydragogues be given. A cholagogue, on the other hand, clears away
a great quantity of bile, and the skin of patients so treated at once
becomes clear. I myself have, in many cases, after treating the liver
condition, then removed the disease by means of a single purgation;
whereas, if one had employed a drug for removing phlegm one would have
done no good.
Nor is Hippocrates the only one who knows this to be so, whilst those
who take experience alone as their starting-point[102] know otherwise;
they, as well as all physicians who are engaged in the practice of
medicine, are of this opinion. Asclepiades, however is an exception;
he would hold it a betrayal of his assumed “elements”[103] to confess
the truth about such matters. For if a single drug were to be
discovered which attracted such and such a humour only, there would
obviously be danger of the opinion gaining ground that there is in
every body[104] a faculty which attracts its own particular quality.
He therefore says that safflower,[105] the Cnidian berry,[106] and
_Hippophaes_,[107] do not draw phlegm from the body, but actually make
it. Moreover, he holds that the flower and scales of bronze, and burnt
bronze itself, and germander,[108] and wild mastich[109] dissolve the
body into water, and that dropsical patients derive benefit from these
substances, not because they are purged by them, but because they are
rid of substances which actually help to increase the disease; for, if
the medicine does not evacuate[110] the dropsical fluid contained in
the body, but generates it, it aggravates the condition further.
Moreover, scammony, according to the Asclepiadean argument, not only
fails to evacuate[110] the bile from the bodies of jaundiced subjects,
but actually turns the useful blood into bile, and dissolves the body;
in fact it does all manner of evil and increases the disease.
And yet this drug may be clearly seen to do good to numbers of people!
“Yes,” says he, “they derive benefit certainly, but merely in
proportion to the evacuation.” ... But if you give these cases a drug
which draws off phlegm they will not be benefited. This is so obvious
that even those who make experience alone their starting-point[111]
are aware of it; and these people make it a cardinal point of their
teaching to trust to no arguments, but only to what can be clearly
seen. In this, then, they show good sense; whereas Asclepiades goes
far astray in bidding us distrust our senses where obvious facts
plainly overturn his hypotheses. Much better would it have been for
him not to assail obvious facts, but rather to devote himself entirely
to these.
Is it, then, these facts only which are plainly irreconcilable with
the views of Asclepiades? Is not also the fact that in summer yellow
bile is evacuated in greater quantity by the same drugs, and in winter
phlegm, and that in a young man more bile is evacuated, and in an old
man more phlegm? Obviously each drug attracts something which already
exists, and does not generate something previously non-existent. Thus
if you give in the summer season a drug which attracts phlegm to a
young man of a lean and warm habit, who has lived neither idly nor too
luxuriously, you will with great difficulty evacuate a very small
quantity of this humour, and you will do the man the utmost harm. On
the other hand, if you give him a cholagogue, you will produce an
abundant evacuation and not injure him at all.
Do we still, then, disbelieve that each drug attracts _that humour
which is proper to it_?[112] Possibly the adherents of Asclepiades
will assent to this—or rather, they will—not possibly, but
certainly—declare that they disbelieve it, lest they should betray
their darling prejudices.
XIII
Μαθεῖν δ' ἔνεστιν οὐ μόνον ἐξ ὧν οἱ τἀναντία
τιθέμενοι διαφέρονται τοῖς ἐναργῶς φαινομένοις, εἰς
ὅσον ὀρθότητός τε καὶ ἀληθείας ἥκει τὰ Ἱπποκράτους
δόγματα, ἀλλὰ κἀξ αὐτῶν τῶν κατὰ μέρος ἐν τῇ φυσικῇ
θεωρίᾳ ζητουμένων τῶν τ' ἄλλων ἁπάντων καὶ τῶν ἐν
τοῖς ζῴοις ἐνεργειῶν. ὅσοι γὰρ οὐδεμίαν οὐδενὶ μορίῳ
νομίζουσιν ὑπάρχειν ἑλκτικὴν τῆς οἰκείας ποιότητος
δύναμιν, ἀναγκάζονται πολλάκις ἐναντία λέγειν τοῖς
ἐναργῶς φαινομένοις, ὥσπερ καὶ Ἀσκληπιάδης ὁ ἰατρὸς
ἐπὶ τῶν νεφρῶν ἐποίησεν, οὓς οὐ μόνον Ἱπποκράτης ἢ
Διοκλῆς ἢ Ἐρασίστρατος ἢ Πραξαγόρας ἤ τις ἄλλος
ἰατρὸς ἄριστος ὄργανα διακριτικὰ τῶν οὔρων
πεπιστεύκασιν ὑπάρχειν, ἀλλὰ καὶ οἱ || μάγειροι 31
σχεδὸν ἅπαντες ἴσασιν, ὁσημέραι θεώμενοι τήν τε
θέσιν αὐτῶν καὶ τὸν ἀφ' ἑκατέρου πόρον εἰς τὴν
κύστιν ἐμβάλλοντα, τὸν οὐρητῆρα καλούμενον, ἐξ αὐτῆς
τῆς κατασκευῆς ἀναλογιζόμενοι τήν τε χρείαν αὐτῶν
καὶ τὴν δύναμιν. καὶ πρό γε τῶν μαγείρων ἅπαντες
ἄνθρωποι καὶ δυσουροῦντες πολλάκις καὶ παντάπασιν
ἰσχουροῦντες, ὅταν ἀλγῶσι μὲν τὰ κατὰ τὰς ψόας,
ψαμμώδη δ' ἐξουρῶσιν, νεφριτικοὺς ὀνομάζουσι σφᾶς
αὐτούς.
Ἀσκληπιάδην δ' οἶμαι μηδὲ λίθον οὐρηθέντα ποτὲ
θεάσασθαι πρὸς τῶν οὕτω πασχόντων μηδ' ὡς προηγήσατο
κατὰ τὴν μεταξὺ τῶν νεφρῶν καὶ τῆς κύστεως χώραν
ὀδύνη τις ὀξεῖα διερχομένου τοῦ λίθου τὸν οὐρητῆρα
μηδ' ὡς οὐρηθέντος αὐτοῦ τά τε τῆς ὀδύνης καὶ τὰ τῆς
ἰσχουρίας ἐπαύσατο παραχρῆμα. πῶς οὖν εἰς τὴν κύστιν
τῷ λόγῳ παράγει τὸ οὖρον, ἄξιον ἀκοῦσαι καὶ θαυμάσαι
τἀνδρὸς τὴν σοφίαν, ὃς καταλιπὼν οὕτως εὐρείας ὁδοὺς
ἐναργῶς φαινομένας ἀφανεῖς καὶ στενὰς καὶ παντάπασιν
ἀναισθήτους || ὑπέθετο. βούλεται γὰρ εἰς ἀτμοὺς 32
ἀναλυόμενον τὸ πινόμενον ὑγρὸν εἰς τὴν κύστιν
διαδίδοσθαι κἄπειτ' ἐξ ἐκείνων αὖθις ἀλλήλοις
συνιόντων οὕτως ἀπολαμβάνειν αὐτὸ τὴν ἀρχαίαν ἰδέαν
καὶ γίγνεσθαι πάλιν ὑγρὸν ἐξ ἀτμῶν ἀτεχνῶς ὡς περὶ
σπογγιᾶς τινος ἢ ἐρίου τῆς κύστεως διανοούμενος,
ἀλλ' οὐ σώματος ἀκριβῶς πυκνοῦ καὶ στεγανοῦ δύο
χιτῶνας ἰσχυροτάτους κεκτημένου, δι' ὧν εἴπερ
διέρχεσθαι φήσομεν τοὺς ἀτμούς, τί δήποτ' οὐχὶ διὰ
τοῦ περιτοναίου καὶ τῶν φρενῶν διελθόντες ἐνέπλησαν
ὕδατος τό τ' ἐπιγάστριον ἅπαν καὶ τὸν θώρακα; ἀλλὰ
παχύτερος, φησίν, ἐστὶ δηλαδὴ καὶ στεγανώτερος ὁ
περιτόναιος χιτὼν τῆς κύστεως καὶ διὰ τοῦτ' ἐκεῖνος
μὲν ἀποστέγει τοὺς ἀτμούς, ἡ δὲ κύστις παραδέχεται.
ἀλλ' εἴπερ ἀνατετμήκει ποτέ, τάχ' ἂν ἠπίστατο τὸν
μὲν ἔξωθεν χιτῶνα τῆς κύστεως ἀπὸ τοῦ περιτοναίου
πεφυκότα τὴν αὐτὴν ἐκείνῳ φύσιν ἔχειν, τὸν δ'
ἔνδοθεν τὸν αὐτῆς τῆς κύστεως ἴδιον πλέον ἢ
διπλάσιον ἐκείνου τὸ πάχος ὑπάρχειν.
Ἀλλ' ἴσως οὔτε τὸ || πάχος οὔθ' ἡ λεπτότης τῶν 33
χιτώνων, ἀλλ' ἡ θέσις τῆς κύστεως αἰτία τοῦ φέρεσθαι
τοὺς ἀτμοὺς εἰς αὐτήν. καὶ μὴν εἰ καὶ διὰ τἆλλα
πάντα πιθανὸν ἦν αὐτούς ἐνταυθοῖ συναθροίζεσθαι, τό
γε τῆς θέσεως μόνης αὔταρκες κωλῦσαι. κάτω μὲν γὰρ ἡ
κύστις κεῖται, τοῖς δ' ἀτμοῖς σύμφυτος ἡ πρὸς τὸ
μετέωρον φορά, ὥστε πολὺ πρότερον ἂν ἔπλησαν ἅπαντα
τὰ κατὰ τὸν θώρακά τε καὶ τὸν πνεύμονα, πρὶν ἐπὶ τὴν
κύστιν ἀφικέσθαι.
Καίτοι τί θέσεως κύστεως καὶ περιτοναίου καὶ θώρακος
μνημονεύω; διεκπεσόντες γὰρ δήπου τούς τε τῆς
κοιλίας καὶ τῶν ἐντέρων χιτῶνας οἱ ἀτμοὶ κατὰ τὴν
μεταξὺ χώραν αὐτῶν τε τούτων καὶ τοῦ περιτοναίου
συναθροισθήσονται καὶ ὑγρὸν ἐνταυθοῖ γενήσονται,
ὥσπερ καὶ τοῖς ὑδερικοῖς ἐν τούτῳ τῷ χωρίῳ τὸ
πλεῖστον ἀθροίζεται τοῦ ὕδατος, ἢ πάντως αὐτοὺς χρὴ
φέρεσθαι πρόσω διὰ πάντων τῶν ὁπωσοῦν ὁμιλούντων καὶ
μηδέποθ' ἵστασθαι. ἀλλ' εἰ καὶ τοῦτό τις ὑπόθοιτο,
διεκπεσόντες ἂν οὕτως οὐ τὸ περιτόναιον μόνον ἀλλὰ
καὶ τὸ ἐπιγάστριον, εἰς τὸ περιέχον σκεδασθεῖεν ἢ
πάντως ἂν ὑπὸ τῷ δέρματι || συναθροισθεῖεν. 34
Ἀλλὰ καὶ πρὸς ταῦτ' ἀντιλέγειν οἱ νῦν Ἀσκληπιάδειοι
πειρῶνται, καίτοι πρὸς ἁπάντων ἀεὶ τῶν
παρατυγχανόντων αὐτοῖς, ὅταν περὶ τούτων ἐρίζωσι,
καταγελώμενοι. οὕτως ἄρα δυσαπότριπτόν τι κακόν
ἐστιν ἡ περὶ τὰς αἱρέσεις φιλοτιμία καὶ δυσέκνιπτον
ἐν τοῖς μάλιστα καὶ ψώρας ἁπάσης δυσιατότερον.
Τῶν γοῦν καθ' ἡμᾶς τις σοφιστῶν τά τ' ἄλλα καὶ περὶ
τοὺς ἐριστικοὺς λόγους ἱκανῶς συγκεκροτημένος καὶ
δεινὸς εἰπεῖν, εἴπερ τις ἄλλος, ἀφικόμενος ἐμοί ποθ'
ὑπὲρ τούτων εἰς λόγους, τοσοῦτον ἀπέδει τοῦ
δυσωπεῖσθαι πρός τινος τῶν εἰρημένων, ὥστε καὶ
θαυμάζειν ἔφασκεν ἐμοῦ τὰ σαφῶς φαινόμενα λόγοις
ληρώδεσιν ἀνατρέπειν ἐπιχειροῦντος. ἐναργῶς γὰρ
ὁσημέραι θεωρεῖσθαι τὰς κύστεις ἁπάσας, εἴ τις αὐτὰς
ἐμπλήσειεν ὕδατος ἢ ἀέρος, εἶτα δήσας τὸν τράχηλον
πιέζοι πανταχόθεν, οὐδαμόθεν μεθιείσας οὐδέν, ἀλλ'
ἀκριβῶς ἅπαν ἐντὸς ἑαυτῶν στεγούσας. καίτοι γ' εἴπερ
ἦσάν τινες ἐκ τῶν νεφρῶν εἰς αὐτὰς ἥκοντες αἰσθητοὶ
καὶ μεγάλοι πόροι, πάντως ἄν, ἔφη, δι' ἐκείνων,
ὥσπερ εἰσῄει τὸ || ὑγρὸν εἰς αὐτάς, οὕτω καὶ 35
θλιβόντων ἐξεκρίνετο. ταῦτα καὶ τὰ τοιαῦτ' εἰπὼν
ἐξαίφνης ἀπταίστῳ καὶ σαφεῖ τῷ στόματι τελευτῶν
ἀναπηδήσας ἀπῄει καταλιπὼν ἡμᾶς ὡς οὐδὲ πιθανῆς
τινος ἀντιλογίας εὐπορῆσαι δυναμένους.
Οὕτως οὐ μόνον ὑγιὲς οὐδὲν ἴσασιν οἱ ταῖς αἱρέσεσι
δουλεύοντες, ἀλλ' οὐδὲ μαθεῖν ὑπομένουσι. δέον γὰρ
ἀκοῦσαι τὴν αἰτίαν, δι' ἣν εἰσιέναι μὲν δύναται διὰ
τῶν οὐρητήρων εἰς τὴν κύστιν τὸ ὑγρόν, ἐξιέναι δ'
αὖθις ὀπίσω τὴν αὐτὴν ὁδὸν οὐκέθ' οἷόν τε, καὶ
θαυμάσαι τὴν τέχνην τῆς φύσεως, οὔτε μαθεῖν ἐθέλουσι
καὶ λοιδοροῦνται προσέτι μάτην ὑπ' αὐτῆς ἄλλα τε
πολλὰ καὶ τοὺς νεφροὺς γεγονέναι φάσκοντες. εἰσὶ δ'
οἳ καὶ δειχθῆναι παρόντων αὐτῶν τοὺς ἀπὸ τῶν νεφρῶν
εἰς τὴν κύστιν ἐμφυομένους οὐρητῆρας ὑπομείναντες
ἐτόλμησαν εἰπεῖν οἱ μέν, ὅτι μάτην καὶ οὗτοι
γεγόνασιν, οἱ δ', ὅτι σπερματικοί τινές εἰσι πόροι
καὶ διὰ τοῦτο κατὰ τὸν τράχηλον αὐτῆς, οὐκ εἰς τὸ
κῦτος ἐμφύονται. δείξαντες οὖν ἡμεῖς αὐτοῖς τοὺς ὡς
ἀληθῶς σπερματικοὺς πόρους κατωτέρω τῶν οὐρητήρων || 36
ἐμβάλλοντας εἰς τὸν τράχηλον, νῦν γοῦν, εἰ καὶ μὴ
πρότερον, ᾠήθημεν ἀπάξειν τε τῶν ψευδῶς ὑπειλημμένων
ἐπί τε τἀναντία μεταστήσειν αὐτίκα. οἱ δὲ καὶ πρὸς
τοῦτ' ἀντιλέγειν ἐτόλμων οὐδὲν εἶναι θαυμαστὸν
εἰπόντες, ἐν ἐκείνοις μὲν ὡς ἂν στεγανωτέροις οὖσιν
ἐπὶ πλέον ὑπομένειν τὸ σπέρμα, κατὰ δὲ τοὺς ἀπὸ τῶν
νεφρῶν ὡς ἂν ἱκανῶς ἀνευρυσμένους ἐκρεῖν διὰ ταχέων.
ἡμεῖς οὖν ἠναγκάσθημεν αὐτοῖς τοῦ λοιποῦ δεικνύειν
εἰσρέον τῇ κύστει διὰ τῶν οὐρητήρων τὸ οὖρον ἐναργῶς
ἐπὶ ζῶντος ἔτι τοῦ ζῴου, μόγις ἂν οὕτω ποτὲ τὴν
φλυαρίαν αὐτῶν ἐπισχήσειν ἐλπίζοντες.
Ὁ δὲ τρόπος τῆς δείξεώς ἐστι τοιόσδε. διελεῖν χρὴ τὸ
πρὸ τῶν οὐρητήρων περιτόναιον, εἶτα βρόχοις αὐτοὺς
ἐκλαβεῖν κἄπειτ' ἐπιδήσαντας ἐᾶσαι τὸ ζῷον· οὐ γὰρ
ἂν οὐρήσειεν ἔτι. μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα λύειν μὲν τοὺς
ἔξωθεν δεσμούς, δεικνύναι δὲ κενὴν μὲν τὴν κύστιν,
μεστοὺς δ' ἱκανῶς καὶ διατεταμένους τοὺς οὐρητῆρας
καὶ κινδυνεύοντας ῥαγῆναι κἄπειτα τοὺς βρόχους αὐτῶν
ἀφελόντας ἐναργῶς ὁρᾶν ἤδη πληρουμένην οὔρου τὴν
κύστιν.
Ἐπὶ δὲ τούτῳ || φανέντι, πρὶν οὐρήσαι τὸ ζῷον, 37
βρόχον αὐτοῦ περιβαλεῖν χρὴ τῷ αἰδοίῳ κἄπειτα
θλίβειν πανταχόθεν τὴν κύστιν. οὐδὲ γὰρ ἂν οὐδὲν ἔτι
διὰ τῶν οὐρητήρων ἐπανέλθοι πρὸς τοὺς νεφρούς. κἀν
τούτῳ δῆλον γίγνεται τὸ μὴ μόνον ἐπὶ τεθνεῶτος ἀλλὰ
καὶ περιόντος ἔτι τοῦ ζῴου κωλύεσθαι μεταλαμβάνειν
αὖθις ἐκ τῆς κύστεως τοὺς οὐρητῆρας τὸ οὖρον. ἐπὶ
τούτοις ὀφθεῖσιν ἐπιτρέπειν ἤδη τὸ ζῷον οὐρεῖν
λύοντας αὐτοῦ τὸν ἐπὶ τῷ αἰδοίῳ βρόχον, εἶτ' αὖθις
ἐπιβαλεῖν μὲν θατέρῳ τῶν οὐρητήρων, ἐᾶσαι δὲ τὸν
ἕτερον εἰς τὴν κύστιν συρρεῖν καί τινα διαλιπόντας
χρόνον ἐπιδεικνύειν ἤδη, πῶς ὁ μὲν ἕτερος αὐτῶν ὁ
δεδεμένος μεστὸς καὶ διατεταμένος κατὰ τὰ πρὸς τῶν
νεφρῶν μέρη φαίνεται, ὁ δ' ἕτερος ὁ λελυμένος αὐτὸς
μὲν χαλαρός ἐστι, πεπλήρωκε δ' οὔρου τὴν κύστιν.
εἶτ' αὖθις διατεμεῖν πρῶτον μὲν τὸν πλήρη καὶ
δεῖξαι, πῶς ἐξακοντίζεται τὸ οὖρον ἐξ αὐτοῦ, καθάπερ
ἐν ταῖς φλεβοτομίαις τὸ αἷμα, μετὰ ταῦτα δὲ καὶ τὸν
ἕτερον αὖθις διατεμεῖν κἄπειτ' ἐπιδῆσαι τὸ ζῷον
ἔξωθεν, ἀμφοτέρων διῃρημενων, || εἶθ' ὅταν ἱκανῶς 38
ἔχειν δοκῇ, λῦσαι τὸν δεσμόν. εὑρεθήσεται γὰρ ἡ μὲν
κύστις κενή, πλῆρες δ' οὔρου τὸ μεταξὺ τῶν ἐντέρων
τε καὶ τοῦ περιτοναίου χωρίον ἅπαν, ὡς ἂν εἰ καὶ
ὑδερικὸν ἦν τὸ ζῷον. ταῦτ' οὖν εἴ τις αὐτὸς καθ'
ἑαυτὸν βουληθείη βασανίζειν ἐπὶ ζῴου, μεγάλως μοι
δοκεῖ καταγνώσεσθαι τῆς Ἀσκληπιάδου προπετείας. εἰ
δὲ δὴ καὶ τὴν αἰτίαν μάθοι, δι' ἣν οὐδὲν ἐκ τῆς
κύστεως εἰς τοὺς οὐρητῆρας ἀντεκρεῖ, πεισθῆναι ἄν
μοι δοκεῖ καὶ διὰ τοῦδε τὴν εἰς τὰ ζῷα πρόνοιάν τε
καὶ τέχνην τῆς φύσεως.
Ἱπποκράτης μὲν οὖν ὧν ἴσμεν ἰατρῶν τε καὶ φιλοσόφων
πρῶτος ἁπάντων, ὡς ἂν καὶ πρῶτος ἐπιγνοὺς τὰ τῆς
φύσεως ἔργα, θαυμάζει τε καὶ διὰ παντὸς αὐτὴν ὑμνεῖ
δικαίαν ὀνομάζων καὶ μόνην ἐξαρκεῖν εἰς ἅπαντα τοῖς
ζῴοις φησίν, αὐτὴν ἐξ αὑτῆς ἀδιδάκτως πράττουσαν
ἅπαντα τὰ δέοντα· τοιαύτην δ' οὖσαν αὐτὴν εὐθέως καὶ
δυνάμεις ὑπέλαβεν ἔχειν ἑλκτικὴν μὲν τῶν οἰκείων,
ἀποκριτικὴν δὲ τῶν ἀλλοτρίων καὶ τρέφειν τε καὶ
αὔξειν αὐ||τὴν τὰ ζῷα καὶ κρίνειν τὰ νοσήματα· καὶ 39
διὰ τοῦτ' ἐν τοῖς σώμασιν ἡμῶν σύμπνοιάν τε μίαν
εἶναί φησι καὶ σύρροιαν καὶ πάντα συμπαθέα. κατὰ δὲ
τὸν Ἀσκληπιάδην οὐδὲν οὐδενὶ συμπαθές ἐστι φύσει,
διῃρημένης τε καὶ κατατεθραυσμένης εἰς ἄναρμα
στοιχεῖα καὶ ληρώδεις ὄγκους ἁπάσης τῆς οὐσίας. ἐξ
ἀνάγκης οὖν ἄλλα τε μυρία τοῖς ἐναργῶς φαινομένοις
ἐναντίως ἀπεφήνατο καὶ τῆς φύσεως ἠγνόησε τήν τε τῶν
οἰκείων ἐπισπαστικὴν δύναμιν καὶ τὴν τῶν ἀλλοτρίων
ἀποκριτικήν. ἐπὶ μὲν οὖν τῆς ἐξαιματώσεώς τε καὶ
ἀναδόσεως ἐξεῦρέ τινα ψυχρὰν ἀδολεσχίαν· εἰς δὲ τὴν
τῶν περιττωμάτων κάθαρσιν οὐδὲν ὅλως ἑυρὼν εἰπεῖν
οὐκ ὤκνησεν ὁμόσε χωρῆσαι τοῖς φαινομένοις, ἐπὶ μὲν
τῆς τῶν οὔρων διακρίσεως ἀποστερήσας μὲν τῶν τε
νεφρῶν καὶ τῶν οὐρητήρων τὴν ἐνέργειαν, ἀδήλους δέ
τινας πόρους εἰς τὴν κύστιν ὑποθέμενος· τοῦτο γὰρ ἦν
δηλαδὴ μέγα καὶ σεμνὸν ἀπιστήσαντα τοῖς φαινομένοις
πιστεῦσαι τοῖς ἀδήλοις.
Ἐπὶ || δὲ τῆς ξανθῆς χολῆς ἔτι μεῖζον αὐτῷ καὶ 40
νεανικώτερόν ἐστι τὸ τόλμημα· γεννάσθαι γὰρ αὐτὴν ἐν
τοῖς χοληδόχοις ἀγγείοις, οὐ διακρίνεσθαι λέγει.
Πῶς οὖν τοῖς ἰκτερικοῖς ἅμ' ἄμφω συμπίπτει, τὰ μὲν
διαχωρήματα μηδὲν ὅλως ἐν αὑτοῖς ἔχοντα χολῆς,
ἀνάπλεων δ' αὐτοῖς γιγνόμενον ὅλον τὸ σῶμα; ληρεῖν
πάλιν ἐνταῦθ' ἀναγκάζεται τοῖς ἐπὶ τῶν οὔρων
εἰρημένοις παραπλησίως. ληρεῖ δ' οὐδὲν ἧττον καὶ
περὶ τῆς μελαίνης χολῆς καὶ τοῦ σπληνὸς οὔτε τί ποθ'
ὑφ' Ἱπποκράτους εἴρηται συνιεὶς ἀντιλέγειν τ'
ἐπιχειρῶν οἷς οὐκ οἶδεν ἐμπλήκτῳ τινὶ καὶ μανικῷ
στόματι.
Τί δὴ τὸ κέρδος ἐκ τῶν τοιούτων δογμάτων εἰς τὰς
θεραπείας ἐκτήσατο; μήτε νεφριτικόν τι νόσημα
δύνασθαι θεραπεῦσαι μήτ' ἰκτερικὸν μήτε
μελαγχολικόν, ἀλλὰ καὶ περὶ τοῦ πᾶσιν ἀνθρώποις οὐχ
Ἱπποκράτει μόνον ὁμολογουμένου τοῦ καθαίρειν τῶν
φαρμάκων ἔνια μὲν τὴν ξανθὴν χολήν, ἔνια δὲ τὴν
μέλαιναν, ἄλλα δέ τινα φλέγμα καί τινα τὸ λεπτὸν καὶ
ὑδατῶδες περίττωμα, μηδὲ περὶ τούτων συγχωρεῖν, ἀλλ'
ὑπ' αὐτῶν τῶν φαρμάκων γίγνεσθαι λέγειν τοιοῦτον
ἕκαστον τῶν κενουμένων, ὥσπερ ὑπὸ τῶν χολη||δόχων 41
πόρων τὴν χολήν· καὶ μηδὲν διαφέρειν κατὰ τὸν
θαυμαστὸν Ἀσκληπιάδην ἢ ὑδραγωγὸν διδόναι τοῖς
ὑδεριῶσιν ἢ χολαγωγὸν φάρμακον· ἅπαντα γὰρ ὁμοίως
κενοῦν καὶ συντήκειν τὸ σῶμα καὶ τὸ σύντηγμα τοιόνδε
τι φαίνεσθαι ποιεῖν, μὴ πρότερον ὑπάρχον τοιοῦτον.
Ἆρ' οὖν οὐ μαίνεσθαι νομιστέον αὐτὸν ἢ παντάπασιν
ἄπειρον εἶναι τῶν ἔργων τῆς τέχνης; τίς γὰρ οὐκ
οἶδεν, ὡς, εἰ μὲν φλέγματος ἀγωγὸν δοθείη φάρμακον
τοῖς ἰκτεριῶσιν, οὐκ ἂν οὐδὲ τέτταρας κυάθους
καθαρθεῖεν· οὕτω δ' οὐδ' εἰ τῶν ὑδραγωγῶν τι·
χολαγωγῷ δὲ φαρμάκῳ πλεῖστον μὲν ἐκκενοῦται χολῆς,
αὐτίκα δὲ καθαρὸς τοῖς οὕτω καθαρθεῖσιν ὁ χρὼς
γίγνεται. πολλοὺς γοῦν ἡμεῖς μετὰ τὸ θεραπεῦσαι τὴν
ἐν τῷ ἥπατι διάθεσιν ἅπαξ καθήραντες ἀπηλλάξαμεν τοῦ
παθήματος. οὐ μὴν οὐδ' εἰ φλέγματος ἀγωγῷ καθαίροις
φαρμάκῳ, πλέον ἄν τι διαπράξαιο.
Καὶ ταῦτ' οὐχ Ἱπποκράτης μὲν οὕτως οἶδε γιγνόμενα,
τοῖς δ' ἀπὸ τῆς ἐμπειρίας μόνης ὁρμωμένοις ἑτέρως
ἔγνωσται, ἀλλὰ κἀκεί||νοις ὡσαύτως καὶ πᾶσιν 42
ἰατροῖς, οἷς μέλει τῶν ἔργων τῆς τέχνης, οὕτω δοκεῖ
πλὴν Ἀσκληπιάδου. προδοσίαν γὰρ εἶναι νενόμικε τῶν
στοιχείων ὧν ὑπέθετο τὴν ἀληθῆ περὶ τῶν τοιούτων
ὁμολογίαν. εἰ γὰρ ὅλως εὑρεθείη τι φάρμακον ἑλκτικὸν
τοῦδέ τινος τοῦ χυμοῦ μόνου, κίνδυνος κρατεῖν δηλαδὴ
τῷ λόγῳ τὸ ἐν ἑκάστῳ τῶν σωμάτων εἶναί τινα δύναμιν
ἐπισπαστικὴν τῆς οἰκείας ποιότητος. διὰ τοῦτο κνῆκον
μὲν καὶ κόκκον τὸν κνίδιον καὶ ἱπποφαὲς οὐχ ἕλκειν
ἐκ τοῦ σώματος ἀλλὰ ποιεῖν τὸ φλέγμα φησίν· ἄνθος δὲ
χαλκοῦ καὶ λεπίδα καὶ αὐτὸν τὸν κεκαυμένον χαλκὸν
καὶ χαμαίδρυν καὶ χαμαιλέοντα εἰς ὕδωρ ἀναλύειν τὸ
σῶμα καὶ τοὺς ὑδερικοὺς ὑπὸ τούτων οὐ καθαιρομένους
ὀνίνασθαι ἀλλὰ κενουμένους συναυξόντων δηλαδὴ τὸ
πάθος. εἰ γὰρ οὐ κενοῖ τὸ περιεχόμενον ἐν τοῖς
σώμασιν ὑδατῶδες ὑγρὸν ἀλλ' αὐτὸ γεννᾷ, τῷ νοσήματι
προστιμωρεῖται. καὶ μέν γε καὶ ἡ σκαμμωνία πρὸς τῷ
μὴ κενοῦν ἐκ τοῦ σώματος τῶν ἰκτερικῶν τὴν χολὴν ἔτι
καὶ τὸ χρηστὸν αἷμα χολὴν ἐργαζομένη || καὶ 43
συντήκουσα τὸ σῶμα καὶ τηλικαῦτα κακὰ δρῶσα καὶ τὸ
πάθος ἐπαύξουσα κατά γε τὸν Ἀσκληπιάδου λόγον.
Ὅμως ἐναργῶς ὁρᾶται πολλοὺς ὠφελοῦσα. ναί, φησίν,
ὀνίνανται μέν, ἀλλ' αὐτῷ μόνῳ τῷ λόγῳ τῆς κενώσεως.
καὶ μὴν εἰ φλέγματος ἀγωγὸν αὐτοῖς δοίης φάρμακον,
οὐκ ὀνήσονται. καὶ τοῦθ' οὕτως ἐναργές ἐστιν, ὥστε
καὶ οἱ ἀπὸ μόνης τῆς ἐμπειρίας ὁρμώμενοι
γιγνώσκουσιν αὐτό. καίτοι τούτοις γε τοῖς ἀνδράσιν
αὐτὸ δὴ τοῦτ' ἐστί φιλοσόφημα, τὸ μηδενὶ λόγῳ
πιστεύειν ἀλλὰ μόνοις τοῖς ἐναργῶς φαινομένοις.
ἐκεῖνοι μὲν οὖν σωφρονοῦσιν· Ἀσκληπιάδης δὲ
παραπαίει ταῖς αἰσθήσεσιν ἡμᾶς ἀπιστεῖν κελεύων,
ἔνθα τὸ φαινόμενον ἀνατρέπει σαφῶς αὐτοῦ τὰς
ὑποθέσεις. καίτοι μακρῷ γ' ἦν ἄμεινον οὐχ ὁμόσε
χωρεῖν τοῖς φαινομένοις ἀλλ' ἐκείνοις ἀναθέσθαι τὸ
πᾶν.
Ἆρ' οὖν ταῦτα μόνον ἐναργῶς μάχεται τοῖς Ἀσκληπιάδου
δόγμασιν ἢ καὶ τὸ θέρους μὲν πλείονα κενοῦσθαι τὴν
ξανθὴν χολὴν ὑπὸ τῶν αὐτῶν φαρμάκων, χειμῶνος δὲ τὸ
φλέγμα, καὶ νεανίσκῳ μὲν πλείονα τὴν χολήν, πρεσβύτῃ
δὲ τὸ φλέγμα; φαίνεται || γὰρ ἕκαστον ἕλκειν τὴν 44
οὖσαν, οὐκ αὐτὸ γεννᾶν τὴν οὐκ οὖσαν. εἰ γοῦν
ἐθελήσαις νεανίσκῳ τινὶ τῶν ἰσχνῶν καὶ θερμῶν ὥρᾳ
θέρους μήτ' ἀργῶς βεβιωκότι μήτ' ἐν πλησμονῇ
φλέγματος ἀγωγὸν δοῦναι φάρμακον, ὀλίγιστον μὲν καὶ
μετὰ βίας πολλῆς ἐκκενώσεις τοῦ χυμοῦ, βλάψεις δ'
ἐσχάτως τὸν ἄνθρωπον· ἔμπαλιν δ' εἰ χολαγωγὸν δοίης,
καὶ πάμπολυ κενώσεις καὶ βλάψεις οὐδέν.
Ἆρ' ἀπιστοῦμεν ἔτι τῷ μὴ οὐχ ἕκαστον τῶν φαρμάκων
ἐπάγεσθαι τὸν οἰκεῖον ἑαυτῷ χυμόν; ἴσως φήσουσιν οἱ
ἀπ' Ἀσκληπιάδου, μᾶλλον δ' οὐκ ἴσως, ἀλλὰ πάντως
ἀπιστεῖν ἐροῦσιν, ἵνα μὴ προδῶσι τὰ φίλτατα.
XIV
Let us pass on, then, again to another piece of nonsense; for the
sophists do not allow one to engage in enquiries that are of any
worth, albeit there are many such; they compel one to spend one’s time
in dissipating the fallacious arguments which they bring forward.
What, then, is this piece of nonsense? It has to do with the famous
and far-renowned stone which draws iron [the lodestone]. It might be
thought that this would draw[113] their minds to a belief that there
are in all bodies certain _faculties_ by which they attract their own
proper qualities.
Now Epicurus, despite the fact that he employs in his _Physics_[114]
elements similar to those of Asclepiades,[115] yet allows that iron is
attracted by the lodestone,[116] and chaff by amber. He even tries to
give the cause of the phenomenon. His view is that the atoms which
flow from the stone are related in shape to those flowing from the
iron, and so they become easily interlocked with one another; thus it
is that, after colliding with each of the two compact masses (the
stone and the iron) they then rebound into the middle and so become
entangled with each other, and draw the iron after them. So far, then,
as his hypotheses regarding causation[117] go, he is perfectly
unconvincing; nevertheless, he does grant that there is an attraction.
Further, he says that it is on similar principles that there occur in
the bodies of animals the dispersal of nutriment[118] and the
discharge of waste matters, as also the actions of cathartic drugs.
Asclepiades, however, who viewed with suspicion the incredible
character of the cause mentioned, and who saw no other credible cause
on the basis of his supposed elements, shamelessly had recourse to the
statement that nothing is in any way attracted by anything else. Now,
if he was dissatisfied with what Epicurus said, and had nothing better
to say himself, he ought to have refrained from making hypotheses, and
should have said that Nature is a constructive artist and that the
substance of things is always tending towards unity and also towards
alteration because its own parts act upon and are acted upon by one
another.[119] For, if he had assumed this, it would not have been
difficult to allow that this constructive nature has powers which
attract appropriate and expel alien matter. For in no other way could
she be constructive, preservative of the animal, and eliminative of
its diseases,[120] unless it be allowed that she conserves what is
appropriate and discharges what is foreign.
But in this matter, too, Asclepiades realized the logical sequence of
the principles he had assumed; he showed no scruples, however, in
opposing plain fact; he joins issue in this matter also, not merely
with all physicians, but with everyone else, and maintains that there
is no such thing as a crisis, or critical day,[121] and that Nature
does absolutely nothing for the preservation of the animal. For his
constant aim is to follow out logical consequences and to upset
obvious fact, in this respect being opposed to Epicurus; for the
latter always stated the observed fact, although he gives an
ineffective explanation of it. For, that these small corpuscles
belonging to the lodestone rebound, and become entangled with other
similar particles of the iron, and that then, by means of this
entanglement (which cannot be seen anywhere) such a heavy substance as
iron is attracted—I fail to understand how anybody could believe
this. Even if we admit this, the same principle will not explain the
fact that, when the iron has another piece brought in contact with it,
this becomes attached to it.
For what are we to say? That, forsooth, some of the particles that
flow from the lodestone collide with the iron and then rebound back,
and that it is by these that the iron becomes suspended? that others
penetrate into it, and rapidly pass through it by way of its empty
channels?[122] that these then collide with the second piece of iron
and are not able to penetrate it although they penetrated the first
piece? and that they then course back to the first piece, and produce
entanglements like the former ones?
The hypothesis here becomes clearly refuted by its absurdity. As a
matter of fact, I have seen five writing-stylets of iron attached to
one another in a line, only the first one being in contact with the
lodestone, and the power[123] being transmitted through it to the
others. Moreover, it cannot be said that if you bring a second stylet
into contact with the lower end of the first, it becomes held,
attached, and suspended, whereas, if you apply it to any other part of
the side it does not become attached. For the power of the lodestone
is distributed in all directions; it merely needs to be in contact
with the first stylet at any point; from this stylet again the power
flows, as quick as a thought, all through the second, and from that
again to the third. Now, if you imagine a small lodestone hanging in a
house, and in contact with it all round a large number of pieces of
iron, from them again others, from these others, and so on,—all these
pieces of iron must surely become filled with the corpuscles which
emanate from the stone; therefore, this first little stone is likely
to become dissipated by disintegrating into these emanations.[124]
Further, even if there be no iron in contact with it, it still
disperses into the air, particularly if this be also warm.
“Yes,” says Epicurus, “but these corpuscles must be looked on as
exceedingly small, so that some of them are a ten-thousandth part of
the size of the very smallest particles carried in the air.” Then do
you venture to say that so great a weight of iron can be suspended by
such small bodies? If each of them is a ten-thousandth part as large
as the dust particles which are borne in the atmosphere, how big must
we suppose the hook-like extremities by which they interlock with each
other[125] to be? For of course this is quite the smallest portion of
the whole particle.
Then, again, when a small body becomes entangled with another small
body, or when a body in motion becomes entangled with another also in
motion, they do not rebound at once. For, further, there will of
course be others which break in upon them from above, from below, from
front and rear, from right and left, and which shake and agitate them
and never let them rest. Moreover, we must perforce suppose that each
of these small bodies has a large number of these hook-like
extremities. For by one it attaches itself to its neighbours, by
another—the topmost one—to the lodestone, and by the bottom one to
the iron. For if it were attached to the stone above and not
interlocked with the iron below, this would be of no use.[126] Thus,
the upper part of the superior extremity must hang from the lodestone,
and the iron must be attached to the lower end of the inferior
extremity; and, since they interlock with each other by their sides as
well, they must, of course, have hooks there too. Keep in mind also,
above everything, what small bodies these are which possess all these
different kinds of outgrowths. Still more, remember how, in order that
the second piece of iron may become attached to the first, the third
to the second, and to that the fourth, these absurd little particles
must both penetrate the passages in the first piece of iron and at the
same time rebound from the piece coming next in the series, although
this second piece is naturally in every way similar to the first.
Such an hypothesis, once again, is certainly not lacking in audacity;
in fact, to tell the truth, it is far more shameless than the previous
ones; according to it, when five similar pieces of iron are arranged
in a line, the particles of the lodestone which easily traverse the
first piece of iron rebound from the second, and do not pass readily
through it in the same way. Indeed, it is nonsense, whichever
alternative is adopted. For, if they do rebound, how then do they pass
through into the third piece? And if they do not rebound, how does the
second piece become suspended to the first? For Epicurus himself
looked on the rebound as the active agent in attraction.
But, as I have said, one is driven to talk nonsense whenever one gets
into discussion with such men. Having, therefore, given a concise and
summary statement of the matter, I wish to be done with it. For if one
diligently familiarizes oneself with the writings of Asclepiades, one
will see clearly their logical dependence on his first principles, but
also their disagreement with observed facts. Thus, Epicurus, in his
desire to adhere to the facts, cuts an awkward figure by aspiring to
show that these agree with his principles, whereas Asclepiades
safeguards the sequence of principles, but pays no attention to the
obvious fact. Whoever, therefore, wishes to expose the absurdity of
their hypotheses, must, if the argument be in answer to Asclepiades,
keep in mind his disagreement with observed fact; or if in answer to
Epicurus, his discordance with his principles. Almost all the other
sects depending on similar principles are now entirely extinct, while
these alone maintain a respectable existence still. Yet the tenets of
Asclepiades have been unanswerably confuted by Menodotus the
Empiricist, who draws his attention to their opposition to phenomena
and to each other; and, again, those of Epicurus have been confuted by
Asclepiades, who adhered always to logical sequence, about which
Epicurus evidently cares little.
Now people of the present day do not begin by getting a clear
comprehension of these sects, as well as of the better ones,
thereafter devoting a long time to judging and testing the true and
false in each of them; despite their ignorance, they style themselves,
some “physicians” and others “philosophers.” No wonder, then, that
they honour the false equally with the true. For everyone becomes like
the first teacher that he comes across, without waiting to learn
anything from anybody else. And there are some of them, who, even if
they meet with more than one teacher, are yet so unintelligent and
slow-witted that even by the time they have reached old age they are
still incapable of understanding the steps of an argument.... In the
old days such people used to be set to menial tasks.... What will be
the end of it God knows!
Now, we usually refrain from arguing with people whose principles are
wrong from the outset. Still, having been compelled by the natural
course of events to enter into some kind of a discussion with them, we
must add this further to what was said—that it is not only cathartic
drugs which naturally attract their special qualities,[127] but also
those which remove thorns and the points of arrows such as sometimes
become deeply embedded in the flesh. Those drugs also which draw out
animal poisons or poisons applied to arrows all show the same faculty
as does the lodestone. Thus, I myself have seen a thorn which was
embedded in a young man’s foot fail to come out when we exerted
forcible traction with our fingers, and yet come away painlessly and
rapidly on the application of a medicament. Yet even to this some
people will object, asserting that when the inflammation is dispersed
from the part the thorn comes away of itself, without being pulled out
by anything. But these people seem, in the first place, to be unaware
that there are certain drugs for drawing out inflammation and
different ones for drawing out embedded substances; and surely if it
was on the cessation of an inflammation that the abnormal matters were
expelled, then all drugs which disperse inflammations ought, _ipso
facto_, to possess the power of extracting these substances as
well.[128]
And secondly, these people seem to be unaware of a still more
surprising fact, namely, that not merely do certain medicaments draw
out thorns and others poisons, but that of the latter there are some
which attract the poison of the viper, others that of the
sting-ray,[129] and others that of some other animal; we can, in fact,
plainly observe these poisons deposited on the medicaments. Here,
then, we must praise Epicurus for the respect he shows towards obvious
facts, but find fault with his views as to causation. For how can it
be otherwise than extremely foolish to suppose that a thorn which we
failed to remove by digital traction could be drawn out by these
minute particles?
Have we now, therefore, convinced ourselves that everything which
exists[130] possesses a faculty by which it attracts its proper
quality, and that some things do this more, and some less?
Or shall we also furnish our argument with the illustration afforded
by _corn_?[131] For those who refuse to admit that anything is
attracted by anything else, will, I imagine, be here proved more
ignorant regarding Nature than the very peasants. When, for my own
part, I first learned of what happens, I was surprised, and felt
anxious to see it with my own eyes. Afterwards, when experience also
had confirmed its truth, I sought long among the various sects for an
explanation, and, with the exception of that which gave the first
place to _attraction_, I could find none which even approached
plausibility, all the others being ridiculous and obviously quite
untenable.
What happens, then, is the following. When our peasants are bringing
corn from the country into the city in wagons, and wish to filch some
away without being detected, they fill earthen jars with water and
stand them among the corn; the corn then draws the moisture into
itself through the jar and acquires additional bulk and weight, but
the fact is never detected by the onlookers unless someone who knew
about the trick before makes a more careful inspection. Yet, if you
care to set down the same vessel in the very hot sun, you will find
the daily loss to be very little indeed. Thus corn has a greater power
than extreme solar heat of drawing to itself the moisture in its
neighbourhood.[132] Thus the theory that the water is carried towards
the rarefied part of the air surrounding us[133] (particularly when
that is distinctly warm) is utter nonsense; for although it is much
more rarefied there than it is amongst the corn, yet it does not take
up a tenth part of the moisture which the corn does.
XIV
Πάλιν οὖν καὶ ἡμεῖς ἐφ' ἑτέραν μεταβῶμεν ἀδολεσχίαν·
οὐ γὰρ ἐπιτρέπουσιν οἱ σοφισταὶ τῶν ἀξίων τι
ζητημάτων προχειρίζεσθαι καίτοι παμπόλλων
ὑπαρχόντων, ἀλλὰ κατατρίβειν ἀναγκάζουσι τὸν χρόνον
εἰς τὴν τῶν σοφισμάτων, ὧν προβάλλουσι, λύσιν.
Τίς οὖν ἡ ἀδολεσχία; ἡ ἔνδοξος αὕτη καὶ πολυθρύλητος
λίθος ἡ τὸν σίδηρον || ἐπισπωμένη. τάχα γὰρ ἂν αὕτη 45
ποτὲ τὴν ψυχὴν αὐτῶν ἐπισπάσαιτο πιστεύειν εἶναί
τινας ἐν ἑκάστῳ τῶν σωμάτων ἑλκτικάς τῶν οἰκείων
ποιοτήτων δυνάμεις.
Ἐπίκουρος μὲν οὖν καίτοι παραπλησίοις Ἀσκληπιάδῃ
στοιχείοις πρὸς τὴν φυσιολογίαν χρώμενος ὅμως
ὁμολογεῖ, πρὸς μὲν τῆς ἡρακλείας λίθου τὸν σίδηρον
ἕλκεσθαι, πρὸς δὲ τῶν ἠλέκτρων τὰ κυρήβια καὶ
πειρᾶταί γε καὶ τὴν αἰτίαν ἀποδιδόναι τοῦ
φαινομένου. τὰς γὰρ ἀπορρεούσας ἀτόμους ἀπὸ τῆς
λίθου ταῖς ἀπορρεούσαις ἀπὸ τοῦ σιδήρου τοῖς
σχήμασιν οἰκείας εἶναί φησιν, ὥστε περιπλέκεσθαι
ῥᾳδίως. προσκρουούσας οὖν αὐτὰς τοῖς συγκρίμασιν
ἑκατέροις τῆς τε λίθου καὶ τοῦ σιδήρου κἄπειτ' εἰς
τὸ μέσον ἀποπαλλομένας οὕτως ἀλλήλαις τε
περιπλέκεσθαι καὶ συνεπισπᾶσθαι τὸν σίδηρον. τὸ μὲν
οὖν τῶν ὑποθέσεων εἰς τὴν αἰτιολογίαν ἀπίθανον
ἄντικρυς δῆλον, ὅμως δ' οὖν ὁμολογεῖ τὴν ὁλκήν. καὶ
οὕτω γε καὶ κατὰ τὰ σώματα τῶν ζῴων φησὶ γίγνεσθαι
τάς τ' ἀναδόσεις καὶ τὰς διακρίσεις τῶν περιττωμάτων
καὶ τὰς τῶν καθαιρόντων φαρμάκων ἐνεργείας.
Ἀσκληπιάδης δὴ τό τε τῆς ἐιρημένης αἰτίας ἀπίθανον
|| ὑπιδόμενος καὶ μηδεμίαν ἄλλην ἐφ' οἷς ὑπέθετο 46
στοιχείοις ἐξευρίσκων πιθανὴν ἐπὶ τὸ μηδ' ὅλως
ἕλκεσθαι λέγειν ὑπὸ μηδενὸς μηδὲν ἀναισχυντήσας
ἐτράπετο, δέον, εἰ μήθ' οἷς Ἐπίκουρος εἶπεν ἠρέσκετο
μήτ' ἄλλα βελτίω λέγειν εἶχεν, ἀποστῆναι τῶν
ὑποθέσεων καὶ τήν τε φύσιν εἰπεῖν τεχνικὴν καὶ τὴν
οὐσίαν τῶν ὄντων ἑνουμένην τε πρὸς ἑαυτὴν ἀεὶ καὶ
ἀλλοιουμένην ὑπὸ τῶν ἑαυτὴς μορίων εἰς ἄλληλα
δρώντων τε καὶ πασχόντων. εἰ γὰρ ταῦθ' ὑπέθετο,
χαλεπὸν οὐδὲν ἦν τὴν τεχνικὴν ἐκείνην φύσιν
ὁμολογῆσαι δύναμεις ἔχειν ἐπισπαστικὴν μὲν τῶν
οἰκείων, ἀποκριτικὴν δὲ τῶν ἀλλοτρίων. οὐ γὰρ δι'
ἄλλο τί γ' ἦν αὐτῇ τὸ τεχνικῇ τ' εἶναι καὶ τοῦ ζῴου
διασωστικῇ καὶ τῶν νοσημάτων κριτικῇ παρὰ τὸ
προσίεσθαι μὲν καὶ φυλάττειν τὸ οἰκεῖον, ἀποκρίνειν
δὲ τὸ ἀλλότριον.
Ἀλλ' Ἀσκληπιάδης κἀνταῦθα τὸ μὲν ἀκόλουθον ταῖς
ἀρχαῖς αἷς ὑπέθετο συνεῖδεν, οὐ μὴν τήν γε πρὸς τὸ
φαινόμενον ἐναργῶς ᾐδέσθη μάχην, ἀλλ' ὁμόσε || χωρεῖ 47
καὶ περὶ τούτου πᾶσιν οὐκ ἰατροῖς μόνον ἀλλ' ἤδη καὶ
τοῖς ἄλλοις ἀνθρώποις οὔτε κρίσιν εἶναί τινα λέγων
οὔθ' ἡμέραν κρίσιμον οὔθ' ὅλως οὐδὲν ἐπὶ σωτηρίᾳ τοῦ
ζῴου πραγματεύσασθαι τὴν φύσιν. ἀεὶ γὰρ τὸ μὲν
ἀκόλουθον φυλάττειν βούλεται, τὸ δ' ἐναργῶς
φαινόμενον ἀνατρέπειν ἔμπαλιν Ἐπικούρῳ. τιθεὶς γὰρ
ἐκεῖνος ἀεὶ τὸ φαινόμενον αἰτίαν αὐτοῦ ψυχρὰν
ἀποδίδωσι. τὰ γὰρ ἀποπαλλόμενα σμικρὰ σώματα τῆς
ἡρακλείας λίθου τοιούτοις ἑτέροις περιπλέκεσθαι
μορίοις τοῦ σιδήρου κἄπειτα διὰ τῆς περιπλοκῆς
ταύτης μηδαμοῦ φαινομένης ἐπισπᾶσθαι βαρεῖαν οὕτως
οὐσίαν οὐκ οἶδ' ὅπως ἄν τις πεισθείη. καὶ γὰρ εἰ
τοῦτο συγχωρήσομεν, τό γε τῷ σιδήρῳ πάλιν ἕτερον
προστεθέν τι συνάπτεσθαι τὴν αὐτὴν αἰτίαν οὐκέτι
προσίεται.
Τί γὰρ ἐροῦμεν; ἢ δηλαδὴ τῶν ἀπορρεόντων τῆς λίθου
μορίων ἔνια μὲν προσκρούσαντα τῷ σιδήρῳ πάλιν
ἀποπάλλεσθαι καὶ ταῦτα μὲν εἶναι, δι' ὧν
κρεμάννυσθαι συμβαίνει τὸν σίδηρον, τὰ δ' εἰς αὐτὸν
εἰσδυόμενα διὰ τῶν || κενῶν πόρων διεξέρχεσθαι 48
τάχιστα κἄπειτα τῷ παρακειμένῳ σιδήρῳ προσκρούοντα
μήτ' ἐκεῖνον διαδῦναι δύνασθαι, καίτοι τόν γε πρῶτον
διαδύντα, παλινδρομοῦντα δ' αὖθις ἐπὶ τὸν πρότερον
ἑτέρας αὖθις ἐργάζεσθαι ταῖς προτέραις ὁμοίας
περιπλοκάς;
Ἐναργῶς γὰρ ἐνταῦθα τὸ ληρῶδες τῆς αἰτίας ἐλέγχεται.
γραφεῖα γοῦν οἶδα ποτε σιδηρᾶ πέντε κατὰ τὸ συνεχὲς
ἀλλήλοις συναφθέντα, τοῦ πρώτου μὲν μόνου τῆς λίθου
ψαύσαντος, ἐξ ἐκείνου δ' εἰς τἆλλα τῆς δυνάμεως
διαδοθείσης· καὶ οὐκ ἔστιν εἰπεῖν, ὡς, εἰ μὲν τῷ
κάτω τοῦ γραφείου πέρατι προσάγοις ἕτερον, ἔχεταί τε
καὶ συνάπτεται καὶ κρέμαται τὸ προσενεχθέν· εἰ δ'
ἄλλῳ τινὶ μέρει τῶν πλαγίων προσθείης, οὐ
συνάπτεται. πάντη γὰρ ὁμοίως ἡ τῆς λίθου διαδίδοται
δύναμις, εἰ μόνον ἅψαιτο κατά τι τοῦ πρώτου
γραφείου. καὶ μέντοι κἀκ τούτου πάλιν εἰς τὸ
δεύτερον ὅλον ἡ δύναμις ἅμα νοήματι διαρρεῖ κἀξ
ἐκείνου πάλιν εἰς τὸ τρίτον ὅλον. εἰ δὴ νοήσαις
σμικράν τινα λίθον ἡρακλείαν ἐν οἴκῳ τινὶ
κρεμαμένην, εἶτ' ἐν κύκλῳ ψαύοντα πάμπολλα σιδήρια
κἀκείνων πάλιν ἑτέρα κἀκείνων ἄλλα καὶ τοῦτ' ἄχρι
πλείονος, ἅπαντα || δήπου πίμπλασθαι δεῖ τὰ σιδήρια 49
τῶν ἀπορρεόντων τῆς λίθου σωμάτων. καὶ κινδυνεύει
διαφορηθῆναι τὸ σμικρὸν ἐκεῖνο λιθίδιον εἰς τὰς
ἀπορροὰς διαλυθέν. καίτοι, κἂν εἰ μηδὲν παρακέοιτ'
αὐτῷ σιδήριον, εἰς τὸν ἀέρα σκεδάννυται, μάλιστ' εἰ
καὶ θερμὸς ὑπάρχοι.
Ναί, φησί, σμικρὰ γὰρ αὐτὰ χρὴ πάνυ νοεῖν, ὥστε τῶν
ἐμφερομένων τῷ ἀέρι ψηγμάτων τούτων δὴ τῶν
σμικροτάτων ἐκείνων ἔνια μυριοστὸν εἶναι μέρος. εἶτ'
ἐξ οὕτω σμικρῶν τολμᾶτε λέγειν κρεμάννυσθαι βάρη
τηλικαῦτα σιδήρου; εἰ γὰρ ἕκαστον αὐτῶν μυριοστόν
ἐστι μέρος τῶν ἐν τῷ ἀέρι φερομένων ψηγμάτων,
πηλίκον χρὴ νοῆσαι τὸ πέρας αὐτῶν τὸ ἀγκιστροειδές,
ᾧ περιπλέκεται πρὸς ἄλληλα; πάντως γὰρ δήπου τοῦτο
σμικρότατόν ἐστιν ὅλου τοῦ ψήγματος.
Εἶτα μικρὸν μικρῷ, κινούμενον κινουμένῳ περιπλακὲν
οὐκ εὐθὺς ἀποπάλλεται. καὶ γὰρ δὴ καὶ ἄλλ' ἄττα
πάντως αὐτοῖς, τὰ μὲν ἄνωθεν, τὰ δὲ κάτωθεν, καὶ τὰ
μὲν ἔμπροσθεν, τὰ δ' ὄπισθεν, τὰ δ' ἐκ τῶν δεξιῶν,
τὰ δ' ἐκ τῶν ἀριστερῶν || ἐκρηγνύμενα σείει τε καὶ 50
βράττει καὶ μένειν οὐκ ἐᾷ. καὶ μέντοι καὶ πολλὰ χρὴ
νοεῖν ἐξ ἀνάγκης ἕκαστον ἐκείνων τῶν σμικρῶν σωμάτων
ἔχειν ἀγκιστρώδη πέρατα. δι' ἑνὸς μὲν γὰρ ἀλλήλοις
συνάπτεται, δι' ἑτέρου δ' ἑνὸς τοῦ μὲν ὑπερκειμένου
τῇ λίθῳ, τοῦ δ' ὑποκειμένου τῷ σιδήρῳ. εἰ γὰρ ἄνω
μὲν ἐξαφθείη τῆς λίθου, κάτω δὲ τῷ σιδήρῳ μὴ
συμπλακείη, πλέον οὐδέν. ὥστε τοῦ μὲν ὑπερκειμένου
τὸ ἄνω μέρος ἐκκρέμασθαι χρὴ τῆς λίθου, τοῦ δ'
ὑποκειμένου τῷ κάτω πέρατι συνῆφθαι τὸν σίδηρον.
ἐπεὶ δὲ κἀκ τῶν πλαγίων ἀλλήλοις περιπλέκεται,
πάντως που κἀνταῦθα ἔχει τὰ ἄγκιστρα. καὶ μέμνησό
μοι πρὸ πάντων, ὅπως ὄντα σμικρὰ τὰς τοιαύτας καὶ
τοσαύτας ἀποφύσεις ἔχει. καὶ τούτου μᾶλλον ἔτι, πῶς,
ἵνα τὸ δεύτερον σιδήριον συναφθῇ τῷ πρώτῳ καὶ τῷ
δευτέρῳ τὸ τρίτον κἀκείνῳ τὸ τέταρτον, ἅμα μὲν
διεξέρχεσθαι χρὴ τοὺς πόρους ταυτὶ τὰ σμικρὰ καὶ
ληρώδη ψήγματα, ἅμα δ' ἀποπάλλεσθαι τοῦ μετ' αὐτὸ || 51
τεταγμένου, καίτοι κατὰ πᾶν ὁμοίου τὴν φύσιν
ὑπάρχοντος.
Οὐδὲ γὰρ ἡ τοιαύτη πάλιν ὑπόθεσις ἄτολμος, ἀλλ', εἰ
χρὴ τἀληθὲς εἰπεῖν, μακρῷ τῶν ἔμπροσθεν
ἀναισχυντοτέρα, πέντε σιδηρίων ὁμοίων ἀλλήλοις
ἐφεξῆς τεταγμένων διὰ τοῦ πρώτου διαδυόμενα ῥᾳδίως
τῆς λίθου τὰ μόρια κατὰ τὸ δεύτερον ἀποπάλλεσθαι καὶ
μὴ διὰ τούτου κατὰ τὸν αὐτὸν τρόπον ἑτοίμως
διεξέρχεσθαι. καὶ μὴν ἑκατέρως ἄτοπον. εἰ μὲν γὰρ
ἀποπάλλεται, πῶς εἰς τὸ τρίτον ὠκέως διεξέρχεται; εἰ
δ' οὐκ ἀποπάλλεται, πῶς κρεμάννυται τὸ δεύτερον ἐκ
τοῦ πρώτου; τὴν γὰρ ἀπόπαλσιν αὐτὸς ὑπέθετο
δημιουργὸν τῆς ὁλκῆς.
Ἀλλ', ὅπερ ἔφην, εἰς ἀδολεσχίαν ἀναγκαῖον ἐμπίπτειν,
ἐπειδάν τις τοιούτοις ἀνδράσι διαλέγηται. σύντομον
οὖν τινα καὶ κεφαλαιώδη λόγον εἰπὼν ἀπαλλάττεσθαι
βούλομαι. τοῖς Ἀσκληπιάδου γράμμασιν εἴ τις ἐπιμελῶς
ὁμιλήσειε, τήν τε πρὸς τὰς ἀρχὰς ἀκολουθίαν τῶν
τοιούτων δογμάτων ἀκριβῶς ἂν ἐκμάθοι καὶ τὴν πρὸς τὰ
φαινόμενα μάχην. ὁ μὲν οὖν Ἐπίκουρος τὰ φαινόμενα
φυλάττειν βουλόμενος ἀσχημονεῖ || φιλοτιμούμενος 52
ἐπιδεικνύειν αὐτὰ ταῖς ἀρχαῖς ὁμολογοῦντα· ὁ δ'
Ἀσκληπιάδης τὸ μὲν ἀκόλουθον ταῖς ἀρχαῖς φυλάττει,
τοῦ φαινομένου δ' οὐδὲν αὐτῷ μέλει. ὅστις οὖν
βούλεται τὴν ἀτοπίαν ἐξελέγχειν τῶν ὑποθέσεων, εἰ
μὲν πρὸς Ἀσκληπιάδην ὁ λόγος αὐτῷ γίγνοιτο, τῆς πρὸς
τὸ φαινόμενον ὑπομιμνησκέτω μάχης· εἰ δὲ πρὸς
Ἐπίκουρον, τῆς πρὸς τὰς ἀρχὰς διαφωνίας. αἱ δ' ἄλλαι
σχεδὸν αἱρέσεις αἱ τῶν ὁμοίων ἀρχῶν ἐχόμεναι τελέως
ἀπέσβησαν, αὗται δ' ἔτι μόναι διαρκοῦσιν οὐκ
ἀγεννῶς. καίτοι τὰ μὲν Ἀσκληπιάδου Μηνόδοτος ὁ
ἐμπειρικὸς ἀφύκτως ἐξελέγχει, τήν τε πρὸς τὰ
φαινόμενα μάχην ὑπομιμνήσκων αὐτὸν καὶ τὴν πρὸς
ἄλληλα· τὰ δ' Ἐπικούρου πάλιν ὁ Ἀσκληπιάδης ἐχόμενος
ἀεὶ τῆς ἀκολουθίας, ἧς ἐκεῖνος οὐ πάνυ τι φαίνεται
φροντίζων.
Ἀλλ' οἱ νῦν ἄνθρωποι, πρὶν καὶ ταύτας ἐκμαθεῖν τὰς
αἱρέσεις καὶ τὰς ἄλλας τὰς βελτίους κἄπειτα χρόνῳ
πολλῷ κρῖναί τε καὶ βασανίσαι τὸ καθ' ἑκάστην αὐτῶν
ἀληθές τε καὶ ψεῦδος, οἱ μὲν ἰατροὺς ἑαυτούς, οἱ δὲ
φιλοσόφους ὀνομάζουσι μηδὲν εἰδότες. || οὐδὲν οὖν 53
θαυμαστὸν ἐπίσης τοῖς ἀληθέσι τὰ ψευδῆ τετιμῆσθαι.
ὅτῳ γὰρ ἂν ἕκαστος πρώτῳ περιτύχῃ διδασκάλῳ,
τοιοῦτος ἐγένετο, μὴ περιμείνας μηδὲν ἔτι παρ' ἄλλου
μαθεῖν. ἔνιοι δ' αὐτῶν, εἰ καὶ πλείοσιν ἐντύχοιεν,
ἀλλ' οὕτω γ' εἰσὶν ἀσύνετοί τε καὶ βραδεῖς τὴν
διάνοιαν, ὥστε καὶ γεγηρακότες οὔπω συνιᾶσιν
ἀκολουθίαν λόγου. πάλαι δὲ τοὺς τοιούτους ἐπὶ τὰς
βαναύσους ἀπέλυον τέχνας. ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν ἐς ὅ τι
τελευτήσει θεὸς οἶδεν.
Ἡμεῖς δ' ἐπειδή, καίτοι φεύγοντες ἀντιλέγειν τοῖς ἐν
αὐταῖς ταῖς ἀρχαῖς εὐθὺς ἐσφαλμένοις, ὅμως
ἠναγκάσθημεν ὑπ' αὐτῆς τῶν πραγμάτων τῆς ἀκολουθίας
εἰπεῖν τινα καὶ διαλεχθῆναι πρὸς αὐτούς, ἔτι καὶ
τοῦτο προσθήσομεν τοῖς εἰρημένοις, ὡς οὐ μόνον τὰ
καθαίροντα φάρμακα πέφυκεν ἐπισπᾶσθαι τὰς οἰκείας
ποιότητας ἀλλὰ καὶ τὰ τοὺς σκόλοπας ἀνάγοντα καὶ τὰς
τῶν βελῶν ἀκίδας εἰς πολὺ βάθος σαρκὸς ἐμπεπαρμένας
ἐνίοτε. καὶ μέντοι καὶ ὅσα τοὺς ἰοὺς τῶν θηρίων ἢ
τοὺς ἐμπεφαρμαγμένους τοῖς βέλεσιν ἀνέλκει, καὶ
ταῦτα τὴν αὐτὴν ταῖς ἡρακλείαις λίθοις
ἐπὶ||δείκνυται δύναμιν. ἔγωγ' οὖν οἶδά ποτε 54
καταπεπαρμένον ἐν ποδὶ νεανίσκου σκόλοπα τοῖς μὲν
δακτύλοις ἕλκουσιν ἡμῖν βιαίως οὐκ ἀκολουθήσαντα,
φαρμάκου δ' ἐπιτεθέντος ἀλύπως τε καὶ διὰ ταχέων
ἀνελθόντα. καίτοι καὶ πρὸς τοῦτό τινες ἀντιλέγουσι
φάσκοντες, ὅταν ἡ φλεγμονὴ λυθῇ τοῦ μέρους,
αὐτόματον ἐξιέναι τὸν σκόλοπα πρὸς οὐδενὸς
ἀνελκόμενον. ἀλλ' οὗτοί γε πρῶτον μὲν ἀγνοεῖν
ἐοίκασιν, ὡς ἄλλα μέν ἐστι φλεγμονῆς, ἄλλα δὲ τῶν
οὕτω καταπεπαρμένων ἑλκτικὰ φάρμακα· καίτοι γ' εἴπερ
ἀφλεγμάντων γενομένων ἐξεκρίνετο τὰ παρὰ φύσιν, ὅσα
φλεγμονῆς ἐστι λυτικά, ταῦτ' εὐθὺς ἂν ἦν κἀκείνων
ἑλκτικά.
Δεύτερον δ', ὃ καὶ μᾶλλον ἄν τις θαυμάσειεν, ὡς οὐ
μόνον ἄλλα μὲν τοὺς σκόλοπας, ἄλλα δὲ τοὺς ἰοὺς
ἐξάγει φάρμακα, ἀλλὰ καὶ αὐτῶν τῶν τοὺς ἰοὺς
ἑλκόντων τὰ μὲν τὸν τῆς ἐχίδνης, τὰ δὲ τὸν τῆς
τρυγόνος, τὰ δ' ἄλλου τινὸς ἐπισπᾶται καὶ σαφῶς
ἔστιν ἰδεῖν τοῖς φαρμάκοις ἐπικειμένους αὐτούς.
ἐνταῦθ' οὖν Ἐπίκουρον μὲν ἐπαινεῖν χρὴ τῆς πρὸς || 55
τὸ φαινόμενον αἰδοῦς, μέμφεσθαι δὲ τὸν λόγον τῆς
αἰτίας. ὃν γὰρ ἡμεῖς ἕλκοντες τοῖς δακτύλοις οὐκ
ἀνηγάγομεν σκόλοπα, τοῦτον ὑπὸ τῶν σμικρῶν ἐκείνων
ἀνέλκεσθαι ψηγμάτων, πῶς οὐ παντάπασιν ἄτοπον εἶναι
χρὴ νομίζειν;
Ἆρ' οὖν ἤδη πεπείσμεθα τῶν ὄντων ἑκάστῳ δύναμίν τιν'
ὑπάρχειν, ᾗ τὴν οἰκείαν ἕλκει ποιότητα, τὸ μὲν
μᾶλλον, τὸ δ' ἧττον;
Ἢ καὶ τὸ τῶν πυρῶν ἔτι παράδειγμα προχειρισόμεθα τῷ
λόγῳ; φανήσονται γὰρ οἶμαι καὶ τῶν γεωργῶν αὐτῶν
ἀμαθέστεροι περὶ τὴν φύσιν οἱ μηδὲν ὅλως ὑπὸ μηδενὸς
ἕλκεσθαι συγχωροῦντες· ὡς ἔγωγε πρῶτον μὲν ἀκούσας
τὸ γιγνόμενον ἐθαύμασα καὶ αὐτὸς ἠβουλήθην αὐτόπτης
αὐτοῦ καταστῆναι. μετὰ ταῦτα δέ, ὡς καὶ τὰ τῆς
πείρας ὡμολόγει, τὴν αἰτίαν σκοπούμενος ἐν παμπόλλῳ
χρόνῳ κατὰ πάσας τὰς αἱρέσεις οὐδεμίαν ἄλλην εὑρεῖν
οἷός τ' ἦν οὐδ' ἄχρι τοῦ πιθανοῦ προϊοῦσαν ἀλλὰ
καταγελάστους τε καὶ σαφῶς ἐξελεγχομένας τὰς ἄλλας
ἁπάσας πλὴν τῆς τὴν ὁλκὴν πρεσβευούσης.
Ἔστι δὲ τὸ γιγνόμενον τοιόνδε. κατακομίζοντες οἱ
παρ' ἡμῖν γεωργοὶ τοὺς || ἐκ τῶν ἀγρῶν πυροὺς εἰς 56
τὴν πόλιν ἐν ἁμάξαις τισίν, ὅταν ὑφελέσθαι
βουληθῶσιν, ὥστε μὴ φωραθῆναι, κεράμι' ἄττα
πληρώσαντες ὕδατος μέσοις αὐτοῖς ἐνιστᾶσιν. ἕλκοντες
οὖν ἐκεῖνοι διὰ τοῦ κεραμίου τὸ ὑγρὸν εἰς αὑτοὺς
ὄγκον μὲν καὶ βάρος προσκτῶνται, κατάδηλοι δ' οὐ
πάνυ γίγνονται τοῖς ὁρῶσιν, εἰ μή τις προπεπυσμένος
ἤδη περιεργότερον ἐπισκοποῖτο. καίτοι γ' εἰ
βουληθείης ἐν ἡλίῳ καταθεῖναι πάνυ θερμῷ ταὐτὸν
ἀγγεῖον, ἐλάχιστον παντελῶς εὑρήσεις τὸ δαπανώμενον
ἐφ' ἑκάστης ἡμέρας. οὕτως ἄρα καὶ τῆς ἡλιακῆς
θερμασίας τῆς σφοδρᾶς ἰσχυροτέραν οἱ πυροὶ δύναμιν
ἔχουσιν ἕλκειν εἰς ἑαυτοὺς τὴν πλησιάζουσαν
ὑγρότητα. λῆρος οὖν ἐνταῦθα μακρὸς ἡ πρὸς τὸ
λεπτομερὲς φορὰ τοῦ περιέχοντος ἡμᾶς ἀέρος καὶ
μάλισθ' ὅταν ἱκανῶς ᾖ θερμός, πολὺ μὲν ὑπάρχοντος ἢ
κατὰ τοὺς πυροὺς λεπτομερεστέρου, δεχομένου δ' οὐδὲ
τὸ δέκατον μέρος τῆς εἰς ἐκείνους μεταλαμβανομένης
ὑγρότητος.
XV
Since then, we have talked sufficient nonsense—not willingly, but
because we were forced, as the proverb says, “to behave madly among
madmen”—let us return again to the subject of urinary secretion. Here
let us forget the absurdities of Asclepiades, and, in company with
those who are persuaded that the urine does pass through the kidneys,
let us consider what is the character of this function. For, most
assuredly, either the urine is conveyed by its own motion to the
kidneys, considering this the better course (as do we when we go off
to market![134]), or, if this be impossible, then some other reason
for its conveyance must be found. What, then, is this? If we are not
going to grant the kidneys a faculty for attracting this particular
quality,[135] as Hippocrates held, we shall discover no other reason.
For, surely everyone sees that either the kidneys must attract the
urine, or the veins must propel it—if, that is, it does not move of
itself. But if the veins did exert a propulsive action when they
contract, they would squeeze out into the kidneys not merely the
urine, but along with it the whole of the blood which they
contain.[136] And if this is impossible, as we shall show, the
remaining explanation is that the kidneys do exert traction.
And how is propulsion by the veins impossible? The situation of the
kidneys is against it. They do not occupy a position beneath the
hollow vein [vena cava] as does the sieve-like [ethmoid] passage in
the nose and palate in relation to the surplus matter from the
brain;[137] they are situated on both sides of it. Besides, if the
kidneys are like sieves, and readily let the thinner serous
[whey-like] portion through, and keep out the thicker portion, then
the whole of the blood contained in the vena cava must go to them,
just as the whole of the wine is thrown into the filters. Further, the
example of milk being made into cheese will show clearly what I mean.
For this, too, although it is all thrown into the wicker strainers,
does not all percolate through; such part of it as is too fine in
proportion to the width of the meshes passes downwards, and this is
called _whey_ [serum]; the remaining thick portion which is destined
to become cheese cannot get down, since the pores of the strainers
will not admit it. Thus it is that, if the blood-serum has similarly
to percolate through the kidneys, the whole of the blood must come to
them, and not merely one part of it.
What, then, is the appearance as found on dissection?
One division of the vena cava is carried upwards[138] to the heart,
and the other mounts upon the spine and extends along its whole length
as far as the legs; thus one division does not even come near the
kidneys, while the other approaches them but is certainly not inserted
into them. Now, if the blood were destined to be purified by them as
if they were sieves, the whole of it would have to fall into them, the
thin part being thereafter conveyed downwards, and the thick part
retained above. But, as a matter of fact, this is not so. For the
kidneys lie on either side of the vena cava. They therefore do not act
like sieves, filtering fluid sent to them by the vena cava, and
themselves contributing no force. They obviously exert traction; for
this is the only remaining alternative.
_How_, then, do they exert this traction? If, as Epicurus thinks, all
attraction takes place by virtue of the _rebounds_ and _entanglements_
of atoms, it would be certainly better to maintain that the kidneys
have no attractive action at all; for his theory, when examined, would
be found as it stands to be much more ridiculous even than the theory
of the lodestone, mentioned a little while ago. Attraction occurs in
the way that Hippocrates laid down; this will be stated more clearly
as the discussion proceeds; for the present our task is not to
demonstrate this, but to point out that no other cause of the
secretion of urine can be given except that of attraction by the
kidneys,[139] and that this attraction does not take place in the way
imagined by people who do not allow Nature a faculty of her own.[140]
For if it be granted that there is any attractive faculty at all in
those things which are governed by Nature,[141] a person who attempted
to say anything else about the absorption of nutriment[142] would be
considered a fool.
XV
Ἐπεὶ δ' ἱκανῶς ἠδολεσχήσαμεν οὐχ ἑκόντες, ἀλλ', ὡς ἡ
παροιμία φησί, μαινομένοις ἀναγκασθέντες
συμ||μανῆναι, πάλιν ἐπὶ τὴν τῶν οὔρων ἐπανέλθωμεν 57
διάκρισιν, ἐν ᾗ τῶν μὲν Ἀσκληπιάδου λήρων
ἐπιλαθώμεθα, μετὰ δὲ τῶν πεπεισμένων διηθεῖσθαι τὰ
οὖρα διὰ τῶν νεφρῶν, τίς ὁ τρόπος τῆς ἐνεργείας
ἐστίν, ἐπισκεψώμεθα· πάντως γὰρ ἢ ἐξ αὑτῶν ἐπὶ τοὺς
νεφροὺς φέρεται τὰ οὖρα τοῦτο βέλτιον εἶναι
νομίζοντα, καθάπερ ἡμεῖς, ὁπόταν εἰς τὴν ἀγορὰν
ἀπίωμεν· ἤ, εἰ τοῦτ' ἀδύνατον, ἕτερόν τι χρὴ τῆς
φορᾶς αὐτῶν ἐξευρεῖν αἴτιον. τί δὴ τοῦτ' ἔστιν; εἰ
γὰρ μὴ τοῖς νεφροῖς δώσομέν τινα δύναμιν ἑλκτικὴν
τῆς τοιαύτης ποιότητος, ὡς Ἱπποκράτης ἐνόμιζεν,
οὐδὲν ἕτερον ἐξευρήσομεν. ὅτι μὲν γὰρ ἤτοι τούτους
ἕλκειν αὐτὸ προσῆκεν ἢ τὰς φλέβας πέμπειν, εἴπερ γε
μὴ ἐξ ἑαυτοῦ φέρεται, παντί που δῆλον. ἀλλ' εἰ μὲν
αἱ φλέβες περιστελλόμεναι προωθοῖεν, οὐκ ἐκεῖνο
μόνον, ἀλλὰ σὺν αὐτῷ καὶ τὸ πᾶν αἷμα τὸ περιεχόμενον
ἐν ἑαυταῖς εἰς τοὺς νεφροὺς ἐκθλίψουσιν· εἰ δὲ τοῦτ'
ἀδύνατον, ὡς δείξομεν, λείπεται τοὺς νεφροὺς ἕλκειν.
Πῶς οὖν ἀδύνατον τοῦτο; τῶν νεφρῶν ἡ θέσις
ἀντιβαίνει. οὐ γὰρ δὴ οὕτω γ' ὑπόκεινται τῇ κοίλῃ
φλεβὶ || καθάπερ τοῖς ἐξ ἐγκεφάλου περιττώμασιν ἔν 58
τε τῇ ῥινὶ καὶ κατὰ τὴν ὑπερῴαν οἱ τοῖς ἠθμοῖς
ὅμοιοι πόροι, ἀλλ' ἑκατέρωθεν αὐτῇ παράκεινται. καὶ
μήν, εἴπερ ὁμοίως τοῖς ἠθμοῖς ὅσον ἂν ᾖ λεπτότερον
καὶ τελέως ὀρρῶδες, τοῦτο μὲν ἑτοίμως διαπέμπουσι,
τὸ δὲ παχύτερον ἀποστέγουσιν, ἅπαν ἐπ' αὐτοὺς ἰέναι
χρὴ τὸ αἷμα τὸ περιεχόμενον ἐν τῇ κοίλῃ φλεβί,
καθάπερ εἰς τοὺς τρυγητοὺς ὁ πᾶς οἶνος ἐμβάλλεται.
καὶ μέν γε καὶ τὸ τοῦ γάλακτος τοῦ τυρουμένου
παράδειγμα σαφῶς ἄν, ὃ βούλομαι λέγειν, ἐνδείξαιτο.
καὶ γὰρ καὶ τοῦτο πᾶν ἐμβληθὲν εἰς τοὺς ταλάρους οὐ
πᾶν διηθεῖται, ἀλλ' ὅσον μὲν ἂν ᾖ λεπτότερον τῆς
εὐρύτητος τῶν πλοκάμων, εἰς τὸ κατάντες φέρεται καὶ
τοῦτο μὲν ὀρρὸς ἐπονομάζεται· τὸ λοιπὸν δὲ τὸ παχὺ
τὸ μέλλον ἔσεσθαι τυρός, ὡς ἂν οὐ παραδεχομένων αὐτὸ
τῶν ἐν τοῖς ταλάροις πόρων, οὐ διεκπίπτει κάτω. καὶ
τοίνυν, εἴπερ οὕτω μέλλει διηθεῖσθαι τῶν νεφρῶν ὁ
τοῦ αἵματος ὀρρός, ἅπαν ἐπ' αὐτοὺς ἥκειν χρὴ τὸ αἷμα
καὶ μὴ τὸ μὲν ναί, τὸ δ' οὔ. || 59
Πῶς οὖν ἔχει τὸ φαινόμενον ἐκ τῆς ἀνατομῆς;
Τὸ μὲν ἕτερον μέρος τῆς κοίλης ἄνω πρὸς τὴν καρδίαν
ἀναφέρεται, τὸ λοιπὸν δ' ἐπιβαίνει τῇ ῥάχει καθ'
ὅλης αὐτῆς ἐκτεινόμενον ἄχρι τῶν σκελῶν, ὥστε τὸ μὲν
ἕτερον οὐδ' ἐγγὺς ἀφικνεῖται τῶν νεφρῶν, τὸ λοιπὸν
δὲ πλησιάζει μέν, οὐ μὴν εἰς αὐτούς γε καταφύεται.
ἐχρῆν δ', εἴπερ ἔμελλεν ὡς δι' ἠθμῶν αὐτῶν
καθαρθήσεσθαι τὸ αἷμα, πᾶν ἐμπίπτειν εἰς αὐτοὺς
κἄπειτα κάτω μὲν φέρεσθαι τὸ λεπτόν, ἴσχεσθαι δ' ἄνω
τὸ παχύ. νυνὶ δ' οὐχ οὕτως ἔχει· πλάγιοι γὰρ
ἑκατέρωθεν τῆς κοίλης φλεβὸς οἱ νεφροὶ κεῖνται.
οὔκουν ὡς ἠθμοὶ διηθοῦσι, πεμπούσης μὲν ἐκείνης,
αὐτοὶ δ' οὐδεμίαν ἐισφερόμενοι δύναμιν, ἀλλ' ἕλκουσι
δηλονότι· τοῦτο γὰρ ἔτι λείπεται.
Πῶς οὖν ἕλκουσιν; εἰ μέν, ὡς Ἐπίκουρος οἴεται τὰς
ὁλκὰς ἁπάσας γίγνεσθαι κατὰ τὰς τῶν ἀτόμων
ἀποπάλσεις τε καὶ περιπλοκάς, ἄμεινον ἦν ὄντως
εἰπεῖν αὐτοὺς μηδ' ἕλκειν ὅλως· πολὺ γὰρ ἂν οὕτω γε
τῶν ἐπὶ τῆς ἡρακλείας λίθου μικρῷ πρόσθεν
εἰρη||μένων ὁ λόγος ἐξεταζόμενος εὑρεθείη 60
γελοιότερος· ἀλλ' ὡς Ἱπποκράτης ἠβούλετο. λεχθήσεται
δὲ σαφέστερον ἐπὶ προήκοντι τῷ λόγῳ. νυνὶ γὰρ οὐ
τοῦτο πρόκειται διδάσκειν, ἀλλ' ὡς οὔτ' ἄλλο τι
δυνατὸν εἰπεῖν αἴτιον εἶναι τῆς τῶν οὔρων διακρίσεως
πλὴν τῆς ὁλκῆς τῶν νεφρῶν οὔθ' οὕτω γίγνεσθαι τὴν
ὁλκήν, ὡς οἱ μηδεμίαν οἰκείαν διδόντες τῇ φύσει
δύναμιν οἴονται γίγνεσθαι.
Τούτου γὰρ ὁμολογηθέντος, ὡς ἔστιν ὅλως τις ἐν τοῖς
ὑπὸ φύσεως διοικουμένοις δύναμις ἑλκτική, ληρώδης
νομίζοιτ' ἂν ὁ περὶ ἀναδόσεως τροφῆς ἄλλο τι λέγειν
ἐπιχειρῶν.
XVI
Now, while Erasistratus[143] for some reason replied at great length
to certain other foolish doctrines, he entirely passed over the view
held by Hippocrates, not even thinking it worth while to mention it,
as he did in his work “On Deglutition”; in that work, as may be seen,
he did go so far as at least to make mention of the word _attraction_,
writing somewhat as follows:
“Now, the stomach does not appear to exercise any attraction.”[143]
But when he is dealing with _anadosis_ he does not mention the
Hippocratic view even to the extent of a single syllable. Yet we
should have been satisfied if he had even merely written this:
“Hippocrates lies in saying ‘The flesh[144] attracts both from the
stomach and from without,’ for it cannot attract either from the
stomach or from without.” Or if he had thought it worth while to state
that Hippocrates was wrong in criticizing the weakness of the neck of
the uterus, “seeing that the orifice of the uterus has no power of
attracting semen,”[145] or if he [Erasistratus] had thought proper to
write any other similar opinion, then we in our turn would have
defended ourselves in the following terms:
“My good sir, do not run us down in this rhetorical fashion without
some proof; state some definite objection to our view, in order that
either you may convince us by a brilliant refutation of the ancient
doctrine, or that, on the other hand, we may convert you from your
ignorance.” Yet why do I say “rhetorical”? For we too are not to
suppose that when certain rhetoricians pour ridicule upon that which
they are quite incapable of refuting, without any attempt at argument,
their words are really thereby constituted rhetoric. For rhetoric
proceeds by persuasive reasoning; words without reasoning are
buffoonery rather than rhetoric. Therefore, the reply of Erasistratus
in his treatise “On Deglutition” was neither rhetoric nor logic. For
what is it that he says? “Now, the stomach does not appear to exercise
any traction.” Let us testify against him in return, and set our
argument beside his in the same form. _Now, there appears to be no
peristalsis[146] of the gullet._ “And how does this appear?” one of
his adherents may perchance ask. “For is it not indicative of
_peristalsis_ that always when the upper parts of the gullet contract
the lower parts dilate?” Again, then, we say, “And in what way does
the attraction of the stomach not appear? For is it not indicative of
_attraction_ that always when the lower parts of the gullet dilate the
upper parts contract?” Now, if he would but be sensible and recognize
that this phenomenon is not more indicative of the one than of the
other view, but that it applies equally to both,[147] we should then
show him without further delay the proper way to the discovery of
truth.
We will, however, speak about the stomach again. And the dispersal of
nutriment [anadosis] need not make us have recourse to the theory
regarding the _natural tendency of a vacuum to become refilled_,[148]
when once we have granted the attractive faculty of the kidneys. Now,
although Erasistratus knew that this faculty most certainly existed,
he neither mentioned it nor denied it, nor did he make any statement
as to his views on the secretion of urine.
Why did he give notice at the very beginning of his “General
Principles” that he was going to speak about natural
activities—firstly what they are, how they take place, and in what
situations—and then, in the case of urinary secretion, declared that
this took place through the kidneys, but left out its method of
occurrence? It must, then, have been for no purpose that he told us
how digestion occurs, or spends time upon the secretion of biliary
superfluities;[149] for in these cases also it would have been
sufficient to have named the parts through which the function takes
place, and to have omitted the method. On the contrary, in these cases
he was able to tell us not merely through what organs, but also in
what way it occurs—as he also did, I think, in the case of
_anadosis_; for he was not satisfied with saying that this took place
through the veins, but he also considered fully the method, which he
held to be from the tendency of a vacuum to become refilled.
Concerning the secretion of urine, however, he writes that this occurs
through the kidneys, but does not add in what _way_ it occurs. I do
not think he could say that this was from the tendency of matter to
fill a vacuum,[150] for, if this were so, nobody would have ever died
of retention of urine, since no more can flow into a vacuum than has
run out. For, if no other factor comes into operation[151] save only
this tendency by which a vacuum becomes refilled, no more could ever
flow in than had been evacuated. Nor could he suggest any other
plausible cause, such, for example, as the expression of nutriment by
the stomach[152] which occurs in the process of anadosis; this had
been entirely disproved in the case of blood in the vena cava;[153] it
is excluded, not merely owing to the long distance, but also from the
fact that the overlying heart, at each diastole, robs the vena cava by
violence of a considerable quantity of blood.
In relation to the lower part of the vena cava[154] there would still
remain, solitary and abandoned, the specious theory concerning the
filling of a vacuum. This, however, is deprived of plausibility by the
fact that people die of retention of urine, and also, no less, by the
situation of the kidneys. For, if the whole of the blood were carried
to the kidneys, one might properly maintain that it all undergoes
purification there. But, as a matter of fact, the whole of it does not
go to them, but only so much as can be contained in the veins going to
the kidneys;[155] this portion only, therefore, will be purified.
Further, the thin serous part of this will pass through the kidneys as
if through a sieve, while the thick sanguineous portion remaining in
the veins will obstruct the blood flowing in from behind; this will
first, therefore, have to run back to the vena cava, and so to empty
the veins going to the kidneys; these veins will no longer be able to
conduct a second quantity of unpurified blood to the kidneys—occupied
as they are by the blood which had preceded, there is no passage left.
What power have we, then, which will draw back the purified blood from
the kidneys? And what power, in the next place, will bid this blood
retire to the lower part of the vena cava, and will enjoin on another
quantity coming from above not to proceed downwards before turning off
into the kidneys?
Now Erasistratus realized that all these ideas were open to many
objections, and he could only find one idea which held good in all
respects—namely, that of _attraction_. Since, therefore, he did not
wish either to get into difficulties or to mention the view of
Hippocrates, he deemed it better to say nothing at all as to the
manner in which secretion occurs.
But even if he kept silence, I am not going to do so. For I know that
if one passes over the Hippocratic view and makes some other
pronouncement about the function of the kidneys, one cannot fail to
make oneself utterly ridiculous. It was for this reason that
Erasistratus kept silence and Asclepiades lied; they are like slaves
who have had plenty to say in the early part of their career, and have
managed by excessive rascality to escape many and frequent
accusations, but who, later, when caught in the act of thieving,
cannot find any excuse; the more modest one then keeps silence, as
though thunderstruck, whilst the more shameless continues to hide the
missing article beneath his arm and denies on oath that he has ever
seen it. For it was in this way also that Asclepiades, when all subtle
excuses had failed him and there was no longer any room for nonsense
about “conveyance towards the rarefied part [of the air],”[156] and
when it was impossible without incurring the greatest derision to say
that this superfluity [_i.e._ the urine] is generated by the kidneys
as is bile by the canals in the liver—he, then, I say, clearly lied
when he swore that the urine does not reach the kidneys, and
maintained that it passes, in the form of vapour, straight from the
region of the vena cava,[157] to collect in the bladder.
Like slaves, then, caught in the act of stealing, these two are quite
bewildered, and while the one says nothing, the other indulges in
shameless lying.
XVI
Ἐρασίστρατος δ' οὐκ οἶδ' ὅπως ἑτέραις μέν τισι
δόξαις εὐήθεσιν ἀντεῖπε διὰ μακρῶν, ὑπερέβη δὲ
τελέως τὴν Ἱπποκράτους, οὐδ' ἄχρι τοῦ μνημονεῦσαι
μόνον αὐτῆς, ὡς ἐν τοῖς περὶ καταπόσεως ἐποίησεν,
ἀξιώσας. ἐν ἐκείνοις μὲν γὰρ ἄχρι τοσούτου φαίνεται
μνημονεύων, ὡς τοὔνομ' εἰπεῖν τῆς ὁλκῆς μόνον ὥδέ
πως γράφων·
“Ὁλκὴ μὲν οὖν τῆς κοιλίας οὐδεμία φαίνεται εἶναι”·
περὶ δὲ τῆς || ἀναδόσεως τὸν λόγον ποιούμενος οὐδ' 61
ἄχρι συλλαβῆς μιᾶς ἐμνημόνευσε τῆς Ἱπποκρατείου
δόξης. καίτοι γ' ἐπήρκεσεν ἂν ἡμῖν, εἰ καὶ τοῦτ'
ἔγραψε μόνον, ὡς Ἱπποκράτης εἰπὼν “Σάρκες ὁλκοὶ καὶ
ἐκ κοιλίης καὶ ἔξωθεν” ψεύδεται· οὔτε γὰρ ἐκ τῆς
κοιλίας οὔτ' ἔξωθεν ἕλκειν δύνανται. εἰ δὲ καὶ ὅτι
μήτρας αἰτιώμενος ἄρρωστον αὐχένα κακῶς εἶπεν “Οὐ
γὰρ δύναται αὐτέης ὁ στόμαχος εἰρύσαι τὴν γονήν,” ἢ
εἰ καί τι τοιοῦτον ἄλλο γράφειν ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος
ἠξίωσε, τότ' ἂν καὶ ἡμεῖς πρὸς αὐτὸν ἀπολογούμενοι
εἴπομεν·
Ὦ γενναῖε, μὴ ῥητορικῶς ἡμῶν κατάτρεχε χωρὶς
ἀποδείξεως, ἀλλ' εἰπέ τινα κατηγορίαν τοῦ δόγματος,
ἵν' ἢ πεισθῶμέν σοι ὡς καλῶς ἐξέλεγχοντι τὸν παλαιὸν
λόγον ἢ μεταπείσωμεν ὡς ἀγνοοῦντα. καίτοι τί λέγω
ῥητορικῶς; μὴ γάρ, ἐπειδή τινες τῶν ῥητόρων, ἃ
μάλιστ' ἀδυνατοῦσι διαλύεσθαι, ταῦτα διαγελάσαντες
οὐδ' ἐπιχειροῦσιν ἀντιλέγειν, ἤδη που τοῦτο καὶ
ἡμεῖς ἡγώμεθ' εἶναι τὸ ῥητορικῶς· τὸ γὰρ διὰ λόγου
πιθανοῦ ἐστι τὸ || ῥητορικῶς, τὸ δ' ἄνευ λόγου 62
βωμολοχικόν, οὐ ῥητορικόν. οὔκουν οὔτε ῥητορικῶς
οὔτε διαλεκτικῶς ἀντεῖπεν ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος ἐν τῷ περὶ
τῆς καταπόσεως λόγῳ. τί γάρ φησιν; “Ὁλκὴ μὲν οὖν τῆς
κοιλίας οὐδεμία φαίνεται εἶναι.” πάλιν οὖν αὐτῷ παρ'
ἡμῶν ἀντιμαρτυρῶν ὁ αὐτὸς λόγος ἀντιπαραβαλλέσθω·
περιστολὴ μὲν οὖν τοῦ στομάχου οὐδεμία φαίνεται
εἶναι. καὶ πῶς οὐ φαίνεται; τάχ' ἂν ἴσως εἴποι τις
τῶν ἀπ' αὐτοῦ· τὸ γὰρ ἀεὶ τῶν ἄνωθεν αὐτοῦ μερῶν
συστελλομένων διαστέλλεσθαι τὰ κάτω πῶς οὐκ ἔστι τῆς
περιστολῆς ἐνδεικτικόν; αὖθις οὖν ἡμεῖς, καὶ πῶς οὐ
φαίνεται, φήσομεν, ἡ τῆς κοιλίας ὁλκή; τὸ γὰρ ἀεὶ
τῶν κάτωθεν μερῶν τοῦ στομάχου διαστελλομένων
συστέλλεσθαι τὰ ἄνω πῶς οὐκ ἔστι τῆς ὁλκῆς
ἐνδεικτικόν; εἰ δὲ σωφρονήσειέ ποτε καὶ γνοίη τὸ
φαινόμενον τοῦτο μηδὲν μᾶλλον τῆς ἑτέρας τῶν δοξῶν
ὑπάρχειν ἐνδεικτικὸν ἀλλ' ἀμφοτέρων εἶναι κοινόν,
οὕτως ἂν ἤδη δείξαιμεν αὐτῷ τὴν ὀρθὴν ὁδὸν τῆς τοῦ
ἀληθοῦς ἑυρέσεως.
Ἀλλὰ περὶ μὲν τῆς κοιλίας αὖθις. ἡ δὲ τῆς τροφῆς
ἀνάδοσις οὐδὲν δεῖται || τῆς πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον 63
ἀκολουθίας ἅπαξ γε τῆς ἑλκτικῆς δυνάμεως ἐπὶ τῶν
νεφρῶν ὡμολογημένης, ἣν καίτοι πάνυ σαφῶς ἀληθῆ
γιγνώσκων ὑπάρχειν ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος οὔτ' ἐμνημόνευσεν
οὔτ' ἀντεῖπεν οὔθ' ὅλως ἀπεφήνατο, τίν' ἔχει δόξαν
ὑπὲρ τῆς τῶν οὔρων διακρίσεως.
Ἢ διὰ τί προειπὼν εὐθὺς κατ' ἀρχὰς τῶν καθ' ὅλου
λόγων, ὡς ὑπὲρ τῶν φυσικῶν ἐνεργειῶν ἐρεῖ, πρῶτον
τίνες τ' εἰσὶ καὶ πῶς γίγνονται καὶ διὰ τίνων τόπων,
ἐπὶ τῆς τῶν οὔρων διακρίσεως, ὅτι μὲν διὰ νεφρῶν,
ἀπεφήνατο, τὸ δ' ὅπως γίγνεται παρέλιπε; μάτην οὖν
ἡμᾶς καὶ περὶ τῆς πέψεως ἐδίδαξεν, ὅπως γίγνεται,
καὶ περὶ τῆς τοῦ χολώδους περιττώματος διακρίσεως
κατατρίβει. ἤρκει γὰρ εἰπεῖν κἀνταῦθα τὰ μόρια, δι'
ὧν γίγνεται, τὸ δ' ὅπως παραλιπεῖν. ἀλλὰ περὶ μὲν
ἐκείνων εἶχε λέγειν, οὐ μόνον δι' ὧν ὀργάνων ἀλλὰ
καὶ καθ' ὅντινα γίγνεται τρόπον, ὥσπερ οἶμαι καὶ
περὶ τῆς ἀναδόσεως· οὐ γὰρ ἤρκεσεν εἰπεῖν αὐτῷ
μόνον, ὅτι διὰ φλεβῶν, ἀλλὰ καὶ πῶς ἐπεξῆλθεν, ὅτι
τῇ πρὸς || τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ· περὶ δὲ τῶν 64
οὔρων τῆς διακρίσεως, ὅτι μὲν διὰ νεφρῶν γίγνεται,
γράφει, τὸ δ' ὅπως οὐκέτι προστίθησιν. οὐδὲ γὰρ
οἶμαι τῇ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ ἦν εἰπεῖν·
οὕτω γὰρ ἂν οὐδεὶς ὑπ' ἰσχουρίας ἀπέθανεν οὐδέποτε
μὴ δυναμένου πλείονος ἐπιρρυῆναί ποτε παρὰ τὸ
κενούμενον· ἄλλης γὰρ αἰτίας μηδεμιᾶς προστεθείσης,
ἀλλὰ μόνης τῆς πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίας
ποδηγούσης τὸ συνεχές, οὐκ ἐγχωρεῖ πλέον ἐπιρρυῆναί
ποτε τοῦ κενουμένου. ἀλλ' οὐδ' ἄλλην τινὰ προσθεῖναι
πιθανὴν αἰτίαν εἶχεν, ὡς ἐπὶ τῆς ἀναδόσεως τὴν
ἔκθλιψιν τῆς γαστρός. ἀλλ' αὕτη γ' ἐπὶ τοῦ κατὰ τὴν
κοίλην αἵματος ἀπωλώλει τελέως, οὐ τῷ μήκει μόνον
τῆς ἀποστάσεως ἐκλυθεῖσα, ἀλλὰ καὶ τῷ τὴν καρδίαν
ὑπερκειμένην ἐξαρπάζειν αὐτῆς σφοδρῶς καθ' ἑκάστην
διαστολὴν οὐκ ὀλίγον αἷμα.
Μόνη δή τις ἔτι καὶ πάντων ἔρημος ἀπελείπετο τῶν
σοφισμάτων ἐν τοῖς κάτω τῆς κοίλης ἡ πρὸς || τὸ 65
κενούμενον ἀκολουθία, διά τε τοὺς ἐπὶ ταῖς
ἰσχουρίαις ἀποθνήσκοντας ἀπολωλεκυῖα τὴν πιθανότητα
καὶ διὰ τὴν τῶν νεφρῶν θέσιν οὐδὲν ἧττον, εἰ μὲν γὰρ
ἅπαν ἐπ' αὐτοὺς ἐφέρετο τὸ αἷμα, δεόντως ἄν τις ἅπαν
ἔφασκεν αὐτὸ καθαίρεσθαι. νυνὶ δέ, οὐ γὰρ ὅλον ἀλλὰ
τοσοῦτον αὐτοῦ μέρος, ὅσον αἱ μέχρι νεφρῶν δέχονται
φλέβες, ἐπ' αὐτοὺς ἔρχεται, μόνον ἐκεῖνο
καθαρθήσεται. καὶ τὸ μὲν ὀρρῶδες αὐτοῦ καὶ λεπτὸν
οἷον δι' ἠθμῶν τινων τῶν νεφρῶν διαδύσεται· τὸ δ'
αἱματῶδές τε καὶ παχὺ κατὰ τὰς φλέβας ὑπομένον
ἐμποδὼν στήσεται τῷ κατόπιν ἐπιρρέοντι. παλινδρομεῖν
οὖν αὐτὸ πρότερον ἐπὶ τὴν κοίλην ἀναγκαῖον καὶ κενὰς
οὕτως ἐργάζεσθαι τὰς ἐπὶ τοὺς νεφροὺς ἰούσας φλέβας,
αἳ δεύτερον οὐκέτι παρακομιοῦσιν ἐπ' αὐτοὺς
ἀκάθαρτον αἷμα· κατειληφότος γὰρ αὐτὰς τοῦ προτέρου
πάροδος οὐδεμία λέλειπται. τίς οὖν ἡμῖν ἡ δύναμις
ἀπάξει πάλιν ὀπίσω τῶν νεφρῶν τὸ καθαρὸν αἷμα; τίς
δὲ τοῦτο μὲν διαδεξαμένη κελεύσει πάλιν πρὸς τὸ κάτω
μέρος ἰέναι τῆς κοίλης, ἑτέρῳ δ' ἄνωθεν ἐπιφερομένῳ
προστάξει, πρὶν || ἐπὶ τοὺς νεφροὺς ἀπελθεῖν, μὴ 66
φέρεσθαι κάτω;
Ταῦτ' οὖν ἅπαντα συνιδὼν ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος ἀποριῶν
μεστὰ καὶ μίαν μόνην δόξαν εὔπορον εὑρὼν ἐν ἅπασι
τὴν τῆς ὁλκῆς, οὔτ' ἀπορεῖσθαι βουλόμενος οὔτε τὴν
Ἱπποκράτους ἐθέλων λέγειν ἄμεινον ὑπέλαβε σιωπητέον
εἶναι περὶ τοῦ τρόπου τῆς διακρίσεως.
Ἀλλ' εἰ κἀκεῖνος ἐσίγησεν, ἡμεῖς οὐ σιωπήσομεν·
ἴσμεν γάρ, ὡς οὐκ ἐνδέχεται παρελθόντα τὴν
Ἱπποκράτειον δόξαν, εἶθ' ἕτερόν τι περὶ νεφρῶν
ἐνεργείας εἰπόντα μὴ οὐ καταγέλαστον εἶναι
παντάπασι. διὰ τοῦτ' Ἐρασίστρατος μὲν ἐσιώπησεν,
Ἀσκληπιάδης δ' ἐψεύσατο παραπλησίως οἰκέταις λάλοις
μὲν τὰ πρόσθεν τοῦ βίου καὶ πολλὰ πολλάκις ἐγκλήματα
διαλυσαμένοις ὑπὸ περιττῆς πανουργίας, ἐπ' αὐτοφώρῳ
δέ ποτε κατειλημμένοις, εἶτ' οὐδὲν ἐξευρίσκουσι
σόφισμα κἄπειτ' ἐνταῦθα τοῦ μὲν αἰδημονεστέρου
σιωπῶντος, οἷον ἀποπληξίᾳ τινὶ κατειλημμένου, τοῦ δ'
ἀναισχυντοτέρου κρύπτοντος μὲν ἔθ' ὑπὸ μάλης τὸ
ζητούμενον, ἐξομνυμένου δὲ καὶ μηδ' ἑωρακέναι πώποτε
φάσκοντος. οὕτω γάρ τοι καὶ ὁ Ἀσκληπιάδης || 67
ἐπιλειπόντων αὐτὸν τῶν τῆς πανουργίας σοφισμάτων καὶ
μήτε τῆς πρὸς τὸ λεπτομερὲς φορᾶς ἐχούσης ἔτι χώραν
ἐνταυθοῖ ληρεῖσθαι μήθ' ὡς ὑπὸ τῶν νεφρῶν γεννᾶται
τουτὶ τὸ περίττωμα, καθάπερ ὑπὸ τῶν ἐν ἥπατι πόρων ἡ
χολή, δυνατὸν ὂν εἰπόντα μὴ οὐ μέγιστον ὀφλεῖν
γέλωτα, ἐξόμνυταί τε καὶ ψεύδεται φανερῶς, οὐ
διήκειν λέγων ἐπὶ τοὺς νεφροὺς τὸ οὖρον ἀλλ'
ἀτμοειδῶς εὐθὺς ἐκ τῶν κατὰ τὴν κοίλην μερῶν εἰς τὴν
κύστιν ἀθροίζεσθαι.
Οὗτοι μὲν οὖν τοῖς ἐπ' αὐτοφώρῳ κατειλημμένοις
οἰκέταις ὁμοίως ἐκπλαγέντες ὁ μὲν ἐσιώπησεν, ὁ δ'
ἀναισχύντως ψεύδεται.
XVII
Now such of the younger men as have dignified themselves with the
names of these two authorities by taking the appellations
“Erasistrateans” or “Asclepiadeans” are like the _Davi_ and
_Getae_—the slaves introduced by the excellent Menander into his
comedies. As these slaves held that they had done nothing fine unless
they had cheated their master three times, so also the men I am
discussing have taken their time over the construction of impudent
sophisms, the one party striving to prevent the lies of Asclepiades
from ever being refuted, and the other saying stupidly what
Erasistratus had the sense to keep silence about.
But enough about the Asclepiadeans. The Erasistrateans, in attempting
to say how the kidneys let the urine through, will do anything or
suffer anything or try any shift in order to find some plausible
explanation which does not demand the principle of _attraction_.
Now those near the times of Erasistratus maintain that the parts above
the kidneys receive pure blood, whilst the watery residue, being
heavy, tends to run downwards; that this, after percolating through
the kidneys themselves, is thus rendered serviceable, and is sent, as
blood, to all the parts below the kidneys.
For a certain period at least this view also found favour and
flourished, and was held to be true; after a time, however, it became
suspect to the Erasistrateans themselves, and at last they abandoned
it. For apparently the following two points were assumed, neither of
which is conceded by anyone, nor is even capable of being proved. The
first is the heaviness of the serous fluid, which was said to be
produced in the vena cava, and which did not exist, apparently, at the
beginning, when this fluid was being carried up from the stomach to
the liver. Why, then, did it not at once run downwards when it was in
these situations? And if the watery fluid is so heavy, what
plausibility can anyone find in the statement that it assists in the
process of _anadosis_?
In the second place there is this absurdity, that even if it be agreed
that all the watery fluid does fall downwards, and only when it is in
the vena cava,[158] still it is difficult, or, rather, impossible, to
say through what means it is going to fall into the kidneys, seeing
that these are not situated below, but on either side of the vena
cava, and that the vena cava is not inserted into them, but merely
sends a branch[159] into each of them, as it also does into all the
other parts.
What doctrine, then, took the place of this one when it was condemned?
One which to me seems far more foolish than the first, although it
also flourished at one time. For they say, that if oil be mixed with
water and poured upon the ground, each will take a different route,
the one flowing this way and the other that, and that, therefore, it
is not surprising that the watery fluid runs into the kidneys, while
the blood falls downwards along the vena cava. Now this doctrine also
stands already condemned. For why, of the countless veins which spring
from the vena cava, should blood flow into all the others, and the
serous fluid be diverted to those going to the kidneys? They have not
answered the question which was asked; they merely state what happens
and imagine they have thereby assigned the reason.
Once again, then (the third cup to the Saviour!),[160] let us now
speak of the worst doctrine of all, lately invented by Lycus of
Macedonia,[161] but which is popular owing to its novelty. This Lycus,
then, maintains, as though uttering an oracle from the inner
sanctuary, that urine is _residual matter from the nutrition of the
kidneys_![162] Now, the amount of urine passed every day shows clearly
that it is the whole of the fluid drunk which becomes urine, except
for that which comes away with the dejections or passes off as sweat
or insensible perspiration. This is most easily recognized in winter
in those who are doing no work but are carousing, especially if the
wine be thin and diffusible; these people rapidly pass almost the same
quantity as they drink. And that even Erasistratus was aware of this
is known to those who have read the first book of his “General
Principles.”[163] Thus Lycus is speaking neither good Erasistratism,
nor good Asclepiadism, far less good Hippocratism. He is, therefore,
as the saying is, like a white crow, which cannot mix with the genuine
crows owing to its colour, nor with the pigeons owing to its size. For
all this, however, he is not to be disregarded; he may, perhaps, be
stating some wonderful truth, unknown to any of his predecessors.
Now it is agreed that all parts which are undergoing nutrition produce
a certain amount of residue, but it is neither agreed nor is it
likely, that the kidneys alone, small bodies as they are, could hold
four whole _congii_,[164] and sometimes even more, of residual matter.
For this surplus must necessarily be greater in quantity in each of
the larger viscera; thus, for example, that of the lung, if it
corresponds in amount to the size of the viscus, will obviously be
many times more than that in the kidneys, and thus the whole of the
thorax will become filled, and the animal will be at once suffocated.
But if it be said that the residual matter is equal in amount in each
of the other parts, where are the _bladders_, one may ask, through
which it is excreted? For, if the kidneys produce in drinkers three
and sometimes four _congii_ of superfluous matter, that of each of the
other viscera will be much more, and thus an enormous barrel will be
needed to contain the waste products of them all. Yet one often
urinates practically the same quantity as one has drunk, which would
show that the whole of what one drinks goes to the kidneys.
Thus the author of this third piece of trickery would appear to have
achieved nothing, but to have been at once detected, and there still
remains the original difficulty which was insoluble by Erasistratus
and by all others except Hippocrates. I dwell purposely on this topic,
knowing well that nobody else has anything to say about the function
of the kidneys, but that either we must prove more foolish than the
very butchers[165] if we do not agree that the urine passes through
the kidneys; or, if one acknowledges this, that then one cannot
possibly give any other reason for the secretion than the principle of
attraction.
Now, if the movement of urine does not depend on the tendency of a
vacuum to become refilled,[166] it is clear that neither does that of
the blood nor that of the bile; or if that of these latter does so,
then so also does that of the former. For they must all be
accomplished in one and the same way, even according to Erasistratus
himself.
This matter, however, will be discussed more fully in the book
following this.
XVII
Τῶν δὲ νεωτέρων ὅσοι τοῖς τούτων ὀνόμασιν ἑαυτοὺς
ἐσέμνυναν Ἐρασιστρατείους τε καὶ Ἀσκληπιαδείους
ἐπονομάσαντες, ὁμοίως τοῖς ὑπὸ τοῦ βελτίστου
Μενάνδρου κατὰ τὰς κωμῳδίας εἰσαγομένοις οἰκέταις,
Δάοις τέ τισι καὶ Γέταις, οὐδὲν ἡγουμένοις σφίσι
πεπρᾶχθαι γενναῖον, εἰ μὴ τρὶς ἐξαπατήσειαν τὸν
δεσπότην, οὕτω καὶ αὐτοὶ κατὰ πολλὴν σχολὴν
ἀναίσχυντα σοφίσματα συνέθεσαν, οἱ μέν, ἵνα μηδ'
ὅλως ἐξελεγχθείη ποτ' || Ἀσκληπιάδης ψευδόμενος, οἱ 68
δ', ἵνα κακῶς εἴπωσιν, ἃ καλῶς ἐσιώπησεν
Ἐρασίστρατος.
Ἀλλὰ τῶν μὲν Ἀσκληπιαδείων ἅλις. οἱ δ'
Ἐρασιστράτειοι λέγειν ἐπιχειροῦντες, ὅπως οἱ νεφροὶ
διηθοῦσι τὸ οὖρον, ἅπαντα δρῶσί τε καὶ πάσχουσι καὶ
παντοῖοι γίγνονται πιθανὸν ἐξευρεῖν τι ζητοῦντες
αἴτιον ὁλκῆς μὴ δεόμενον.
Οἱ μὲν δὴ πλησίον Ἐρασιστράτου τοῖς χρόνοις
γενόμενοι τὰ μὲν ἄνω τῶν νεφρῶν μόρια καθαρὸν αἷμα
λαμβάνειν φασί, τῷ δὲ βάρος ἔχειν τὸ ὑδατῶδες
περίττωμα βρίθειν τε καὶ ὑπορρεῖν κάτω· διηθούμενον
δ' ἐνταῦθα κατὰ τοὺς νεφροὺς αὐτοὺς χρηστὸν οὕτω
γενόμενον ἅπασι τοῖς κάτω τῶν νεφρῶν ἐπιπέμπεσθαι τὸ
αἷμα.
Καὶ μέχρι γέ τινος εὐδοκίμησεν ἥδε ἡ δόξα καὶ ἤκμασε
καὶ ἀληθὴς ἐνομίσθη· χρόνῳ δ' ὕστερον καὶ αὐτοῖς
τοῖς Ἐρασιστρατείοις ὕποπτος ἐφάνη καὶ τελευτῶντες
ἀπέστησαν αὐτῆς. αἰτεῖσθαι γὰρ ἐδόκουν δύο ταῦτα
μήτε συγχωρούμενα πρός τινος ἀλλ' οὐδ' ἀποδειχθῆναι
δυνάμενα, πρῶτον μὲν τὸ βάρος τῆς ὀρρώδους ὑγρότητος
ἐν τῇ κοίλῃ || φλεβὶ γεννώμενον, ὥσπερ οὐκ ἐξ ἀρχῆς 69
ὑπάρχον, ὁπότ' ἐκ τῆς κοιλίας εἰς ἧπαρ ἀνεφέρετο. τί
δὴ οὖν οὐκ εὐθὺς ἐν ἐκείνοις τοῖς χωρίοις ὑπέρρει
κάτω; πῶς δ' ἄν τῳ δόξειεν εὐλόγως εἰρῆσθαι
συντελεῖν εἰς τὴν ἀνάδοσιν ἡ ὑδατώδης ὑγρότης, εἴπερ
οὕτως ἐστὶ βαρεῖα;
Δεύτερον δ' ἄτοπον, ὅτι κἂν κάτω συγχωρηθῇ φέρεσθαι
πᾶσα καὶ μὴ κατ' ἄλλο χωρίον ἢ τὴν κοίλην φλέβα,
τίνα τρόπον εἰς τοὺς νεφροὺς ἐμπεσεῖται, χαλεπόν,
μᾶλλον δ' ἀδύνατον εἰπεῖν, μήτ' ἐν τοῖς κάτω μέρεσι
κειμένων αὐτῶν τῆς φλεβὸς ἀλλ' ἐκ τῶν πλαγίων μήτ'
ἐμφυομένης εἰς αὐτοὺς τῆς κοίλης ἀλλ' ἀπόφυσίν τινα
μόνον εἰς ἑκάτερον πεμπούσης, ὥσπερ καὶ εἰς τἆλλα
πάντα μόρια.
Τίς οὖν ἡ διαδεξαμένη ταύτην δόξα καταγνωσθεῖσαν;
ἐμοὶ μὲν ἠλιθιωτέρα μακρῷ φαίνεται τῆς προτέρας.
ἤκμασε δ' οὖν καὶ αὕτη ποτέ. φασὶ γάρ, εἰ κατὰ τῆς
γῆς ἐκχυθείη μεμιγμένον ἔλαιον ὕδατι, διάφορον
ἑκάτερον ὁδὸν βαδιεῖσθαι καὶ ῥυήσεσθαι τὸ μὲν τῇδε,
τὸ δὲ τῇδε. θαυμαστὸν οὖν οὐδὲν εἶναί φασιν, εἰ τὸ
μὲν ὑδατῶδες ὑγρὸν εἰς τοὺς νε||φροὺς ῥεῖ, τὸ δ' 70
αἷμα διὰ τῆς κοίλης φέρεται κάτω. κατέγνωσται οὖν
ἤδη καὶ ἥδε ἡ δόξα. διὰ τί γὰρ ἀπὸ τῆς κοίλης μυρίων
ἐκπεφυκυιῶν φλεβῶν αἷμα μὲν εἰς τὰς ἄλλας ἁπάσας, ἡ
δ' ὀρρώδης ὑγρότης εἰς τὰς ἐπὶ τοὺς νεφροὺς
φερομένας ἐκτρέπεται; τοῦτ' αὐτὸ τὸ ζητούμενον οὐκ
εἰρήκασιν, ἀλλὰ τὸ γιγνόμενον εἰπόντες μόνον οἴονται
τὴν αἰτίαν ἀποδεδωκέναι.
Πάλιν οὖν, τὸ τρίτον τῷ σωτῆρι, τὴν χειρίστην ἁπασῶν
δόξαν ἐξευρημένην νῦν ὑπὸ Λύκου τοῦ Μακεδόνος,
εὐδοκιμοῦσαν δὲ διὰ τὸ καινὸν ἤδη λέγωμεν. ἀπεφήνατο
γὰρ δὴ ὁ Λύκος οὗτος, ὥσπερ ἐξ ἀδύτου τινὸς χρησμὸν
ἀποφθεγγόμενος, περίττωμα τῆς τῶν νεφρῶν θρέψεως
εἶναι τὸ οὖρον. ὅτι μὲν οὖν αὐτὸ τὸ πινόμενον ἅπαν
οὖρον γίγνεται, πλὴν εἴ τι μετὰ τῶν διαχωρημάτων
ὑπῆλθεν ἢ εἰς ἱδρῶτας ἀπεχώρησεν ἢ εἰς τὴν ἄδηλον
διαπνοήν, ἐναργῶς ἐνδείκνυται τὸ πλῆθος τῶν καθ'
ἑκάστην ἡμέραν οὐρουμένων. ἐν χειμῶνι δὲ μάλιστα
μαθεῖν ἔστιν ἐπὶ τῶν ἀργούντων μέν, κωθωνιζομένων
δέ, καὶ μάλιστ' εἰ λεπτὸς ὁ οἶνος εἴη καὶ πόριμος.
οὐροῦσι || γὰρ οὗτοι διὰ ταχέων ὀλίγου δεῖν, ὅσονπερ 71
καὶ πίνουσιν. ὅτι δὲ καὶ ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος οὕτως
ἐγίγνωσκεν, οἱ τὸ πρῶτον ἀνεγνωκότες αὐτοῦ σύγγραμμα
τῶν καθόλου λόγων ἐπίστανται. ὥσθ' ὁ Λύκος οὔτ'
ἀληθῆ φαίνεται λέγων οὔτ' Ἐρασιστράτεια, δῆλον δ' ὡς
οὐδ' Ἀσκληπιάδεια, πολὺ δὲ μᾶλλον οὐδ' Ἱπποκράτεια.
λευκῷ τοίνυν κατὰ τὴν παροιμίαν ἔοικε κόρακι μήτ'
αὐτοῖς τοῖς κόραξιν ἀναμιχθῆναι δυναμένῳ διὰ τὴν
χρόαν μήτε ταῖς περιστεραῖς διὰ τὸ μέγεθος, ἀλλ'
οὔτι που τούτου γ' ἕνεκα παροπτέος· ἴσως γάρ τι
λέγει θαυμαστόν, ὃ μηδεὶς τῶν ἔμπροσθεν ἔγνω.
Τὸ μὲν οὖν ἅπαντα τὰ τρεφόμενα μόρια ποιεῖν τι
περίττωμα συγχωρούμενον, τὸ δὲ τοὺς νεφροὺς μόνους,
οὕτω σμικρὰ σώματα, χόας ὅλους τέτταρας ἢ καὶ
πλείους ἴσχειν ἐνίοτε περιττώματος οὔθ'
ὁμολογούμενον οὔτε λόγον ἔχον· τὸ γὰρ ἑκάστου τῶν
μειζόνων σπλάγχνων περίττωμα πλεῖον ἀναγκαῖον
ὑπάρχειν. οἷον αὐτίκα τὸ τοῦ πνεύμονος, εἴπερ
ἀνάλογον τῷ μεγέθει τοῦ σπλάγχνου γίγνοιτο,
πολλαπλα||σιον ἔσται δήπου τοῦ κατὰ τοὺς νεφρούς, 72
ὥσθ' ὅλος μὲν ὁ θώραξ ἐμπλησθήσεται, πνιγήσεται δ'
αὐτίκα τὸ ζῷον. ἀλλ' εἰ ἴσον φήσει τις γίγνεσθαι τὸ
καθ' ἕκαστον τῶν ἄλλων μορίων περίττωμα, διὰ ποίων
κύστεων ἐκκρίνεται; εἰ γὰρ οἱ νεφροὶ τοῖς
κωθωνιζομένοις τρεῖς ἢ τέτταρας ἐνίοτε χόας ποιοῦσι
περιττώματος, ἑκάστου τῶν ἄλλων σπλάγχνων πολλῷ
πλείους ἔσονται καὶ πίθου τινὸς οὕτω μεγίστου δεήσει
τοῦ δεξομένου τὰ πάντων περιττώματα. καίτοι
πολλάκις, ὅσον ἔπιέ τις, ὀλίγου δεῖν οὔρησεν ἅπαν,
ὡς ἂν ἐπὶ τοὺς νεφροὺς φερομένου τοῦ πόματος
ἅπαντος.
Ἔοικεν οὖν ὁ τὸ τρίτον ἐξαπατῶν οὗτος οὐδὲν ἀνύειν
ἀλλ' εὐθὺς γεγονέναι κατάφωρος καὶ μένειν ἔτι τὸ ἐξ
ἀρχῆς ἄπορον Ἐρασιστράτῳ τε καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις ἅπασι
πλὴν Ἱπποκράτους. διατρίβω δ' ἑκὼν ἐν τῷ τόπῳ σαφῶς
εἰδώς, ὅτι μηδὲν εἰπεῖν ἔχει μηδεὶς ἄλλος περὶ τῆς
τῶν νεφρῶν ἐνεργείας, ἀλλ' ἀναγκαῖον ἢ τῶν μαγείρων
ἀμαθεστέρους φαίνεσθαι μηδ' ὅτι διηθεῖται δι' αὐτῶν
τὸ οὖρον ὁμολογοῦντας ἢ || τοῦτο συγχωρήσαντας μηδὲν 73
ἔτ' ἔχειν εἰπεῖν ἕτερον αἴτιον τῆς διακρίσεως πλὴν
τῆς ὁλκης.
Ἀλλ' εἰ μὴ τῶν οὔρων ἡ φορὰ τῇ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον
ἀκολουθίᾳ γίγνεται, δῆλον, ὡς οὐδ' ἡ τοῦ αἵματος
οὐδ' ἡ τῆς χολῆς ἢ εἴπερ ἐκείνων καὶ τούτου· πάντα
γὰρ ὡσαύτως ἀναγκαῖον ἐπιτελεῖσθαι καὶ κατ' αὐτὸν
τὸν Ἐρασίστρατον.
Εἰρήσεται δ' ἐπὶ πλέον ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν ἐν τῷ μετὰ ταῦτα
γράμματι.
[5] That is, “On the Natural Powers,” the powers of the
_Physis_ or Nature. By that Galen practically means what
we would call the physiological or biological powers,
the characteristic faculties of the living organism; his
Physis is the subconscious vital principle of the animal
or plant. Like Aristotle, however, he also ascribes
quasi-vital properties to inanimate things, _cf._
Introduction, p. xxvii.
[6] _Ergon_, here rendered an _effect_, is literally a
_work_ or _deed_; strictly speaking, it is something
_done_, _completed_, as distinguished from _energeia_,
which is the actual _doing_, the _activity_ which
produces this _ergon_, _cf._ p. 13, and Introduction, p.
xxx.
[7] Gk. _psyche_, Lat. _anima_.
[8] Gk. _physis_, Lat. _natura_.
[9] _Motion_ (kinesis) is Aristotle’s general term for
what we would rather call _change_. It includes various
kinds of change, as well as movement proper, _cf._
Introduction, p. xxix.
[10] “Conveyance,” “transport,” “transit”; purely
mechanical or passive motion, as distinguished from
_alteration_ (qualitative change).
[11] “Waxing and waning,” the latter literally
_phthisis_, a wasting or “decline;” _cf._ Scotch
_divining_, Dutch _verdwijnen_.
[12] Becoming and perishing: Latin, _generatio et
corruptio_.
[13] “Ad substantiam productio seu ad formam processus”
(Linacre).
[14] “Preformationist” doctrine of Anaxagoras. To him
the apparent alteration in qualities took place when a
number of minute pre-existing bodies, all bearing the
same quality, came together in sufficient numbers to
impress that quality on the senses. The factor which
united the minute quality-bearers was Nous. “In the
beginning,” says Anaxagoras, “all things existed
together—then came Nous and brought them into order.”
[15] “De ea alteratione quae per totam fit substantiam”
(Linacre).
[16] The systematizer of Stoicism and successor of Zeno.
[17] Note characteristic impatience with metaphysics. To
Galen, as to Hippocrates and Aristotle, it sufficed to
look on the qualitative differences apprehended by the
senses as fundamental. Zeno of Citium was the founder of
the Stoic school; on the further analysis by this school
of the _qualities_ into _bodies_ _cf._ p. 144, note 3
(203).
[18] A rallying-ground: lit. a place where two glens
meet.
[19] Thus according to Gomperz (_Greek Thinkers_), the
hypothesis of Anaxagoras was that “the bread ... already
contained the countless forms of matter as such which
the human body displays. Their minuteness of size would
withdraw them from our perception. For the defect or
‘weakness’ of the senses is the narrowness of their
receptive area. These elusive particles are rendered
visible and tangible by the process of _nutrition_,
which combines them.”
[20] Therefore the blood must have come from the bread.
The food from the alimentary canal was supposed by Galen
to be converted into blood in and by the portal veins,
_cf._ p. 17.
[21] By “elements” is meant all homogeneous, amorphous
substances, such as metals, &c., as well as the
elementary _tissues_.
[22] Work or product. Lat. _opus_. _cf._ p. 3, note 2
(6).
[23] Operation, activation, or functioning. Lat.
_actio_. _cf._ _loc. cit._
[24] _i.e._ a concomitant (secondary) or passive
affection. Galen is contrasting active and passive
“motion.” _cf._ p. 6, note 1 (10).
[25] As already indicated, there is no exact English
equivalent for the Greek term _physis_, which is a
principle immanent in the animal itself, whereas our
term “Nature” suggests something more transcendent; we
are forced often, however, to employ it in default of a
better word. _cf._ p. 2, note 1 (5).
[26] In Greek _anadosis_. This process includes two
stages: (1) transmission of food from alimentary canal
to liver (rather more than our “absorption”); (2)
further transmission from liver to tissues. _Anadosis_
is lit. a yielding-up, a “delivery;” it may sometimes be
rendered “dispersal.” “Distribution” (_diadosis_) is a
further stage; _cf._ p. 163, note 4 (230).
[27] _cf._ p. 9.
[28] Since heat and cold tend to cause diffusion and
condensation respectively.
[29] Lit. _haematopoietic_. _cf._ p. 11, note 3 (20).
[30] Lit. _peptic_.
[31] Lit. _sphygmic_.
[32] _Genesis_ corresponds to the intrauterine life, or
what we may call _embryogeny_. _Alteration_ here means
histogenesis or tissue-production; _shaping_ or
_moulding_ (in Greek _diaplasis_) means the ordering of
these tissues into organs (organogenesis).
[33] _cf._ p. 25, note 4 (49).
[34] Note inadequate analogy of semen with fertilised
seeds of plants (_i.e._ of gamete with zygote). Strictly
speaking, of course, semen corresponds to pollen. _cf._
p. 130, note 2 (188).
[35] _i.e._ the four primary qualities; _cf._ chap. iii.
_supra_.
[36] Various secondary or derivative differences in the
tissues. Note pre-eminence of sense of touch.
[37] _De Anima_, ii. _et seq._
[38] Lit. _homoeomerous_ = of similar parts throughout,
“the same all through.” He refers to the elementary
tissues, conceived as not being susceptible of further
analysis.
[39] That is, by the bodily eye, and not by the mind’s
eye. The observer is here called an _autoptes_ or
“eye-witness.” Our medical term _autopsy_ thus means
literally a _persona inspection_ of internal parts,
ordinarily hidden.
[40] _i.e._ “alteration” is the earlier of the two
stages which constitute embryogeny or “genesis.” _cf._
p. 18, note 1 (32).
[41] The terms Galen actually uses are: _ostopoietic_,
_neuropoietic_, _chondropoietic_.
[42] As we should say, _parenchyma_ (a term used by
Erasistratus).
[43] Those were all the elemental tissues that
Aristotle, for example, had recognized; other tissues
(_e.g._ flesh or muscle) he believed to be complexes of
these.
[44] Or _tunics_.
[45] _i.e._ tissues.
[46] As, for example, Aristotle had held; _cf._ p. 23,
note 3 (43). Galen added many new tissues to those described
by Aristotle.
[47] Lit. _synthesis_.
[48] By this is meant the _duodenum_, considered as an
outgrowth or prolongation of the stomach towards the
intestines.
[49] _cf._ p. 19, note 2 (33).
[50] Lit. the _auxetic_ or _incremental_ faculty.
[51] _i.e._ to the alterative and shaping faculties
(histogenetic and organogenetic).
[52] If the reading is correct we can only suppose that
Galen meant _the embryo_.
[53] _i.e._ not the pre-natal development of tissue
already described. _cf._ chap. vi.
[54] Administration, lit. “economy.”
[55] The _activation_ or _functioning_ of this faculty,
the faculty _in actual operation_. _cf._ p. 3, note 2
(6).
[56] “Un rapport commun et une affinité” (Daremberg).
“Societatem aliquam cognationemque in qualitatibus”
(Linacre). _cf._ p. 36, note 2 (61).
[57] Lit. “necessity”; more _restrictive_, however, than
our “law of Nature.” _cf._ p. 314, note 1 (386).
[58] His point is that no great change, in colours or in
anything else, can take place at one step.
[59] Not quite our “waste _products_,” since these are
considered as being partly synthetic, whereas the Greek
_perittomata_ were simply superfluous substances which
could not be used and were thrown aside.
[60] Note “our natures,” _cf._ p. 12, note 4 (25); p. 47,
note 1 (75).
[61] The term οἰκεῖος, here rendered _appropriate_,
is explained on p. 33. _cf._ also footnote on same
page. Linacre often translated it _conveniens_,
and it may usually be rendered _proper_, _peculiar_,
_own special_, or _own particular_ in English.
Sometimes it is almost equal to _akin_, _cognate_,
_related_: _cf._ p. 319, note 2 (394). With Galen’s
οἰκεῖος and ἀλλότριος we may compare the German
terms _eigen_ and _fremd_ used by Aberhalden in
connection with his theory of defensive ferments in
the blood-serum.
[62] Transit, _cf._ p. 6, note 1 (10).
[63] _i.e._ of the living organism, _cf._ p. 2, note 1
(5).
[64] _i.e._ with nutrition.
[65] We might perhaps say, more shortly, “assimilation
of food to feeder,” or, “of food to fed”; Linacre
renders, “nutrimenti cum nutrito assimilatio.”
[66] Lit. _prosphysis_, _i.e._ attachment, implantation.
[67] Lit. _prosthesis_, “apposition.” One is almost
tempted to retain the terms _prosthesis_ and
_prosphysis_ in translation, as they obviously
correspond much more closely to Galen’s physiological
conceptions than any English or semi-English words can.
[68] Lit. _phthisis_. _cf._ p. 6, note 2 (11). Now
means _tuberculosis_ only.
[69] More literally, “chymified.” In _anasarca_ the
subcutaneous tissue is soft, and pits on pressure. In
the “white” disease referred to here (by which is
probably meant _nodular leprosy_) the same tissues are
indurated and “brawny.” The principle of certain
diseases being best explained as cases of _arrest_ at
various stages of the metabolic path is recognized in
modern pathology, although of course the instances given
by Galen are too crude to stand.
[70] The effects of _oxidation_ attributed to the heat
which accompanies it? _cf._ p. 141, note 1 (199); p.
254, note 1 (332).
[71] Here follows a contrast between the Vitalists and
the Epicurean Atomists. _cf._ p. 153 _et seq._
[72] A unity or _continuum_, an _individuum_.
[73] Lit. to the _physis_ or the _psyche_; that is, a
denial of the autonomy of physiology and psychology.
[74] Lit. _somata_.
[75] For “natures” in the plural, involving the idea of
a separate nature immanent in each individual, _cf._ p.
36, note 1 (60).
[76] A lost work.
[77] For Asclepiades _v._ p. 49, note 5 (82).
[78] “Le corps tout entier a unité de souffle
(_perspiration et expiration_) et unité de flux
(_courants_, _circulation des liquides_)” (Daremberg).
“Conspirabile et confluxile corpus esse” (Linacre).
Apparently Galen refers to the pneuma and the various
humours. _cf._ p. 293, note 2 (366).
[79] _i.e._ “appropriated”; very nearly “assimilated.”
[80] “Attractricem convenientis qualitatis vim”
(Linacre). _cf._ p. 36, note 2 (61).
[81] Lit. “obvious phenomena.”
[82] Asclepiades of Bithynia, who flourished in the
first half of the first century B.C., was an adherent of
the atomistic philosophy of Democritus, and is the
typical representative of the Mechanistic school in
Graeco-Roman medicine; he disbelieved in any principle
of individuality (“nature”) in the organism, and his
methods of treatment, in accordance with his pathology,
were mechano-therapeutical. _cf._ p. 64, note 3 (100).
[83] Diocles of Carystus was the chief representative of
the Dogmatic or Hippocratic school in the first half of
the fourth century B.C. Praxagoras was his disciple, and
followed him in the leadership of the school. For
Erasistratus, _cf._ p. 95 _et seq._
[84] Sufferers from kidney-trouble.
[85] The ureters.
[86] Unless otherwise stated, “peritoneum” stands for
parietal peritoneum alone.
[87] In the peritoneal cavity.
[88] Contrast, however, _anasarca_, p. 41.
[89] Regurgitation, however, is prevented by the fact
that the ureter runs for nearly one inch obliquely
through the bladder wall before opening into its cavity,
and thus an efficient _valve_ is produced.
[90] On the τέχνη (artistic or creative skill) shown by
the living organism (φύσις) _v._ pp. 25, 45, 47;
Introduction, p. xxix.
[91] Direct denial of Aristotle’s dictum that “Nature
does nothing in vain.” We are reminded of the view of
certain modern laboratory physicians and surgeons that
the _colon_ is a “useless” organ, _cf._ Erasistratus, p.
143.
[92] The _vasa deferentia_.
[93] “De l’habileté et de la prévoyance de la nature à
l’égard des animaux” (Daremberg). _cf._ p. 56, note 1
(90).
[94] _cf._ p. 36, note 2 (61).
[95] The morbid material passed successively through the
stages of “crudity,” “coction” (_pepsis_), and
“elimination” (_crisis_). For “critical days” _cf._ p.
74, note 1 (121).
[96] This was the process by which nutriment was taken
up from the alimentary canal; “absorption,” “dispersal;”
_cf._ p. 13, note 5 (26). The subject is dealt with more
fully in chap. xvi.
[97] Lit. _catharsis_.
[98] _i.e._ urine.
[99] On use of κενόω _v._ p. 67, note 9 (110).
[100] _i.e._ bile and phlegm had no existence as such
before the drugs were given; they are the products of
dissolved tissue. Asclepiades did not believe that
diseases were due to a _materia peccans_, but to
disturbances in the movements of the molecules (ὄγκοι)
which constitute the body; thus, in opposition to the
humoralists such as Galen, he had no use for drugs. _cf._
p. 49, note 5 (82).
[101] About 4 oz., or one-third of a pint.
[102] The Empiricists, _cf._ Introduction, p. xiii.
[103] His ὄγκοι or molecules.
[104] He does not say “organized” or “living” body;
inanimate things were also thought to possess “natures”;
_cf._ p. 2, note 1 (5).
[105] Carthamus tinctorius.
[106] Daphne Gnidium.
[107] Euphorbia acanthothamnos.
[108] Teucrium chamaedrys.
[109] Atractylis gummifera.
[110] On use of κενόω _cf._ p. 98, note 1 (148).
[111] Empiricist physicians.
[112] Note that drugs also have “natures”; _cf._ p. 66,
note 3 (104), and pp. 83-84.
[113] Pun here.
[114] Lit. _physiology_, _i.e._ _nature-lore_, almost
our “Natural Philosophy”; _cf._ Introduction, p. xxvi.
[115] The ultimate particle of Epicurus was the ἄτομος or
atom (lit. “non-divisible”), of Asclepiades, the ὄγκος or
molecule. Asclepiades took his atomic theory from
Epicurus, and he again from Democritus; _cf._ p. 49, note
5 (82).
[116] Lit. _Herculean stone_.
[117] Lit. _aetiology_.
[118] _Anadosis_; _cf._ p. 62, note 1 (96).
[119] _cf._ p. 45.
[120] The _vis conservatrix et medicatrix Naturae_.
[121] _cf._ p. 61, note 3 (95). The _crisis_ or resolution in
fevers was observed to take place with a certain
regularity; hence arose the doctrine of “critical days.”
[122] These were hypothetical spaces or channels between
the atoms; _cf._ Introduction, p. xiv.
[123] He means the specific drawing power or faculty of
the lodestone.
[124] _cf._ our modern “radium-emanations.”
[125] _cf._ Ehrlich’s hypothesis of “receptors” in
explanation of the “affinities” of animal cells.
[126] _i.e._ from the point of view of the theory.
[127] _cf._ p. 69, note 2 (112).
[128] That is to say, the two properties should go
together in all cases—which they do not.
[129] _Trygon pastinaca_.
[130] _cf._ p. 66, note 3 (104).
[131] The way that corn can attract moisture.
[132] Specific attraction of the “proper” quality; _cf._
p. 85, note 3 (130).
[133] Theory of evaporation insufficient to account for
it. _cf._ p. 104, note 1 (156).
[134] Playful suggestion of free-will in the urine.
[135] Specific attraction, _cf._ p. 87, note 2 (233).
[136] _i.e._ there would be no selective action.
[137] Nasal mucus was supposed to be the non-utilizable
part of the nutriment conveyed to the brain, _cf._ p.
214, note 3 (297).
[138] He means from its origin in the liver (_i.e._ in
the three hepatic veins). His idea was that the upper
division took nutriment to heart, lungs, head, etc., and
the lower division to lower part of body. On the
relation of right auricle to vena cava and right
ventricle, _cf._ p. 321, notes 4 (398) and 5 (399).
[139] We arrive at our belief by excluding other
possibilities.
[140] _i.e._ the mechanistic physicists. _cf._ pp.
45-47.
[141] _cf._ p. 85, note 3 (130).
[142] The subject of _anadosis_ is taken up in the next
chapter. _cf._ also p. 62, note 1 (96).
[143] On Erasistratus _v._ Introd. p. xii. His view that the
stomach exerts no _holké_, or attraction, is dealt with
more fully in Book III., chap. viii.
[144] _i.e._ the tissues.
[145] _cf._ p. 291.
[146] _Peristalsis_ may be used here to translate Gk.
_peristolé_, meaning the contraction and dilation of
muscle-fibres _circularly_ round a lumen, _cf._ p. 263,
note 2 (341).
[147] For a demonstration that this phenomenon is a
conclusive proof neither of _peristolé_ nor of real
vital _attraction_, but is found even in dead bodies
_v._ p. 267.
[148] This was Erasistratus’s favourite principle, known
in Latin as the “horror vacui” and in English as “Nature’s
abhorrence of a vacuum,” although these terms are not an
exact translation of the Greek. τὸ κενούμενον probably
means _the vacuum_, not the _matter evacuated_, although
Galen elsewhere uses κενόω in the latter (non-classical)
sense, _e.g._ pp. 67, 215. Akolouthia is a _following-up_,
a _sequence_, almost a _consequence_.
[149] _v._ p. 123.
[150] _cf._ Book II., chap. i.
[151] Vital factor necessary over and above the
mechanical.
[152] _cf._ p. 119, note 2 (173).
[153] pp. 91, 93.
[154] _i.e._ the part below the liver; _cf._ p. 91, note
2 (138).
[155] Renal veins.
[156] _cf._ p. 87, note 3 (133).
[157] κοίλην: the usual reading is κοιλίαν, which
would make it “from the region of the alimentary
canal.” _cf._ p. 118, note 1 (171).
[158] Not at an earlier stage, when it is still on its
way from the alimentary canal to the liver.
[159] _i.e._ a renal vein.
[160] In a toast, the third cup was drunk to Zeus Sôtêr
(the Saviour).
[161] An anatomist of the Alexandrian school.
[162] _cf._ nasal mucus, p. 90, note 1 (137).
[163] “Sur l’Ensemble des Choses” (Daremberg).
[164] About twelve quarts. This is about five times as
much as the average daily excretion, and could only be
passed if a very large amount of wine were drunk.
[165] _cf._ p. 51.
[166] Horror vacui. Note analogical reasoning; _cf._ p.
289, note 1 (360).
BOOK II
I
In the previous book we demonstrated that not only Erasistratus, but
also all others who would say anything to the purpose about urinary
secretion, must acknowledge that the kidneys possess some faculty
which attracts to them this particular quality existing in the
urine.[167] Besides this we drew attention to the fact that the urine
is not carried through the kidneys into the bladder by one method, the
blood into parts of the animal by another, and the yellow bile
separated out on yet another principle. For when once there has been
demonstrated in any one organ, the drawing, or so-called
_epispastic_[168] faculty, there is then no difficulty in transferring
it to the rest. Certainly Nature did not give a power such as this to
the kidneys without giving it also to the vessels which abstract the
biliary fluid,[169] nor did she give it to the latter without also
giving it to each of the other parts. And, assuredly, if this is true,
we must marvel that Erasistratus should make statements concerning the
delivery of nutriment from the food-canal[170] which are so false as
to be detected even by Asclepiades. Now, Erasistratus considers it
absolutely certain that, if anything flows from the veins, one of two
things must happen: either a completely empty space will result, or
the contiguous quantum of fluid will run in and take the place of that
which has been evacuated. Asclepiades, however, holds that not one of
two, but one of three things must be said to result in the emptied
vessels: either there will be an entirely empty space, or the
contiguous portion will flow in, or the vessel will contract. For
whereas, in the case of reeds and tubes it is true to say that, if
these be submerged in water, and are emptied of the air which they
contain in their lumens, then either a completely empty space will be
left, or the contiguous portion will move onwards; in the case of
veins this no longer holds, since their coats can collapse and so fall
in upon the interior cavity. It may be seen, then, how false this
hypothesis—by Zeus, I cannot call it a demonstration!—of
Erasistratus is.
And, from another point of view, even if it were true, it is
superfluous, if the stomach[171] has the power of compressing the
veins, as he himself supposed, and the veins again of contracting upon
their contents and propelling them forwards.[172] For, apart from
other considerations, no _plethora_[173] would ever take place in the
body, if delivery of nutriment resulted merely from the tendency of a
vacuum to become refilled. Now, if the compression of the stomach
becomes weaker the further it goes, and cannot reach to an indefinite
distance, and if, therefore, there is need of some other mechanism to
explain why the blood is conveyed in all directions, then the
principle of the refilling of a vacuum may be looked on as a necessary
addition;[174] there will not, however, be a plethora in any of the
parts coming after the liver,[175] or, if there be, it will be in the
region of the heart and lungs; for the heart alone of the parts which
come after the liver draws the nutriment into its right ventricle,
thereafter sending it through the _arterioid vein_[176] to the lungs
(for Erasistratus himself will have it that, owing to the membranous
excrescences,[177] no other parts save the lungs receive nourishment
from the heart). If, however, in order to explain how plethora comes
about, we suppose the force of compression by the stomach to persist
indefinitely, we have no further need of the principle of the
refilling of a vacuum, especially if we assume contraction of the
veins in addition—as is, again, agreeable to Erasistratus himself.
BOOK II
Β
I
Ὅτι μὲν οὖν ἀναγκαῖόν ἐστιν οὐκ Ἐρασιστράτῳ μόνον 74
ἀλλὰ καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις ἅπασιν, ὅσοι μέλλουσι περὶ
διακρίσεως οὔρων ἐρεῖν τι χρηστόν, ὁμολογῆσαι
δύναμίν τιν' ὑπάρχειν τοῖς νεφροῖς ἕλκουσαν εἰς
ἑαυτοὺς ποιότητα τοιαύτην, οἵα ἐν τοῖς οὔροις ἐστί,
διὰ τοῦ πρόσθεν ἐπιδέδεικται γράμματος,
ἀναμιμνησκόντων ἅμ' αὐτῷ καὶ τοῦθ' ἡμῶν, ὡς οὐκ
ἄλλως μὲν εἰς τὴν κύστιν φέρεται τὰ οὖρα διὰ τῶν
νεφρῶν, ἄλλως δ' εἰς ἅπαντα τοῦ ζῴου τὰ μόρια τὸ
αἷμα, κατ' ἄλλον δέ τινα τρόπον ἡ ξανθὴ χολὴ
διακρίνεται. δειχθείσης γὰρ ἐναργῶς ἐφ' ἑνὸς || 75
οὑτινοσοῦν ὀργάνου τῆς ἑλκτικῆς τε καὶ ἐπισπαστικῆς
ὀνομαζομένης δυνάμεως οὐδὲν ἔτι χαλεπὸν ἐπὶ τὰ λοιπὰ
μεταφέρειν αὐτήν· οὐ γὰρ δὴ τοῖς μὲν νεφροῖς ἡ φύσις
ἔδωκέ τινα τοιαύτην δύναμιν, οὐχὶ δέ γε καὶ τοῖς τὸ
χολῶδες ὑγρὸν ἕλκουσιν ἀγγείοις οὐδὲ τούτοις μέν,
οὐκέτι δὲ καὶ τῶν ἄλλων μορίων ἑκάστῳ. καὶ μὴν εἰ
τοῦτ' ἀληθές ἐστι, θαυμάζειν χρὴ τοῦ Ἐρασιστράτου
ψευδεῖς οὕτω λόγους ὑπὲρ ἀναδόσεως τροφῆς εἰπόντος,
ὡς μηδ' Ἀσκληπιάδην λαθεῖν. καίτοι γ' οἴεται παντὸς
μᾶλλον ἀληθὲς ὑπάρχειν, ὡς, εἴπερ ἐκ τῶν φλεβῶν
ἀπορρέοι τι, δυοῖν θάτερον ἢ κενὸς ἔσται τόπος
ἀθρόως ἢ τὸ συνεχὲς ἐπιρρυήσεται τὴν βάσιν
ἀναπληροῦν τοῦ κενουμένου. ἀλλ' ὅ γ' Ἀσκληπιάδης οὐ
δυοῖν θάτερόν φησιν, ἀλλὰ τριῶν ἕν τι χρῆναι λέγειν
ἐπὶ τοῖς κενουμένοις ἀγγείοις ἕπεσθαι ἢ κενὸν ἀθρόως
τόπον ἢ τὸ συνεχὲς ἀκολουθήσειν ἢ συσταλήσεσθαι τὸ
ἀγγεῖον. ἐπὶ μὲν γὰρ τῶν καλάμων καὶ τῶν αὐλίσκων
τῶν εἰς τὸ ὕδωρ καθιεμένων ἀληθὲς εἰπεῖν, ὅτι
κενουμένου τοῦ περιεχομένου κατὰ τὴν || εὐρυχωρίαν 76
αὐτῶν ἀέρος ἢ κενὸς ἀθρόως ἔσται τόπος ἢ ἀκολουθήσει
τὸ συνεχές· ἐπὶ δὲ τῶν φλεβῶν οὐκέτ' ἐγχωρεῖ,
δυναμένου δὴ τοῦ χιτῶνος αὐτῶν εἰς ἑαυτὸν συνιζάνειν
καὶ διὰ τοῦτο καταπίπτειν εἰς τὴν ἐντὸς εὐρυχωρίαν.
οὕτω μὲν δὴ ψευδὴς ἡ περὶ τῆς πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον
ἀκολουθίας οὐκ ἀπόδειξις μὰ Δί' εἴποιμ' ἂν ἀλλ'
ὑπόθεσις Ἐρασιστράτειος.
Καθ' ἕτερον δ' αὖ τρόπον, εἰ καὶ ἀληθὴς εἴη,
περιττή, τῆς μὲν κοιλίας ἐνθλίβειν ταῖς φλεψὶ
δυναμένης, ὡς αὐτὸς ὑπέθετο, τῶν φλεβῶν δ' αὖ
περιστέλλεσθαι τῷ ἐνυπάρχοντι καὶ προωθεῖν αὐτό. τά
τε γὰρ ἄλλα καὶ πλῆθος οὐκ ἂν ἐν τῷ σώματι γένοιτο,
τῇ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ μόνῃ τῆς ἀναδόσεως
ἐπιτελουμένης. εἰ μὲν οὖν ἡ τῆς γαστρὸς ἔνθλιψις
ἐκλύεται προϊοῦσα καὶ μέχρι παντὸς ἀδύνατός ἐστιν
ἐξικνεῖσθαι καὶ διὰ τοῦτ' ἄλλης τινὸς δεῖ μηχανῆς
εἰς τὴν πάντη φορὰν τοῦ αἵματος, ἀναγκαία μὲν ἡ πρὸς
τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθία προσεξεύρηται· πλῆθος δ' ἐν
οὐδενὶ τῶν μεθ' ἧπαρ ἔσται || μορίων, ἤ, εἴπερ ἄρα, 77
περὶ τὴν καρδίαν τε καὶ τὸν πνεύμονα. μόνη γὰρ αὕτη
τῶν μεθ' ἧπαρ εἰς τὴν δεξιὰν αὑτῆς κοιλίαν ἕλκει τὴν
τροφήν, εἶτα διὰ τῆς φλεβός τῆς ἀρτηριώδους ἐκπέμπει
τῷ πνεύμονι· τῶν γὰρ ἄλλων οὐδὲν οὐδ' αὐτὸς ὁ
Ἐρασίστρατος ἐκ καρδίας βούλεται τρέφεσθαι διὰ τὴν
τῶν ὑμένων ἐπίφυσιν. εἰ δέ γ', ἵνα πλῆθος γένηται,
φυλάξομεν ἄχρι παντὸς τὴν ῥώμην τῆς κατὰ τὴν κοιλίαν
ἐνθλίψεως, οὐδὲν ἔτι δεόμεθα τῆς πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον
ἀκολουθίας, μάλιστ' εἰ καὶ τὴν τῶν φλεβῶν
συνυποθοίμεθα περιστολήν, ὡς αὖ καὶ τοῦτ' αὐτῷ πάλιν
ἀρέσκει τῷ Ἐρασιστράτῳ.
II
Let me draw his attention, then, once again, even if he does not wish
it, to the kidneys, and let me state that these confute in the very
clearest manner such people as object to the principle of
_attraction_. Nobody has ever said anything plausible, nor, as we
previously showed, has anyone been able to discover, by any means,
any other cause for the secretion of urine; we necessarily appear mad
if we maintain that the urine passes into the kidneys in the form of
vapour, and we certainly cut a poor figure when we talk about the
tendency of a vacuum to become refilled;[178] this idea is foolish in
the case of blood, and impossible, nay, perfectly nonsensical, in the
case of the urine.[179]
This, then, is one blunder made by those who dissociate themselves
from the principle of attraction. Another is that which they make
about the _secretion of yellow bile_. For in this case, too, it is not
a fact that when the blood runs past the mouths [stomata] of the
bile-ducts there will be a thorough separation out [secretion] of
biliary waste-matter. “Well,” say they, “let us suppose that it is not
secreted but carried with the blood all over the body.” But, you
sapient folk, Erasistratus himself supposed that Nature took thought
for the animals’ future, and was workmanlike in her method; and at the
same time he maintained that the biliary fluid was useless in every
way for the animals. Now these two things are incompatible. For how
could Nature be still looked on as exercising forethought for the
animal when she allowed a noxious humour such as this to be carried
off and distributed with the blood?...
This, however, is a small matter. I shall again point out here the
greatest and most obvious error. For if the yellow bile adjusts itself
to the narrower vessels and stomata, and the blood to the wider ones,
for no other reason than that blood is thicker and bile thinner, and
that the stomata of the veins are wider and those of the bile-ducts
narrower,[180] then it is clear that this watery and serous
superfluity,[181] too, will run out into the bile-ducts quicker than
does the bile, exactly in proportion as it is thinner than the bile!
How is it, then, that it does not run out? “Because,” it may be said,
“urine is thicker than bile!” This was what one of our Erasistrateans
ventured to say, herein clearly disregarding the evidence of his
senses, although he had trusted these in the case of the bile and
blood. For, if it be that we are to look on bile as thinner than blood
because it runs more, then, since the serous residue[181] passes
through fine linen or lint or a sieve more easily even than does bile,
by these tokens bile must also be thicker than the watery fluid. For
here, again, there is no argument which will demonstrate that bile is
thinner than the serous superfluities.
But when a man shamelessly goes on using circumlocutions, and never
acknowledges when he has had a fall, he is like the amateur wrestlers,
who, when they have been overthrown by the experts and are lying on
their backs on the ground, so far from recognizing their fall,
actually seize their victorious adversaries by the necks and prevent
them from getting away, thus supposing themselves to be the winners!
II
Ἀναμνηστέον οὖν αὖθις αὐτόν, κἂν μὴ βούληται, τῶν
νεφρῶν καὶ λεκτέον, ὡς ἔλεγχος οὗτοι φανερώτατος
ἁπάντων τῶν ἀποχωρούντων τῆς ὁλκῆς· οὐδεὶς γὰρ οὐδὲν
οὔτ' εἶπε πιθανόν, ἀλλ' οὐδ' ἐξευρεῖν εἶχε κατ'
οὐδένα τρόπον, ὡς ἔμπροσθεν ἐδείκνυμεν, ἕτερον
αἴτιον οὔρων διακρίσεως, ἀλλ' ἀναγκαῖον ἢ μαίνεσθαι
δοκεῖν, εἰ φήσαιμεν ἀτμοει||δῶς εἰς τὴν κύστιν ἰέναι 78
τὸ οὖρον ἢ ἀσχημονεῖν τῆς πρὸς τὸ κενουμένον
ἀκολουθίας μνημονεύοντας, ληρώδους μὲν οὔσης κἀπὶ
τοῦ αἵματος, ἀδυνάτου δὲ καὶ ἠλιθίου παντάπασιν ἐπὶ
τῶν οὔρων.
Ἓν μὲν δὴ τοῦτο σφάλμα τῶν ἀποστάντων τῆς ὁλκῆς·
ἕτερον δὲ τὸ περὶ τῆς κατὰ τὴν ξανθὴν χολὴν
διακρίσεως. οὐδὲ γὰρ οὐδ' ἐκεῖ παραρρέοντος τοῦ
αἵματος τὰ στόματα τῶν χοληδόχων ἀγγείων ἀκριβῶς
διακριθήσεται τὸ χολῶδες περίττωμα. καὶ μὴ
διακρινέσθω, φασιν, ἄλλα συναναφερέσθω τῷ αἵματι
πάντη τοῦ σώματος. ἀλλ', ὦ σοφώτατοι, προνοητικὴν
τοῦ ζώου καὶ τεχνικὴν αὐτὸς ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος ὑπέθετο
τὴν φύσιν. ἄλλα καὶ τὸ χολῶδες ὑγρόν ἄχρηστον εἶναι
παντάπασι τοῖς ζώοις ἔφασκεν. οὐ συμβαίνει δ'
ἀλλήλοις ἄμφω ταῦτα. πῶς γὰρ ἂν ἔτι προνοεῖσθαι τοῦ
ζώου δόξειεν ἐπιτρέπουσα συναναφέρεσθαι τῷ αἵματι
μοχθηρὸν οὕτω χυμόν;
Ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν σμικρά· τὸ δὲ μέγιστον καὶ σαφέστατον
πάλιν ἐνταῦθ' ἁμάρτημα καὶ δὴ φράσω. εἴπερ γὰρ δι'
οὐδὲν ἄλλ' ἢ ὅτι παχύτερον μέν ἐστι τὸ αἷμα,
λεπτοτέρα δ' ἡ || ξανθὴ χολὴ καὶ τὰ μὲν τῶν φλεβῶν 79
εὐρύτερα στόματα, τὰ δὲ τῶν χοληδόχων ἀγγείων
στενότερα, διὰ τοῦθ' ἡ μὲν χολὴ τοῖς στενοτέροις
ἀγγείοις τε καὶ στόμασιν ἐναρμόττει, τὸ δ' αἷμα τοῖς
εὐρυτέροις, δῆλον, ὡς καὶ τὸ ὑδατῶδες τοῦτο καὶ
ὀρρῶδες περίττωμα τοσούτῳ πρότερον εἰσρυήσεται τοῖς
χοληδόχοις ἀγγείοις, ὅσῳ λεπτότερόν ἐστι τῆς χολῆς.
πῶς οὖν οὐκ εἰσρεῖ; ὅτι παχύτερόν ἐστι νὴ Δία τὸ
οὖρον τῆς χολῆς· τοῦτο γὰρ ἐτόλμησέ τις εἰπεῖν τῶν
καθ' ἡμᾶς Ἐρασιστρατείων ἀποστὰς δηλονότι τῶν
αἰσθήσεων, αἷς ἐπίστευσεν ἐπί τε τῆς χολῆς καὶ τοῦ
αἵματος. εἴτε γὰρ ὅτι μᾶλλον ἡ χολὴ τοῦ αἵματος ῥεῖ,
διὰ τοῦτο λεπτοτέραν αὐτὴν ἡμῖν ἐστι νομιστέον, εἴθ'
ὅτι δι' ὀθόνης ἢ ῥάκους ἤ τινος ἠθμοῦ ῥᾷον
διεξέρχεται καὶ ταύτης τὸ ὀρρῶδες περίττωμα, κατὰ
ταῦτα τὰ γνωρίσματα παχυτέρα τῆς ὑδατώδους ὑγρότητος
καὶ αὕτη γενήσεται. πάλιν γὰρ οὐδ' ἐνταῦθα λόγος
οὐδείς ἐστιν, ὃς ἀποδείξει λεπτοτέραν τὴν χολὴν τῶν
ὀρρωδῶν περιττωμάτων.
Ἀλλ' ὅταν τις ἀναισχυντῇ περιπλέκων τε καὶ μήπω
καταπεπτωκέναι συγχωρῶν, || ὅμοιος ἔσται τοῖς 80
ἰδιώταις τῶν παλαιστῶν, οἳ καταβληθέντες ὑπὸ τῶν
παλαιστρικῶν καὶ κατὰ τῆς γῆς ὕπτιοι κείμενοι
τοσούτου δέουσι τὸ πτῶμα γνωρίζειν, ὥστε καὶ
κρατοῦσι τῶν αὐχένων αὐτοὺς τοὺς καταβαλόντας οὐκ
ἐῶντες ἀπαλλάττεσθαι, κἀν τούτῳ νικᾶν ὑπολαμβάνουσι.
III
Thus, every hypothesis of _channels_[182] as an explanation of natural
functioning is perfect nonsense. For, if there were not _an inborn
faculty_ given by Nature to each one of the organs at the very
beginning, then animals could not continue to live even for a few
days, far less for the number of years which they actually do. For let
us suppose they were under no guardianship, lacking in creative
ingenuity[183] and forethought; let us suppose they were steered only
by material forces,[184] and not by any special _faculties_ (the one
attracting what is proper to it, another rejecting what is foreign,
and yet another causing alteration and adhesion of the matter destined
to nourish it); if we suppose this, I am sure it would be ridiculous
for us to discuss natural, or, still more, psychical, activities—or,
in fact, life as a whole.[185]
For there is not a single animal which could live or endure for the
shortest time if, possessing within itself so many different parts, it
did not employ faculties which were attractive of what is appropriate,
eliminative of what is foreign, and alterative of what is destined for
nutrition. On the other hand, if we have these faculties, we no longer
need _channels_, little or big, resting on an unproven hypothesis, for
explaining the secretion of urine and bile, and the conception of some
_favourable situation_ (in which point alone Erasistratus shows some
common sense, since he does regard all the parts of the body as having
been well and truly placed and shaped by Nature).
But let us suppose he remained true to his own statement that Nature
is “artistic”—this Nature which, at the beginning, well and truly
shaped and disposed all the parts of the animal,[186] and, after
carrying out this function (for she left nothing undone), brought it
forward to the light of day, endowed with certain faculties necessary
for its very existence, and, thereafter, gradually increased it until
it reached its due size. If he argued consistently on this principle,
I fail to see how he can continue to refer natural functions to the
smallness or largeness of canals, or to any other similarly absurd
hypothesis. For this Nature which shapes and gradually adds to the
parts is most certainly extended throughout their whole substance. Yes
indeed, she shapes and nourishes and increases them through and
through, not on the outside only. For Praxiteles and Phidias and all
the other statuaries used merely to decorate their material on the
outside, in so far as they were able to touch it; but its inner parts
they left unembellished, unwrought, unaffected by art or forethought,
since they were unable to penetrate therein and to reach and handle
all portions of the material. It is not so, however, with Nature.
Every part of a bone she makes bone, every part of the flesh she makes
flesh, and so with fat and all the rest; there is no part which she
has not touched, elaborated, and embellished. Phidias, on the other
hand, could not turn wax into ivory and gold, nor yet gold into wax:
for each of these remains as it was at the commencement, and becomes a
perfect statue simply by being clothed externally in a form and
artificial shape. But Nature does not preserve the original character
of any kind of matter; if she did so then all parts of the animal
would be blood—that blood, namely, which flows to the semen from the
impregnated female and which is, so to speak, like the statuary’s wax,
a single uniform matter, subjected to the artificer. From this blood
there arises no part of the animal which is as red and moist [as blood
is], for bone, artery, vein, nerve, cartilage, fat, gland, membrane,
and marrow are not blood, though they arise from it.
I would then ask Erasistratus himself to inform me what the altering,
coagulating, and shaping agent is. He would doubtless say, “Either
Nature or the semen,” meaning the same thing in both cases, but
explaining it by different devices. For that which was previously
semen, when it begins to procreate and to shape the animal, becomes,
so to say, a special _nature_.[187] For in the same way that Phidias
possessed the faculties of his art even before touching his material,
and then activated these in connection with this material (for every
faculty remains inoperative in the absence of its proper material), so
it is with the semen: its faculties it possessed from the
beginning,[188] while its activities it does not receive from its
material, but it manifests them in connection therewith.
And, of course, if it were to be overwhelmed with a great quantity of
blood, it would perish, while if it were to be entirely deprived of
blood it would remain inoperative and would not turn into a _nature_.
Therefore, in order that it may not perish, but may become a _nature_
in place of semen, there must be an afflux to it of a little
blood—or, rather, one should not say a little, but a quantity
commensurate with that of the semen. What is it then that measures the
quantity of this afflux? What prevents more from coming? What ensures
against a deficiency? What is this third overseer of animal generation
that we are to look for, which will furnish the semen with a due
amount of blood? What would Erasistratus have said if he had been
alive, and had been asked this question? Obviously, the semen itself.
This, in fact, is the artificer analogous with Phidias, whilst the
blood corresponds to the statuary’s wax.
Now, it is not for the wax to discover for itself how much of it is
required; that is the business of Phidias. Accordingly the artificer
will draw to itself as much blood as it needs. Here, however, we must
pay attention and take care not unwittingly to credit the semen with
reason and intelligence; if we were to do this, we would be making
neither semen nor a nature, but an actual living animal.[189] And if
we retain these two principles—that of proportionate attraction[190]
and that of the non-participation of intelligence—we shall ascribe to
the semen a faculty for attracting blood similar to that possessed by
the lodestone for iron.[191] Here, then, again, in the case of the
semen, as in so many previous instances, we have been compelled to
acknowledge some kind of attractive faculty.
And what is the semen? Clearly the active principle of the animal, the
material principle being the menstrual blood.[192] Next, seeing that
the active principle employs this faculty primarily, therefore, in
order that any one of the things fashioned by it may come into
existence, it [the principle] must necessarily be possessed of its own
faculty. How, then, was Erasistratus unaware of it, if the primary
function of the semen be to draw to itself a due proportion of blood?
Now, this fluid would be in due proportion if it were so thin and
vaporous, that, as soon as it was drawn like dew into every part of
the semen, it would everywhere cease to display its own particular
character; for so the semen will easily dominate and quickly
assimilate it—in fact, will use it as food. It will then, I imagine,
draw to itself a second and a third quantum, and thus by feeding it
acquires for itself considerable bulk and quantity.[193] In fact, _the
alterative faculty_ has now been discovered as well, although about
this also Erasistratus has not written a word. And, thirdly the
_shaping_[194] faculty will become evident, by virtue of which the
semen firstly surrounds itself with a thin membrane like a kind of
superficial condensation; this is what was described by Hippocrates in
the sixth-day birth, which, according to his statement, fell from the
singing-girl and resembled the pellicle of an egg. And following this
all the other stages will occur, such as are described by him in his
work “On the Child’s Nature.”
But if each of the parts formed were to remain as small as when it
first came into existence, of what use would that be? They have, then,
to grow. Now, how will they grow? By becoming extended in all
directions and at the same time receiving nourishment. And if you will
recall what I previously said about the bladder which the children
blew up and rubbed,[195] you will also understand my meaning better as
expressed in what I am now about to say.
Imagine the heart to be, at the beginning, so small as to differ in no
respect from a millet-seed, or, if you will, a bean; and consider how
otherwise it is to become large than by being extended in all
directions and acquiring nourishment throughout its whole substance,
in the way that, as I showed a short while ago, the semen is
nourished. But even this was unknown to Erasistratus—the man who
sings the artistic skill of Nature! He imagines that animals grow like
webs, ropes, sacks, or baskets, each of which has, woven on to its end
or margin, other material similar to that of which it was originally
composed.
But this, most sapient sir, is not growth, but genesis! For a bag,
sack, garment, house, ship, or the like is said to be still coming
into existence [undergoing genesis] so long as the appropriate form
for the sake of which it is being constructed by the artificer is
still incomplete. Then, when does it grow? Only when the basket, being
complete, with a bottom, a mouth, and a belly, as it were, as well as
the intermediate parts, now becomes larger in all these respects. “And
how can this happen?” someone will ask. Only by our basket suddenly
becoming an animal or a plant; for growth belongs to living things
alone. Possibly you imagine that a house _grows_ when it is being
built, or a basket when being plaited, or a garment when being woven?
It is not so however. Growth belongs to that which has already been
completed in respect to its form, whereas the process by which that
which is still _becoming_ attains its form is termed not growth but
genesis. That which _is_, grows, while that which _is not_, becomes.
III
Λῆρος οὖν μακρὸς ἅπασα πόρων ὑπόθεσις εἰς φυσικὴν
ἐνέργειαν. εἰ μὴ γὰρ δύναμίς τις σύμφυτος ἑκάστῳ τῶν
ὀργάνων ὑπὸ τῆς φύσεως εὐθὺς ἐξ ἀρχῆς δοθείη,
διαρκεῖν οὐ δυνήσεται τὰ ζῷα, μὴ ὅτι τοσοῦτον
ἀριθμὸν ἐτῶν ἀλλ' οὐδ' ἡμερῶν ὀλιγίστων·
ἀνεπιτρόπευτα γὰρ ἐάσαντες αὐτὰ καὶ τέχνης καὶ
προνοίας ἔρημα μόναις ταῖς τῶν ὑλῶν οἰακιζόμενα
ῥοπαῖς, οὐδαμοῦ δυνάμεως οὐδεμιᾶς τῆς μὲν ἑλκούσης
τὸ προσῆκον ἑαυτῇ, τῆς δ' ἀπωθούσης τὸ ἀλλότριον,
τῆς δ' ἀλλοιούσης τε καὶ προσφυούσης τὸ θρέψον, οὐκ
οἶδ' ὅπως οὐκ ἂν εἴημεν καταγέλαστοι περί τε τῶν
φυσικῶν ἐνεργειῶν διαλεγόμενοι καὶ πολὺ μᾶλλον ἔτι
περὶ τῶν ψυχικῶν καὶ || συμπάσης γε τῆς ζωῆς. 81
Οὐδὲ γὰρ ζῆν οὐδὲ διαμένειν οὐδενὶ τῶν ζῴων οὐδ' εἰς
ἐλάχιστον χρόνον ἔσται δυνατόν, εἰ τοσαῦτα
κεκτημένον ἐν ἑαυτῷ μόρια καὶ οὕτω διαφέροντα μήθ'
ἑλκτικῇ τῶν οἰκείων χρήσεται δυνάμει μήτ' ἀποκριτικῇ
τῶν ἀλλοτρίων μήτ' ἀλλοιωτικῇ τῶν θρεψόντων. καὶ μὴν
εἰ ταύτας ἔχοιμεν, οὐδὲν ἔτι πόρων μικρῶν ἢ μεγάλων
ἐξ ὑποθέσεως ἀναποδείκτου λαμβανομένων εἰς οὔρου καὶ
χολῆς διάκρισιν δεόμεθα καί τινος ἐπικαίρου θέσεως,
ἐν ᾧ μόνῳ σωφρονεῖν ἔοικεν ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος ἅπαντα
καλῶς τεθῆναί τε καὶ διαπλασθῆναι τὰ μόρια τοῦ
σώματος ὑπὸ τῆς φύσεως οἰόμενος.
Ἀλλ' εἰ παρακολουθήσειεν ἑαυτῷ φύσιν ὀνομάζοντι
τεχνικήν, εὐθὺς μὲν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἅπαντα καλῶς
διαπλάσασάν τε καὶ διαθεῖσαν τοῦ ζῴου τὰ μόρια, μετὰ
δὲ τὴν τοιαύτην ἐνέργειαν, ὡς οὐδὲν ἔλειπεν, ἔτι
προαγαγοῦσαν εἰς φῶς αὐτὸ σύν τισι δυνάμεσιν, ὧν
ἄνευ ζῆν οὐκ ἠδύνατο, καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα κατὰ βραχὺ
προσαυξήσασαν ἄχρι τοῦ πρέποντος μεγέθους, οὐκ οἶδα
πῶς ὑπομένει πόρων σμικρότησιν || ἢ μεγέθεσιν ἢ 82
τισὶν ἄλλαις οὕτω ληρώδεσιν ὑποθέσεσι φυσικὰς
ἐνεργείας ἐπιτρέπειν. ἡ γὰρ διαπλάττουσα τὰ μόρια
φύσις ἐκείνη καὶ κατὰ βραχὺ προσαύξουσα πάντως δήπου
δι' ὅλων αὐτῶν ἐκτέταται· καὶ γὰρ ὅλα δι' ὅλων οὐκ
ἔξωθεν μόνον αὐτὰ διαπλάττει τε καὶ τρέφει καὶ
προσαύξει. Πραξιτέλης μὲν γὰρ ἢ Φειδίας ἢ τις ἄλλος
ἀγαλματοποιὸς ἔξωθεν μόνον ἐκόσμουν τὰς ὕλας, καθὰ
καὶ ψαύειν αὐτῶν ἠδύναντο, τὸ βάθος δ' ἀκόσμητον καὶ
ἀργὸν καὶ ἄτεχνον καὶ ἀπρονόητον ἀπέλιπον, ὡς ἂν μὴ
δυνάμενοι κατελθεῖν εἰς αὐτὸ καὶ καταδῦναι καὶ
θιγεῖν ἁπάντων τῆς ὕλης τῶν μερῶν. ἡ φύσις δ' οὐχ
οὕτως, ἄλλα τὸ μὲν ὀστοῦ μέρος ἅπαν ὀστοῦν ἀποτελεῖ,
τὸ δὲ σαρκὸς σάρκα, τὸ δὲ πιμελῆς πιμελὴν καὶ τῶν
ἄλλων ἕκαστον· οὐδὲν γὰρ ἐστιν ἄψαυστον αὐτῇ μέρος
οὐδ' ἀνεξέργαστον οὐδ' ἀκόσμητον. ἄλλα τὸν μὲν κηρὸν
ὁ Φειδίας οὐκ ἠδύνατο ποιεῖν ἐλέφαντα καὶ χρυσόν,
ἀλλ' οὐδὲ τὸν χρυσὸν κηρόν· ἕκαστον γὰρ αὐτῶν μένον,
οἷον ἦν ἐξ ἀρχῆς, ἔξωθεν μόνον ἠμφιεσμένον εἶδός τι
καὶ σχῆμα τεχνικόν, ἄγαλμα τέλειον || γέγονεν. ἡ 83
φύσις δ' οὐδεμιᾶς ἔτι φυλάττει τῶν ὑλῶν τὴν ἀρχαίαν
ἰδέαν· αἷμα γὰρ ἂν ἦν οὕτως ἅπαντα τοῦ ζῴου τὰ
μόρια, τὸ παρὰ τῆς κυούσης ἐπιρρέον τῷ σπέρματι,
δίκην κηροῦ τινος ὕλη μία καὶ μονοειδὴς ὑποβεβλημένη
τῷ τεχνίτῃ. γίγνεται δ' ἐξ αὐτῆς οὐδὲν τῶν τοῦ ζῴου
μορίων οὔτ' ἐρυθρὸν οὕτως οὔθ' ὑγρόν. ὀστοῦν γὰρ καὶ
ἀρτηρία καὶ φλὲψ καὶ νεῦρον καὶ χόνδρος καὶ πιμελὴ
καὶ ἀδὴν καὶ ὑμὴν καὶ μυελὸς ἄναιμα μέν, ἐξ αἵματος
δὲ γέγονε.
Τίνος ἀλλοιώσαντος καὶ τίνος πήξαντος καὶ τίνος
διαπλάσαντος ἐδεόμην ἄν μοι τὸν Ἐρασίστρατον αὐτὸν
ἀποκρίνασθαι. πάντως γὰρ ἂν εἶπεν ἤτοι τὴν φύσιν ἢ
τὸ σπέρμα, ταὐτὸν μὲν λέγων καθ' ἑκάτερον, διαφόροις
δ' ἐπινοίαις ἑρμηνεύων· ὃ γὰρ ἦν πρότερον σπέρμα,
τοῦθ', ὅταν ἄρξηται φύειν τε καὶ διαπλάττειν τὸ
ζῷον, φύσις τις γίγνεται. καθάπερ γὰρ ὁ Φειδίας εἶχε
μὲν τὰς δυνάμεις τῆς τέχνης καὶ πρὶν ψαύειν τῆς
ὕλης, ἐνήργει δ' αὐταῖς περὶ τὴν ὕλην—ἅπασα γὰρ
δύναμις ἀργεῖ ἀποροῦσα τῆς οἰκείας ὕλης—, οὕτω καὶ
τὸ σπέρμα τὰς μὲν || δυνάμεις οἴκοθεν ἐκέκτητο, τὰς 84
δ' ἐνεργείας οὐκ ἐκ τῆς ὕλης ἔλαβεν, ἀλλὰ περὶ τὴν
ὕλην ἐπεδείξατο.
Καὶ μὴν εἰ πολλῷ μὲν ἐπικλύζοιτο τῷ αἵματι τὸ
σπέρμα, διαφθείροιτ' ἄν· εἰ δ' ὅλως ἀποροίη
παντάπασιν ἀργοῦν, οὐκ ἂν γένοιτο φύσις. ἵν' οὖν
μήτε φθείρηται καὶ γίγνηται φύσις ἀντὶ σπέρματος,
ὀλίγον ἐπιρρεῖν ἀναγκαῖον αὐτῷ τοῦ αἵματος, μᾶλλον
δ' οὐκ ὀλίγον λέγειν χρή, ἀλλὰ σύμμετρον τῷ πλήθει
τοῦ σπέρματος. τίς οὖν ὁ μετρῶν αὐτοῦ τὸ ποσὸν τῆς
ἐπιρροῆς; τίς ὁ κωλύων ἰέναι πλέον; τίς ὁ προτρέπων,
ἵν' ἐνδεέστερον μὴ ἴῃ; τίνα ζητήσομεν ἐνταῦθα τρίτον
ἐπιστάτην τοῦ ζῴου τῆς γενέσεως, ὃς χορηγήσει τῷ
σπέρματι τὸ σύμμετρον αἷμα; τί ἂν εἶπεν
Ἐρασίστρατος, εἰ ζῶν ταῦτ' ἠρωτήθη; τὸ σπέρμα αὐτὸ
δηλονότι· τοῦτο γάρ ἐστιν ὁ τεχνίτης ὁ ἀναλογῶν τῷ
Φειδίᾳ, τὸ δ' αἷμα τῷ κηρῷ προσέοικεν.
Οὔκουν πρέπει τὸν κηρὸν αὐτὸν ἑαυτῷ τὸ μέτρον
ἐξευρίσκειν, ἀλλὰ τὸν Φείδιαν. ἕλξει δὴ τοσοῦτον
αἵματος ὁ τεχνίτης εἰς ἑαυτόν, ὁπόσου δεῖται. ἀλλ'
ἐν||ταῦθα χρὴ προσέχειν ἤδη τὸν νοῦν καὶ σκοπεῖν, μή 85
πως λάθωμεν τῷ σπέρματι λογισμόν τινα καὶ νοῦν
χαρισάμενοι· οὕτω γὰρ ἂν οὔτε σπέρμα ποιήσαιμεν οὔτε
φύσιν ἀλλ' ἤδη ζῷον αὐτό. καὶ μὴν εἰ φυλάξομεν
ἀμφότερα, τήν θ' ὁλκὴν τοῦ συμμέτρου καὶ τὸ χωρὶς
λογισμοῦ, δύναμίν τινα, καθάπερ ἡ λίθος ἑλκτικὴν
εἶχε τοῦ σιδήρου, καὶ τῷ σπέρματι φήσομεν ὑπάρχειν
αἵματος ἐπισπαστικήν. ἠναγκάσθημεν οὖν πάλιν
κἀνταῦθα, καθάπερ ἤδη πολλάκις ἔμπροσθεν, ἑλκτικήν
τινα δύναμιν ὁμολογῆσαι κατὰ τὸ σπέρμα.
Τί δ' ἦν τὸ σπέρμα; ἡ ἀρχὴ τοῦ ζῴου δηλονότι ἡ
δραστική· ἡ γὰρ ὑλικὴ τὸ καταμήνιόν ἐστιν. εἶτ'
αὐτῆς τῆς ἀρχῆς πρώτῃ ταύτῃ τῇ δυνάμει χρωμένης, ἵνα
γένηται τῶν ὑπ' αὐτῆς τι δεδημιουργημένων, ἄμοιρον
εἶναι τῆς οἰκείας δυνάμεως οὐκ ἐνδέχεται. πῶς οὖν
Ἐρασίστρατος αὐτὴν οὐκ οἶδεν, εἰ δὴ πρώτη μὲν αὕτη
τοῦ σπέρματος ἐνέργεια τὸ σύμμετρον αἵματος
ἐπισπᾶσθαι πρὸς ἑαυτό; σύμμετρον δ' ἂν εἴη τὸ λεπτὸν
οὕτω καὶ ἀτμῶδες, ὥστ' εὐθὺς εἰς πᾶν μόριον
ἑλκόμενον τοῦ σπέρματος δροσοειδῶς μηδαμοῦ τὴν || 86
ἑαυτοῦ παρεμφαίνειν ἰδέαν. οὕτω γὰρ αὐτοῦ καὶ
κρατήσει ῥᾳδίως τὸ σπέρμα καὶ ταχέως ἐξομοιώσει καὶ
τροφὴν ἑαυτῷ ποιήσεται κἄπειτ' οἶμαι δεύτερον
ἐπισπάσεται καὶ τρίτον, ὡς ὄγκον ἑαυτῷ καὶ πλῆθος
ἀξιόλογον ἐργάσασθαι τραφέντι. καὶ μὴν ἤδη καὶ ἡ
ἀλλοιωτικὴ δύναμις ἐξεύρηται μηδ' αὐτὴ πρὸς
Ἐρασιστράτου γεγραμμένη. τρίτη δ' ἂν ἡ διαπλαστικὴ
φανείη, καθ' ἣν πρῶτον μὲν οἷον ἐπίπαγόν τινα λεπτὸν
ὑμένα περιτίθησιν ἑαυτῷ τὸ σπέρμα, τὸν ὑφ'
Ἱπποκράτους ἐπὶ τῆς ἑκταίας γονῆς, ἣν ἐκπεσεῖν ἔλεγε
τῆς μουσουργοῦ, τῷ τῶν ὠῶν εἰκασθέντα χιτῶνι· μετὰ
δὲ τούτον ἤδη καὶ τἆλλ', ὅσα πρὸς ἐκείνου λέγεται
διὰ τοῦ περὶ φύσιος παιδίου συγγράμματος.
Ἀλλ' εἰ τῶν διαπλασθέντων ἕκαστον οὕτω μείνειε
σμικρόν, ὡς ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἐγένετο, τί ἂν εἴη πλέον;
αὐξάνεσθαι τοίνυν αὐτὰ χρή. πῶς οὖν αὐξηθήσεται;
πάντη διατεινόμενα θ' ἅμα καὶ τρεφόμενα. καί μοι τῶν
ἔμπροσθεν εἰρημένων ἐπὶ τῆς κύστεως, ἣν οἱ παῖδες
ἐμφυσῶντες ἔτριβον, ἀναμνησθεὶς μαθήσῃ μᾶλλον || κἀκ 87
τῶν νῦν ῥηθησομένων.
Ἐννόησον γὰρ δὴ τὴν καρδίαν οὕτω μὲν μικρὰν εἶναι
κατ' ἀρχάς, ὡς κέγχρου μηδὲν διαφέρειν ἢ, εἰ βούλει,
κυάμου, καὶ ζήτησον, ὅπως ἂν ἄλλως αὕτη γένοιτο
μεγάλη χωρὶς τοῦ πάντη διατεινομένην τρέφεσθαι δι'
ὅλης ἑαυτὴς, ὡς ὀλίγῳ πρόσθεν ἐδείκνυτο τὸ σπέρμα
τρεφόμενον. ἀλλ' οὐδὲ τοῦτ' Ἐρασίστρατος οἶδεν ὁ τὴν
τέχνην τῆς φύσεως ὑμνῶν, ἀλλ' οὕτως αὐξάνεσθαι τὰ
ζῷα νομίζει καθάπερ τινὰ κρησέραν ἢ σειρὰν ἢ σάκκον
ἢ τάλαρον, ὧν ἑκάστῳ κατὰ τὸ πέρας ἐπιπλεκομένων
ὁμοίων ἑτέρων τοῖς ἐξ ἀρχῆς αὐτὰ συντιθεῖσιν ἡ
πρόσθεσις γίγνεται.
Ἀλλὰ τοῦτό γ' οὐκ αὔξησίς ἐστιν ἀλλὰ γένεσις, ὦ
σοφώτατε· γίγνεται γὰρ ὁ θύλακος ἔτι καὶ ὁ σάκκος
καὶ θοἰμάτιον καὶ ἡ οἰκία καὶ τὸ πλοῖον καὶ τῶν
ἄλλων ἕκαστον, ὅταν μηδέπω τὸ προσῆκον εἶδος, οὗ
χάριν ὑπὸ τοῦ τεχνίτου δημιουργεῖται,
συμπεπληρωμένον ᾖ. πότ' οὖν αὐξάνεται; ὅταν ἤδη
τέλειος ὢν ὁ τάλαρος, ὡς ἔχειν πυθμένα τέ τινα καὶ
στόμα καὶ οἷον γαστέρα καὶ τὰ τούτων μεταξύ, μείζων
ἅπασι τούτοις γένηται. καὶ πῶς || ἔσται τοῦτο; φήσει 88
τις. πῶς δ' ἄλλως ἢ εἰ ζῷον ἐξαίφνης ἢ φυτὸν ὁ
τάλαρος ἡμῖν γένοιτο; μόνων γὰρ τῶν ζώντων ἡ
αὔξησις. σὺ δ' ἴσως οἴει τὴν οἰκίαν οἰκοδομουμένην
αὐξάνεσθαι καὶ τὸν τάλαρον πλεκόμενον καὶ θοἰμάτιον
ὑφαινόμενον. ἀλλ' οὐχ ὧδ' ἔχει· τοῦ μὲν γὰρ ἤδη
σύμπεπληρωμένου κατὰ τὸ εἶδος ἡ αὔξησις, τοῦ δ' ἔτι
γιγνομένου ἡ εἰς τὸ εἶδος ὁδὸς οὐκ αὔξησις ἀλλὰ
γένεσις ὀνομάζεται· αὐξάνεται μὲν γὰρ τὸ ὄν,
γίγνεται δὲ τὸ οὐκ ὄν.
IV
This also was unknown to Erasistratus, whom nothing escaped, if his
followers speak in any way truly in maintaining that he was familiar
with the Peripatetic philosophers. Now, in so far as he acclaims
Nature as being an artist in construction, even I recognize the
Peripatetic teachings, but in other respects he does not come near
them. For if anyone will make himself acquainted with the writings of
Aristotle and Theophrastus, these will appear to him to consist of
commentaries on the Nature-lore [physiology][196] of
Hippocrates—according to which the principles of heat, cold, dryness
and moisture act upon and are acted upon by one another, the hot
principle being the most active, and the cold coming next to it in
power; all this was stated in the first place by Hippocrates and
secondly by Aristotle.[197] Further, it is at once the Hippocratic and
the Aristotelian teaching that the parts which are being nourished
receive that nourishment throughout their whole substance, and that,
similarly, processes of _mingling_ and _alteration_ involve the entire
substance.[198] Moreover, that digestion is a species of alteration—a
transmutation of the nutriment into the proper quality of the thing
receiving it; that blood-production also is an alteration, and
nutrition as well; that growth results from extension in all
directions, combined with nutrition; that alteration is effected
mainly by the warm principle, and that therefore digestion, nutrition,
and the generation of the various humours, as well as the qualities of
the surplus substances, result from the _innate heat_;[199] all these
and many other points besides in regard to the aforesaid faculties,
the origin of diseases, and the discovery of remedies, were correctly
stated first by Hippocrates of all writers whom we know, and were in
the second place correctly expounded by Aristotle. Now, if all these
views meet with the approval of the Peripatetics, as they undoubtedly
do, and if none of them satisfy Erasistratus, what can the
Erasistrateans possibly mean by claiming that their leader was
associated with these philosophers? The fact is, they revere him as a
god, and think that everything he says is true. If this be so, then we
must suppose the Peripatetics to have strayed very far from truth,
since they approve of none of the ideas of Erasistratus. And, indeed,
the disciples of the latter produce his connection with the
Peripatetics in order to furnish his Nature-lore with a respectable
pedigree.
Now, let us reverse our argument and put it in a different way from
that which we have just employed. For if the Peripatetics were correct
in their teaching about Nature, there could be nothing more absurd
than the contentions of Erasistratus. And, I will leave it to the
Erasistrateans themselves to decide; they must either advance the one
proposition or the other. According to the former one the Peripatetics
had no accurate acquaintance with Nature, and according to the second,
Erasistratus. It is my task, then, to point out the opposition between
the two doctrines, and theirs to make the choice....
But they certainly will not abandon their reverence for Erasistratus.
Very well, then; let them stop talking about the Peripatetic
philosophers. For among the numerous physiological teachings regarding
the genesis and destruction of animals, their health, their diseases,
and the methods of treating these, there will be found one only which
is common to Erasistratus and the Peripatetics—namely, the view that
Nature does everything for some purpose, and nothing in vain.
But even as regards this doctrine their agreement is only verbal; in
practice Erasistratus makes havoc of it a thousand times over. For,
according to him, the spleen was made for no purpose, as also the
omentum; similarly, too, the arteries which are inserted into
kidneys[200]—although these are practically the largest of all those
that spring from the great artery [aorta]! And to judge by the
Erasistratean argument, there must be countless other useless
structures; for, if he knows nothing at all about these structures, he
has little more anatomical knowledge than a butcher, while, if he is
acquainted with them and yet does not state their use, he clearly
imagines that they were made for no purpose, like the spleen. Why,
however, should I discuss these structures fully, belonging as they do
to the treatise “On the Use of Parts,” which I am personally about to
complete?
Let us, then, sum up again this same argument, and, having said a few
words more in answer to the Erasistrateans, proceed to our next topic.
The fact is, these people seem to me to have read none of Aristotle’s
writings, but to have heard from others how great an authority he was
on “Nature,” and that those of the Porch[201] follow in the steps of
his Nature-lore; apparently they then discovered a single one of the
current ideas which is common to Aristotle and Erasistratus, and made
up some story of a connection between Erasistratus and these
people.[202] That Erasistratus, however, has no share in the
Nature-lore of Aristotle is shown by an enumeration of the aforesaid
doctrines, which emanated first from Hippocrates, secondly from
Aristotle, thirdly from the Stoics (with a single modification,
namely, that for them the _qualities_ are _bodies_).[203]
Perhaps, however, they will maintain that it was in the matter of
_logic_ that Erasistratus associated himself with the Peripatetic
philosophers? Here they show ignorance of the fact that these
philosophers never brought forward false or inconclusive arguments,
while the Erasistratean books are full of them.
So perhaps somebody may already be asking, in some surprise, what
possessed Erasistratus that he turned so completely from the doctrines
of Hippocrates, and why it is that he takes away the attractive
faculty from the biliary[204] passages in the liver—for we have
sufficiently discussed the kidneys—alleging [as the cause of
bile-secretion] a favourable situation, the narrowness of vessels, and
_a common space_ into which the veins from the gateway [of the
liver][205] conduct the unpurified blood, and from which, in the first
place, the [biliary] passages take over the bile, and secondly, the
[branches] of the vena cava take over the purified blood. For it would
not only have done him no harm to have mentioned the idea of
_attraction_, but he would thereby have been able to get rid of
countless other disputed questions.
IV
Καὶ ταῦτ' Ἐρασίστρατος οὐκ οἶδεν, ὃν οὐδὲν λανθάνει,
εἴπερ ὅλως ἀληθεύουσιν οἱ ἀπ' αὐτοῦ φάσκοντες
ὡμιληκέναι τοῖς ἐκ τοῦ περιπάτου φιλοσόφοις αὐτόν.
ἄχρι μὲν οὖν τοῦ τὴν φύσιν ὑμνεῖν ὡς τεχνικὴν κἀγὼ
γνωρίζω τὰ τοῦ περιπάτου δόγματα, τῶν δ' ἄλλων οὐδὲν
οὐδ' ἐγγύς. εἰ γάρ τις ὁμιλήσειε τοῖς Ἀριστοτέλους
καὶ Θεοφράστου γράμμασι, τῆς Ἱπποκράτους ἂν αὐτὰ
δόξειε φυσιολογίας ὑπομνήματα συγκεῖσθαι, τὸ θερμὸν
καὶ τὸ ψυχρὸν || καὶ τὸ ξηρὸν καὶ τὸ ὑγρὸν εἰς 89
ἄλληλα δρῶντα καὶ πάσχοντα καὶ τούτων αὐτῶν
δραστικώτατον μὲν τὸ θερμόν, δεύτερον δὲ τῇ δυνάμει
τὸ ψυχρὸν Ἱπποκράτους ταῦτα σύμπαντα πρώτου,
δευτέρου δ' Ἀριστοτέλους εἰπόντος. τρέφεσθαι δὲ δι'
ὅλων αὑτῶν τὰ τρεφόμενα καὶ κεράννυσθαι δι' ὅλων τὰ
κεραννύμενα καὶ ἀλλοιοῦσθαι δι' ὅλων τὰ ἀλλοιούμενα,
καὶ ταῦθ' Ἱπποκράτειά θ' ἅμα καὶ Ἀριστοτέλεια. καὶ
τὴν πέψιν ἀλλοίωσίν τιν' ὑπάρχειν καὶ μεταβολὴν τοῦ
τρέφοντος εἰς τὴν οἰκείαν τοῦ τρεφομένου ποιότητα,
τὴν δ' ἐξαιμάτωσιν ἀλλοίωσιν εἶναι καὶ τὴν θρέψιν
ὡσαύτως καὶ τὴν αὔξησιν ἐκ τῆς πάντη διατάσεως καὶ
θρέψεως γίγνεσθαι, τὴν δ' ἀλλοίωσιν ὑπὸ τοῦ θερμοῦ
μάλιστα συντελεῖσθαι καὶ διὰ τοῦτο καὶ τὴν πέψιν καὶ
τὴν θρέψιν καὶ τὴν τῶν χυμῶν ἁπάντων γένεσιν, ἤδη δὲ
καὶ τοῖς περιττώμασι τὰς ποιότητας ὑπὸ τῆς ἐμφύτου
θερμασίας ἐγγίγνεσθαί, ταῦτα σύμπαντα καὶ πρὸς
τούτοις ἑτέρα πολλὰ τὰ τε τῶν προειρημένων δυνάμεων
καὶ τὰ || τῶν νοσημάτων τῆς γενέσεως καὶ τὰ τῶν 90
ἰαμάτων τῆς εὑρέσεως Ἱπποκράτης μὲν πρῶτος ἁπάντων
ὧν ἴσμεν ὀρθῶς εἶπεν, Ἀριστοτέλης δὲ δεύτερος ὀρθῶς
ἐξηγήσατο. καὶ μὴν εἰ ταῦτα σύμπαντα τοῖς ἐκ τοῦ
περιπάτου δοκεῖ, καθάπερ οὖν δοκεῖ, μηδὲν δ' αὐτῶν
ἀρέσκει τῷ Ἐρασιστράτῳ, τί ποτε βούλεται τοῖς
Ἐρασιστρατείοις ἡ πρὸς τοὺς φιλοσόφους ἐκείνους τοῦ
τῆς αἱρέσεως αὐτῶν ἡγεμόνος ὁμιλία; θαυμάζουσι μὲν
γὰρ αὐτὸν ὡς θεὸν καὶ πάντ' ἀληθεύειν νομίζουσιν. εἰ
δ' οὕτως ἔχει ταῦτα, πάμπολυ δήπου τῆς ἀληθείας
ἐσφάλθαι χρὴ νομίζειν τοὺς ἐκ τοῦ περιπάτου
φιλοσόφους, οἷς μηδὲν ὧν Ἐρασίστρατος ὑπελάμβανεν
ἀρέσκει. καὶ μὴν ὥσπερ τιν' εὐγένειαν αὐτῷ τῆς
φυσιολογίας τὴν πρὸς τοὺς ἄνδρας ἐκείνους συνουσίαν
ἐκπορίζουσι.
Πάλιν οὖν ἀναστρέψωμεν τὸν λόγον ἑτέρως ἢ ὡς ὀλίγῳ
πρόσθεν ἐτύχομεν εἰπόντες. εἴπερ γὰρ οἱ ἐκ τοῦ
περιπάτου καλῶς ἐφυσιολόγησαν, οὐδὲν ἂν εἴη
ληρωδέστερον Ἐρασιστράτου καὶ δίδωμι τοῖς
Ἐρασιστρατείοις αὐτοῖς τὴν αἵρεσιν· ἢ γὰρ τὸν
πρότερον λόγον ἢ τοῦτον || προσήσονται. λέγει δ' ὁ 91
μὲν πρότερος οὐδὲν ὀρθῶς ἐγνωκέναι περὶ φύσεως τοὺς
περιπατητικούς, ὁ δὲ δεύτερος Ἐρασίστρατον. ἐμὸν μὲν
οὖν ὑπομνῆσαι τῶν δογμάτων τὴν μάχην, ἐκείνων δ' ἡ
αἵρεσις.
Ἀλλ' οὐκ ἂν ἀποσταῖεν τοῦ θαυμάζειν Ἐρασίστρατον·
οὐκοῦν σιωπάτωσαν περὶ τῶν ἐκ τοῦ περιπάτου
φιλοσόφων. παμπόλλων γὰρ ὄντων δογμάτων φυσικῶν περί
τε γένεσιν καὶ φθορὰν τῶν ζῴων καὶ ὑγίειαν καὶ
νόσους καὶ τὰς θεραπείας αὐτῶν ἓν μόνον εὑρεθήσεται
ταὐτὸν Ἐρασιστράτῳ κἀκείνοις τοῖς ἀνδράσι, τό τινος
ἕνεκα πάντα ποιεῖν τὴν φύσιν καὶ μάτην μηδέν.
Ἀλλὰ καὶ αὐτὸ τοῦτο μέχρι λόγου κοινόν, ἔργῳ δὲ
μυριάκις Ἐρασίστρατος αὐτὸ διαφθείρει· μάτην μὲν γὰρ
ὁ σπλὴν ἐγένετο, μάτην δὲ τὸ ἐπίπλοον, μάτην δ' αἱ
εἰς τοὺς νεφροὺς ἀρτηρίαι καταφυόμεναι, σχεδὸν
ἁπασῶν τῶν ἀπὸ τῆς μεγάλης ἀρτηρίας ἀποβλαστανουσῶν
οὖσαι μέγισται, μάτην δ' ἄλλα μυρία κατά γε τὸν
Ἐρασιστράτειον λόγον· ἅπερ εἰ μὲν οὐδ' ὅλως
γιγνώσκει, βραχεῖ μαγείρου σοφώτερός ἐστιν ἐν ταῖς
ἀνατομαῖς, εἰ δ' εἰδὼς οὐ λέγει τὴν χρείαν αὐτῶν,
οἴεται || δηλονότι παραπλησίως τῷ σπληνὶ μάτην αὐτὰ 92
γεγονέναι. καίτοι τί ταῦτ' ἐπεξέρχομαι τῆς περὶ
χρείας μορίων πραγματείας ὄντα μελλούσης ἡμῖν ἰδίᾳ
περαίνεσθαι;
Πάλιν οὖν ἀναλάβωμεν τὸν αὐτὸν λόγον εἰπόντες τέ τι
βραχὺ πρὸς τοὺς Ἐρασιστρατείους ἔτι τῶν ἐφεξῆς
ἐχώμεθα. δοκοῦσι γάρ μοι μηδὲν ἀνεγνωκέναι τῶν
Ἀριστοτέλους οὗτοι συγγραμμάτων, ἀλλ' ἄλλων
ἀκούοντες, ὡς δεινὸς ἦν περὶ φύσιν ὁ ἄνθρωπος καὶ ὡς
οἱ ἀπὸ τῆς στοᾶς κατ' ἴχνη τῆς ἐκείνου φυσιολογίας
βαδίζουσιν, εἶθ' εὑρόντες ἕν τι τῶν περιφερομένων
δογμάτων κοινὸν αὐτῷ πρὸς Ἐρασίστρατον ἀναπλάσαι
τινὰ συνουσίαν αὐτοῦ πρὸς ἐκείνους τοὺς ἄνδρας. ἀλλ'
ὅτι μὲν τῆς Ἀριστοτέλους φυσιολογίας οὐδὲν
Ἐρασιστράτῳ μέτεστιν, ὁ κατάλογος τῶν προειρημένων
ἐνδείκνυται δογμάτων, ἃ πρώτου μὲν Ἱπποκράτους ἦν,
δευτέρου δ' Ἀριστοτέλους, τρίτων δὲ τῶν Στωϊκῶν,
ἑνὸς μόνου μετατιθεμένου τοῦ τὰς ποιότητας εἶναι
σώματα.
Τάχα δ' ἂν τῆς λογικῆς ἕνεκα θεωρίας ὡμιληκέναι
φαῖεν τὸν Ἐρασίστρατον τοῖς ἐκ τοῦ περιπάτου
φιλοσόφοις, οὐκ εἰδότες, ὡς ἐκεῖνοι μὲν ψευ||δεῖς 93
καὶ ἀπεράντους οὐκ ἔγραψαν λόγους, τὰ δ'
Ἐρασιστράτεια βιβλία παμπόλλους ἔχει τοὺς τοιούτους.
Τάχ' ἂν οὖν ἤδη τις θαυμάζοι καὶ διαποροίη, τί παθὼν
ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος εἰς τοσοῦτον τῶν Ἱπποκράτους δογμάτων
ἀπετράπετο καὶ διὰ τί τῶν ἐν ἥπατι πόρων τῶν
χοληδόχων, ἅλις γὰρ ἤδη νεφρῶν, ἀφελόμενος τὴν
ἑλκτικὴν δύναμιν ἐπίκαιρον αἰτιᾶται θέσιν καὶ
στομάτων στενότητα καὶ χώραν τινὰ κοινήν, εἰς ἣν
παράγουσι μὲν αἱ ἀπὸ τῶν πυλῶν τὸ ἀκάθαρτον αἷμα,
μεταλαμβάνουσι δὲ πρότεροι μὲν οἱ πόροι τὴν χολήν,
δεύτεραι δ' αἱ ἀπὸ τῆς κοίλης φλεβὸς τὸ καθαρὸν
αἷμα. πρὸς γὰρ τῷ μηδὲν ἂν βλαβῆναι τὴν ὁλκὴν εἰπὼν
ἄλλων μυρίων ἔμελλεν ἀμφισβητουμένων ἀπαλλάξεσθαι
λόγων.
V
At the actual moment, however, the Erasistrateans are engaged in a
considerable battle, not only with others but also amongst themselves,
and so they cannot explain the passage from the first book of the
“General Principles,” in which Erasistratus says, “Since there are two
kinds of vessels opening[206] at the same place, the one kind
extending to the gall-bladder and the other to the vena cava, the
result is that, of the nutriment carried up from the alimentary canal,
that part which fits both kinds of stomata is received into both kinds
of vessels, some being carried into the gall-bladder, and the rest
passing over into the vena cava.” For it is difficult to say what we
are to understand by the words “opening at the same place” which are
written at the beginning of this passage. Either they mean there is a
_junction_[207] between the termination of the vein which is on the
concave surface of the liver[208] and two other vascular terminations
(that of the vessel on the convex surface of the liver[209] and that
of the bile-duct), or, if not, then we must suppose that there is, as
it were, a common space for all three vessels, which becomes filled
from the lower vein,[210] and empties itself both into the bile-duct
and into the branches of the vena cava. Now, there are many
difficulties in both of these explanations, but if I were to state
them all, I should find myself inadvertently writing an exposition of
the teaching of Erasistratus, instead of carrying out my original
undertaking. There is, however, one difficulty common to both these
explanations, namely, that the whole of the blood does not become
purified. For it ought to fall into the bile-duct as into a kind of
sieve, instead of going (running, in fact, rapidly) past it, into the
larger stoma, by virtue of the impulse of _anadosis_.
Are these, then, the only inevitable difficulties in which the
argument of Erasistratus becomes involved through his disinclination
to make any use of the attractive faculty, or is it that the
difficulty is greatest here, and also so obvious that even a child
could not avoid seeing it?
V
Ὡς νῦν γε πόλεμος οὐ σμικρός ἐστι τοῖς
Ἐρασιστρατείοις οὐ πρὸς τοὺς ἄλλους μόνον ἀλλὰ καὶ
πρὸς ἀλλήλους, οὐκ ἔχουσιν, ὅπως ἐξηγήσωνται τὴν ἐκ
τοῦ πρώτου τῶν καθόλου λόγων λέξιν, ἐν ᾗ φησιν· “Εἰς
τὸ || αὐτὸ δ' ἀνεστομωμένων ἑτέρων δύο ἀγγείων τῶν 94
τ' ἐπὶ τὴν χοληδόχον τεινόντων καὶ τῶν ἐπὶ τὴν
κοίλην φλέβα συμβαίνει τῆς ἀναφερομένης ἐκ τῆς
κοιλίας τροφῆς τὰ ἐναρμόζοντα ἑκατέροις τῶν στομάτων
εἰς ἑκάτερα τῶν ἀγγείων μεταλαμβάνεσθαι καὶ τὰ μὲν
ἐπὶ τὴν χοληδόχον φέρεσθαι, τὰ δ' ἐπὶ τὴν κοίλην
φλέβα περαιοῦσθαι.” τὸ γὰρ “εἰς τὸ αὐτὸ
ἀνεστομωμένων,” ὃ κατ' ἀρχὰς τῆς λέξεως γέγραπται,
τί ποτε χρὴ νοῆσαι, χαλεπὸν εἰπεῖν. ἤτοι γὰρ οὕτως
εἰς ταὐτόν, ὥστε τῷ τῆς ἐν τοῖς σιμοῖς φλεβὸς πέρατι
συνάπτειν δύο ἕτερα πέρατα, τό τ' ἐν τοῖς κυρτοῖς
καὶ τὸ τοῦ χοληδόχου πόρου, ἤ, εἰ μὴ οὕτω, χώραν
τινὰ κοινὴν ἐπινοῆσαι χρὴ τῶν τριῶν ἀγγείων οἷον
δεξαμενήν τινα, πληρουμένην μὲν ὑπὸ τῆς κάτω φλεβός,
ἐκκενουμένην δ' εἴς τε τοὺς χοληδόχους πόρους καὶ
τὰς τῆς κοίλης ἀποσχίδας· καθ' ἑκατέραν δὲ τῶν
ἐξηγήσεων ἄτοπα πολλά, περὶ ὧν εἰ πάντων λέγοιμι,
λάθοιμ' ἂν ἐμαυτὸν ἐξηγήσεις Ἐρασιστράτου γράφων,
οὐχ, ὅπερ ἐξ ἀρχῆς προὐθέμην, περαίνων. κοινὸν δ'
ἀμφοτέραις ταῖς ἐξηγήσεσιν ἄτοπον τὸ μὴ || 95
καθαίρεσθαι πᾶν τὸ αἷμα. χρὴ γὰρ ὡς εἰς ἠθμόν τινα
τὸ χοληδόχον ἀγγεῖον ἐμπίπτειν αὐτό, οὐ παρέρχεσθαι
καὶ παραρρεῖν ὠκέως εἰς τὸ μεῖζον στόμα τῇ ῥύμῃ τῆς
ἀναδόσεως φερόμενον.
Ἆρ' οὖν ἐν τούτοις μόνον ἀπορίαις ἀφύκτοις ὁ
Ἐρασιστράτου λόγος ἐνέχεται μὴ βουληθέντος χρήσασθαι
ταῖς ἑλκτικαῖς δυνάμεσιν εἰς μηδέν, ἢ σφοδρότατα μὲν
ἐν τούτοις καὶ σαφῶς οὕτως, ὡς ἂν μηδὲ παῖδα λαθεῖν;
VI
And if one looks carefully into the matter one will find that even
Erasistratus’s reasoning on the subject of _nutrition_, which he takes
up in the second book of his “General Principles,” fails to escape
this same difficulty. For, having conceded one premise to the
principle that matter tends to fill a vacuum, as we previously showed,
he was only able to draw a conclusion in the case of the veins and
their contained blood.[211] That is to say, when blood is running
away through the stomata of the veins, and is being dispersed, then,
since an absolutely empty space cannot result, and the veins cannot
collapse (for this was what he overlooked), it was therefore shown to
be necessary that the adjoining quantum of fluid should flow in and
fill the place of the fluid evacuated. It is in this way that we may
suppose the veins to be nourished; they get the benefit of the blood
which they contain. But how about the nerves?[212] For they do not
also contain blood. One might obviously say that they draw their
supply from the veins.[213] But Erasistratus will not have it so. What
further contrivance, then, does he suppose? He says that a nerve has
within itself veins and arteries, like a rope woven by Nature out of
three different strands. By means of this hypothesis he imagined that
his theory would escape from the idea of _attraction_. For if the
nerve contain within itself a blood-vessel it will no longer need the
adventitious flow of other blood from the real vein lying adjacent;
this fictitious vessel, perceptible only in theory,[214] will suffice
it for nourishment.
But this, again, is succeeded by another similar difficulty. For this
small vessel will nourish itself, but it will not be able to nourish
this adjacent simple nerve or artery, unless these possess some innate
proclivity for attracting nutriment. For how could the _nerve_, being
simple, attract its nourishment, as do the composite veins, by virtue
of the tendency of a vacuum to become refilled? For, although
according to Erasistratus, it contains within itself a cavity of
sorts, this is not occupied with blood, but with _psychic
pneuma_,[215] and we are required to imagine the nutriment introduced,
not into this cavity, but into the vessel containing it, whether it
needs merely to be nourished, or to grow as well. How, then, are we to
imagine it introduced? For this simple vessel [_i.e._ nerve] is so
small—as are also the other two—that if you prick it at any part
with the finest needle you will tear the whole three of them at once.
Thus there could never be in it a perceptible space entirely empty.
And an emptied space which merely existed in theory could not compel
the adjacent fluid to come and fill it.
At this point, again, I should like Erasistratus himself to answer
regarding this small elementary nerve, whether it is actually one and
definitely continuous, or whether it consists of many small bodies,
such as those assumed by Epicurus, Leucippus, and Democritus.[216] For
I see that the Erasistrateans are at variance on this subject. Some of
them consider it one and continuous, for otherwise, as they say, he
would not have called it _simple_; and some venture to resolve it into
yet other elementary bodies. But if it be one and continuous, then
what is evacuated from it in the so-called _insensible transpiration_
of the physicians will leave no empty space in it; otherwise it would
not be one body but many, separated by empty spaces. But if it
consists of many bodies, then we have “escaped by the back door,” as
the saying is, to Asclepiades, seeing that we have postulated certain
_inharmonious elements_. Once again, then, we must call Nature
“inartistic”; for this necessarily follows the assumption of such
elements.
For this reason some of the Erasistrateans seem to me to have done
very foolishly in reducing the simple vessels to elements such as
these. Yet it makes no difference to me, since the theory of both
parties regarding nutrition will be shown to be absurd. For in these
minute simple vessels constituting the large perceptible nerves, it is
impossible, according to the theory of those who would keep the former
continuous, that any “refilling of a vacuum” should take place, since
no vacuum can occur in a continuum even if anything does run away; for
the parts left come together (as is seen in the case of water) and
again become one, taking up the whole space of that which previously
separated them. Nor will any “refilling” occur if we accept the
argument of the other Erasistrateans, since none of their _elements_
need it. For this principle only holds of things which are
perceptible, and not of those which exist merely in theory; this
Erasistratus expressly acknowledges, for he states that it is not a
vacuum such as this, interspersed in small portions among the
corpuscles, that his various treatises deal with, but a vacuum which
is clear, perceptible, complete in itself, large in size, evident, or
however else one cares to term it (for, what Erasistratus himself says
is, that “there cannot be a perceptible space which is entirely
empty”; while I, for my part, being abundantly equipped with terms
which are equally elucidatory, at least in relation to the present
topic of discussion, have added them as well).
Thus it seems to me better that we also should help the Erasistrateans
with some contribution, since we are on the subject, and should advise
those who reduce the vessel called _primary_ and _simple_ by
Erasistratus into other elementary bodies to give up their opinion;
for not only do they gain nothing by it, but they are also at variance
with Erasistratus in this matter. That they gain nothing by it has
been clearly demonstrated; for this hypothesis could not escape the
difficulty regarding _nutrition_. And it also seems perfectly evident
to me that this hypothesis is not in consonance with the view of
Erasistratus, when it declares that what he calls simple and primary
is composite, and when it destroys the principle of Nature’s artistic
skill.[217] For, if we do not grant a certain _unity of
substance_[218] to these simple structures as well, and if we arrive
eventually at inharmonious and indivisible elements,[219] we shall
most assuredly deprive Nature of her artistic skill, as do all the
physicians and philosophers who start from this hypothesis. For,
according to such a hypothesis, Nature does not precede, but is
secondary to the _parts_ of the animal.[220] Now, it is not the
province of what comes secondarily, but of what pre-exists, to shape
and to construct. Thus we must necessarily suppose that the faculties
of Nature, by which she shapes the animal, and makes it grow and
receive nourishment, are present from the seed onwards; whereas none
of these inharmonious and non-partite corpuscles contains within
itself any formative, incremental,[221] nutritive, or, in a word, any
artistic power; it is, by hypothesis, unimpressionable and
untransformable,[222] whereas, as we have previously shown,[223] none
of the processes mentioned takes place without transformation,
alteration, and complete intermixture. And, owing to this necessity,
those who belong to these sects are unable to follow out the
consequences of their supposed elements, and they are all therefore
forced to declare Nature devoid of art. It is not from us, however,
that the Erasistrateans should have learnt this, but from those very
philosophers who lay most stress on a preliminary investigation into
the elements of all existing things.
Now, one can hardly be right in supposing that Erasistratus could
reach such a pitch of foolishness as to be incapable of recognizing
the logical consequences of this theory, and that, while assuming
Nature to be artistically creative, he would at the same time break up
substance into insensible, inharmonious, and untransformable elements.
If, however, he will grant that there occurs in the elements a process
of alteration and transformation, and that there exists in them unity
and continuity, then that _simple vessel_ of his (as he himself names
it) will turn out to be single and uncompounded. And the simple vein
will receive nourishment from itself, and the nerve and artery from
the vein. How, and in what way? For, when we were at this point
before, we drew attention to the disagreement among the
Erasistrateans,[224] and we showed that the nutrition of these simple
vessels was impracticable according to the teachings of both parties,
although we did not hesitate to adjudicate in their quarrel and to do
Erasistratus the honour of placing him in the better sect.[225]
Let our argument, then, be transferred again to the doctrine which
assumes this _elementary nerve_[226] to be a single, simple, and
entirely unified structure, and let us consider how it is to be
nourished; for what is discovered here will at once be found to be
common also to the school of Hippocrates.
It seems to me that our enquiry can be most rigorously pursued in
subjects who are suffering from illness and have become very
emaciated, since in these people all parts of the body are obviously
atrophied and thin, and in need of additional substance and
feeding-up; for the same reason the ordinary _perceptible_ nerve,
regarding which we originally began this discussion, has become thin,
and requires nourishment. Now, this contains within itself various
parts, namely, a great many of these primary, invisible, minute
nerves, a few simple arteries, and similarly also veins. Thus, all its
elementary nerves have themselves also obviously become emaciated;
for, if they had not, neither would the nerve as a whole; and of
course, in such a case, the whole nerve cannot require nourishment
without each of these requiring it too. Now, if on the one hand they
stand in need of feeding-up, and if on the other the principle of the
refilling of a vacuum[227] can give them no help—both by reason of
the difficulties previously mentioned and the actual thinness, as I
shall show—we must then seek another cause for nutrition.
How is it, then, that the tendency of a vacuum to become refilled is
unable to afford nourishment to one in such a condition? Because its
rule is that only so much of the contiguous matter should succeed as
has flowed away. Now this is sufficient for nourishment in the case of
those who are in good condition, for, in them, what is
_presented_[228] must be equal to what has flowed away. But in the
case of those who are very emaciated and who need a great restoration
of nutrition, unless what was presented were many times greater than
what has been emptied out, they would never be able to regain their
original habit. It is clear, therefore, that these parts will have to
exert a greater amount of _attraction_, in so far as their
requirements are greater. And I fail to understand how Erasistratus
does not perceive that here again he is putting the cart before the
horse. Because, in the case of the sick, there must be a large amount
of _presentation_[228] in order to feed them up, he argues that the
factor of “refilling”[227] must play an equally large part. And how
could much _presentation_ take place if it were not preceded by an
abundant _delivery_[229] of nutriment? And if he calls the conveyance
of food through the veins delivery, and its assumption by each of
these simple and visible nerves and arteries not delivery but
_distribution_,[230] as some people have thought fit to name it, and
then ascribes conveyance through the veins to the principle of
vacuum-refilling alone, let him explain to us the assumption of food
by the hypothetical elements.[231] For it has been shown that at least
in relation to these there is no question of the refilling of a vacuum
being in operation, and especially where the parts are very
attenuated. It is worth while listening to what Erasistratus says
about these cases in the second book of his “General Principles”: “In
the ultimate simple [vessels], which are thin and narrow, presentation
takes place from the adjacent vessels, the nutriment being attracted
through the sides of the vessels and deposited in the empty spaces
left by the matter which has been carried away.” Now, in this
statement firstly I admit and accept the words “through the sides.”
For, if the simple nerve were actually to take in the food through its
mouth, it could not distribute it through its whole substance; for the
mouth is dedicated to the psychic pneuma.[232] It can, however, take
it in through its sides from the adjacent simple vein. Secondly, I
also accept in Erasistratus’s statement the expression which precedes
“through the sides.” What does this say? “The nutriment being
attracted through the sides of the vessels.” Now I, too, agree that it
is attracted, but it has been previously shown that this is not
through the tendency of evacuated matter to be replaced.
VI
Εἰ δ' ἐπισκοποῖτό τις ἐπιμελῶς, οὐδ' ὁ περὶ θρέψεως
αὐτοῦ λόγος, ὃν ἐν τῷ δευτέρῳ τῶν καθόλου λόγων
διεξέρχεται, τὰς αὐτὰς ἀπορίας ἐκφεύγει. τῇ γὰρ πρὸς
τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ συγχωρηθέντος ἑνὸς λήμματος,
ὡς πρόσθεν ἐδείκνυμεν, ἐπέραινέ τι περὶ φλεβῶν μόνων
καὶ τοῦ κατ' αὐτὰς αἵματος. ἐκρέοντος γάρ τινος κατὰ
τὰ στόματ' αὐτῶν καὶ διαφορουμένου καὶ μήτ' ἀθρόως
τόπου κενοῦ δυναμένου γενέσθαι μήτε τῶν φλεβῶν
συμπεσεῖν, τοῦτο γὰρ ἦν τὸ παραλειπόμενον, ἀναγκαῖον
ἦν ἕπεσθαι τὸ συνεχὲς ἀναπληροῦν τοῦ κενου||μένου 96
τὴν βάσιν. αἱ μὲν δὴ φλέβες ἡμῖν οὕτω θρέψονται τοῦ
περιεχομένου κατ' αὐτὰς αἵματος ἀπολαύουσαι· τὰ δὲ
νεῦρα πῶς; οὐ γὰρ δὴ κἀν τούτοις ἐστὶν αἷμα.
πρόχειρον μὲν γὰρ ἦν εἰπεῖν, ἕλκοντα παρὰ τῶν
φλεβῶν· ἀλλ' οὐ βούλεται. τί ποτ' οὖν κἀνταῦθα
ἐπιτεχνᾶται; φλέβας ἔχειν ἐν ἑαυτῷ καὶ ἀρτηρίας τὸ
νεῦρον ὥσπερ τινὰ σειρὰν ἐκ τριῶν ἱμάντων
διαφερόντων τῇ φύσει πεπλεγμένην. ᾠήθη γὰρ ἐκ ταύτης
τῆς ὑποθέσεως ἐκφεύξεσθαι τῷ λόγῳ τὴν ὁλκήν· οὐ γὰρ
ἂν ἔτι δεήσεσθαι τὸ νεῦρον ἐν ἑαυτῷ περιέχον αἵματος
ἀγγεῖον ἐπιρρύτου τινὸς ἔξωθεν ἐκ τῆς παρακειμένης
φλεβὸς τῆς ἀληθινῆς αἵματος ἑτέρου, ἀλλ' ἱκανὸν αὐτῷ
πρὸς τὴν θρέψιν ἔσεσθαι τὸ κατεψευσμένον ἀγγεῖον
ἐκεῖνο τὸ λόγῳ θεωρητόν.
Ἀλλὰ κἀνταῦθα πάλιν αὐτὸν ὁμοία τις ἀπορία
διεδέξατο. τουτὶ γὰρ τὸ σμικρὸν ἀγγεῖον ἑαυτὸ μὲν
θρέψει, τὸ παρακείμενον μέντοι νεῦρον ἐκεῖνο τὸ
ἁπλοῦν ἢ τὴν ἀρτηρίαν οὐχ οἷόν τ' ἔσται τρέφειν ἄνευ
τοῦ σύμφυτόν τιν' ὑπάρχειν αὐτοῖς ὁλκὴν τῆς τροφῆς.
|| τῇ μὲν γὰρ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ πῶς ἂν 97
ἔτι δύναιτο τὴν τροφὴν ἐπισπᾶσθαι τὸ ἁπλοῦν νεῦρον,
ὥσπερ αἱ φλέβες αἱ σύνθετοι; κοιλότης μὲν γάρ τίς
ἐστιν ἐν αὐτῷ κατ' αὐτόν, ἀλλ' οὐχ αἵματος αὕτη γ'
ἀλλὰ πνεύματος ψυχικοῦ μεστή. δεόμεθα δ' ἡμεῖς οὐκ
εἰς τὴν κοιλότητα ταύτην εἰσάγειν τῷ λόγῳ τὴν τροφὴν
ἀλλ' εἰς τὸ περιέχον αὐτὴν ἀγγεῖον, εἴτ' οὖν
τρέφεσθαι μόνον εἴτε καὶ αὔξεσθαι δέοιτο. πῶς οὖν
εἰσάξομεν; οὕτω γάρ ἐστι σμικρὸν ἐκεῖνο τὸ ἁπλοῦν
ἀγγεῖον καὶ μέντοι καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἑκάτερον, ὥστ', εἰ
τῇ λεπτοτάτῃ βελόνῃ νύξειάς τι μέρος, ἅμα διαιρήσεις
τὰ τρία. τόπος οὖν αἰσθητὸς ἀθρόως κενὸς οὐκ ἂν ποτ'
ἐν αὐτῷ γένοιτο· λόγῳ δὲ θεωρητὸς τόπος κενούμενος
οὐκ ἦν ἀναγκαστικὸς τῆς τοῦ συνεχοῦς ἀκολουθίας.
Ἠβουλόμην δ' αὖ πάλιν μοι κἀνταῦθα τὸν Ἐρασίστρατον
αὐτὸν ἀποκρίνασθαι περὶ τοῦ στοιχειώδους ἐκείνου
νεύρου τοῦ σμικροῦ, πότερον ἕν τι καὶ συνεχὲς
ἀκριβῶς ἐστιν ἢ ἐκ πολλῶν καὶ σμικρῶν σωμάτων, ὧν
Ἐπίκουρος καὶ Λεύκιππος καὶ Δημόκριτος ὑπέθεντο,
σύγ||κειται. καὶ γὰρ καὶ περὶ τούτου τοὺς 98
Ἐρασιστρατείους ὁρῶ διαφερομένους. οἱ μὲν γὰρ ἕν τι
καὶ συνεχὲς αὐτὸ νομίζουσιν ἢ οὐκ ἂν ἁπλοῦν εἰρῆσθαι
πρὸς αὐτοῦ φασι· τινὲς δὲ καὶ τοῦτο διαλύειν εἰς
ἕτερα στοιχειώδη τολμῶσιν. ἀλλ' εἰ μὲν ἕν τι καὶ
συνεχές ἐστι, τὸ κενούμενον ἐξ αὐτοῦ κατὰ τὴν ἄδηλον
ὑπὸ τῶν ἰατρῶν ὀνομαζομένην διαπνοὴν οὐδεμίαν ἐν
ἑαυτῷ καταλείψει χώραν κενήν. οὕτω γὰρ οὐχ ἓν ἀλλὰ
πολλὰ γενήσεται, διειργόμενα δήπου ταῖς κεναῖς
χώραις. εἰ δ' ἐκ πολλῶν σύγκειται, τῇ κηπαίᾳ κατὰ
τὴν παροιμίαν πρὸς Ἀσκληπιάδην ἀπεχωρήσαμεν ἄναρμά
τινα στοιχεῖα τιθέμενοι. πάλιν οὖν ἄτεχνος ἡμῖν ἡ
φύσις λεγέσθω· τοῖς γὰρ τοιούτοις στοιχείοις ἐξ
ἀνάγκης τοῦθ' ἕπεται.
Διὸ δή μοι καὶ δοκοῦσιν ἀμαθῶς πάνυ τὴν εἰς τὰ
τοιαῦτα στοιχεῖα τῶν ἁπλῶν ἀγγείων εἰσάγειν διάλυσιν
ἔνιοι τῶν Ἐρασιστρατείων. ἐμοὶ γοῦν οὐδὲν διαφέρει.
καθ' ἑκατέρους γὰρ ἄτοπος ὁ τῆς θρέψεως ἔσται λόγος,
ἐκείνοις τοῖς ἁπλοῖς ἀγγείοις τοῖς σμικροῖς τοῖς
συντιθεῖσι τὰ μεγάλα || τε καὶ αἰσθητὰ νεῦρα κατὰ 99
μὲν τοὺς συνεχῆ φυλάττοντας αὐτὰ μὴ δυναμένης
γενέσθαι τῆς πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίας, ὅτι
μηδὲν ἐν τῷ συνεχεῖ γίγνεται κενόν, κἂν ἀπορρέῃ τι·
συνέρχεται γὰρ πρὸς ἄλληλα τὰ καταλειπόμενα μόρια,
καθάπερ ἐπὶ τοῦ ὕδατος ὁρᾶται, καὶ πάλιν ἓν γίγνεται
πάντα τὴν χώραν τοῦ διαφορηθέντος αὐτὰ
καταλαμβάνοντα· κατὰ δὲ τοὺς ἑτέρους, ὅτι τῶν
στοιχείων ἐκείνων οὐδὲν δεῖται τῆς πρὸς τὸ
κενούμενον ἀκολουθίας. ἐπὶ γὰρ τῶν αἰσθητῶν μόνων,
οὐκ ἐπὶ τῶν λόγῳ θεωρητῶν ἔχει δύναμιν, ὡς αὐτὸς ὁ
Ἐρασίστρατος ὁμολογεῖ διαρρήδην, οὐ περὶ τοῦ
τοιούτου κενοῦ φάσκων ἑκάστοτε ποιεῖσθαι τὸν λόγον,
ὃ κατὰ βραχὺ παρέσπαρται τοῖς σώμασιν, ἀλλὰ περὶ τοῦ
σαφοῦς καὶ αἰσθητοῦ καὶ ἀθρόου καὶ μεγάλου καὶ
ἐναργοῦς καὶ ὅπως ἂν ἄλλως ὀνομάζειν ἐθέλῃς.
Ἐρασίστρατος μὲν γὰρ αὐτὸς αἰσθητὸν ἀθρόως οὔ φησι
δύνασθαι γενέσθαι κενόν· ἐγὼ δ' ἐκ περιουσίας
εὐπορήσας ὀνομάτων ταὐτὸν δηλοῦν ἔν γε τῷ νῦν
προκειμένῳ λόγῳ δυναμένων καὶ τἆλλα προσέθηκα.
Κάλλιον οὖν μοι δοκεῖ καὶ || ἡμᾶς τι 100
συνεισενέγκασθαι τοῖς Ἐρασιστρατείοις, ἐπειδὴ κατὰ
τοῦτο γεγόναμεν, καὶ συμβουλεῦσαι τοῖς τὸ πρῶτον
ἐκεῖνο καὶ ἁπλοῦν ὑπ' Ἐρασιστράτου καλούμενον
ἀγγεῖον εἰς ἕτερ' ἄττα σώματα στοιχειώδη διαλύουσιν
ἀποστῆναι τῆς ὑπολήψεως, ὡς πρὸς τῷ μηδὲν ἔχειν
πλέον ἔτι καὶ διαφερομένοις Ἐρασιστράτῳ. ὅτι μὲν οὖν
οὐδὲν ἔχει πλέον, ἐπιδέδεικται σαφῶς· οὐδὲ γὰρ
ἠδυνήθη διαφυγεῖν τὴν περὶ τῆς θρέψεως ἀπορίαν ἡ
ὑπόθεσις· ὅτι δ' οὐδ' Ἐρασιστράτῳ σύμφωνός ἐστιν, ὃ
ἐκεῖνος ἁπλοῦν καὶ πρῶτον ὀνομάζει, σύνθετον
ἀποφαίνουσα, καὶ τὴν τῆς φύσεως τέχνην ἀναιροῦσα,
πρόδηλον καὶ τοῦτ' εἶναί μοι δοκεῖ. εἰ μὴ γὰρ κἀν
τοῖς ἁπλοῖς τούτοις ἕνωσίν τινα τῆς οὐσίας
ἀπολείψομεν, ἀλλ' εἰς ἄναρμα καὶ ἀμέριστα
καταβησόμεθα στοιχεῖα, παντάπασιν ἀναιρήσομεν τῆς
φύσεως τὴν τέχνην, ὥσπερ καὶ πάντες οἱ ἐκ ταύτης
ὁρμώμενοι τῆς ὑποθέσεως ἰατροὶ καὶ φιλόσοφοι.
δευτέρα γὰρ τῶν τοῦ ζῴου μορίων κατὰ τὴν τοιαύτην
ὑπόθεσιν ἡ φύσις, οὐ πρώτη γίγνεται. διαπλάττειν δὲ
|| καὶ δημιουργεῖν οὐ τοῦ δευτέρου γεγονότος, ἀλλὰ 101
τοῦ προϋπάρχοντός ἐστιν· ὥστ' ἀναγκαῖόν ἐστιν εὐθὺς
ἐκ σπερμάτων ὑποθέσθαι τὰς δυνάμεις τῆς φύσεως, αἷς
διαπλάττει τε καὶ αὐξάνει καὶ τρέφει τὸ ζῷον· ἀλλ'
ἐκείνων τῶν σωμάτων τῶν ἀνάρμων καὶ ἀμερῶν οὐδὲν ἐν
ἑαυτῷ διαπλαστικὴν ἔχει δύναμιν ἢ αὐξητικὴν ἢ
θρεπτικὴν ἢ ὅλως τεχνικήν· ἀπαθὲς γὰρ καὶ
ἀμετάβλητον ὑπόκειται. τῶν δ' εἰρημένων οὐδὲν ἄνευ
μεταβολῆς καὶ ἀλλοιώσεως καὶ τῆς δι' ὅλων κράσεως
γίγνεται, καθάπερ καὶ διὰ τῶν ἔμπροσθεν
ἐνεδειξάμεθα. καὶ διὰ ταύτην τὴν ἀνάγκην οὐκ
ἔχοντες, ὅπως τὰ ἀκόλουθα τοῖς στοιχείοις, οἷς
ὑπέθεντο, φυλάττοιεν, οἱ ἀπὸ τῶν τοιούτων αἱρέσεων
ἅπαντες ἄτεχνον ἠναγκάσθησαν ἀποφήνασθαι τὴν φύσιν.
καίτοι ταῦτα γ' οὐ παρ' ἡμῶν ἐχρῆν μανθάνειν τοὺς
Ἐρασιστρατείους, ἀλλὰ παρ' αὐτῶν τῶν φιλοσόφων, οἷς
μάλιστα δοκεῖ πρῶτον ἐπισκοπεῖσθαι τὰ στοιχεῖα τῶν
ὄντων ἁπάντων.
Οὔκουν οὐδ' Ἐρασίστρατον ἄν τις ὀρθῶς ἄχρι τοσαύτης
ἀμαθίας νομίζοι προήκειν, ὡς μηδὲ ταύτην γνωρίσαι
δυνηθῆναι τὴν ἀκολου||θίαν, ἀλλ' ἅμα μὲν ὑποθέσθαι 102
τεχνικὴν τὴν φύσιν, ἅμα δ' εἰς ἀπαθῆ καὶ ἄναρμα καὶ
ἀμετάβλητα στοιχεῖα καταθραῦσαι τὴν οὐσίαν. καὶ μὴν
εἰ δώσει τιν' ἐν τοῖς στοιχείοις ἀλλοίωσίν τε καὶ
μεταβολὴν καὶ ἕνωσιν καὶ συνέχειαν, ἓν ἀσύνθετον
αὐτῷ τὸ ἁπλοῦν ἀγγεῖον ἐκεῖνο, καθάπερ καὶ αὐτὸς
ὀνομάζει, γενήσεται. ἀλλ' ἡ μὲν ἁπλῆ φλὲψ ἐξ αὑτῆς
τραφήσεται, τὸ νεῦρον δὲ καὶ ἡ ἀρτηρία παρὰ τῆς
πλεβός. πῶς καὶ τίνα τρόπον; ἐν τούτῳ γὰρ δὴ καὶ
πρόσθεν γενόμενοι τῷ λόγῳ τῆς τῶν Ἐρασιστρατείων
διαφωνίας ἐμνημονεύσαμεν, ἐπεδείξαμεν δὲ καὶ καθ'
ἑκατέρους μὲν ἄπορον εἶναι τὴν τῶν ἁπλῶν ἐκείνων
ἀγγείων θρέψιν, ἀλλὰ καὶ κρῖναι τὴν μάχην αὐτῶν οὐκ
ὠκνήσαμεν καὶ τιμῆσαι τὸν Ἐρασίστρατον εἰς τὴν
βελτίονα μεταστήσαντες αἵρεσιν.
Αὖθις οὖν ἐπὶ τὴν ἓν ἁπλοῦν ἡνωμένον ἑαυτῷ πάντη τὸ
στοιχειῶδες ἐκεῖνο νεῦρον ὑποτιθεμένην αἵρεσιν ὁ
λόγος μεταβὰς ἐπισκοπείσθω, πῶς τραφήσεται· τὸ γὰρ
εὑρεθὲν ἐνταῦθα κοινὸν ἂν ἤδη καὶ τῆς Ἱπποκράτους
αἱρέσεως γένοιτο.
Κάλλιον δ' ἄν μοι δοκῶ τὸ ζητού||μενον ἐπὶ τῶν 103
νενοσηκότων καὶ σφόδρα καταλελεπτυσμένων
βασανισθῆναι. πάντα γὰρ τούτοις ἐναργῶς φαίνεται τὰ
μόρια τοῦ σώματος ἄτροφα καὶ λεπτὰ καὶ πολλῆς
προσθήκης τε καὶ ἀναθρέψεως δεόμενα. καὶ τοίνυν καὶ
τὸ νεῦρον τοῦτο τὸ αἰσθητόν, ἐφ' οὗπερ ἐξ ἀρχῆς
ἐποιησάμην τὸν λόγον, ἰσχνὸν μὲν ἱκανῶς γέγονε,
δεῖται δὲ θρέψεως. ἔχει δ' ἐν ἑαυτῷ μέρη πάμπολλα
μὲν ἐκεῖνα τὰ πρῶτα καὶ ἀόρατα νεῦρα τὰ σμικρὰ καί
τινας ἀρτηρίας ἁπλᾶς ὀλίγας καὶ φλέβας ὁμοίως.
ἅπαντ' οὖν αὐτοῦ τὰ νεῦρα τὰ στοιχειώδη
καταλελέπτυνται δηλονότι καὶ αὐτά, ἤ, εἰ μηδ'
ἐκεῖνα, οὐδὲ τὸ ὅλον. καὶ τοίνυν καὶ θρέψεως οὐ τὸ
μὲν ὅλον δεῖται νεῦρον, ἕκαστον δ' ἐκείνων οὐ
δεῖται. καὶ μὴν εἰ δεῖται μὲν ἀναθρέψεως, οὐδὲν δ' ἡ
πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθία βοηθεῖν αὐτοῖς δύναται
διά τε τὰς ἔμπροσθεν εἰρημένας ἀπορίας καὶ διὰ τὴν
ὑπόγυιον ἰσχνότητα, καθάπερ δείξω, ζητητέον ἡμῖν
ἐστιν ἑτέραν αἰτίαν θρέψεως.
Πῶς οὖν ἡ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθία τρέφειν
ἀδύνατός ἐστι τὸν οὕτω διακείμενον; ὅτι τοσοῦτον
ἀκολουθεῖν || ἀναγκάζει τῶν συνεχῶν, ὅσον ἀπορρεῖ. 104
τοῦτο δ' ἐπὶ μὲν τῶν εὐεκτούντων ἱκανόν ἐστιν εἰς
τὴν θρέψιν, ἴσα γὰρ ἐπ' αὐτῶν εἶναι χρὴ τοῖς
ἀπορρέουσι τὰ προστιθέμενα· ἐπὶ δὲ τῶν ἐσχάτως
ἰσχνῶν καὶ πολλῆς ἀναθρέψεως δεομένων εἰ μὴ
πολλαπλάσιον εἴη τὸ προστιθέμενον τοῦ κενουμένου,
τὴν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἕξιν ἀναλαβεῖν οὐκ ἄν ποτε δύναιντο.
δῆλον οὖν, ὡς ἕλκειν αὐτὰ δεήσει τοσούτῳ πλεῖον, ὅσῳ
καὶ δεῖται πλείονος. Ἐρασίστρατος δὲ κἀνταῦθα
πρότερον ποιήσας τὸ δεύτερον οὐκ οἶδ' ὅπως οὐκ
αἰσθάνεται. διότι γάρ, φησί, πολλὴ πρόσθεσις εἰς
ἀνάθρεψιν γίγνεται τοῖς νενοσηκόσι, διὰ τοῦτο καὶ ἡ
πρὸς ταύτην ἀκολουθία πολλή. πῶς δ' ἂν πολλὴ
πρόσθεσις γένοιτο μὴ προηγουμένης ἀναδόσεως
δαψιλοῦς; εἰ δὲ τὴν διὰ τῶν φλεβῶν φορὰν τῆς τροφῆς
ἀνάδοσιν καλεῖ, τὴν δ' εἰς ἕκαστον τῶν ἁπλῶν καὶ
ἀοράτων ἐκείνων νεύρων καὶ ἀρτηριῶν μετάληψιν οὐκ
ἀνάδοσιν ἀλλὰ διάδοσιν, ὥς τινες ὀνομάζειν ἠξίωσαν,
εἶτα || τὴν διὰ τῶν φλεβῶν μόνῃ τῇ πρὸς τὸ 105
κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ φησὶ γίγνεσθαι, τὴν εἰς τὰ λόγῳ
θεωρητὰ μετάληψιν ἡμῖν ἐξηγησάσθω. ὅτι μὲν γὰρ
οὐκέτ' ἐπὶ τούτων ἡ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθία
λέγεσθαι δύναται καὶ μάλιστ' ἐπὶ τῶν ἐσχάτως ἰσχνῶν,
ἀποδέδεικται. τί δέ φησιν ἐπ' αὐτῶν ἐν τῷ δευτέρῳ
τῶν καθόλου λόγων ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος, ἄξιον ἐπακοῦσαι
τῆς λέξεως· “Τοῖς δ' ἐσχάτοις τε καὶ ἁπλοῖς, λεπτοῖς
τε καὶ στενοῖς οὖσιν, ἐκ τῶν παρακειμένων ἀγγείων ἡ
πρόσθεσις συμβαίνει εἰς τὰ κενώματα τῶν ἀπενεχθέντων
κατὰ τὰ πλάγια τῶν ἀγγείων ἑλκομένης τῆς τροφῆς καὶ
καταχωριζομένης.” ἐκ ταύτης τῆς λέξεως πρῶτον μὲν τὸ
κατὰ τὰ πλάγια προσίεμαί τε καὶ ἀποδέχομαι· κατὰ μὲν
γὰρ αὐτὸ τὸ στόμα τὸ ἁπλοῦν νεῦρον οὐκ ἂν δύναιτο
δεχόμενον τὴν τροφὴν οὕτως εἰς ὅλον ἑαυτὸ διανέμειν·
ἀνάκειται γὰρ ἐκεῖνο τῷ ψυχικῷ πνεύματι· κατὰ δὲ τὸ
πλάγιον ἐκ τῆς παρακειμένης φλεβὸς τῆς ἁπλῆς ἐγχωρεῖ
λαβεῖν αὐτό. δεύτερον δ' ἀποδέχομαι τῶν ἐκ τῆς
Ἐρασιστράτου λέξεως ὀνομάτων τὸ γεγραμμένον ἐφεξῆς
τῷ κατὰ τὰ πλάγια. || τί γάρ φησι; “Κατὰ τὰ πλάγια 106
τῶν ἀγγείων ἑλκομένης τῆς τροφῆς.” ὅτι μὲν οὖν
ἕλκεται, καὶ ἡμεῖς ὁμολογοῦμεν, ὅτι δ' οὐ τῇ πρὸς τὸ
κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ, δέδεικται πρόσθεν.
VII
Let us, then, consider together how it is attracted. How else than in
the way that iron is attracted by the lodestone, the latter having a
faculty attractive of this particular quality [existing in iron]?[233]
But if the beginning of anadosis depends on the squeezing action of
the stomach,[234] and the whole movement thereafter on the peristalsis
and propulsive action of the veins, as well as on the traction exerted
by each of the parts which are undergoing nourishment, then we can
abandon the principle of replacement of evacuated matter, as not being
suitable for a man who assumes Nature to be a skilled artist; thus we
shall also have avoided the contradiction of Asclepiades[235] though
we cannot refute it: for the disjunctive argument used for the
purposes of demonstration is, in reality, disjunctive not of two but
of three alternatives; now, if we treat the disjunction as a
disjunction of two alternatives, one of the two propositions assumed
in constructing our proof must be false; and if as a disjunctive of
three alternatives, no conclusion will be arrived at.
VII
Ἐξεύρωμεν οὖν κοινῇ, πῶς ἕλκεται. πῶς δ' ἄλλως ἢ ὡς
ὁ σίδηρος ὑπὸ τῆς ἡρακλείας λίθου δύναμιν ἐχούσης
ἑλκτικὴν τοιαύτης ποιότητος; ἀλλ' εἰ τὴν μὲν ἀρχὴν
τῆς ἀναδόσεως ἡ τῆς κοιλίας ἔνθλιψις παρέχεται, τὴν
δὲ μετὰ ταῦτα φορὰν ἅπασαν αἵ τε φλέβες
περιστελλόμεναι καὶ προωθοῦσαι καὶ τῶν τρεφομένων
ἕκαστον ἐπισπώμενον εἰς ἑαυτό, τῆς πρὸς τὸ
κενούμενον ἀκολουθίας ἀποστάντες, ὡς οὐ πρεπούσης
ἀνδρὶ τεχνικὴν ὑποθεμένῳ τὴν φύσιν, οὕτως ἂν ἤδη καὶ
τὴν ἀντιλογίαν εἴημεν πεφευγότες τὴν Ἀσκληπιάδου μὴ
δυνάμενοί γε λύειν αὐτήν. τὸ γὰρ εἰς τὴν ἀπόδειξιν
παραλαμβανόμενον λῆμμα τὸ διεζευγμένον οὐκ ἐκ δυοῖν
ἀλλ' ἐκ τριῶν ἐστι κατά γε τὴν ἀλήθειαν
διεζευγμένον. εἰ μὲν οὖν ὡς ἐκ δυοῖν αὐτῷ
χρη||σαίμεθα, ψεῦδος ἔσται τι τῶν εἰς τὴν ἀπόδειξιν 107
παρειλημμένων· εἰ δ' ὡς ἐκ τριῶν, ἀπέραντος ὁ λόγος
γενήσεται.
VIII
Now Erasistratus ought not to have been ignorant of this if he had
ever had anything to do with the Peripatetics—even in a dream. Nor,
similarly, should he have been unacquainted with the genesis of the
_humours_, about which, not having even anything moderately plausible
to say, he thinks to deceive us by the excuse that the consideration
of such matters is not the least useful. Then, in Heaven’s name, is it
useful to know how food is digested in the stomach, but unnecessary to
know how _bile_ comes into existence in the veins? Are we to pay
attention merely to the evacuation of this humour, and not to its
genesis? As though it were not far better to prevent its excessive
development from the beginning than to give ourselves all the trouble
of expelling it![236] And it is a strange thing to be entirely unaware
as to whether its genesis is to be looked on as taking place in the
body, or whether it comes from without and is contained in the food.
For, if it was right to raise this problem, why should we not make
investigations concerning the _blood_ as well—whether it takes its
origin in the body, or is distributed through the food as is
maintained by those who postulate _homœmeries_?[237] Assuredly it
would be much more useful to investigate what kinds of food are
suited, and what kinds unsuited, to the process of
blood-production[238] rather than to enquire into what articles of
diet are easily mastered by the activity of the stomach, and what
resist and contend with it. For the choice of the latter bears
reference merely to digestion, while that of the former is of
importance in regard to the generation of useful blood. For it is not
equally important whether the aliment be imperfectly chylified[239] in
the stomach or whether it fail to be turned into useful blood. Why is
Erasistratus not ashamed to distinguish all the various kinds of
digestive failure and all the occasions which give rise to them,
whilst in reference to the errors of blood-production he does not
utter a single word—nay, not a syllable? Now, there is certainly to
be found in the veins both thick and thin blood; in some people it is
redder, in others yellower, in some blacker, in others more of the
nature of phlegm. And one who realizes that it may smell offensively
not in one way only, but in a great many different respects (which
cannot be put into words, although perfectly appreciable to the
senses), would, I imagine, condemn in no measured terms the
carelessness of Erasistratus in omitting a consideration so essential
to the practice of our art.
Thus it is clear what errors in regard to the subject of _dropsies_
logically follow this carelessness. For, does it not show the most
extreme carelessness to suppose that the blood is prevented from going
forward into the liver owing to the _narrowness of the passages_, and
that dropsy can never occur in any other way? For, to imagine that
dropsy is never caused by the spleen[240] or any other part, but
always by induration of the liver,[241] is the standpoint of a man
whose intelligence is perfectly torpid and who is quite out of touch
with things that happen every day. For, not merely once or twice, but
frequently, we have observed dropsy produced by chronic haemorrhoids
which have been suppressed,[242] or which, through immoderate
bleeding, have given the patient a severe chill; similarly, in women,
the complete disappearance of the monthly discharge,[243] or an undue
evacuation such as is caused by violent bleeding from the womb, often
provoke dropsy; and in some of them the so-called female flux ends in
this disorder. I leave out of account the dropsy which begins in the
flanks or in any other susceptible part; this clearly confutes
Erasistratus’s assumption, although not so obviously as does that kind
of dropsy which is brought about by an excessive chilling of the whole
constitution; this, which is the primary reason for the occurrence of
dropsy, results from a failure of blood-production,[244] very much
like the diarrhoea which follows imperfect digestion of food;
certainly in this kind of dropsy neither the liver nor any other
viscus becomes indurated.
The learned Erasistratus, however, overlooks—nay, despises—what
neither Hippocrates, Diocles, Praxagoras, nor Philistion[245]
despised, nor indeed any of the best philosophers, whether Plato,
Aristotle, or Theophrastus; he passes by whole functions as though it
were but a trifling and casual department of medicine which he was
neglecting, without deigning to argue whether or not these authorities
are right in saying that the bodily parts of all animals are governed
by the Warm, the Cold, the Dry and the Moist, the one pair being
active and the other passive, and that among these the Warm has most
power in connection with all functions, but especially with the
genesis of the humours.[246] Now, one cannot be blamed for not
agreeing with all these great men, nor for imagining that one knows
more than they; but not to consider such distinguished teaching worthy
either of contradiction or even mention shows an extraordinary
arrogance.
Now, Erasistratus is thoroughly small-minded and petty to the last
degree in all his disputations—when, for instance, in his treatise
“On Digestion,”[247] he argues jealously with those who consider that
this is a process of putrefaction of the food; and, in his work “On
Anadosis,”[248] with those who think that the anadosis of blood
through the veins results from the contiguity of the arteries; also,
in his work “On Respiration,” with those who maintain that the air is
forced along by contraction. Nay, he did not even hesitate to
contradict those who maintain that the urine passes into the bladder
in a vaporous state,[249] as also those who say that imbibed fluids
are carried into the lung. Thus he delights to choose always the most
valueless doctrines, and to spend his time more and more in
contradicting these; whereas on the subject of the _origin of blood_
(which is in no way less important than the chylification[250] of food
in the stomach) he did not deign to dispute with any of the ancients,
nor did he himself venture to bring forward any other opinion, despite
the fact that at the beginning of his treatise on “General Principles”
he undertook to say how all the various natural functions take place,
and through what parts of the animal! Now, is it possible that, when
the faculty which naturally digests food is weak, the animal’s
digestion fails, whereas the faculty which turns the digested food
into blood cannot suffer any kind of impairment?[251] Are we to
suppose this latter faculty alone to be as tough as steel and
unaffected by circumstances? Or is it that weakness of this faculty
will result in something else than dropsy? The fact, therefore, that
Erasistratus, in regard to other matters, did not hesitate to attack
even the most trivial views, whilst in this case he neither dared to
contradict his predecessors nor to advance any new view of his own,
proves plainly that he recognized the fallacy of his own way of
thinking.[252]
For what could a man possibly say about blood who had no use for
_innate heat_? What could he say about yellow or black bile, or
phlegm? Well, of course, he might say that the bile could come
directly from without, mingled with the food! Thus Erasistratus
practically says so in the following words: “It is of no value in
practical medicine to find out whether a fluid of this kind[253]
arises from the elaboration of food in the stomach-region, or whether
it reaches the body because it is mixed with the food taken in from
outside.” But, my very good Sir, you most certainly maintain also that
this humour has to be evacuated from the animal, and that it causes
great pain if it be not evacuated. How, then, if you suppose that no
good comes from the bile, do you venture to say that an investigation
into its origin is of no value in medicine?
Well, let us suppose that it is contained in the food, and not
specifically secreted in the liver (for you hold these two things
possible). In this case, it will certainly make a considerable
difference whether the ingested food contains a minimum or a maximum
of bile; for the one kind is harmless, whereas that containing a large
quantity of bile, owing to the fact that it cannot be properly
purified[254] in the liver, will result in the various
affections—particularly jaundice—which Erasistratus himself states
to occur where there is much bile. Surely, then, it is most essential
for the physician to know in the first place, that the bile is
contained in the food itself from outside, and, secondly, that for
example, beet contains a great deal of bile, and bread very little,
while olive oil contains most, and wine least of all, and all the
other articles of diet different quantities. Would it not be absurd
for any one to choose voluntarily those articles which contain more
bile, rather than those containing less?
What, however, if the bile is not contained in the food, but comes
into existence in the animal’s body? Will it not also be useful to
know what _state of the body_ is followed by a greater, and what by a
smaller occurrence of bile?[255] For obviously it is in our power to
alter and transmute morbid states of the body—in fact, to give them a
turn for the better. But if we did not know in what respect they were
morbid or in what way they diverged from the normal, how should we be
able to ameliorate them?
Therefore it is not useless in treatment, as Erasistratus says, to
know the actual truth about the genesis of bile. Certainly it is not
impossible, or even difficult to discover that the reason why _honey_
produces yellow bile is not that it contains a large quantity of this
within itself, but because it [the honey] undergoes change, becoming
_altered_ and transmuted into bile. For it would be bitter to the
taste if it contained bile from the outset, and it would produce an
equal quantity of bile in every person who took it. The facts,
however, are not so.[256] For in those who are in the prime of life,
especially if they are warm by nature and are leading a life of toil,
the honey changes entirely into yellow bile. Old people, however, it
suits well enough, inasmuch as the alteration which it undergoes is
not into bile, but into blood. Erasistratus, however, in addition to
knowing nothing about this, shows no intelligence even in the division
of his argument; he says that it is of no practical importance to
investigate whether the bile is contained in the food from the
beginning or comes into existence as a result of gastric digestion. He
ought surely to have added something about its genesis in liver and
veins, seeing that the old physicians and philosophers declare that it
along with the blood is generated in these organs. But it is
inevitable that people who, from the very outset, go astray, and
wander from the right road, should talk such nonsense, and should,
over and above this, neglect to search for the factors of most
practical importance in medicine.
Having come to this point in the argument, I should like to ask those
who declare that Erasistratus was very familiar with the Peripatetics,
whether they know what Aristotle stated and demonstrated with regard
to our bodies being compounded out of the Warm, the Cold, the Dry and
the Moist, and how he says that among these the Warm is the most
active, and that those animals which are by nature warmest have
abundance of blood, whilst those that are colder are entirely lacking
in blood, and consequently in winter lie idle and motionless, lurking
in holes like corpses. Further, the question of the colour of the
blood has been dealt with not only by Aristotle but also by
Plato.[257] Now I, for my part, as I have already said, did not set
before myself the task of stating what has been so well demonstrated
by the Ancients, since I cannot surpass these men either in my views
or in my method of giving them expression. Doctrines, however, which
they either stated without demonstration, as being self-evident (since
they never suspected that there could be sophists so degraded as to
contemn the truth in these matters), or else which they actually
omitted to mention at all—these I propose to discover and prove.
Now in reference to the _genesis of the humours_, I do not know that
any one could add anything wiser than what has been said by
Hippocrates, Aristotle, Praxagoras, Philotimus[258] and many other
among the Ancients. These men demonstrated that when the nutriment
becomes altered in the veins by the innate heat, blood is produced
when it is in moderation, and the other humours when it is not in
proper proportion. And all the observed facts[259] agree with this
argument. Thus, those articles of food, which are by nature warmer are
more productive of bile, while those which are colder produce more
phlegm. Similarly of the periods of life, those which are naturally
warmer tend more to bile, and the colder more to phlegm. Of
occupations also, localities and seasons, and, above all, of
natures[260] themselves, the colder are more phlegmatic, and the
warmer more bilious. Also cold diseases result from phlegm, and warmer
ones from yellow bile. There is not a single thing to be found which
does not bear witness to the truth of this account. How could it be
otherwise? For, seeing that every part functions in its own special
way because of the manner in which the four qualities are compounded,
it is absolutely necessary that the function [activity] should be
either completely destroyed, or, at least hampered, by any damage to
the qualities, and that thus the animal should fall ill, either as a
whole, or in certain of its parts.
Also the diseases which are primary and most generic are four in
number, and differ from each other in warmth, cold, dryness and
moisture. Now, Erasistratus himself confesses this, albeit
unintentionally;[261] for when he says that the digestion of food
becomes worse in fever, not because the innate heat has ceased to be
in due proportion, as people previously supposed, but because the
stomach, with its activity impaired, cannot contract and triturate as
before—then, I say, one may justly ask him what it is that has
impaired the activity of the stomach.
Thus, for example, when a bubo develops following an accidental
wound[262] gastric digestion does not become impaired _until after the
patient has become fevered_; neither the bubo nor the sore of itself
impedes in any way or damages the activity of the stomach. But if
fever occurs, the digestion at once deteriorates, and we are also
right in saying that the activity of the stomach at once becomes
impaired. We must add, however, by what it has been impaired. For the
wound was not capable of impairing it, nor yet the bubo, for, if they
had been, then they would have caused this damage before the fever as
well. If it was not these that caused it, then it was the excess of
heat[263] (for these two symptoms occurred besides the bubo—an
alteration in the arterial and cardiac movements[264] and an excessive
development of natural heat). Now the alteration of these movements
will not merely not impair the function of the stomach in any way: it
will actually prove an additional help among those animals in which,
according to Erasistratus, the _pneuma_, which is propelled through
the arteries and into the alimentary canal, is of great service in
digestion;[265] there is only left, then, the disproportionate heat to
account for the damage to the gastric activity. For the pneuma is
driven in more vigorously and continuously, and in greater quantity
now than before; thus in this case, the animal whose digestion is
promoted by pneuma will digest more, whereas the remaining
factor—abnormal heat—will give them indigestion. For to say, on the
one hand, that the pneuma has a certain property by virtue of which it
promotes digestion, and then to say that this property disappears in
cases of fever, is simply to admit the absurdity. For when they are
again asked what it is that has altered the pneuma, they will only be
able to reply, “the abnormal heat,” and particularly if it be the
pneuma in the food canal which is in question (since this does not
come in any way near the bubo).
Yet why do I mention those animals in which the property of the pneuma
plays an important part, when it is possible to base one’s argument
upon human beings, in whom it is either of no importance at all, or
acts quite faintly and feebly?[266] But Erasistratus himself agrees
that human beings digest badly in fevers, adding as the cause that the
activity of the stomach has been impaired. He cannot, however, advance
any other cause of this impairment than abnormal heat. But if it is
not by accident that the abnormal heat impairs this activity, but by
virtue of its own essence and power, then this abnormal heat must
belong to the _primary diseases_. But, indeed, if _disproportion_ of
heat belongs to the primary diseases, it cannot but be that a
_proportionate_ blending [eucrasia] of the qualities produces the
normal activity.[267] For a disproportionate blend [dyscrasia] can
only become a cause of the primary diseases through derangement of the
eucrasia. That is to say, it is because the [normal] activities arise
from the eucrasia that the primary impairments of these activities
necessarily arise from its derangement.
I think, then, it has been proved to the satisfaction of those people
who are capable of seeing logical consequences, that, even according
to Erasistratus’s own argument, the cause of the normal functions is
eucrasia of the Warm.[268] Now, this being so, there is nothing
further to prevent us from saying that, in the case of each function,
eucrasia is followed by the more, and dyscrasia by the less favourable
alternative. And, therefore, if this be the case, we must suppose
blood to be the outcome of proportionate, and yellow bile of
disproportionate heat. So we naturally find yellow bile appearing in
greatest quantity in ourselves at the warm periods of life, in warm
countries, at warm seasons of the year, and when we are in a warm
condition; similarly in people of warm temperaments, and in connection
with warm occupations, modes of life, or diseases.
And to be in doubt as to whether this humour has its genesis in the
human body or is contained in the food is what you would expect from
one who has—I will not say failed to see that, when those who are
perfectly healthy have, under the compulsion of circumstances, to fast
contrary to custom, their mouths become bitter and their urine
bile-coloured, while they suffer from gnawing pains in the
stomach—but has, as it were, just made a sudden entrance into the
world, and is not yet familiar with the phenomena which occur there.
Who, in fact, does not know that anything which is overcooked grows at
first salt and afterwards bitter? And if you will boil honey itself,
far the sweetest of all things, you can demonstrate that even this
becomes quite bitter. For what may occur as a result of boiling in the
case of other articles which are not warm by nature, exists naturally
in honey; for this reason it does not become sweeter on being boiled,
since exactly the same quantity of heat as is needed for the
production of sweetness exists from beforehand in the honey. Therefore
the external heat, which would be useful for insufficiently warm
substances, becomes in the honey a source of damage, in fact an
excess; and it is for this reason that honey, when boiled, can be
demonstrated to become bitter sooner than the others. For the same
reason it is easily transmuted into bile in those people who are
naturally warm, or in their prime, since warm when associated with
warm becomes readily changed into a disproportionate combination and
turns into bile sooner than into blood. Thus we need a cold
temperament and a cold period of life if we would have honey brought
to the nature of blood.[269] Therefore Hippocrates not improperly
advised those who were naturally bilious not to take honey, since they
were obviously of too warm a temperament. So also, not only
Hippocrates, but all physicians say that honey is bad in bilious
diseases but good in old age; some of them having discovered this
through the indications afforded by its nature, and others simply
through experiment,[270] for the Empiricist physicians too have made
precisely the same observation, namely, that honey is good for an old
man and not for a young one, that it is harmful for those who are
naturally bilious, and serviceable for those who are phlegmatic. In a
word, in bodies which are warm either through nature, disease, time of
life, season of the year, locality, or occupation, honey is productive
of bile, whereas in opposite circumstances it produces blood.
But surely it is impossible that the same article of diet can produce
in certain persons bile and in others blood, if it be not that the
genesis of these humours is accomplished _in the body_. For if all
articles of food contained bile from the beginning and of themselves,
and did not produce it by undergoing change in the animal body, then
they would produce it similarly in all bodies; the food which was
bitter to the taste would, I take it, be productive of bile, while
that which tasted good and sweet would not generate even the smallest
quantity of bile. Moreover, not only honey but all other sweet
substances are readily converted into bile in the aforesaid bodies
which are warm for any of the reasons mentioned.
Well, I have somehow or other been led into this discussion,—not in
accordance with my plan, but compelled by the course of the argument.
This subject has been treated at great length by Aristotle and
Praxagoras, who have correctly expounded the view of Hippocrates and
Plato.
VIII
Καὶ ταῦτ' οὐκ ἐχρῆν ἀγνοεῖν τὸν Ἐρασίστρατον, εἴπερ
κἂν ὄναρ ποτὲ τοῖς ἐκ τοῦ περιπάτου συνέτυχεν, ὥσπερ
οὖν οὐδὲ τὰ περὶ τῆς γενέσεως τῶν χυμῶν, ὑπὲρ ὧν
οὐδὲν ἔχων εἰπεῖν οὐδὲ μέχρι τοῦ μετρίου πιθανὸν
οἴεται παρακρούεσθαι σκηπτόμενος, ὡς οὐδὲ χρήσιμος
ὅλως ἐστὶν ἡ τῶν τοιούτων ἐπίσκεψις. εἶτ', ὦ πρὸς
θεῶν, ὅπως μὲν τὰ σιτία κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα πέττεται
χρήσιμον ἐπίστασθαι, πῶς δ' ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν ἡ χολὴ
γίγνεται, περιττόν; καὶ τῆς κενώσεως ἄρα φροντιστέον
αὐτῆς μόνης, ἀμελητέον δὲ τῆς γενέσεως; ὥσπερ οὐκ
ἄμεινον ὑπάρχον μακρῷ τὸ κωλύειν εὐθὺς ἐξ ἀρχῆς
γεννᾶσθαι πλείονα τοῦ πράγματ' ἔχειν ἐκκενοῦντας.
θαυμαστὸν δὲ καὶ τὸ διαπορεῖν, εἴτ' ἐν τῷ σώματι τὴν
γένεσιν αὐτῆς ὑποθετέον εἴτ' εὐθὺς ἔξωθεν ἐν τοῖς
σιτίοις περιέχεσθαι φατέον. εἰ γὰρ δὴ τοῦτο καλῶς
ἠπόρηται, τί οὐχὶ καὶ περὶ τοῦ αἵματος ἐπισκεψόμεθα,
πότερον ἐν τῷ σώματι || λαμβάνει τὴν γένεσιν ἢ τοῖς 108
σιτίοις παρέσπαρται, καθάπερ οἱ τὰς ὁμοιομερείας
ὑποτιθέμενοί φασι; καὶ μὴν πολλῷ γ' ἦν χρησιμώτερον
ζητεῖσθαι, ποῖα τῶν σιτίων ὁμολογεῖ τῇ τῆς
αἱματώσεως ἐνεργείᾳ καὶ ποῖα διαφέρεται, τοῦ ζητεῖν,
τίνα μὲν τῇ τῆς γαστρὸς ἐνεργείᾳ νικᾶται ῥᾳδίως,
τίνα δ' ἀντιβαίνει καὶ μάχεται. τούτων μὲν γὰρ ἡ
ἔκλεξις εἰς πέψιν μόνην, ἐκείνων δ' εἰς αἵματος
χρηστοῦ διαφέρει γένεσιν. οὐδὲ γὰρ ἴσον ἐστὶν ἢ μὴ
καλῶς ἐν τῇ γαστρὶ χυλωθῆναι τὴν τροφὴν ἢ μὴ χρηστὸν
αἷμα γεννηθῆναι. πῶς δ' οὐκ αἰδεῖται τὰς μὲν τῆς
πέψεως ἀποτυχίας διαιρούμενος, ὡς πολλαί τ' εἰσὶ καὶ
κατὰ πολλὰς γίγνονται προφάσεις, ὑπὲρ δὲ τῶν τῆς
αἱματώσεως σφαλμάτων οὐδ' ἄχρι ῥήματος ἑνὸς οὐδ'
ἄχρι συλλαβῆς μιᾶς φθεγξάμενος; καὶ μὴν εὑρίσκεταί
γε καὶ παχὺ καὶ λεπτὸν ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν αἷμα καὶ τοῖς
μὲν ἐρυθρότερον, τοῖς δὲ ξανθότερον, τοῖς δὲ
μελάντερον, τοῖς δὲ φλεγματωδέστερον. εἰ δ' ὅτι καὶ
δυσῶδες οὐχ ἕνα τρόπον ἀλλ' ἐν πολλαῖς πάνυ
διαφοραῖς ἀρρήτοις μὲν λόγῳ, σα||φεστάταις δ' 109
αἰσθήσεσι φαίνεται γιγνόμενον, εἰδείη τις, οὐκ ἂν
οἶμαι μετρίως ἔτι καταγνώσεσθαι τῆς Ἐρασιστράτου
ῥᾳθυμίας αὐτὸν οὕτω γ' ἀναγκαίαν εἰς τὰ ἔργα τῆς
τέχνης θεωρίαν παραλιπόντος.
Ἐναργῆ γὰρ δὴ καὶ τὰ περὶ τῶν ὑδέρων ἁμαρτήματα τῇ
ῥᾳθυμίᾳ ταύτῃ κατὰ λόγον ἠκολουθηκότα. τό τε γὰρ τῇ
στενοχωρίᾳ τῶν ὁδῶν κωλύεσθαι νομίζειν πρόσω τοῦ
ἥπατος ἰέναι τὸ αἷμα καὶ μηδέποτ' ἂν ἄλλως ὕδερον
δύνασθαι συστῆναι πῶς οὐκ ἐσχάτην ἐνδείκνυται
ῥᾳθυμίαν; τό τε μὴ διὰ τὸν σπλῆνα μηδὲ δι' ἄλλο τι
μόριον, ἀλλ' ἀεὶ διὰ τὸν ἐν τῷ ἥπατι σκίρρον ὕδερον
οἴεσθαι γίγνεσθαι τελέως ἀργοῦ τὴν διάνοιαν ἀνθρώπου
καὶ μηδενὶ τῶν ὁσημέραι γιγνομένων παρακολουθοῦντος.
ἐπὶ μέν γε χρονίαις αἱμορροΐσιν ἐπισχεθείσαις ἢ διὰ
κένωσιν ἄμετρον εἰς ψῦξιν ἐσχάτην ἀγαγούσαις τὸν
ἄνθρωπον οὐχ ἅπαξ οὐδὲ δὶς ἀλλὰ πολλάκις ἤδη
τεθεάμεθα συστάντας ὑδέρους, ὥσπερ γε καὶ γυναιξὶν ἥ
τε τῆς ἐφ' ἑκάστῳ μηνὶ καθάρσεως ἀπώλεια παντελὴς
καὶ ἄμετρος κένωσις, ὅταν αἱμορραγήσωσί ποθ' αἱ
μῆτραι σφοδρῶς, ἐπεκαλέσαντο πολ||λάκις ὕδερον καί 110
τισιν αὐτῶν καὶ ὁ γυναικεῖος ὀνομαζόμενος ῥοῦς εἰς
τοῦτ' ἐτελεύτησε τὸ πάθος, ἵνα τοὺς ἀπὸ τῶν κενεώνων
ἀρχομένους ἢ ἄλλου τινὸς τῶν ἐπικαίρων μορίων
ὑδέρους παραλίπω, σαφῶς μὲν καὶ αὐτοὺς ἐξελέγχοντας
τὴν Ἐρασιστράτειον ὑπόληψιν, ἀλλ' οὐχ οὕτως ἐναργῶς
ὡς οἱ διὰ κατάψυξιν σφοδρὰν τῆς ὅλης ἕξεως
ἀποτελούμενοι. πρώτη γὰρ αὕτη γενέσεως ὑδέρων αἰτία
διὰ τὴν ἀποτυχίαν τῆς αἱματώσεως γιγνομένη τρόπον
ὁμοιότατον ταῖς ἐπὶ τῇ τῶν σιτίων ἀπεψίᾳ διαρροίαις.
οὐ μὴν ἐσκίρρωταί γε κατὰ τοὺς τοιούτους ὑδέρους
οὐδ' ἄλλο τι σπλάγχνον οὐδὲ τὸ ἧπαρ.
Ἀλλ' Ἐρασίστρατος ὁ σοφὸς ὑπεριδὼν καὶ καταφρονήσας,
ὧν οὔθ' Ἱπποκράτης οὔτε Διοκλῆς οὔτε Πραξαγόρας οὔτε
Φιλιστίων ἀλλ' οὐδὲ τῶν ἀρίστων φιλοσόφων οὐδεὶς
κατεφρόνησεν οὔτε Πλάτων οὔτ' Ἀριστοτέλης οὔτε
Θεόφραστος, ὅλας ἐνεργείας ὑπερβαίνει καθάπερ τι
σμικρὸν καὶ τὸ τυχὸν τῆς τέχνης παραλιπὼν μέρος οὐδ'
ἀντειπεῖν ἀξιώσας, εἴτ' ὀρθῶς εἴτε καὶ μὴ || 111
σύμπαντες οὗτοι θερμῷ καὶ ψυχρῷ καὶ ξηρῷ καὶ ὑγρῷ,
τοῖς μὲν ὡς δρῶσι, τοῖς δ' ὡς πάσχουσι, τὰ κατὰ τὸ
σῶμα τῶν ζῴων ἁπάντων διοικεῖσθαί φασι καὶ ὡς τὸ
θερμὸν ἐν αὐτοῖς εἴς τε τὰς ἄλλας ἐνεργείας καὶ
μάλιστ' εἰς τὴν τῶν χυμῶν γένεσιν τὸ πλεῖστον
δύναται. ἀλλὰ τὸ μὲν μὴ πείθεσθαι τοσούτοις τε καὶ
τηλικούτοις ἀνδράσι καὶ πλέον αὐτῶν οἴεσθαί τι
γιγνώσκειν ἀνεμέσητον, τὸ δὲ μήτ' ἀντιλογίας ἀξιῶσαι
μήτε μνήμης οὕτως ἔνδοξον δόγμα θαυμαστήν τινα τὴν
ὑπεροψίαν ἐνδείκνυται.
Καὶ μὴν σμικρότατός ἐστι τὴν γνώμην καὶ ταπεινὸς
ἐσχάτως ἐν ἁπάσαις ταῖς ἀντιλογίαις ἐν μὲν τοῖς περὶ
τῆς πέψεως λόγοις τοῖς σήπεσθαι τὰ σιτία νομίζουσι
φιλοτίμως ἀντιλέγων, ἐν δὲ τοῖς περὶ τῆς ἀναδόσεως
τοῖς διὰ τὴν παράθεσιν τῶν ἀρτηριῶν ἀναδίδοσθαι τὸ
διὰ τῶν φλεβῶν αἷμα νομίζουσιν, ἐν δὲ τοῖς περὶ τῆς
ἀναπνοῆς τοῖς περιωθεῖσθαι τὸν ἀέρα φάσκουσιν. οὐκ
ὤκνησε δ' οὐδὲ τοῖς ἀτμοειδῶς εἰς τὴν κύστιν ἰέναι
τὰ οὖρα νομίζουσιν ἀντειπεῖν οὐδὲ τοῖς εἰς || τὸν 112
πνεύμονα φέρεσθαι τὸ ποτόν. οὕτως ἐν ἅπασι τὰς
χειρίστας ἐπιλεγόμενος δόξας ἀγάλλεται διατρίβων ἐπὶ
πλέον ἐν ταῖς ἀντιλογίαις· ἐπὶ δὲ τῆς τοῦ αἵματος
γενέσεως οὐδὲν ἀτιμοτέρας οὔσης τῆς ἐν τῇ γαστρὶ
χυλώσεως τῶν σιτίων οὔτ' ἀντειπεῖν τινι τῶν
πρεσβυτέρων ἠξίωσεν οὔτ' αὐτὸς εἰσηγήσασθαί τιν'
ἑτέραν γνώμην ἐτόλμησεν, ὁ περὶ πασῶν τῶν φυσικῶν
ἐνεργειῶν ἐν ἀρχῇ τῶν καθόλου λόγων ὑποσχόμενος
ἐρεῖν, ὅπως τε γίγνονται καὶ δι' ὧντινων τοῦ ζῴου
μορίων. ἢ τῆς μὲν πέττειν τὰ σιτία πεφυκυίας
δυνάμεως ἀρρωστούσης ἀπεπτήσει τὸ ζῷον, τῆς δ'
αἱματούσης τὰ πεφθέντα οὐδὲν ἔσται πάθημα τὸ
παράπαν, ἀλλ' ἀδαμαντίνη τις ἡμῖν αὕτη μόνη καὶ
ἀπαθής ἐστιν; ἢ ἄλλο τι τῆς ἀρρωστίας αὐτῆς ἔκγονον
ὑπάρξει καὶ οὐχ ὕδερος; δῆλος οὖν ἐναργῶς ἐστιν ὁ
Ἐρασίστρατος ἐξ ὧν ἐν μὲν τοῖς ἄλλοις οὐδὲ ταῖς
φαυλοτάταις δόξαις ἀντιλέγειν ὤκνησεν, ἐνταυθοῖ δ'
οὔτ' ἀντειπεῖν τοῖς πρόσθεν οὔτ' αὐτὸς εἰπεῖν τι
καινὸν ἐτόλμησε, τὸ σφάλμα τῆς ἑαυτοῦ γνωρίζων
αἱρέσεως.
Τί γὰρ ἂν καὶ λέγειν ἔσχεν ὑπὲρ αἵματος || ἄνθρωπος 113
εἰς μηδὲν τῷ συμφύτῳ θερμῷ χρώμενος; τί δὲ περὶ
ξανθῆς χολῆς ἢ μελαίνης ἢ φλέγματος; ὅτι νὴ Δία
δυνατόν ἐστιν ἀναμεμιγμένην τοῖς σιτίοις εὐθὺς
ἔξωθεν παραγίγνεσθαι τὴν χολήν. λέγει γοῦν ὥδέ πως
αὐτοῖς ὀνόμασι· “Πότερον δ' ἐν τῇ περὶ τὴν κοιλίαν
κατεργασίᾳ τῆς τροφῆς γεννᾶται τοιαύτη ὑγρασία ἢ
μεμιγμένη τοῖς ἔξωθεν προσφερομένοις παραγίγνεται,
οὐδὲν χρήσιμον πρὸς ἰατρικὴν ἐπεσκέφθαι.” καὶ μήν, ὦ
γενναιότατε, καὶ κενοῦσθαι χρῆναι φάσκεις ἐκ τοῦ
ζῴου τὸν χυμὸν τοῦτον καὶ μεγάλως λυπεῖν, εἰ μὴ
κενωθείη. πῶς οὖν οὐδὲν ἐξ αὐτοῦ χρηστὸν ὑπολαμβάνων
γίγνεσθαι τολμᾷς ἄχρηστον λέγειν εἰς ἰατρικὴν εἶναι
τὴν περὶ τῆς γενέσεως αὐτοῦ σκέψιν;
Ὑποκείσθω γὰρ ἐν μὲν τοῖς σιτίοις περιέχεσθαι, μὴ
διακρίνεσθαι δ' ἀκριβῶς ἐν ἥπατι· ταῦτα γὰρ ἀμφότερα
νομίζεις εἶναι δυνατά. καὶ μὴν οὐ σμικρὸν ἐνταῦθα τὸ
διαφέρον ἢ ἐλαχίστην ἢ παμπόλλην χολὴν ἐν ἑαυτοῖς
περιέχοντα προσάρασθαι σιτία. τὰ μὲν γὰρ ἀκίνδυνα,
τὰ δὲ παμπόλλην περιέχοντα τῷ μὴ δύνασθαι πᾶσαν
αὐτὴν ἐν || ἥπατι καθαρθῆναι καλῶς αἰτία 114
καταστήσεται τῶν τ' ἄλλων παθῶν, ὧν αὐτὸς ὁ
Ἐρασίστρατος ἐπὶ πλήθει χολῆς γίγνεσθαί φησι, καὶ
τῶν ἰκτέρων οὐχ ἥκιστα. πῶς οὖν οὐκ ἀναγκαιότατον
ἰατρῷ γιγνώσκειν, πρῶτον μέν, ὡς ἐν τοῖς σιτίοις
αὐτοῖς ἔξωθεν ἡ χολὴ περιέχεται, δεύτερον δ', ὡς τὸ
μὲν τεῦτλον, εἰ τύχοι, παμπόλλην, ὁ δ' ἄρτος
ἐλαχίστην καὶ τὸ μὲν ἔλαιον πλείστην, ὁ δ' οἶνος
ὀλιγίστην ἕκαστόν τε τῶν ἄλλων ἄνισον τῷ πλήθει
περιέχει τὴν χολήν; πῶς γὰρ οὐκ ἂν εἴη γελοιότατος,
ὃς ἂν ἑκὼν αἱρῆται τὰ πλείονα χολὴν ἐν ἑαυτοῖς
περιέχοντα πρὸ τῶν ἐναντίων;
Τί δ' εἰ μὴ περιέχεται μὲν ἐν τοῖς σιτίοις ἡ χολή,
γίγνεται δ' ἐν τοῖς τῶν ζῴων σώμασιν; ἢ οὐχὶ καὶ
κατὰ τοῦτο χρήσιμον ἐπίστασθαι, τίνι μὲν καταστάσει
σώματος ἕπεται πλείων αὐτῆς ἡ γένεσις, τίνι δ'
ἐλάττων; ἀλλοιοῦν γὰρ δήπου καὶ μεταβάλλειν οἷοί τ'
ἐσμὲν καὶ τρέπειν ἐπὶ τὸ βέλτιον ἀεὶ τὰς μοχθηρὰς
καταστάσεις τοῦ σώματος. ἀλλ' εἰ μὴ γιγνώσκοιμεν,
καθότι μοχθηραὶ καὶ ὅπῃ τῆς δεούσης ἐξίστανται, πῶς
ἂν αὐτὰς ἐπανάγειν οἷοί τ' εἴημεν ἐπὶ τὸ || 115
κρεῖττον;
Οὔκουν ἄχρηστόν ἐστιν εἰς τὰς ἰάσεις, ὡς
Ἐρασίστρατός φησιν, ἐπίστασθαι τἀληθὲς αὐτὸ περὶ
γενέσεως χολῆς. οὐ μὴν οὐδ' ἀδύνατον οὐδ' ἀσαφὲς
ἐξευρεῖν, ὅτι μὴ τῷ πλείστην ἐν ἑαυτῷ περιέχειν τὸ
μέλι τὴν ξανθὴν χολὴν ἀλλ' ἐν τῷ σώματι
μεταβαλλόμενον εἰς αὐτὴν ἀλλοιοῦταί τε καὶ τρέπεται.
πικρόν τε γὰρ ἂν ἦν γευομένοις, εἰ χολὴν ἔξωθεν
εὐθὺς ἐν ἑαυτῷ περιεῖχεν ἅπασί τ' ἂν ὡσαύτως τοῖς
ἀνθρώποις ἴσον αὐτῆς ἐγέννα τὸ πλῆθος. ἀλλ' οὐχ ὧδ'
ἔχει τἀληθές. ἐν μὲν γὰρ τοῖς ἀκμάζουσι καὶ μάλιστ'
εἰ φύσει θερμότεροι καὶ βίον εἶεν βιοῦντες
ταλαίπωρον, ἅπαν εἰς ξανθὴν χολὴν μεταβάλλει τὸ
μέλι· τοῖς γέρουσι δ' ἱκανῶς ἐστιν ἐπιτήδειον, ὡς ἂν
οὐκ εἰς χολὴν ἀλλ' εἰς αἷμα τὴν ἀλλοίωσιν ἐν
ἐκείνοις λαμβάνον. Ἐρασίστρατος δὲ πρὸς τῷ μηδὲν
τούτων γιγνώσκειν οὐδὲ περὶ τὴν διαίρεσιν τοῦ λόγου
σωφρονεῖ, πότερον ἐν τοῖς σιτίοις ἡ χολὴ περιέχεται
εὐθὺς ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἢ κατὰ τὴν ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ κατεργασίαν
ἐγένετο, μηδὲν εἶναι χρήσιμον εἰς ἰατρικὴν
ἐπεσκέφθαι λέγων. ἐχρῆν || γὰρ δήπου προσθεῖναί τι 116
καὶ περὶ τῆς ἐν ἥπατι καὶ φλεψὶ γενέσεως αὐτῆς, ἐν
τοῖσδε τοῖς ὀργάνοις γεννᾶσθαι τὴν χολὴν ἅμα τῷ
αἵματι τῶν παλαιῶν ἰατρῶν τε καὶ φιλοσόφων
ἀποφηναμένων. ἀλλὰ τοῖς εὐθὺς ἐξ ἀρχῆς σφαλεῖσι καὶ
διαμαρτάνουσι τῆς ὀρθῆς ὁδοῦ τοιαῦτά τε ληρεῖν
ἀναγκαῖόν ἐστι καὶ προσέτι τῶν χρησιμωτάτων εἰς τὴν
τέχνην παραλιπεῖν τὴν ζήτησιν.
Ἡδέως δ' ἂν ἐνταῦθα τοῦ λόγου γεγονὼς ἠρόμην τοὺς
ὁμιλῆσαι φάσκοντας αὐτὸν ἐπὶ πλεῖστον τοῖς ἐκ τοῦ
περιπάτου φιλοσόφοις, εἰ γιγνώσκουσιν, ὅσα περὶ τοῦ
κεκρᾶσθαι τὰ σώμαθ' ἡμῶν ἐκ θερμοῦ καὶ ψυχροῦ καὶ
ξηροῦ καὶ ὑγροῦ πρὸς Ἀριστοτέλους εἴρηταί τε καὶ
ἀποδέδεικται, καὶ ὡς τὸ θερμὸν ἐν αὐτοῖς ἐστι τὸ
δραστικώτατον καὶ ὡς τῶν ζῴων ὅσα μὲν θερμότερα
φύσει, ταῦτα πάντως ἔναιμα, τὰ δ' ἐπὶ πλέον
ψυχρότερα πάντως ἄναιμα καὶ διὰ τοῦτο τοῦ χειμῶνος
ἀργὰ καὶ ἀκίνητα κεῖται φωλεύοντα δίκην νεκρῶν.
εἴρηται δὲ καὶ περὶ τῆς χροιᾶς τοῦ αἵματος οὐκ
Ἀριστοτέλει μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ Πλάτωνι. καὶ ἡμεῖς νῦν,
ὅπερ ἤδη καὶ πρόσθεν εἶπον, || οὐ τὰ καλῶς 117
ἀποδεδειγμένα τοῖς παλαιοῖς λέγειν προὐθέμεθα, μήτε
τῇ γνώμῃ μήτε τῇ λέξει τοὺς ἄνδρας ἐκείνους
ὑπερβαλέσθαι δυνάμενοι· τὰ δ' ἤτοι χωρὶς ἀποδείξεως
ὡς ἐναργῆ πρὸς αὐτῶν εἰρημένα διὰ τὸ μηδ' ὑπονοῆσαι
μοχθηροὺς οὕτως ἔσεσθαί τινας σοφιστάς, οἳ
καταφρονήσουσι τῆς ἐν αὐτοῖς ἀληθείας, ἢ καὶ
παραλελειμμένα τελέως ὑπ' ἐκείνων ἀξιοῦμεν εὑρίσκειν
τε καὶ ἀποδεικνύναι.
Περὶ δὲ τῆς τῶν χυμῶν γενέσεως οὐκ οἶδ', εἰ ἔχει τις
ἕτερον προσθεῖναι σοφώτερον ὧν Ἱπποκράτης εἶπε καὶ
Ἀριστοτέλης καὶ Πραξαγόρας καὶ Φιλότιμος καὶ ἄλλοι
πολλοὶ τῶν παλαιῶν. ἀποδέδεικται γὰρ ἐκείνοις τοῖς
ἀνδράσιν ἀλλοιουμένης τῆς τροφῆς ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν ὑπὸ
τῆς ἐμφύτου θερμασίας αἷμα μὲν ὑπὸ τῆς συμμετρίας
τῆς κατ' αὐτήν, οἱ δ' ἄλλοι χυμοὶ διὰ τὰς ἀμετρίας
γιγνόμενοι· καὶ τούτῳ τῷ λόγῳ πάνθ' ὁμολογεῖ τὰ
φαινόμενα. καὶ γὰρ τῶν ἐδεσμάτων ὅσα μέν ἐστι
θερμότερα φύσει, χολωδέστερα, τὰ δὲ ψυχρότερα
φλεγματικώτερα· καὶ τῶν ἡλικιῶν ὡσαύτως
χολωδέστε||ραι μὲν αἱ θερμότεραι φύσει, 118
φλεγματωδέστεραι δ' αἱ ψυχρότεραι· καὶ τῶν
ἐπιτηδευμάτων δὲ καὶ τῶν χωρῶν καὶ τῶν ὡρῶν καὶ πολὺ
δὴ πρότερον ἔτι τῶν φύσεων αὐτῶν αἱ μὲν ψυχρότεραι
φλεγματωδέστεραι, χολωδέστεραι δ' αἱ θερμότεραι· καὶ
νοσημάτων τὰ μὲν ψυχρὰ τοῦ φλέγματος ἔκγονα, τὰ δὲ
θερμὰ τῆς ξανθῆς χολῆς· καὶ ὅλως οὐδὲν ἔστιν εὑρεῖν
τῶν πάντων, ὃ μὴ τούτῳ τῷ λόγῳ μαρτυρεῖ. πῶς δ' οὐ
μέλλει; διὰ γὰρ τὴν ἐκ τῶν τεττάρων ποιὰν κρᾶσιν
ἑκάστου τῶν μορίων ὡδί πως ἐνεργοῦντος ἀνάγκη πᾶσα
καὶ διὰ τὴν βλάβην αὐτῶν ἢ διαφθείρεσθαι τελέως ἢ
ἐμποδίζεσθαί γε τὴν ἐνέργειαν καὶ οὕτω νοσεῖν τὸ
ζῷον ἢ ὅλον ἢ κατὰ τὰ μόρια.
Καὶ τὰ πρῶτά γε καὶ γενικώτατα νοσήματα τέτταρα τὸν
ἀριθμὸν ὑπάρχει θερμότητι καὶ ψυχρότητι καὶ ξηρότητι
καὶ ὑγρότητι διαφέροντα. τοῦτο δὲ καὶ αὐτὸς ὁ
Ἐρασίστρατος ὁμολογεῖ καίτοι μὴ βουλόμενος. ὅταν γὰρ
ἐν τοῖς πυρετοῖς χείρους τῶν σιτίων τὰς πέψεις
γίγνεσθαι λέγῃ, μὴ διότι τῆς ἐμφύτου || θερμασίας ἡ 119
συμμετρία διέφθαρται, καθάπερ οἱ πρόσθεν
ὑπελάμβανον, ἀλλ' ὅτι περιστέλλεσθαι καὶ τρίβειν ἡ
γαστὴρ οὐχ ὁμοίως δύναται βεβλαμμένη τὴν ἐνέργειαν,
ἐρέσθαι δίκαιον αὐτόν, ὑπὸ τίνος ἡ τῆς γαστρὸς
ἐνέργεια βέβλαπται.
Γενομένου γάρ, εἰ τύχοι, βουβῶνος ἐπὶ προσπταίσματι,
πρὶν μὲν πυρέξαι τὸν ἄνθρωπον, οὐκ ἂν χεῖρον ἡ
γαστὴρ πέψειεν· οὐ γὰρ ἱκανὸν ἦν οὐδέτερον αὐτῶν
οὔθ' ὁ βουβὼν οὔτε τὸ ἕλκος ἐμποδίσαι τι καὶ βλάψαι
τὴν ἐνέργειαν τῆς κοιλίας· εἰ δὲ πυρέξειεν, εὐθὺς
μὲν αἱ πέψεις γίγνονται χείρους, εὐθὺς δὲ καὶ τὴν
ἐνέργειαν τῆς γαστρὸς βεβλάφθαι φαμὲν ὀρθῶς
λέγοντες. ἀλλ' ὑπὸ τίνος ἐβλάβη, προσθεῖναι χρὴ τῷ
λόγῳ. τὸ μὲν γὰρ ἕλκος οὐχ οἷόν τ' ἦν αὐτὴν
βλάπτειν, ὥσπερ οὐδ' ὁ βουβών· ἦ γὰρ ἂν ἔβλαψε καὶ
πρὸ τοῦ πυρετοῦ. εἰ δὲ μὴ ταῦτα, δῆλον, ὡς ἡ τῆς
θερμασίας πλεονεξία. δύο γὰρ ταῦτα προσεγένετο τῷ
βουβῶνι, ἡ τῆς κατὰ τὰς ἀρτηρίας τε καὶ τὴν καρδίαν
κινήσεως ἀλλοίωσις καὶ ἡ τῆς κατὰ φύσιν θερμασίας
πλεονεξία. ἀλλ' ἡ μὲν τῆς κινήσεως ἀλλοίωσις οὐ
μόνον οὐδὲν βλάψει τὴν ἐνέργειαν τῆς γα||στρός, ἀλλὰ 120
καὶ προσωφελήσει κατ' ἐκεῖνα τῶν ζῴων, ἐν οἷς εἰς
τὴν πέψιν ὑπέθετο πλεῖστον δύνασθαι τὸ διὰ τῶν
ἀρτηριῶν εἰς τὴν κοιλίαν ἐμπῖπτον πνεῦμα. διὰ λοιπὴν
οὖν ἔτι καὶ μόνην τὴν ἄμετρον θερμασίαν ἡ βλάβη τῆς
ἐνεργείας τῇ γαστρί. τὸ μὲν γὰρ πνεῦμα σφοδρότερόν
τε καὶ συνεχέστερον καὶ πλέον ἐμπίπτει νῦν ἢ
πρότερον. ὥστε ταύτῃ μὲν μᾶλλον πέψει τὰ διὰ τὸ
πνεῦμα καλῶς πέττοντα ζῷα, διὰ λοιπὴν δ' ἔτι τὴν
παρὰ φύσιν θερμασίαν ἀπεπτήσει. τὸ γὰρ καὶ τῷ
πνεύματι φάναι τιν' ὑπάρχειν ἰδιότητα, καθ' ἣν
πέττει, κἄπειτα ταύτην πυρεττόντων διαφθείρεσθαι
καθ' ἕτερον τρόπον ἐστὶν ὁμολογῆσαι τὸ ἄτοπον.
ἐρωτηθέντες γὰρ αὖθις, ὑπὸ τίνος ἠλλοιώθη τὸ πνεῦμα,
μόνην ἕξουσιν ἀποκρίνεσθαι τὴν παρὰ φύσιν θερμασίαν
καὶ μάλιστ' ἐπὶ τοῦ κατὰ τὴν κοιλίαν· οὐδὲ γὰρ
πλησιάζει κατ' οὐδὲν τοῦτο τῷ βουβῶνι.
Καίτοι τί τῶν ζῴων ἐκείνων, ἐν οἷς ἡ τοῦ πνεύματος
ἰδιότης μέγα δύναται, μνημονεύω, παρὸν ἐπ'
ἀνθρώποις, ἐν οἷς ἢ οὐδὲν ἢ παντάπασιν ἀμυ||δρόν τι 121
καὶ μικρὸν ὠφελεῖ, ποιεῖσθαι τὸν λόγον; ἀλλ' ὅτι μὲν
ἐν τοῖς πυρετοῖς οὗτοι κακῶς πέττουσιν, ὁμολογεῖ καὶ
αὐτὸς καὶ τήν γ' αἰτίαν προστιθεὶς βεβλάφθαι φησὶ
τῆς γαστρὸς τὴν ἐνέργειαν. οὐ μὴν ἄλλην γέ τινα
πρόφασιν τῆς βλάβης εἰπεῖν ἔχει πλὴν τῆς παρὰ φύσιν
θερμασίας. ἀλλ' εἰ βλάπτει τὴν ἐνέργειαν ἡ παρὰ
φύσιν θερμασία μὴ κατά τι συμβεβηκός, ἀλλὰ διὰ τὴν
αὑτῆς οὐσίαν τε καὶ δύναμιν, ἐκ τῶν πρώτων ἂν εἴη
νοσημάτων· καὶ μὴν οὐκ ἐνδέχεται τῶν πρώτων μὲν
εἶναι νοσημάτων τὴν ἀμετρίαν τῆς θερμασίας, τὴν δ'
ἐνέργειαν ὑπὸ τῆς εὐκρασίας μὴ γίγνεσθαι. οὐδὲ γὰρ
δι' ἄλλο τι δυνατὸν γίγνεσθαι τὴν δυσκρασίαν αἰτίαν
τῶν πρώτων νοσημάτων ἀλλ' ἢ διὰ τὴν εὐκρασίαν
διαφθειρομένην. τῷ γὰρ ὑπὸ ταύτης γίγνεσθαι τὰς
ἐνεργείας ἀνάγκη καὶ τὰς πρώτας αὐτῶν βλάβας
διαφθειρομένης γίγνεσθαι.
Ὅτι μὲν οὖν καὶ κατ' αὐτὸν τὸν Ἐρασίστρατον ἡ
εὐκρασία τοῦ θερμοῦ τῶν ἐνεργειῶν αἰτία, τοῖς
θεωρεῖν τὸ ἀκόλουθον δυναμένοις ἱκανῶς ἀποδεδεῖχθαι
νομίζω. τούτου δ' ὑπάρχοντος ἡμῖν οὐδὲν ἔτι χαλεπὸν
|| ἐφ' ἑκάστης ἐνεργείας τῇ μὲν εὐκρασίᾳ τὸ βέλτιον 122
ἕπεσθαι λέγειν, τῇ δὲ δυσκρασίᾳ τὰ χείρω. καὶ τοίνυν
εἴπερ ταῦθ' οὕτως ἔχει, τὸ μὲν αἷμα τῆς συμμέτρου
θερμασίας, τὴν δὲ ξανθὴν χολὴν τῆς ἀμέτρου νομιστέον
ὑπάρχειν ἔγγονον. οὕτω γὰρ καὶ ἡμῖν ἔν τε ταῖς
θερμαῖς ἡλικίαις καὶ τοῖς θερμοῖς χωρίοις καὶ ταῖς
ὥραις τοῦ ἔτους ταῖς θερμαῖς καὶ ταῖς θερμαῖς
καταστάσεσιν, ὡσαύτως δὲ καὶ ταῖς θερμαῖς κράσεσι
τῶν ἀνθρώπων καὶ τοῖς ἐπιτηδεύμασί τε καὶ τοῖς
διαιτήμασι καὶ τοῖς νοσήμασι τοῖς θερμοῖς εὐλόγως ἡ
ξανθὴ χολὴ πλείστη φαίνεται γιγνομένη.
Τὸ δ' ἀπορεῖν, εἴτ' ἐν τοῖς σώμασι τῶν ἀνθρώπων ὁ
χυμὸς οὗτος ἔχει τὴν γένεσιν εἴτ' ἐν τοῖς σιτίοις
περιέχεται, μηδ' ὅτι τοῖς ὑγιαίνουσιν ἀμέμπτως, ὅταν
ἀσιτήσωσι παρὰ τὸ ἔθος ὑπὸ τινος περιστάσεως
πραγμάτων ἀναγκασθέντες, πικρὸν μὲν τὸ στόμα
γίγνεται, χολώδη δὲ τὰ οὖρα, δάκνεται δ' ἡ γαστήρ,
ἑωρακότος ἐστὶν ἀλλ' ὥσπερ ἐξαίφνης νῦν εἰς τὸν
κόσμον ἐληλυθότος καὶ μήπω τὰ κατ' αὐτὸν φαινόμενα
γιγνώσκοντος. ἐπεὶ τίς οὐκ οἶδεν, ὡς ἕκαστον τῶν
ἑψομένων ἐπὶ πλέον ἁλυκώτερον μὲν τὸ πρῶτον, ὕστερον
|| δὲ πικρότερον γίγνεται; κἂν εἰ τὸ μέλι βουληθείης 123
αὐτὸ τὸ πάντων γλυκύτατον ἐπὶ πλεῖστον ἕψειν,
ἀποδείξεις καὶ τοῦτο πικρότατον· ὃ γὰρ τοῖς ἄλλοις,
ὅσα μὴ φύσει θερμά, παρὰ τῆς ἑψήσεως ἐγγίγνεται,
τοῦτ' ἐκ φύσεως ὑπάρχει τῷ μέλιτι. διὰ τοῦτ' οὖν
ἑψόμενον οὐ γίγνεται γλυκύτερον· ὅσον γὰρ ἐχρῆν
εἶναι θερμότητος εἰς γένεσιν γλυκύτητος, ἀκριβῶς
αὐτῷ τοῦτο πᾶν οἴκοθεν ὑπάρχει. ὃ τοίνυν ἔξωθεν τοῖς
ἐλλιπῶς θερμοῖς ἦν ὠφέλιμον, τοῦτ' ἐκείνῳ βλάβη τε
καὶ ἀμετρία γίγνεται καὶ διὰ τοῦτο θᾶττον τῶν ἄλλων
ἑψόμενον ἀποδείκνυται πικρόν. δι' αὐτὸ δὲ τοῦτο καὶ
τοῖς θερμοῖς φύσει καὶ τοῖς ἀκμάζουσιν εἰς χολὴν
ἑτοίμως μεταβάλλεται. θερμῷ γὰρ θερμὸν πλησιάζον εἰς
ἀμετρίαν κράσεως ἑτοίμως ἐξίσταται καὶ φθάνει χολὴ
γιγνόμενον, οὐχ αἷμα. δεῖται τοίνυν ψυχρᾶς μὲν
κράσεως ἀνθρώπου, ψυχρᾶς δ' ἡλικίας, ἵν' εἰς αἵματος
ἄγηται φύσιν. οὔκουν ἄπο τρόπου συνεβούλευσεν
Ἱπποκράτης τοῖς φύσει πικροχόλοις μὴ προσφέρειν τὸ
μέλι, ὡς ἂν θερμοτέρας || δηλονότι κράσεως 124
ὑπάρχουσιν. οὕτω δὲ καὶ τοῖς νοσήμασι τοῖς
πικροχόλοις πολέμιον εἶναι τὸ μέλι καὶ τῇ τῶν
γερόντων ἡλικίᾳ φίλιον οὐχ Ἱπποκράτης μόνον ἀλλὰ καὶ
πάντες ἰατροὶ λέγουσιν, οἱ μὲν ἐκ τῆς φύσεως αὐτοῦ
τὴν δύναμιν ἐνδειξαμένης εὑρόντες, οἱ δ' ἐκ τῆς
πείρας μόνης. οὐδὲ γὰρ οὐδὲ τοῖς ἀπὸ τῆς ἐμπειρίας
ἰατροῖς ἕτερόν τι παρὰ ταῦτα τετήρηται γιγνόμενον,
ἀλλὰ χρηστὸν μὲν γέροντι, νέῳ δ' οὐ χρηστόν, καὶ τῷ
μὲν φύσει πικροχόλῳ βλαβερόν, ὠφέλιμον δὲ τῷ
φλεγματώδει· καὶ τῶν νοσημάτων ὡσαύτως τοῖς μὲν
πικροχόλοις ἐχθρόν, τοῖς δὲ φλεγματώδεσι φίλιον· ἑνὶ
δὲ λόγῳ τοῖς μὲν θερμοῖς σώμασιν ἢ διὰ φύσιν ἢ διὰ
νόσον ἢ δι' ἡλικίαν ἢ δι' ὥραν ἢ διὰ χώραν ἢ δι'
ἐπιτήδευμα χολῆς γεννητικόν, αἵματος δὲ τοῖς
ἐναντίοις.
Καὶ μὴν οὐκ ἐνδέχεται ταὐτὸν ἔδεσμα τοῖς μὲν χολὴν
γεννᾶν, τοῖς δ' αἷμα μὴ οὐκ ἐν τῷ σώματι τῆς
γενέσεως αὐτῶν ἐπιτελουμένης. εἰ γὰρ δὴ οἴκοθέν γε
καὶ παρ' ἑαυτοῦ τῶν ἐδεσμάτων ἕκαστον ἔχον καὶ οὐκ
ἐν τοῖς τῶν ζῴων σώμασι || μεταβαλλόμενον ἐγέννα τὴν 125
χολήν, ἐν ἅπασιν ἂν ὁμοίως αὐτὴν τοῖς σώμασιν ἐγέννα
καὶ τὸ μὲν πικρὸν ἔξω γευομένοις ἦν ἂν οἶμαι χολῆς
ποιητικόν, εἰ δέ τι γλυκὺ καὶ χρηστόν, οὐκ ἂν οὐδὲ
τὸ βραχύτατον ἐξ αὐτοῦ χολῆς ἐγεννᾶτο. καὶ μὴν οὐ τὸ
μέλι μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἕκαστον τῶν γλυκέων
τοῖς προειρημένοις σώμασι τοῖς δι' ὁτιοῦν τῶν
εἰρημένων θερμοῖς οὖσιν εἰς χολὴν ἑτοίμως ἐξίσταται.
Καίτοι ταῦτ' οὐκ οἶδ' ὅπως ἐξηνέχθην εἰπεῖν οὐ
προελόμενος ἀλλ' ὑπ' αὐτῆς τοῦ λόγου τῆς ἀκολουθίας
ἀναγκασθείς. εἴρηται δ' ἐπὶ πλεῖστον ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν
Ἀριστοτέλει τε καὶ Πραξαγόρᾳ τὴν Ἱπποκράτους καὶ
Πλάτωνος γνώμην ὀρθῶς ἐξηγησαμένοις.
IX
For this reason the things that we have said are not to be looked upon
as proofs but rather as indications of the dulness[271] of those who
think differently, and who do not even recognise what is agreed on by
everyone and is a matter of daily observation. As for the scientific
proofs of all this, they are to be drawn from these principles of
which I have already spoken[272]—namely, that bodies act upon and are
acted upon by each other in virtue of the Warm, Cold, Moist and Dry.
And if one is speaking of any activity, whether it be exercised by
vein, liver, arteries, heart, alimentary canal, or any part, one will
be inevitably compelled to acknowledge that this activity depends upon
the way in which the four qualities are blended. Thus I should like to
ask the Erasistrateans why it is that the stomach contracts upon the
food, and why the veins generate blood. There is no use in recognizing
the mere fact of contraction, without also knowing the _cause_; if we
know this, we shall also be able to rectify the failures of function.
“This is no concern of ours,” they say; “we do not occupy ourselves
with such causes as these; they are outside the sphere of the
_practitioner_,[273] and belong to that of the _scientific
investigator_.”[274] Are you, then, going to oppose those who maintain
that the cause of the function of every organ is a natural
eucrasia,[275] that the dyscrasia is itself known as a _disease_, and
that it is certainly by this that the activity becomes impaired? Or,
on the other hand, will you be convinced by the proofs which the
ancient writers furnished? Or will you take a midway course between
these two, neither perforce accepting these arguments as true nor
contradicting them as false, but suddenly becoming
sceptics—Pyrrhonists, in fact? But if you do this you will have to
shelter yourselves behind the Empiricist teaching. For how are you
going to be successful in treatment, if you do not understand the real
essence of each disease? Why, then, did you not call yourselves
Empiricists from the beginning? Why do you confuse us by announcing
that you are investigating natural activities with a view to
treatment? If the stomach is, in a particular case, unable to exercise
its peristaltic and grinding functions, how are we going to bring it
back to the normal if we do not know the _cause_ of its disability?
What I say is[276] that we must cool the over-heated stomach and warm
the chilled one; so also we must moisten the one which has become
dried up, and conversely; so, too, in combinations of these
conditions; if the stomach becomes at the same time warmer and drier
than normally, the first principle of treatment is at once to chill
and moisten it; and if it become colder and moister, it must be warmed
and dried; so also in other cases. But how on earth are the followers
of Erasistratus going to act, confessing as they do that they make no
sort of investigation into the cause of disease? For the fruit of the
enquiry into activities is that by knowing the causes of the
dyscrasiae one may bring them back to the normal, since it is of no
use for the purposes of treatment merely to know what the activity of
each organ is.
Now, it seems to me that Erasistratus is unaware of this fact also,
that the actual disease is that condition of the body which, not
accidentally, but primarily and of itself, impairs the normal
function. How, then, is he going to diagnose or cure diseases if he is
entirely ignorant of what they are, and of what kind and number? As
regards the stomach, certainly, Erasistratus held that one should at
least investigate _how_ it digests the food. But why was not
investigation also made as to the primary originative cause of this?
And, as regards the veins and the blood, he omitted even to ask the
question “_how?_”
Yet neither Hippocrates nor any of the other physicians or
philosophers whom I mentioned a short while ago thought it right to
omit this; they say that when the heat which exists naturally in every
animal is well blended and moderately moist it generates blood; for
this reason they also say that the blood is a _virtually_ warm and
moist humour, and similarly also that yellow bile is warm and dry,
even though for the most part it appears moist. (For in them the
_apparently_ dry would seem to differ from the _virtually_ dry.) Who
does not know that brine and sea-water preserve meat and keep it
uncorrupted,[277] whilst all other water—the drinkable kind—readily
spoils and rots it? And who does not know that when yellow bile is
contained in large quantity in the stomach, we are troubled with an
unquenchable thirst, and that when we vomit this up, we at once become
much freer from thirst than if we had drunk very large quantities of
fluid? Therefore this humour has been very properly termed warm, and
also virtually dry. And, similarly, _phlegm_ has been called cold and
moist; for about this also clear proofs have been given by Hippocrates
and the other Ancients.
Prodicus[278] also, when in his book “On the Nature of Man” he gives
the name “phlegm” (from the verb πεφλέχθαι) to that element in the
humours which has been burned or, as it were, over-roasted, while
using a different terminology, still keeps to the fact just as the
others do; this man’s innovations in nomenclature have also been
amply done justice to by Plato.[279] Thus, the white-coloured
substance which everyone else calls _phlegm_, and which Prodicus
calls _blenna_ [mucus],[280] is the well-known cold, moist humour
which collects mostly in old people and in those who have been
chilled[281] in some way, and not even a lunatic could say that this
was anything else than cold and moist.
If, then, there is a warm and moist humour, and another which is warm
and dry, and yet another which is moist and cold, is there none which
is virtually _cold and dry_? Is the fourth combination of
temperaments, which exists in all other things, non-existent in the
humours alone? No; the _black bile_ is such a humour. This, according
to intelligent physicians and philosophers, tends to be in excess, as
regards seasons, mainly in the fall of the year, and, as regards ages,
mainly after the prime of life. And, similarly, also they say that
there are cold and dry modes of life, regions, constitutions, and
diseases. Nature, they suppose, is not defective in this single
combination like the three other combinations, it extends everywhere.
At this point, also, I would gladly have been able to ask Erasistratus
whether his “artistic” Nature has not constructed any organ for
_clearing away_ a humour such as this. For whilst there are two organs
for the excretion of urine, and another of considerable size for that
of yellow bile, does the humour which is more pernicious than these
wander about persistently in the veins mingled with the blood? Yet
Hippocrates says, “Dysentery is a fatal condition if it proceeds from
black bile”; while that proceeding from yellow bile is by no means
deadly, and most people recover from it; this proves how much more
pernicious and acrid in its potentialities is black than yellow bile.
Has Erasistratus, then, not read the book, “On the Nature of Man,” any
more than any of the rest of Hippocrates’s writings, that he so
carelessly passes over the consideration of the humours? Or, does he
know it, and yet voluntarily neglect one of the finest studies[282] in
medicine? Thus he ought not to have said anything about the
_spleen_,[283] nor have stultified himself by holding that an artistic
Nature would have prepared so large an organ for no purpose. As a
matter of fact, not only Hippocrates and Plato—who are no less
authorities on Nature than is Erasistratus—say that this viscus also
is one of those which cleanse the blood, but there are thousands of
the ancient physicians and philosophers as well who are in agreement
with them. Now, all of these the high and mighty Erasistratus affected
to despise, and he neither contradicted them nor even so much as
mentioned their opinion. Hippocrates, indeed, says that the spleen
wastes in those people in whom the body is in good condition, and all
those physicians also who base themselves on experience[284] agree
with this. Again, in those cases in which the spleen is large and is
increasing from internal suppuration, it destroys the body and fills
it with evil humours;[285] this again is agreed on, not only by
Hippocrates, but also by Plato and many others, including the Empiric
physicians. And the jaundice which occurs when the spleen is out of
order is darker in colour, and the cicatrices of ulcers are dark. For,
generally speaking, when the spleen is drawing the atrabiliary[286]
humour into itself to a less degree than is proper, the blood is
unpurified, and the whole body takes on a bad colour. And when does it
draw this in to a less degree than proper? Obviously, when it [the
spleen] is in a bad condition. Thus, just as the kidneys, whose
function it is to attract the urine, do this badly when they are out
of order, so also the spleen, which has in itself a native power of
attracting an atrabiliary quality,[287] if it ever happens to be weak,
must necessarily exercise this attraction badly, with the result that
the blood becomes thicker and darker.
Now all these points, affording as they do the greatest help in the
diagnosis and in the cure of disease were entirely passed over by
Erasistratus, and he pretended to despise these great men—he who does
not despise ordinary people, but always jealously attacks the most
absurd doctrines. Hence, it was clearly because he had nothing to say
against the statements made by the ancients regarding the function and
utility of the spleen, and also because he could discover nothing new
himself, that he ended by saying nothing at all. I, however, for my
part, have demonstrated, firstly from the _causes_ by which everything
throughout nature is governed (by the causes I mean the Warm, Cold,
Dry and Moist) and secondly, from obvious bodily phenomena, that there
must needs be a cold and dry humour.[288] And having in the next place
drawn attention to the fact that this humour is black bile
[atrabiliary] and that the viscus which clears it away is the
spleen—having pointed this out by help of as few as possible of the
proofs given by ancient writers, I shall now proceed to what remains
of the subject in hand.
What else, then, remains but to explain clearly what it is that
happens in the generation of the humours, according to the belief and
demonstration of the Ancients? This will be more clearly understood
from a comparison. Imagine, then, some new wine which has been not
long ago pressed from the grape, and which is fermenting and
undergoing _alteration_ through the agency of its contained heat.[289]
Imagine next two residual substances produced during this process of
alteration, the one tending to be light and air-like and the other to
be heavy and more of the nature of earth; of these the one, as I
understand, they call the _flower_ and the other the _lees_. Now you
may correctly compare yellow bile to the first of these, and black
bile to the latter, although these humours have not the same
appearance when the animal is in normal health as that which they
often show when it is not so; for then the yellow bile becomes
_vitelline_,[290] being so termed because it becomes like the yolk of
an egg, both in colour and density; and again, even the black bile
itself becomes much more malignant than when in its normal
condition,[291] but no particular name has been given to [such a
condition of] the humour, except that some people have called it
_corrosive_ or _acetose_, because it also becomes sharp like vinegar
and corrodes the animal’s body—as also the earth, if it be poured out
upon it—and it produces a kind of fermentation and seething,
accompanied by bubbles—an abnormal putrefaction having become added
to the natural condition of the black humour. It seems to me also that
most of the ancient physicians give the name _black humour_ and not
_black bile_ to the normal portion of this humour, which is discharged
from the bowel and which also frequently rises to the top [of the
stomach-contents]; and they call _black bile_ that part which, through
a kind of combustion and putrefaction, has had its quality changed to
acid. There is no need, however, to dispute about names, but we must
realise the facts, which are as follow:—
In the genesis of blood, everything in the nutriment[292] which
belongs naturally to the thick and earth-like part of the food,[292]
and which does not take on well the alteration produced by the innate
heat—all this the spleen draws into itself. On the other hand, that
part of the nutriment which is roasted, so to speak, or burnt (this
will be the warmest and sweetest part of it, like honey and fat),
becomes _yellow bile_, and is cleared away through the so-called
biliary[293] vessels; now, this is thin, moist, and fluid, not like
what it is when, having been roasted to an _excessive_ degree, it
becomes yellow, fiery, and thick, like the yolk of eggs; for this
latter is already abnormal, while the previously mentioned state is
natural. Similarly with the black humour: that which does not yet
produce, as I say, this seething and fermentation on the ground, is
natural, while that which has taken over this character and faculty is
unnatural; it has assumed an acridity owing to the combustion caused
by abnormal heat, and has practically become transformed into
ashes.[294] In somewhat the same way burned lees differ from unburned.
The former is a warm substance, able to burn, dissolve, and destroy
the flesh. The other kind, which has not yet undergone combustion, one
may find the physicians employing for the same purposes that one uses
the so-called _potter’s earth_ and other substances which have
naturally a combined drying and chilling action.
Now the vitelline bile also may take on the appearance of this
combusted black bile, if ever it chance to be roasted, so to say, by
fiery heat. And all the other forms of bile are produced, some from a
blending of those mentioned, others being, as it were,
transition-stages in the genesis of these or in their conversion into
one another. And they differ in that those first mentioned are unmixed
and unique, while the latter forms are diluted with various kinds of
_serum_. And all the serums in the humours are waste substances, and
the animal body needs to be purified from them. There is, however, a
natural use for the humours first mentioned, both thick and thin; the
blood is purified both by the spleen and by the bladder beside the
liver, and a part of each of the two humours is put away, of such
quantity and quality that, if it were carried all over the body, it
would do a certain amount of harm. For that which is decidedly thick
and earthy in nature, and has entirely escaped alteration in the
liver, is drawn by the spleen into itself[295]; the other part which
is only moderately thick, after being elaborated [in the liver], is
carried all over the body. For the blood in many parts of the body has
need of a certain amount of thickening, as also, I take it, of the
_fibres_ which it contains. And the use of these has been discussed by
Plato,[296] and it will also be discussed by me in such of my
treatises as may deal with the use of parts. And the blood also needs,
not least, the yellow humour, which has as yet not reached the extreme
stage of combustion; in the treatises mentioned it will be pointed out
what purpose is subserved by this.
Now Nature has made no organ for clearing away _phlegm_, this being
cold and moist, and, as it were, half-digested nutriment; such a
substance, therefore, does not need to be evacuated, but remains in
the body and undergoes _alteration_ there. And perhaps one cannot
properly give the name of _phlegm_ to the surplus-substance which runs
down from the brain,[297] but one should call it _mucus_ [blenna] or
_coryza_—as, in fact, it is actually termed; in any case it will be
pointed out, in the treatise “On the Use of Parts,” how Nature has
provided for the evacuation of this substance. Further, the device
provided by Nature which ensures that the phlegm which forms in the
stomach and intestines may be evacuated in the most rapid and
effective way possible—this also will be described in that
commentary. As to that portion of the phlegm which is carried in the
veins, seeing that this is of service to the animal it requires no
evacuation. Here too, then, we must pay attention and recognise that,
just as in the case of each of the two kinds of bile, there is one
part which is useful to the animal and in accordance with its nature,
while the other part is useless and contrary to nature, so also is it
with the phlegm; such of it as is sweet is useful to the animal and
according to nature, while, as to such of it as has become bitter or
salt, that part which is bitter is completely undigested, while that
part which is salt has undergone putrefaction. And the term “_complete
indigestion_” refers of course to the second digestion—that which
takes place in the veins; it is not a failure of the first
digestion—that in the alimentary canal—for it would not have become
a humour at the outset if it had escaped this digestion also.
It seems to me that I have made enough reference to what has been said
regarding the genesis and destruction of humours by Hippocrates,
Plato, Aristotle, Praxagoras, and Diocles, and many others among the
Ancients; I did not deem it right to transport the whole of their
final pronouncements into this treatise. I have said only so much
regarding each of the humours as will stir up the reader, unless he be
absolutely inept, to make himself familiar with the writings of the
Ancients, and will help him to gain more easy access to them. In
another treatise[298] I have written on the humours according to
Praxagoras, son of Nicarchus; although this authority makes as many as
ten humours, not including the blood (the blood itself being an
eleventh), this is not a departure from the teaching of Hippocrates;
for Praxagoras divides into species and varieties the humours which
Hippocrates first mentioned, with the demonstration proper to each.
Those, then, are to be praised who explain the points which have been
duly mentioned, as also those who add what has been left out; for it
is not possible for the same man to make both a beginning and an end.
Those, on the other hand, deserve censure who are so impatient that
they will not wait to learn any of the things which have been duly
mentioned, as do also those who are so ambitious that, in their lust
after novel doctrines, they are always attempting some fraudulent
sophistry, either purposely neglecting certain subjects, as
Erasistratus does in the case of the humours, or unscrupulously
attacking other people, as does this same writer, as well as many of
the more recent authorities.
But let this discussion come to an end here, and I shall add in the
third book all that remains.
IX
Μὴ τοίνυν ὡς ἀποδείξεις ὑφ' ἡμῶν εἰρῆσθαι νομίζειν
τὰ τοιαῦτα μᾶλλον ἢ περὶ τῆς τῶν ἄλλως γιγνωσκόντων
ἀναισθησίας ἐνδείξεις, οἳ μηδὲ τὰ πρὸς ἁπάντων
ὁμολογούμενα καὶ καθ' ἑκάστην ἡμέραν φαινόμενα
γιγνώσκουσιν· τὰς δ' ἀποδείξεις αὐτῶν τὰς κατ'
ἐπιστήμην ἐξ ἐκείνων χρὴ λαμβάνειν τῶν ἀρχῶν, ὧν ἤδη
καὶ πρόσθεν || εἴπομεν, ὡς τὸ δρᾶν καὶ πάσχειν εἰς 126
ἄλληλα τοῖς σώμασιν ὑπάρχει κατὰ τὸ θερμὸν καὶ
ψυχρὸν καὶ ξηρὸν καὶ ὑγρόν. καὶ εἴτε φλέβας εἴθ'
ἧπαρ εἴτ' ἀρτηρίας εἴτε καρδίαν εἴτε κοιλίαν εἴτ'
ἄλλο τι μόριον ἐνεργεῖν τις φήσειεν ἡντινοῦν
ἐνέργειαν, ἀφύκτοις ἀνάγκαις ἀναγκασθήσεται διὰ τὴν
ἐκ τῶν τεττάρων ποιὰν κρᾶσιν ὁμολογῆσαι τὴν
ἐνέργειαν ὑπάρχειν αὐτῷ. διὰ τί γὰρ ἡ γαστὴρ
περιστέλλεται τοῖς σιτίοις, διὰ τί δ' αἱ φλέβες αἷμα
γεννῶσι, παρὰ τῶν Ἐρασιστρατείων ἐδεόμην ἀκοῦσαι. τὸ
γὰρ ὅτι περιστέλλεται μόνον αὐτὸ καθ' ἑαυτὸ
γιγνώσκειν οὐδέπω χρηστόν, εἰ μὴ καὶ τὴν αἰτίαν
εἰδείημεν· οὕτω γὰρ ἂν οἶμαι καὶ τὰ σφάλματα
θεραπεύσαιμεν. οὐ μέλει, φασίν, ἡμῖν οὐδὲ
πολυπραγμονοῦμεν ἔτι τὰς τοιαύτας αἰτίας· ὑπὲρ
ἰατρὸν γάρ εἰσι καὶ τῷ φυσικῷ προσήκουσι. πότερον
οὖν οὐδ' ἀντερεῖτε τῷ φάσκοντι τὴν μὲν εὐκρασίαν τὴν
κατὰ φύσιν αἰτίαν εἶναι τῆς ἐνεργείας ἑκάστῳ τῶν
ὀργάνων, τὴν δ' αὖ δυσκρασίαν νόσον τ ἤδη καλεῖσθαι
καὶ πάντως ὑπ' αὐ||τῆς βλάπτεσθαι τὴν ἐνέργειαν; ἢ 127
πεισθήσεσθε ταῖς τῶν παλαιῶν ἀποδείξεσιν; ἢ τρίτον
τι καὶ μέσον ἑκατέρου τούτων πράξετε μήθ' ὡς ἀληθέσι
τοῖς λόγοις ἐξ ἀνάγκης πειθόμενοι μήτ' ἀντιλέγοντες
ὡς ψευδέσιν, ἀλλ' ἀπορητικοί τινες ἐξαίφνης καὶ
Πυρρώνειοι γενήσεσθε; καὶ μὴν εἰ τοῦτο δράσετε, τὴν
ἐμπειρίαν ἀναγκαῖον ὑμῖν προστήσασθαι. τῷ γὰρ ἂν ἔτι
τρόπῳ καὶ τῶν ἰαμάτων εὐποροίητε τὴν οὐσίαν ἑκάστου
τῶν νοσημάτων ἀγνοοῦντες; τί οὖν οὐκ ἐξ ἀρχῆς
ἐμπειρικοὺς ὑμᾶς αὐτοὺς ἐκαλέσατε; τί δὲ πράγμαθ'
ἡμῖν παρέχετε φυσικὰς ἐνεργείας ἐπαγγελλόμενοι
ζητεῖν ἰάσεως ἕνεκεν; εἰ γὰρ ἀδύνατος ἡ γαστήρ ἐστί
τινι περιστέλλεσθαι καὶ τρίβειν, πῶς αὐτὴν εἰς τὸ
κατὰ φύσιν ἐπανάξομεν ἀγνοοῦντες τὴν αἰτίαν τῆς
ἀδυναμίας; ἐγὼ μέν φημι τὴν μὲν ὑπερτεθερμασμένην
ἐμψυκτέον ἡμῖν εἶναι, τὴν δ' ἐψυγμένην θερμαντέον·
οὕτω δὲ καὶ τὴν ἐξηρασμένην ὑγραντέον, τὴν δ'
ὑγρασμένην ξηραντέον. ἀλλὰ καὶ || κατὰ συζυγίαν, εἰ 128
θερμοτέρα τοῦ κατὰ φύσιν ἅμα καὶ ξηροτέρα τύχοι
γεγενημένη, κεφάλαιον εἶναι τῆς ἰάσεως ἐμψύχειν θ'
ἅμα καὶ ὑγραίνειν· εἰ δ' αὖ ψυχροτέρα τε καὶ
ὑγροτέρα, θερμαίνειν τε καὶ ξηραίνειν κἀπὶ τῶν ἄλλων
ὡσαύτως· οἱ δ' ἀπ' Ἐρασιστράτου τί ποτε καὶ
πράξουσιν οὐδ' ὅλως ζητεῖν τῶν ἐνεργειῶν τὰς αἰτίας
ὁμολογοῦντες; ὁ γάρ τοι καρπὸς τῆς περὶ τῶν
ἐνεργειῶν ζητήσεως οὗτός ἐστι, τὸ τὰς αἰτίας τῶν
δυσκρασιῶν εἰδότα εἰς τὸ κατὰ φύσιν ἐπανάγειν αὐτάς,
ὡς αὐτό γε μόνον τὸ γνῶναι τὴν ἑκάστου τῶν ὀργάνων
ἐνέργειαν ἥτις ἐστὶν οὔπω χρηστὸν εἰς τὰς ἰάσεις.
Ἐρασίστρατος δέ μοι δοκεῖ καὶ αὐτὸ τοῦτ' ἀγνοεῖν,
ὡς, ἥτις ἂν ἐν τῷ σώματι διάθεσις βλάπτῃ τὴν
ἐνέργειαν μὴ κατά τι συμβεβηκὸς ἀλλὰ πρώτως τε καὶ
καθ' ἑαυτήν, αὕτη τὸ νόσημά ἐστιν αὐτό. πῶς οὖν ἔτι
διαγνωστικός τε καὶ ἰατικὸς ἔσται τῶν νοσημάτων
ἀγνοῶν ὅλως αὐτὰ τίνα τ' ἐστὶ καὶ πόσα καὶ ποῖα;
κατὰ μὲν δὴ τὴν γαστέρα τό γε τοσοῦτον Ἐρασίστρατος
ἠξίωσε ζητεῖσθαι τὸ πῶς πέττεται τὰ σιτία· || τὸ δ' 129
ἥτις πρώτη τε καὶ ἀρχηγὸς αἰτία τούτου, πῶς οὐκ
ἐπεσκέψατο; κατὰ δὲ τὰς φλέβας καὶ τὸ αἷμα καὶ αὐτὸ
τὸ πῶς παρέλιπεν.
Ἀλλ' οὔθ' Ἱπποκράτης οὔτ' ἄλλος τις ὧν ὀλίγῳ πρόσθεν
ἐμνημόνευσα φιλοσόφων ἢ ἰατρῶν ἄξιον ᾤετ' εἶναι
παραλιπεῖν· ἀλλὰ τὴν κατὰ φύσιν ἐν ἑκάστῳ ζῴῳ
θερμασίαν εὔκρατόν τε καὶ μετρίως ὑγρὰν οὖσαν
αἵματος εἶναί φασι γεννητικὴν καὶ δι' αὐτό γε τοῦτο
καὶ τὸ αἷμα θερμὸν καὶ ὑγρὸν εἶναί φασι τῇ δυνάμει
χυμόν, ὥσπερ τὴν ξανθὴν χολὴν θερμὴν καὶ ξηρὰν
εἶναι, εἰ καὶ ὅτι μάλισθ' ὑγρὰ φαίνεται. διαφέρειν
γὰρ αὐτοῖς δοκεῖ τὸ κατὰ φαντασίαν ὑγρόν τοῦ κατὰ
δύναμιν. ἢ τίς οὐκ οἶδεν, ὡς ἅλμη μὲν καὶ θάλαττα
ταριχεύει τὰ κρέα καὶ ἄσηπτα διαφυλάττει, τὸ δ' ἄλλο
πᾶν ὕδωρ τὸ πότιμον ἑτοίμως διαφθείρει τε καὶ σήπει;
τίς δ' οὐκ οἶδεν, ὡς ξανθῆς χολῆς ἐν τῇ γαστρὶ
περιεχομένης πολλῆς ἀπαύστῳ δίψει συνεχόμεθα καὶ ὡς
ἐμέσαντες αὐτὴν εὐθὺς ἄδιψοι γιγνόμεθα μᾶλλον ἢ εἰ
πάμπολυ ποτὸν προσηράμεθα; || θερμὸς οὖν εὐλόγως ὁ 130
χυμὸς οὗτος εἴρηται καὶ ξηρὸς κατὰ δύναμιν, ὥσπερ γε
καὶ τὸ φλέγμα ψυχρὸν καὶ ὑγρόν. ἐναργεῖς γὰρ καὶ
περὶ τούτου πίστεις Ἱπποκράτει τε καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις
εἴρηνται παλαιοῖς.
Πρόδικος δ' ἐν τῷ περὶ φύσεως ἀνθρώπου γράμματι τὸ
συγκεκαυμένον καὶ οἷον ὑπερωπτημένον ἐν τοῖς χυμοῖς
ὀνομάζων φλέγμα παρὰ τὸ πεφλέχθαι τῇ λέξει μὲν
ἑτέρως χρῆται, φυλάττει μέντοι τὸ πρᾶγμα κατὰ ταὐτὸ
τοῖς ἄλλοις. τὴν δ' ἐν τοῖς ὀνόμασι τἀνδρὸς τούτου
καινοτομίαν ἱκανῶς ἐνδείκνυται καὶ Πλάτων. ἀλλὰ
τοῦτό γε τὸ πρὸς ἁπάντων ἀνθρώπων ὀνομαζόμενον
φλέγμα τὸ λευκὸν τὴν χρόαν, ὃ βλένναν ὀνομάζει
Πρόδικος, ὁ ψυχρὸς καὶ ὑγρὸς χυμός ἐστιν οὗτος καὶ
πλεῖστος τοῖς τε γέρουσι καὶ τοῖς ὁπωσδήποτε
ψυγεῖσιν ἀθροίζεται καὶ οὐδεὶς οὐδὲ μαινόμενος ἂν
ἄλλο τι ἢ ψυχρὸν καὶ ὑγρὸν εἴποι ἂν αὐτόν.
Ἆρ' οὖν θερμὸς μέν τίς ἐστι καὶ ὑγρὸς χυμὸς καὶ
θερμὸς καὶ ξηρὸς ἕτερος καὶ ὑγρὸς καὶ ψυχρὸς ἄλλος,
οὐδεὶς δ' ἐστὶ ψυχρὸς καὶ ξηρὸς τὴν δύναμιν, ἀλλ' ἡ
τετάρτη συζυγία τῶν κράσεων || ἐν ἅπασι τοῖς ἄλλοις 131
ὑπάρχουσα μόνοις τοῖς χυμοῖς οὐχ ὑπάρχει; καὶ μὴν ἥ
γε μέλαινα χολὴ τοιοῦτός ἐστι χυμός, ὃν οἱ
σωφρονοῦντες ἰατροὶ καὶ φιλόσοφοι πλεονεκτεῖν ἔφασαν
τῶν μὲν ὡρῶν τοῦ ἔτους ἐν φθινοπώρῳ μάλιστα, τῶν δ'
ἡλικιῶν ἐν ταῖς μετὰ τὴν ἀκμήν. οὕτω δὲ καὶ
διαιτήματα καὶ χωρία καὶ καταστάσεις καὶ νόσους
τινὰς ψυχρὰς καὶ ξηρὰς εἶναί φασιν· οὐ γὰρ δὴ χωλὴν
ἐν ταύτῃ μόνῃ τῇ συζυγίᾳ τὴν φύσιν εἶναι νομίζουσιν
ἀλλ' ὥσπερ τὰς ἄλλας τρεῖς οὕτω καὶ τήνδε διὰ πάντων
ἐκτετάσθαι.
Ηὐξάμην οὖν κἀνταῦθ' ἐρωτῆσαι δύνασθαι τὸν
Ἐρασίστρατον, εἰ μηδὲν ὄργανον ἡ τεχνικὴ φύσις
ἐδημιούργησε καθαρτικὸν τοῦ τοιούτου χυμοῦ, ἀλλὰ τῶν
μὲν οὔρων ἄρα τῆς διακρίσεώς ἐστιν ὄργανα δύο καὶ
τῆς ξανθῆς χολῆς ἕτερον οὐ σμικρόν, ὁ δὲ τούτων
κακοηθέστερος χυμὸς ἀλᾶται διὰ παντὸς ἐν ταῖς φλεψὶν
ἀναμεμιγμένος τῷ αἵματι. καίτοι “Δυσεντερίη,” φησί
που Ἱπποκράτης, “ἢν ἀπὸ χολῆς μελαίνης ἄρξηται,
θανάσιμον,” οὐ μὴν ἥ γ' ἀπὸ τῆς ξαν||θῆς χολῆς 132
ἀρχομένη πάντως ὀλέθριος, ἀλλ' οἱ πλείους ἐξ αὐτῆς
διασῴζονται. τοσούτῳ κακοηθεστέρα τε καὶ δριμυτέρα
τὴν δύναμιν ἡ μέλαινα χολὴ τῆς ξανθῆς ἐστιν. ἆρ' οὖν
οὔτε τῶν ἄλλων ἀνέγνω τι τῶν τοῦ Ἱπποκράτους
γραμμάτων ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος οὐδὲν οὔτε τὸ περὶ φύσεως
ἀνθρώπου βιβλίον, ἵν' οὕτως ἀργῶς παρέλθοι τὴν περὶ
τῶν χυμῶν ἐπίσκεψιν, ἢ γιγνώσκει μέν, ἑκὼν δὲ
παραλείπει καλλίστην τῆς τέχνης θεωρίαν; ἐχρῆν οὖν
αὐτὸν μηδὲ περὶ τοῦ σπληνὸς εἰρηκέναι τι μηδ'
ἀσχημονεῖν ὑπὸ τῆς τεχνικῆς φύσεως ὄργανον
τηλικοῦτον μάτην ἡγούμενον κατεσκευάσθαι. καὶ μὴν
οὐχ Ἱπποκράτης μόνον ἢ Πλάτων, οὐδέν τι χείρους
Ἐρασιστράτου περὶ φύσιν ἄνδρες, ἕν τι τῶν
καθαιρόντων τὸ αἷμα καὶ τοῦτ' εἶναί φασι τὸ
σπλάγχνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ μυρίοι σὺν αὐτοῖς ἄλλοι τῶν
παλαιῶν ἰατρῶν τε καὶ φιλοσόφων, ὧν ἁπάντων
προσποιησάμενος ὑπερφρονεῖν ὁ γενναῖος Ἐρασίστρατος
οὔτ' ἀντεῖπεν οὔθ' ὅλως τῆς δόξης αὐτῶν ἐμνημόνευσε.
καὶ μὴν ὅσοις γε τὸ σῶμα θάλλει, τούτοις ὁ σπλὴν
φθίνει, φησὶν Ἱπποκράτης, καὶ οἱ ἀπὸ τῆς || 133
ἐμπειρίας ὁρμώμενοι πάντες ὁμολογοῦσιν ἰατροί. καὶ
ὅσοις γ' αὖ μέγας καὶ ὕπουλος αὐξάνεται, τούτοις
καταφθείρει τε καὶ κακόχυμα τὰ σώματα τίθησιν, ὡς
καὶ τοῦτο πάλιν οὐχ Ἱπποκράτης μόνον ἀλλὰ καὶ Πλάτων
ἄλλοι τε πολλοὶ καὶ οἱ ἀπὸ τῆς ἐμπειρίας ὁμολογοῦσιν
ἰατροί. καὶ οἱ ἀπὸ σπληνὸς δὲ κακοπραγοῦντος ἴκτεροι
μελάντεροι καὶ τῶν ἑλκῶν αἱ οὐλαὶ μέλαιναι. καθόλου
γάρ, ὅταν ἐνδεέστερον ἢ προσῆκεν εἰς ἑαυτὸν ἕλκῃ τὸν
μελαγχολικὸν χυμόν, ἀκάθαρτον μὲν τὸ αἷμα, κακόχρουν
δὲ τὸ πᾶν γίγνεται σῶμα. πότε δ' ἐνδεέστερον ἕλκει;
ἢ δῆλον ὅτι κακῶς διακείμενος; ὥσπερ οὖν τοῖς
νεφροῖς ἐνεργείας οὔσης ἕλκειν τὰ οὖρα κακῶς ἕλκειν
ὑπάρχει κακοπραγοῦσιν, οὕτω καὶ τῷ σπληνὶ ποιότητος
μελαγχολικῆς ἑλκτικὴν ἐν ἑαυτῷ δύναμιν ἔχοντι
σύμφυτον ἀρρωστήσαντί ποτε ταύτην ἀναγκαῖον ἕλκειν
κακῶς κἀν τῷδε παχύτερον ἤδη καὶ μελάντερον
γίγνεσθαι τὸ αἷμα.
Ταῦτ' οὖν ἅπαντα πρός τε τὰς διαγνώσεις τῶν
νοσημάτων καὶ τὰς ἰάσεις μεγίστην παρεχόμενα χρείαν
|| ὑπερεπήδησε τελέως ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος καὶ καταφρονεῖν 134
προσεποιήσατο τηλικούτων ἀνδρῶν ὁ μηδὲ τῶν τυχόντων
καταφρονῶν ἀλλ' ἀεὶ φιλοτίμως ἀντιλέγων ταῖς
ἠλιθιωτάταις δόξαις. ᾧ καὶ δῆλον, ὡς οὐδὲν ἔχων οὔτ'
ἀντειπεῖν τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις ὑπὲρ ὧν ἀπεφήναντο περὶ
σπληνὸς ἐνεργείας τε καὶ χρείας οὔτ' αὐτὸς
ἐξευρίσκων τι καινὸν εἰς τὸ μηδὲν ὅλως εἰπεῖν
ἀφίκετο. ἀλλ' ἡμεῖς γε πρῶτον μὲν ἐκ τῶν αἰτίων, οἷς
ἅπαντα διοικεῖται τὰ κατὰ τὰς φύσεις, τοῦ θερμοῦ
λέγω καὶ ψυχροῦ καὶ ξηροῦ καὶ ὑγροῦ, δεύτερον δ' ἐξ
αὐτῶν τῶν ἐναργῶς φαινομένων κατὰ τὸ σῶμα ψυχρὸν καὶ
ξηρὸν εἶναί τινα χρῆναι χυμὸν ἀπεδείξαμεν. ἑξῆς δ',
ὅτι καὶ μελαγχολικὸς οὗτος ὑπάρχει καὶ τὸ καθαῖρον
αὐτὸν σπλάγχνον ὁ σπλήν ἐστιν, διὰ βραχέων ὡς ἔνι
μάλιστα τῶν τοῖς παλαιοῖς ἀποδεδειγμένων
ἀναμνήσαντες ἐπὶ τὸ λεῖπον ἔτι τοῖς παροῦσι λόγοις
ἀφιξόμεθα.
Τί δ' ἂν εἴη λεῖπον ἄλλο γ' ἢ ἐξηγήσασθαι σαφῶς,
οἷόν τι βούλονταί τε || καὶ ἀποδεικνύουσι περὶ τὴν 135
τῶν χυμῶν γένεσιν οἱ παλαιοὶ συμβαίνειν.
ἐναργέστερον δ' ἂν γνωσθείη διὰ παραδείγματος. οἶνον
δή μοι νόει γλεύκινον οὐ πρὸ πολλοῦ τῶν σταφυλῶν
ἐκτεθλιμμένον ζέοντά τε καὶ ἀλλοιούμενον ὑπὸ τῆς ἐν
αὐτῷ θερμασίας· ἔπειτα κατὰ τὴν αὐτοῦ μεταβολὴν δύο
γεννώμενα περιττώματα τὸ μὲν κουφότερόν τε καὶ
ἀερωδέστερον, τὸ δὲ βαρύτερόν τε καὶ γεωδέστερον, ὧν
τὸ μὲν ἄνθος, οἶμαι, τὸ δὲ τρύγα καλοῦσι. τούτων τῷ
μὲν ἑτέρῳ τὴν ξανθὴν χολήν, τῷ δ' ἑτέρῳ τὴν μέλαιναν
εἰκάζων οὐκ ἂν ἁμάρτοις, οὐ τὴν αὐτὴν ἐχόντων ἰδέαν
τῶν χυμῶν τούτων ἐν τῷ κατὰ φύσιν διοικεῖσθαι τὸ
ζῷον, οἵαν καὶ παρὰ φύσιν ἔχοντος ἐπιφαίνονται
πολλάκις. ἡ μὲν γὰρ ξανθὴ λεκιθώδης γίγνεται· καὶ
γὰρ ὀνομάζουσιν οὕτως αὐτήν, ὅτι ταῖς τῶν ὠῶν
λεκίθοις ὁμοιοῦται κατά τε χρόαν καὶ πάχος. ἡ δ' αὖ
μέλαινα κακοηθέστερα μὲν πολὺ καὶ αὕτη τῆς κατὰ
φύσιν· ὄνομα δ' οὐδὲν ἴδιον κεῖται τῷ τοιούτῳ χυμῷ,
πλὴν εἴ πού τινες ἢ ξυστικὸν ἢ ὀξώδη κεκλήκασιν
αὐτόν, ὅτι καὶ δριμὺς ὁμοίως ὄξει γίγνεται καὶ || 136
ξύει γε τὸ σῶμα τοῦ ζῴου καὶ τὴν γῆν, εἰ κατ' αὐτῆς
ἐκχυθείη, καί τινα μετὰ πομφολύγων οἷον ζύμωσίν τε
καὶ ζέσιν ἐργάζεται, σηπεδόνος ἐπικτήτου
προσελθούσης ἐκείνῳ τῷ κατὰ φύσιν ἔχοντι χυμῷ τῷ
μέλανι. καί μοι δοκοῦσιν οἱ πλεῖστοι τῶν παλαιῶν
ἰατρῶν αὐτὸ μὲν τὸ κατὰ φύσιν ἔχον τοῦ τοιούτου
χυμοῦ καὶ διαχωροῦν κάτω καὶ πολλάκις ἐπιπολάζον ἄνω
μέλανα καλεῖν χυμόν, οὐ μέλαιναν χολήν, τὸ δ' ἐκ
συγκαύσεώς τινος καὶ σηπεδόνος εἰς τὴν ὀξεῖαν
μεθιστάμενον ποιότητα μέλαιναν ὀνομάζειν χολήν. ἀλλὰ
περὶ μὲν τῶν ὀνομάτων οὐ χρὴ διαφέρεσθαι, τὸ δ'
ἀληθὲς ὧδ' ἔχον εἰδέναι.
Κατὰ τὴν τοῦ αἵματος γένεσιν ὅσον ἂν ἱκανῶς παχὺ καὶ
γεῶδες ἐκ τῆς τῶν σιτίων φύσεως ἐμφερόμενον τῇ τροφῇ
μὴ δέξηται καλῶς τὴν ἐκ τῆς ἐμφύτου θερμασίας
ἀλλοίωσιν, ὁ σπλὴν εἰς ἑαυτὸν ἕλκει τοῦτο. τὸ δ'
ὀπτηθέν, ὡς ἄν τις εἴποι, καὶ συγκαυθὲν τῆς τροφῆς,
εἴη δ' ἂν τοῦτο τὸ θερμότατον ἐν αὐτῇ καὶ
γλυκύτατον, οἷον τό τε μέλι καὶ ἡ πιμελή, ξανθὴ
γενόμενον χολὴ διὰ τῶν χοληδόχων ὀνομαζομένων
ἀγγείων ἐκκαθαίρεται. || λεπτὸν δ' ἐστὶ τοῦτο καὶ 137
ὑγρὸν καὶ ῥυτὸν οὐχ ὥσπερ ὅταν ὀπτηθὲν ἐσχάτως
ξανθὸν καὶ πυρῶδες καὶ παχὺ γένηται ταῖς τῶν ὠῶν
ὅμοιον λεκίθοις. τοῦτο μὲν γὰρ ἤδη παρὰ φύσιν·
θάτερον δὲ τὸ πρότερον εἰρημένον κατὰ φύσιν ἐστίν·
ὥσπερ γε καὶ τοῦ μέλανος χυμοῦ τὸ μὲν μήπω τὴν οἷον
ζέσιν τε καὶ ζύμωσιν τῆς γῆς ἐργαζόμενον κατὰ φύσιν
ἐστί, τὸ δ' εἰς τοιαύτην μεθιστάμενον ἰδέαν τε καὶ
δύναμιν ἤδη παρὰ φύσιν, ὡς ἂν τὴν ἐκ τῆς συγκαύσεως
τοῦ παρὰ φύσιν θερμοῦ προσειληφὸς δριμύτητα καὶ οἷον
τέφρα τις ἤδη γεγονός. ὧδέ πως καὶ ἡ κεκαυμένη τρὺξ
τῆς ἀκαύστου διήνεγκε. θερμὸν γάρ τι χρῆμα αὕτη γ'
ἱκανῶς ἐστιν, ὥστε καίειν τε καὶ τήκειν καὶ
διαφθείρειν τὴν σάρκα. τῇ δ' ἑτέρᾳ τῇ μήπω κεκαυμένῃ
τοὺς ἰατροὺς ἔστιν εὑρεῖν χρωμένους εἰς ὅσαπερ καὶ
τῇ γῇ τῇ καλουμένῃ κεραμίτιδι καὶ τοῖς ἄλλοις, ὅσα
ξηραίνειν θ' ἅμα καὶ ψύχειν πέφυκεν.
Εἰς τὴν τῆς οὕτω συγκαυθείσης μελαίνης χολῆς ἰδέαν
καὶ ἡ λεκιθώδης ἐκείνη μεθίσταται πολλάκις, ὅταν καὶ
αὐτή ποθ' οἷον ὀπτηθεῖσα τύχῃ πυρώδει θερμασίᾳ. τὰ
δ' ἄλλα || τῶν χολῶν εἴδη σύμπαντα τὰ μὲν ἐκ τῆς τῶν 138
εἰρημένων κράσεως γίγνεται, τὰ δ' οἷον ὁδοί τινές
εἰσι τῆς τούτων γενέσεώς τε καὶ εἰς ἄλληλα
μεταβολῆς. διαφέρουσι δὲ τῷ τὰς μὲν ἀκράτους εἶναι
καὶ μόνας, τὰ δ' οἷον ὀρροῖς τισιν ἐξυγρασμένας.
ἀλλ' οἱ μὲν ὀρροὶ τῶν χυμῶν ἅπαντες περιττώματα καὶ
καθαρὸν αὐτῶν εἶναι δεῖται τοῦ ζῴου τὸ σῶμα. τῶν δ'
εἰρημένων χυμῶν ἐστί τις χρεία τῇ φύσει καὶ τοῦ
παχέος καὶ τοῦ λεπτοῦ καὶ καθαίρεται πρός τε τοῦ
σπληνὸς καὶ τῆς ἐπὶ τῷ ἥπατι κύστεως τὸ αἷμα καὶ
ἀποτίθεται τοσοῦτόν τε καὶ τοιοῦτον ἑκατέρου μέρος,
ὅσον καὶ οἷον, εἴπερ εἰς ὅλον ἠνέχθη τοῦ ζῴου τὸ
σῶμα, βλάβην ἄν τιν' εἰργάσατο. τὸ γὰρ ἱκανῶς παχὺ
καὶ γεῶδες καὶ τελέως διαπεφευγὸς τὴν ἐν τῷ ἥπατι
μεταβολὴν ὁ σπλὴν εἰς ἑαυτὸν ἕλκει· τὸ δ' ἄλλο τὸ
μετρίως παχὺ σὺν τῷ κατειργάσθαι πάντη φέρεται.
δεῖται γὰρ ἐν πολλοῖς τοῦ ζῴου μορίοις παχύτητός
τινος τὸ αἷμα καθάπερ οἶμαι καὶ τῶν || ἐμφερομένων 139
ἰνῶν. καὶ εἴρηται μὲν καὶ Πλάτωνι περὶ τῆς χρείας
αὐτῶν, εἰρήσεται δὲ καὶ ἡμῖν ἐν ἐκείνοις τοῖς
γράμμασιν, ἐν οἷς ἂν τὰς χρείας τῶν μορίων
διερχώμεθα· δεῖται δ' οὐχ ἥκιστα καὶ τοῦ ξανθοῦ
χυμοῦ τοῦ μήπω πυρώδους ἐσχάτως γεγενημένου τὸ αἷμα
καὶ τίς αὐτῷ καὶ ἡ παρὰ τοῦδε χρεία, δι' ἐκείνων
εἰρήσεται.
Φλέγματος δ' οὐδὲν ἐποίησεν ἡ φύσις ὄργανον
καθαρτικόν, ὅτι ψυχρὸν καὶ ὑγρόν ἐστι καὶ οἷον
ἡμίπεπτός τις τροφή. δεῖται τοίνυν οὐ κενοῦσθαι τὸ
τοιοῦτον ἀλλ' ἐν τῷ σώματι μένον ἀλλοιοῦσθαι. τὸ δ'
ἐξ ἐγκεφάλου καταρρέον περίττωμα τάχα μὲν ἂν οὐδὲ
φλέγμα τις ὀρθῶς ἀλλὰ βλένναν τε καὶ κόρυζαν, ὥσπερ
οὖν καὶ ὀνομάζεται, καλοίη. εἰ δὲ μή, ἀλλ' ὅτι γε
τῆς τούτου κενώσεως ὀρθῶς ἡ φύσις προὐνοήσατο, καὶ
τοῦτ' ἐν τοῖς περὶ χρείας μορίων εἰρήσεται. καὶ γὰρ
οὖν καὶ τὸ κατά τε τὴν γαστέρα καὶ τὰ ἔντερα
συνιστάμενον φλέγμα ὅπως ἂν ἐκκενωθῇ καὶ αὐτὸ
τάχιστά τε καὶ κάλλιστα, τὸ παρεσκευασμένον τῇ φύσει
μηχάνημα δι' ἐκείνων εἰρήσεται καὶ αὐτὸ τῶν
ὑπομνη||μάτων. ὅσον οὖν ἐμφέρεται ταῖς φλεψὶ φλέγμα 140
χρήσιμον ὑπάρχον τοῖς ζῴοις, οὐδεμιᾶς δεῖται
κενώσεως. προσέχειν δὲ χρὴ κἀνταῦθα τὸν νοῦν καὶ
γιγνώσκειν, ὥσπερ τῶν χολῶν ἑκατέρας τὸ μέν τι
χρήσιμόν ἐστι καὶ κατὰ φύσιν τοῖς ζῴοις, τὸ δ'
ἄχρηστόν τε καὶ παρὰ φύσιν, οὕτω καὶ τοῦ φλέγματος,
ὅσον μὲν ἂν ᾖ γλυκύ, χρηστὸν εἶναι τοῦτο τῷ ζῴῳ καὶ
κατὰ φύσιν, ὅσον δ' ὀξὺ καὶ ἁλμυρὸν ἐγένετο, τὸ μὲν
ὀξὺ τελέως ἠπεπτῆσθαι, τὸ δ' ἁλμυρὸν διασεσῆφθαι.
τελείαν δ' ἀπεψίαν φλέγματος ἀκούειν χρὴ τὴν τῆς
δευτέρας πέψεως δηλονότι τῆς ἐν φλεψίν· οὐ γὰρ δὴ
τῆς γε πρώτης τῆς κατὰ τὴν κοιλίαν· ἢ οὐδ' ἂν
ἐγεγένητο τὴν ἀρχὴν χυμός, εἰ καὶ ταύτην
διεπεφεύγει.
Ταῦτ' ἀρκεῖν μοι δοκεῖ περὶ γενέσεώς τε καὶ
διαφθορᾶς χυμῶν ὑπομνήματ' εἶναι τῶν Ἱπποκράτει τε
καὶ Πλάτωνι καὶ Ἀριστοτέλει καὶ Πραξαγόρᾳ καὶ
Διοκλεῖ καὶ πολλοῖς ἄλλοις τῶν παλαιῶν εἰρημένων· οὐ
γὰρ ἐδικαίωσα πάντα μεταφέρειν εἰς τόνδε τὸν λόγον
τὰ τελέως ἐκείνοις γεγραμμένα. τοσοῦτον δὲ μόνον
ὑπὲρ ἑκάστου εἶπον, ὅσον ἐξορμήσει τε τοὺς || 141
ἐντυγχάνοντας, εἰ μὴ παντάπασιν εἶεν σκαιοί, τοῖς
τῶν παλαιῶν ὁμιλῆσαι γράμμασι καὶ τὴν εἰς τὸ ῥᾷον
αὐτοῖς συνεῖναι βοήθειαν παρέξει. γέγραπται δέ που
καὶ δι' ἑτέρου λόγου περὶ τῶν κατὰ Πραξαγόραν τὸν
Νικάρχου χυμῶν. εἰ γὰρ καὶ ὅτι μάλιστα δέκα ποιεῖ
χωρὶς τοῦ αἵματος, ἑνδέκατος γὰρ ἂν εἴη χυμὸς αὐτὸ
τὸ αἷμα, τῆς Ἱπποκράτους οὐκ ἀποχωρεῖ διδασκαλίας.
ἀλλ' εἰς εἴδη τινὰ καὶ διαφορὰς τέμνει τοὺς ὑπ'
ἐκείνου πρώτου πάντων ἅμα ταῖς οἰκείαις ἀποδείξεσιν
εἰρημένους χυμούς.
Ἐπαινεῖν μὲν οὖν χρὴ τούς τ' ἐξηγησαμένους τὰ καλῶς
εἰρημένα καὶ τοὺς εἴ τι παραλέλειπται προστιθέντας·
οὐ γὰρ οἷόν τε τὸν αὐτὸν ἄρξασθαί τε καὶ τελειῶσαι·
μέμφεσθαι δὲ τοὺς οὕτως ἀταλαιπώρους, ὡς μηδὲν
ὑπομένειν μαθεῖν τῶν ὀρθῶς εἰρημένων, καὶ τοὺς εἰς
τοσοῦτον φιλοτίμους, ὥστ' ἐπιθυμίᾳ νεωτέρων δογμάτων
ἀεὶ πανουργεῖν τι καὶ σοφίζεσθαι, τὰ μὲν ἑκόντας
παραλιπόντας, ὥσπερ Ἐρασίστρατος ἐπὶ τῶν χυμῶν
ἐποίησε, τὰ δὲ πα||νούργως ἀντιλέγοντας, ὥσπερ αὐτός 142
θ' οὗτος καὶ ἄλλοι πολλοὶ τῶν νεωτέρων.
Ἀλλ' οὗτος μὲν ὁ λόγος ἐνταυθοῖ τελευτάτω, τὸ δ'
ὑπόλοιπον ἅπαν ἐν τῷ τρίτῳ προσθήσω.
[167] _cf._ p. 89.
[168] This term is nowadays limited to the drawing
action of a blister, _cf._ p. 223.
[169] The radicles of the hepatic ducts in the liver
were supposed to be the active agents in extracting bile
from the blood. _cf._ pp. 145-149.
[170] _Anadosis_; _cf._ p. 13, note 5 (26).
[171] The term κοιλία is used both specifically for
the stomach proper and also (as probably here) in a
somewhat wider sense for the stomach _region_, including
the adjacent part of the small intestine; this was the
part of the alimentary canal from which nutriment was
believed to be absorbed by the mesenteric veins; _cf._
p. 309, note 2 (382).
[172] _cf._ p. 100, note 2 (152); p. 167, note 2 (234).
[173] A characteristic “lesion” in Erasistratus’s
pathology.
[174] A certain subordinate place allowed to the horror
vacui.
[175] _i.e._ the parts to which the veins convey blood
after it leaves the liver—second stage of _anadosis_;
_cf._ p. 91, note 2 (138); p. 13, note 5 (26).
[176] What we now call the pulmonary artery. Galen
believed that the right ventricle existed for the
purpose of sending nutrient blood to the lungs.
[177] Lit. owing to the ongrowth (_epiphysis_) of
membranes; he means the tricuspid valve; _cf._ p. 314,
note 2 (387); p. 321, note 4 (398).
[178] Horror vacui.
[179] But Erasistratus had never upheld this in the case
of urinary secretion, _cf._ p. 99.
[180] This was the characteristically “anatomical”
explanation of bile-secretion made by Erasistratus.
_cf._ p. 170, note 2 (241). Why, then, says Galen, does not
urine, rather than bile, enter the bile-ducts?
[181] Urine, or, more exactly, blood-serum.
[182] Or ducts, canals, conduits, _i.e._ _morphological_
factors.
[183] Or artistic skill, “artistry.” _cf._ Book I.,
chap. xii.
[184] “Only”; _cf._ Introd., p. xxviii.
[185] Note how Galen, although he has not yet clearly
differentiated physiological from physical processes
(both are “natural”) yet separates them definitely from
the psychical. _cf._ p. 2, footnote (5). A _psychical_
function or activity is, in Latin, _actio animalis_
(from _anima_ = _psyche_).
[186] The stage of organogenesis or _diaplasis_; cf. p.
25, note 4 (49).
[187] The spermatozoon now becomes an “organism” proper.
[188] Galen attributed to the sperma or semen what we
should to the fertilized ovum: to him the maternal
contribution is purely passive—mere food for the sperm.
The epoch-making Ovum Theory was not developed till the
seventeenth century. _cf._ p. 19, note 3 (34).
[189] _i.e._ we should be talking psychology, not
biology; _cf._ stomach, p. 307, note 3 (380).
[190] Attraction now described not merely as
_qualitative_ but also as _quantitative_. _cf._ p. 85,
note 3 (130).
[191] He still tends either to biologize physics, or to
physicize biology—whichever way we prefer to look at
it. _cf._ Book I., chap. xiv.
[192] Aristotelian and Stoic duality of an active and a
passive principle.
[193] Note that early embryonic development is described
as a process of _nutrition_. _cf._ p. 130, note 2 (188).
[194] On the _alterative_ and _shaping_ faculties _cf._
p. 18, note 1 (32).
[195] pp. 27-29.
[196] _cf._ Introduction, p. xxvi.
[197] _cf._ p. 15.
[198] For definitions of _alteration_ and _mingling_
(_crasis_, “temperament”) _cf._ Book I., chaps. ii. and
iii.
[199] _i.e._ are associated with oxidation? _cf._ p. 41,
note 3 (70).
[200] “Useless” organs; _cf._ p. 56, note 2 (91). For fallacy
of Erasistratus’s view on the spleen _v._ p. 205.
[201] The Stoics.
[202] The Peripatetics (Aristotelians).
[203] Aristotle regarded the _qualitative_ differences
apprehended by our senses (the cold, the warm, the
moist, and the dry) as fundamental, while the Stoics
held the four corporeal elements (earth, air, fire, and
water) to be still more fundamental. _cf._ p. 8, note 3
(17).
[204] Lit. bile-receiving (choledochous).
[205] _Jecoris portae_, the transverse fissure, by which
the portal vein enters the liver.
[206] Lit. “anastomosing.”
[207] More literally, “synapse.”
[208] The portal vein.
[209] The hepatic vein or veins.
[210] The portal vein.
[211] _cf._ p. 120, note 1 (174).
[212] _cf._ p. 272, note 1 (350).
[213] _i.e._ one might assume an _attraction_.
[214] _i.e._ visible to the mind’s eye as distinguished
from the bodily eye. _cf._ p. 21, note 4 (39).
_Theoreton_ without qualification means merely
_visible_, not _theoretic_. _cf._ p. 205, note 1 (282).
[215] According to the Pneumatist school, certain of
whose ideas were accepted by Erasistratus, the air,
breath, pneuma, or spirit was brought by inspiration
into the left side of the heart, where it was converted
into natural, vital, and psychic pneuma; the latter then
went to the brain, whence it was distributed through the
nervous system; practically this teaching involved the
idea of a _psyche_, or conscious vital principle.
“Psychic pneuma” is in Latin _spiritus animalis_
(_anima_ = _psyche_); _cf._ p. 126, note 4 (185).
Introduction, p. xxxiv.
[216] Observe that Erasistratus’s “simple nerve” may be
almost looked on as an anticipation of the _cell_. The
question Galen now asks is whether this vessel is a
“unit mass of living matter,” or merely an agglomeration
of _atoms_ subject to mechanical law. _cf._ Galen’s
“fibres,” p. 329.
[217] _cf._ Book I., chap. xii.
[218] _i.e._ in biology we must begin with living
substance—with something which is specifically
alive—here with the “unit mass of living matter.” _cf._
p. 73, note 3 (119).
[219] “Ad elementa quae nec coalescere possunt nec in
partes dividi” (Linacre). On the two contrasted schools
_cf._ p. 45.
[220] _cf._ _loc. cit._
[221] “_Auxetic._” _cf._ p. 26, note 1 (50).
[222] “At corporum quae nec una committi nec dividi
possunt nullum in se formatricem, auctricem, nutricem,
aut in summa artificem facultatem habet; quippe quod
impatibile esse immutibileque praesumitur” (Linacre).
[223] Book I., chaps. v.-xi.
[224] _cf._ p. 153.
[225] On account of his idea of a simple tissue not
susceptible of further analysis.
[226] Or “cell”; _cf._ p. 153, note 2 (216).
[227] The _horror vacui_.
[228] _Prosthesis_ of nutriment; _cf._ p. 39, note 6
(67).
[229] _Anadosis_, “absorption”; _cf._ p. 13, note 5
(26).
[230] Lit. _diadosis_.
[231] _i.e._ let him explain the _diadosis_.
[232] “Spiritus animalis”; _cf._ p. 152, note 1 (215).
The nutriment was for the _walls_ of the vessels, not
for their cavities. _cf._ p. 319, note 3 (394).
[233] Specific attraction; _cf._ Book I., chap. xiv.
[234] _cf._ p. 100, note 2 (152).
[235] In Book II., chap. i.
[236] Prevention better than cure.
[237] _e.g._ Anaxagoras; _cf._ p. 7, note 5 (14); p. 20,
note 3 (38).
[238] Lit. _haematosis_.
[239] _cf._ p. 174, note 4 (250).
[240] Erasistratus held the spleen to be useless, _cf._
p. 143.
[241] Induration: Gk. _skirros_, Lat. _scirrhus_. The
condition is now commonly known by Laënnec’s term
_cirrhosis_, from Gk. _kirros_, meaning yellow or tawny.
Here again we have an example of Erasistratus’s bias
towards anatomical or structural rather than functional
explanations of disease, _cf._ p. 124, note 1 (180).
[242] On the risks which were supposed to attend the
checking of habitual bleeding from piles _cf._ Celsus
(_De Re Med._ VI. xviii. 9), “Atque in quibusdam parum
tuto supprimitur, qui sanguinis profluvio imbecilliores
non fiunt; habent enim purgationem hanc, non morbum.”
(_i.e._ the habit was to be looked on as a periodical
cleansing, not as a disease.)
[243] Lit. _catharsis_.
[244] Apparently some form of anaemia.
[245] Philistion of Locri, a contemporary of Plato, was
one of the chief representatives of the Sicilian school
of medicine. For Diocles and Praxagoras see p. 51, note
1 (83).
[246] _cf._ Book I., chap. iii.
[247] Gk. _pepsis_; otherwise rendered _coction_.
[248] _cf._ p. 13, note 5 (26).
[249] _e.g._ Asclepiades.
[250] Lit. _chylosis_; _cf._ p. 238, note 2 (312).
[251] That is to say, the haematopoietic function
deserves consideration as much as the digestive
processes which precede it.
[252] _i.e._ Erasistratus could obviously say nothing
about any of the humours or their origins, since he had
not postulated the four qualities (particularly the
Warm—that is, innate heat).
[253] _i.e._ bile.
[254] _i.e._ deprived of its bile.
[255] Here it is rather the living organism we consider
than the particular food that is put into it.
[256] Supreme importance of the “soil.” _cf._
Introduction, pp. xii. and xxxi.
[257] Aristotle, _Hist. Animal._, iii. xix.; Plato,
_Timaeus_, 80 E.
[258] Philotimus succeeded Diocles and Praxagoras, who
were successive leaders of the Hippocratic school. _cf._
p. 51, note 1 (83).
[259] Lit. _phenomena_.
[260] _i.e._ living organisms; _cf._ p. 47, note 1 (75).
[261] Erasistratus rejected the idea of innate heat; he
held that the heat of the body was introduced from
outside.
[262] As a _bubo_ is a swelling in the groin, we must
suppose that the wound referred to would be in the leg
or lower abdomen.
[263] _i.e._ fever as a _cause_ of disease.
[264] As we should say, “circulatory” changes.
[265] This is the “vital spirit” or pneuma which,
according to Erasistratus and the Pneumatist school, was
elaborated in the left ventricle, and thereafter carried
by the arteries all over the body, there to subserve
circulatory processes. It has some analogy with oxygen,
but this is also the case with the “_natural_ spirit” or
pneuma, whose seat was the liver and which was
distributed by the _veins_ through the body; it presided
over the more _vegetative_ processes. _cf._ p. 152, note
1 (215); Introduction, p. xxxiv.
[266] Even leaving the pneuma out of account, Galen
claims that he can still prove his thesis.
[267] In other words: if _dyscrasia_ is a first
principle in _pathology_, then _eucrasia_ must be a
first principle in _physiology_.
[268] The above is a good instance of Galen’s “logical”
method as applied to medical questions; an appeal to
those who are capable of following “logical sequence.”
_cf._ p. 209, note 1 (288).
[269] The aim of dietetics always being the production
of moderate heat—_i.e._ blood.
[270] Note contrasted methods of Rationalists and
Empiricists.
[271] Lit. _anaesthesia_. Linacre renders it
_indocilitas_.
[272] p. 15.
[273] _Iatros_: lit. “healer.”
[274] Lit. “physicist” or “physiologist,” the student of
the _physis_. _cf._ p. 70, note 2 (114).
[275] That is, a _blending_ of the four principles in
their natural proportion; Lat. _temperies_.
Dyscrasia = _intemperies_, “distemper.”
[276] This is the orthodox Hippocratic treatment, that
of _opposites by opposites_. Contrast the _homoeopathic_
principle which is the basis of our modern methods of
_immunisation_ (_similia similibus curentur_,
Hahnemann).
[277] Lit. _aseptic_.
[278] Prodicus of Ceos, a Sophist, contemporary of
Socrates.
[279] Plato, _Timaeus_, 83-86, _passim_.
[280] _cf._ the term _blennorrhoea_, which is still
used.
[281] _cf._ the Scotch term “colded” for “affected with
a cold”; Germ. _erkältet_.
[282] The word _theôria_ used here is not the same as
our _theory_. It is rather a “contemplation,” the
process by which a theory is arrived at. _cf._ p. 226,
note 2 (305).
[283] Erasistratus on the uselessness of the spleen.
_cf._ p. 143.
[284] The Empirical school, _cf._ p. 193.
[285] Enlargement and suppuration (?) of spleen
associated with toxaemia or “cacochymy.”
[286] Lit. “melancholic.”
[287] _i.e._ the combination of sensible qualities which
we call black bile. _cf._ p. 8, note 3 (17).
[288] Thus Galen has demonstrated the functions of the
spleen both deductively and inductively. For another
example of the combined method _cf._ Book III., chaps,
i. and ii.; _cf._ also Introd. p. xxxii.
[289] _i.e._ its innate heat.
[290] Lit. _lecithoid_.
[291] Note that there can be “normal” black bile.
[292] The term _food_ here means the food as introduced
into the stomach; the term _nutriment_ (_trophé_) means
the same food in the digested condition, as it is
conveyed to the tissues. _cf._ pp. 41-43. Note idea of
imperfectly oxidized material being absorbed by the
spleen. _cf._ p. 214, note 1 (295).
[293] Lit. _choledochous_, bile-receiving.
[294] Thus _over-roasting_—shall we say excessive
_oxidation_?—produces the abnormal forms of both black
and yellow bile.
[295] _cf._ p. 277, note 2 (353).
[296] _Timaeus_, 82 C-D.
[297] _cf._ p. 90, note 1 (137). The term “catarrh”
refers to this “running down,” which was supposed to
take place through the pores of the cribriform plate of
the ethmoid into the nose.
[298] Now lost.
BOOK III
I
It has been made clear in the preceding discussion that nutrition
occurs by an _alteration_ or _assimilation_ of that which nourishes to
that which receives nourishment,[299] and that there exists in every
part of the animal a faculty which in view of its activity we call, in
general terms, _alterative_, or, more specifically, _assimilative_ and
_nutritive_. It was also shown that a sufficient supply of the matter
which the part being nourished makes into nutriment for itself is
ensured by virtue of another faculty which naturally attracts its
_proper juice_ [humour] that that juice is proper to each part which
is adapted for assimilation, and that the faculty which attracts the
juice is called, by reason of its activity, _attractive_ or
_epispastic_.[300] It has also been shown that assimilation is
preceded by _adhesion_, and this, again, by _presentation_,[301] the
latter stage being, as one might say, the end or goal of the activity
corresponding to the attractive faculty. For the actual bringing up of
nutriment from the veins into each of the parts takes place through
the activation of the attractive faculty,[302] whilst to have been
finally brought up and presented to the part is the actual end for
which we desired such an activity; it is attracted in order that it
may be presented. After this, considerable time is needed for the
nutrition of the animal; whilst a thing may be even rapidly attracted,
on the other hand to become adherent, altered, and entirely
assimilated to the part which is being nourished and to become a part
of it, cannot take place suddenly, but requires a considerable amount
of time. But if the nutritive juice, so presented, does not remain in
the part, but withdraws to another one, and keeps flowing away, and
constantly changing and shifting its position, neither adhesion nor
complete assimilation will take place in any of them. Here too, then,
the [animal’s] nature has need of some other faculty for ensuring a
prolonged stay of the presented juice at the part, and this not a
faculty which comes in from somewhere outside but one which is
resident in the part which is to be nourished. This faculty, again, in
view of its activity our predecessors were obliged to call
_retentive_.
Thus our argument has clearly shown[303] the necessity for the genesis
of such a faculty, and whoever has an appreciation of logical sequence
must be firmly persuaded from what we have said that, if it be laid
down and proved by previous demonstration that Nature is artistic and
solicitous for the animal’s welfare, it necessarily follows that she
must also possess a faculty of this kind.
BOOK III
Γ
I
Ὅτι μὲν οὖν ἡ θρέψις ἀλλοιουμένου τε καὶ ὁμοιουμένου 143
γίγνεται τοῦ τρέφοντος τῷ τρεφομένῳ καὶ ὡς ἐν ἑκάστῳ
τῶν τοῦ ζῴου μορίων ἐστί τις δύναμις, ἣν ἀπὸ τῆς
ἐνεργείας ἀλλοιωτικὴν μὲν κατὰ γένος, ὁμοιωτικὴν δὲ
καὶ θρεπτικὴν κατ' εἶδος ὀνομάζομεν, ἐν τῷ πρόσθεν
δεδήλωται λόγῳ. τὴν δ' εὐπορίαν τῆς ὕλης, ἣν τροφὴν
ἑαυτῷ ποιεῖται τὸ τρεφόμενον, ἐξ ἑτέρας τινὸς ἔχειν
ἐδείκνυτο δυνάμεως ἐπισπᾶσθαι πεφυκυίας τὸν οἰκεῖον
χυμόν, εἶναι δ' οἰκεῖον ἑκάστῳ τῶν μορίων χυμόν, ὃς
ἂν || ἐπιτήδειος εἰς τὴν ἐξομοίωσιν ᾖ, καὶ τὴν 144
ἕλκουσαν αὐτὸν δύναμιν ἀπὸ τῆς ἐνεργείας ἑλκτικήν τέ
τινα καὶ ἐπισπαστικὴν ὀνομάζεσθαι. δέδεικται δὲ καί,
ὡς πρὸ μὲν τῆς ὁμοιώσεώς ἡ πρόσφυσίς ἐστιν, ἐκείνης
δ' ἔμπροσθεν ἡ πρόσθεσις γίγνεται, τέλος, ὡς ἂν
εἴποι τις, οὖσα τῆς κατὰ τὴν ἐπισπαστικὴν δύναμιν
ἐνεργείας. αὐτὸ μὲν γὰρ τὸ παράγεσθαι τὴν τροφὴν ἐκ
τῶν φλεβῶν εἰς ἕκαστον τῶν μορίων τῆς ἑλκτικῆς
ἐνεργούσης γίγνεται δυνάμεως, τὸ δ' ἤδη παρῆχθαί τε
καὶ προστίθεσθαι τῷ μορίῳ τὸ τέλος ἐστὶν αὐτὸ, δι' ὃ
καὶ τῆς τοιαύτης ἐνεργείας ἐδεήθημεν· ἵνα γὰρ
προστεθῇ, διὰ τοῦθ' ἕλκεται. χρόνου δ' ἐντεῦθεν ἤδη
πλείονος εἰς τὴν θρέψιν τοῦ ζῴου δεῖ· ἑλχθῆναι μὲν
γὰρ καὶ διὰ ταχέων τι δύναται, προσφῦναι δὲ καὶ
ἀλλοιωθῆναι καὶ τελέως ὁμοιωθῆναι τῷ τρεφομένῳ καὶ
μέρος αὐτοῦ γενέσθαι παραχρῆμα μὲν οὐχ οἷόν τε,
χρόνῳ δ' ἂν πλείονι συμβαίνοι καλῶς. ἀλλ' εἰ μὴ
μένοι κατὰ τὸ μέρος ὁ προστεθεὶς οὗτος χυμός, εἰς
ἕτερον δέ τι μεθίσταιτο καὶ παραρρέοι διὰ παντὸς
ἀμείβων τε καὶ ὑπαλλάττων τὰ χωρία, κατ' οὐδὲν αὐτῶν
|| οὔτε πρόσφυσις οὔτ' ἐξομοίωσίς ἔσται. δεῖ δὲ 145
κἀνταῦθά τινος τῇ φύσει δυνάμεως ἑτέρας εἰς
πολυχρόνιον μονὴν τοῦ προστεθέντος τῷ μορίῳ χυμοῦ
καὶ ταύτης οὐκ ἔξωθέν ποθεν ἐπιρρεούσης ἀλλ' ἐν αὐτῷ
τῷ θρεψομένῳ κατῳκισμένης, ἣν ἀπὸ τῆς ἐνεργείας
πάλιν οἱ πρὸ ἡμῶν ἠναγκάσθησαν ὀνομάσαι καθεκτικήν.
Ὁ μὲν δὴ λόγος ἤδη σαφῶς ἐνεδείξατο τὴν ἀνάγκην τῆς
γενέσεως τῆς τοιαύτης δυνάμεως καὶ ὅστις ἀκολουθίας
σύνεσιν ἔχει, πέπεισται βεβαίως ἐξ ὧν εἴπομεν, ὡς
ὑποκειμένου τε καὶ προαποδεδειγμένου τοῦ τεχνικὴν
εἶναι τὴν φύσιν καὶ τοῦ ζῴου κηδεμονικὴν ἀναγκαῖον
ὑπάρχειν αὐτῇ καὶ τὴν τοιαύτην δύναμιν.
II
Since, however, it is not our habit to employ this kind of
demonstration[304] alone, but to add thereto cogent and compelling
proofs drawn from obvious facts, we will also proceed to the latter
kind in the present instance: we will demonstrate that in certain
parts of the body _the retentive faculty_ is so obvious that its
operation can be actually recognised by the _senses_, whilst in other
parts it is less obvious to the senses, but is capable even here of
being detected by the _argument_.[305]
Let us begin our exposition, then, by first dealing systematically for
a while with certain definite parts of the body, in reference to which
we may accurately test and enquire what sort of thing the retentive
faculty is.
Now, could one begin the enquiry in any better way than with the
largest and hollowest organs? Personally I do not think one could. It
is to be expected that in these, owing to their size, the activities
will show quite clearly, whereas with respect to the small organs,
even if they possess a strong faculty of this kind, its activation
will not at once be recognisable to sense.
Now those parts of the animal which are especially hollow and large
are the stomach and the organ which is called the womb or uterus.[306]
What prevents us, then, from taking up these first and considering
their activities, conducting the enquiry on our own persons in
regard to those activities which are obvious without dissection, and,
in the case of those which are more obscure, dissecting animals which
are near to man;[307] not that even animals unlike him will not show,
in a general way, the faculty in question, but because in this manner
we may find out at once what is common to all and what is peculiar to
ourselves, and so may become more resourceful in the diagnosis and
treatment of disease.
Now it is impossible to speak of both organs at once, so we shall deal
with each in turn, beginning with the one which is capable of
demonstrating the retentive faculty most plainly. For the stomach
retains the food until it has quite digested it, and the uterus
retains the embryo until it brings it to completion, but the time
taken for the completion of the embryo is many times more than that
for the digestion of food.
II
Ἀλλ' ἡμεῖς οὐ τούτῳ μόνῳ τῷ γένει τῆς ἀποδείξεως
εἰθισμένοι χρῆσθαι, προστιθέντες δ' αὐτῷ καὶ τὰς ἐκ
τῶν ἐναργῶς φαινομένων ἀναγκαζούσας τε καὶ
βιαζομένας πίστεις ἐπὶ τὰς τοιαύτας καὶ νῦν
ἀφιξόμεθα καὶ δείξομεν ἐπὶ μέν τινων μορίων τοῦ
σώματος οὕτως ἐναργῆ τὴν καθεκτικὴν δύναμιν, ὡς
αὐταῖς ταῖς αἰσθήσεσι || διαγιγνώσκεσθαι τὴν 146
ἐνέργειαν αὐτῆς, ἐπὶ δέ τινων ἧττον μὲν ἐναργῶς ταῖς
αἰσθήσεσι, λόγῳ δὲ κἀνταῦθα φωραθῆναι δυναμένην.
Ἀρξώμεθ' οὖν τῆς διδασκαλίας ἀπ' αὐτοῦ τοῦ τέως
πρῶτον μεθόδῳ τινὶ προχειρίσασθαι μόρι' ἄττα τοῦ
σώματος, ἐφ' ὧν ἀκριβῶς ἐστι βασανίσαι τε καὶ
ζητῆσαι τὴν καθεκτικὴν δύναμιν ὁποία ποτ' ἐστίν.
Ἆρ' οὖν ἄμεινον ἄν τις ἑτέρωθεν ἢ ἀπὸ τῶν μεγίστων
τε καὶ κοιλοτάτων ὀργάνων ὑπάρξαιτο τῆς ζητήσεως;
ἐμοί μὲν οὖν οὐκ ἂν δοκεῖ βέλτιον. ἐναργεῖς γοῦν
εἰκὸς ἐπὶ τούτων φανῆναι τὰς ἐνεργείας διὰ τὸ
μέγεθος· ὡς τὰ γε σμικρὰ τάχ' ἂν, εἰ καὶ σφοδρὰν
ἔχει τὴν τοιαύτην δύναμιν, ἀλλ' οὐκ αἰσθήσει γ'
ἑτοίμην διαγιγνώσκεσθαι τὴν ἐνέργειαν αὐτῆς.
Ἀλλ' ἐστιν ἐν τοῖς μάλιστα κοιλότατα καὶ μέγιστα τῶν
τοῦ ζῴου μορίων ἥ τε γαστὴρ καὶ <αἱ> μῆτραί τε καὶ
ὑστέραι καλούμεναι. τί οὖν κωλύει ταῦτα πρῶτα
προχειρισαμένους ἐπισκέψασθαι τὰς ἐνεργείας αὐτῶν,
ὅσαι μὲν καὶ πρὸ τῆς ἀνατομῆς δῆλαι, τὴν ἐξέτασιν
ἐφ' ἡμῶν αὐτῶν ποιουμένους, ὅσαι δ' ἀμυδρότεραι, τὰ
παραπλήσια διαιροῦντας ἀνθρώπῳ ζῷα, || οὐχ ὡς οὐκ ἂν 147
ἱκανῶς τό γε καθόλου περὶ τῆς ζητουμένης δυνάμεως
καὶ τῶν ἀνομοίων ἐνδειξομένων, ἀλλ' ὡς ἵν' ἅμα τῷ
κοινῷ καὶ τὸ ἴδιον ἐφ' ἡμῶν αὐτῶν ἐγνωκότες εἴς τε
τὰς διαγνώσεις τῶν νοσημάτων καὶ τὰς ἰάσεις
εὐπορώτεροι γιγνώμεθα.
Περὶ μὲν οὖν ἀμφοτέρων τῶν ὀργάνων ἅμα λέγειν
ἀδύνατον, ἐν μέρει δ' ὑπὲρ ἑκατέρου ποιησόμεθα τὸν
λόγον ἀπὸ τοῦ σαφέστερον ἐνδείξασθαι δυναμένου τὴν
καθεκτικὴν δύναμιν ἀρξάμενοι. κατέχει μὲν γὰρ καὶ ἡ
γαστὴρ τὰ σιτία, μέχρι περ ἂν ἐκπέψῃ, κατέχουσι δὲ
καὶ αἱ μῆτραι τὸ ἔμβρυον, ἔστ' ἂν τελειώσωσιν· ἀλλα
πολλαπλάσιός ἐστιν ὁ τῆς τῶν ἐμβρύων τελειώσεως
χρόνος τῆς τῶν σιτίων πέψεως.
III
We may expect, then, to detect the retentive faculty in the uterus
more clearly in proportion to the longer duration of its activity as
compared with that of the stomach. For, as we know, it takes nine
months in most women for the foetus to attain maturity in the womb,
this organ having its neck quite closed, and entirely surrounding the
embryo together with the _chorion_. Further, it is the utility of the
function which determines the closure of the os and the stay of the
foetus in the uterus. For it is not casually nor without reason that
Nature has made the uterus capable of contracting upon, and of
retaining the embryo, but in order that the latter may arrive at a
proper size. When, therefore, the object for which the uterus brought
its retentive faculty into play has been fulfilled, it then stops this
faculty and brings it back to a state of rest, and employs instead of
it another faculty hitherto quiescent—the _propulsive_ faculty. In
this case again the quiescent and active states are both determined by
utility; when this calls, there is activity; when it does not, there
is rest.
Here, then, once more, we must observe well the Art [artistic
tendency] of Nature—how she has not merely placed in each organ the
capabilities of useful activities, but has also fore-ordained the
times both of rest and movement. For when everything connected with
the pregnancy proceeds properly, the _eliminative_ faculty remains
quiescent as though it did not exist, but if anything goes wrong in
connection either with the chorion or any of the other membranes or
with the foetus itself, and its completion is entirely despaired of,
then the uterus no longer awaits the nine-months period, but the
retentive faculty forthwith ceases and allows the heretofore
inoperative faculty to come into action. Now it is that something is
done—in fact, useful work effected—by the _eliminative or propulsive
faculty_ (for so it, too, has been called, receiving, like the rest,
its names from the corresponding activities).
Further, our theory can, I think, demonstrate both together; for
seeing that they succeed each other, and that the one keeps giving
place to the other according as utility demands, it seems not
unreasonable to accept a common demonstration also for both. Thus it
is the work of the retentive faculty to make the uterus contract upon
the foetus at every point, so that, naturally enough, when the
midwives palpate it, the os is found to be closed, whilst the pregnant
women themselves, during the first days—and particularly on that on
which conception takes place—experience a sensation as if the uterus
were moving and contracting upon itself. Now, if both of these things
occur—if the os closes apart from inflammation or any other disease,
and if this is accompanied by a feeling of movement in the
uterus—then the women believe that they have received the semen which
comes from the male, and that they are retaining it.
Now we are not inventing this for ourselves: one may say the statement
is based on prolonged experience of those who occupy themselves with
such matters. Thus Herophilus[308] does not hesitate to state in his
writings that up to the time of labour the os uteri will not admit so
much as the tip of a probe, that it no longer opens to the slightest
degree if pregnancy has begun—that, in fact, it dilates more widely
at the times of the menstrual flow. With him are in agreement all the
others who have applied themselves to this subject; and particularly
Hippocrates, who was the first of all physicians and philosophers to
declare that the os uteri closes during pregnancy and inflammation,
albeit in pregnancy it does not depart from its own nature, whilst in
inflammation it becomes hard.
In the case of the opposite (the eliminative) faculty, the os opens,
whilst the whole fundus approaches as near as possible to the os,
expelling the embryo as it does so; and along with the fundus the
contiguous parts—which form as it were a girdle round the whole
organ—co-operate in the work; they squeeze upon the embryo and propel
it bodily outwards. And, in many women who exercise such a faculty
immoderately, violent pains cause forcible prolapse of the whole womb;
here almost the same thing happens as frequently occurs in
wrestling-bouts and struggles, when in our eagerness to overturn and
throw others we are ourselves upset along with them; for similarly
when the uterus is forcing the embryo forward it sometimes becomes
entirely prolapsed, and particularly when the ligaments connecting it
with the spine happen to be naturally lax.[309]
A wonderful device of Nature’s also is this—that, when the foetus is
alive, the os uteri is closed with perfect accuracy, but if it dies,
the os at once opens up to the extent which is necessary for the
foetus to make its exit. The midwife, however, does not make the
parturient woman get up at once and sit down on the [obstetric] chair,
but she begins by palpating the os as it gradually dilates, and the
first thing she says is that it has dilated “enough to admit the
little finger,” then that “it is bigger now,” and as we make enquiries
from time to time, she answers that the size of the dilatation is
increasing. And when it is sufficient to allow of the transit of the
foetus,[310] she then makes the patient get up from her bed and sit on
the chair, and bids her make every effort to expel the child. Now,
this additional work which the patient does of herself is no longer
the work of the uterus but of the epigastric muscles, which also help
us in defaecation and micturition.
III
Εἰκὸς οὖν καὶ τὴν δύναμιν ἐναργέστερον ἐν ταῖς
μήτραις φωράσειν ἡμᾶς τὴν καθεκτικήν, ὅσῳ καὶ
πολυχρονιωτέραν τῆς γαστρὸς τὴν ἐνέργειαν κέκτηται.
μησὶ γὰρ ἐννέα που ταῖς πλείσταις τῶν γυναικῶν ἐν
αὐταῖς τελειοῦται τὰ κυήματα, μεμυκυίαις μὲν ἅπαντι
τῷ αὐχένι, περιεχούσαις δὲ πανταχόθεν αὐτὰ σὺν τῷ
χορίῳ. || καὶ πέρας γε τῆς τοῦ στόματος μύσεως καὶ 148
τῆς τοῦ κυουμένου κατὰ τὰς μήτρας μονῆς ἡ χρεία τῆς
ἐνεργείας ἐστιν· οὐ γὰρ ὡς ἔτυχεν οὐδ' ἀλόγως ἱκανὰς
περιστέλλεσθαι καὶ κατέχειν τὸ ἔμβρυον ἡ φύσις
ἀπείργασατο τὰς ὑστέρας, ἀλλ' ἵν' εἰς τὸ πρέπον
ἀφίκηται μέγεθος τὸ κυούμενον. ὅταν οὖν, οὗ χάριν
ἐνήργουν τῇ καθεκτικῇ δυνάμει, συμπεπληρωμένον ᾖ,
ταύτην μὲν ἀνέπαυσάν τε καὶ εἰς ἠρεμίαν ἐπανήγαγον,
ἀντ' αὐτῆς δ' ἑτέρᾳ χρῶνται τῇ τέως ἡσυχαζούσῃ, τῇ
προωστικῇ. ἦν δ' ἄρα καὶ τῆς ἐκείνης ἡσυχίας ὅρος ἡ
χρεία καὶ τῆς γ' ἐνεργείας ὡσαύτος ἡ χρεία· καλούσης
μὲν γὰρ αὐτῆς ἐνεργεῖ, μὴ καλούσης δ' ἡσυχάζει.
Καὶ χρὴ πάλιν κἀνταῦθα καταμαθεῖν τῆς φύσεως τὴν
τέχνην, ὡς οὐ μόνον ένεργειῶν χρησίμων δυνάμεις
ἐνέθηκεν ἑκάστῳ τῶν ὀργάνων, ἀλλα καὶ τοῦ τῶν
ἡσυχιῶν τε καὶ κινήσεων καὶροῦ προὐνοήσατο. καλῶς
μὲν γὰρ ἁπάντων γιγνομένων τῶν κατὰ τὴν κύησιν ἡ
ἀποκριτικὴ δύναμις ἡσυχάζει τελέως ὥσπερ οὐκ οὖσα,
κακοπραγίας δὲ τινος γενομένης ἢ περὶ τὸ χορίον ἢ
περί τινα τῶν ἄλλων || ὑμένων ἢ περὶ τὸ κυούμενον 149
αὐτὸ καὶ τῆς τελειώσεως αὐτοῦ παντάπασιν
ἀπογνωσθέισης οὐκέτ' ἀναμένουσι τὸν ἐννεάμηνον αἱ
μῆτραι χρόνον, ἀλλ' ἡ μὲν καθεκτικὴ δύναμις αὐτίκα
δὴ πέπαυται καὶ παραχωρεῖ κινεῖσθαι τῇ πρότερον
ἀργούσῃ, πράττει δ' ἤδη τι καὶ πραγματεύεται χρηστὸν
ἡ ἀποκριτική τε καὶ προωστική· καὶ γὰρ οὖν καὶ
ταύτην οὕτως ἐκάλεσαν ἀπὸ τῶν ένεργειῶν αὐτῇ τὰ
ὀνόματα θέμενοι καθάπερ καὶ ταῖς ἄλλαις.
Καὶ πως ὁ λόγος ἔοικεν ὑπὲρ ἀμφοτέρων ἀποδείξειν
ἅμα· καὶ γὰρ τοι καὶ διαδεχομένας αὐτὰς ἀλλήλας καὶ
παραχωροῦσαν ἀεὶ τὴν ἑτέραν τῇ λοιπῇ, καθότι ἂν ἡ
χρεία κελεύῃ, καὶ τὴν διδασκαλίαν κοινὴν οὐκ ἀπεικός
ἐστι δέχεσθαι. τῆς μὲν οὖν καθεκτικῆς δυνάμεως ἔργον
περιστεῖλαι τὰς μήτρας τῷ κυουμένῳ πανταχόθεν, ὥστ'
εὐλόγως ἁπτομέναις μὲν ταῖς μαιευτρίαις τὸ στόμα
μεμυκὸς αὐτῶν φαίνεται, ταῖς κυούσαις δ' αὐταῖς κατὰ
τὰς πρώτας ἡμέρας καὶ μάλιστα κατ' αὐτὴν ἐκείνην, ἐν
ᾗπερ ἂν ἡ τῆς γονῆς σύλληψις γένηται, κινουμένων τε
καὶ συντρεχουσῶν εἰς ἑαυτὰς τῶν ὑστερῶν αἴσθη||σις 150
γίγνεται καὶ ἦν ἄμφω ταῦτα συμβῇ, μῦσαι μὲν τὸ στόμα
χωρὶς φλεγμονῆς ἢ τινος ἄλλου παθήματος, αἴσθησιν δὲ
τῆς κατὰ τὰς μήτρας κινήσεως ἀκολουθῆσαι, πρὸς αὑτὰς
ἤδη τὸ σπέρμα τὸ παρὰ τἀνδρὸς εἰληφέναι τε καὶ
κατέχειν αἱ γυναῖκες νομίζουσι.
Ταῦτα δ' οὐχ ἡμεῖς νῦν ἀναπλάττομεν ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς,
ἀλλ' ἐκ μακρᾶς πείρας δοκιμασθέντα πᾶσι γέγραπται
σχεδὸν τι τοῖς περὶ τούτων πραγματευσαμένοις.
Ἡρόφιλος μέν γε καὶ ὡς οὐδὲ πυρῆνα μήλης ἂν δέχοιτο
τῶν μητρῶν τὸ στόμα, πρὶν ἀποκυεῖν τὴν γυναῖκα, καὶ
ὡς οὐδὲ τοὐλάχιστον ἔτι διέστηκεν, ἢν ὑπάρξηται
κύειν, καὶ ὡς ἐπὶ πλέον ἀναστομοῦνται κατὰ τὰς τῶν
ἐπιμηνίων φοράς, οὐκ ὤκνησε γράφειν· συνομολογοῦσι
δ' αὐτῷ καὶ οἱ ἄλλοι πάντες οἱ περὶ τούτων
πραγματευσάμενοι καὶ πρῶτός γ' ἁπάντων ἰατρῶν τε καὶ
φιλοσόφων Ἱπποκράτης ἀπεφήνατο μύειν τὸ στόμα τῶν
ὑστερῶν ἔν τε ταῖς κυήσεσι καὶ ταῖς φλεγμοναῖς, ἀλλ'
ἐν μὲν ταῖς κυήσεσιν οὐκ ἐξιστάμενον τῆς φύσεως, ἐν
δὲ ταῖς φλεγμοναῖς σκληρὸν γιγνόμενον.
Ἐπὶ δέ γε τῆς ἐναντίας τῆς ἐκκριτικῆς ἀνοίγνυται μὲν
τὸ στόμα, προέρχεται δ' ὁ πυθμὴν || ἅπας ὅσον οἷον 151
τ' ἐγγυτάτω τοῦ στόματος ἀπωθούμενος ἔξω τὸ ἔμβρυον,
ἅμα δ' αὐτῷ καὶ τὰ συνεχῆ μέρη τὰ οἷον πλευρὰ τοῦ
παντὸς ὀργάνου συνεπιλαμβανόμενα τοῦ ἔργου θλίβει τε
καὶ προωθεῖ πᾶν ἔξω τὸ ἔμβρυον. καὶ πολλαῖς τῶν
γυναικῶν ὠδῖνες βίαιοι τὰς μήτρας ὅλας ἐκπεσεῖν
ἠνάγκασαν ἀμέτρως χρησαμέναις τῇ τοιαύτῃ δυνάμει,
παραπλησίου τινὸς γιγνομένου τῷ πολλάκις ἐν πάλαις
τισὶ καὶ φιλονεικίαις συμβαίνοντι, ὅταν ἀνατρέψαι τε
καὶ καταβαλεῖν ἑτέρους σπεύδοντες αὐτοὶ
συγκαταπέσωμεν. οὕτω γὰρ καὶ αἱ μῆτραι τὸ ἔμβρυον
ὠθοῦσαι συνεξέπεσον ἐνίοτε καὶ μάλισθ', ὅταν οἱ πρὸς
τὴν ῥάχιν αὐτῶν σύνδεσμοι χαλαροὶ φύσει τυγχάνωσιν
ὄντες.
Ἔστι δὲ καὶ τοῦτο θαυμαστὸν τι τῆς φύσεως σόφισμα,
τὸ ζῶντος μὲν τοῦ κυήματος ἀκριβῶς πάνυ μεμυκέναι τὸ
στόμα τῶν μητρῶν, ἀποθανόντος δὲ παραχρῆμα
διανοίγεσθαι τοσοῦτον, ὅσον εἰς τὴν ἔξοδον αὐτοῦ
διαφέρει. καὶ μέντοι καὶ αἱ μαῖαι τὰς τικτούσας οὐκ
εὐθὺς ἀνιστᾶσιν οὐδ' ἐπὶ τὸν δίφρον καθίζουσιν, ἀλλ'
ἅπτονται πρότερον ἀνοιγομένου τοῦ στόματος || κατὰ 152
βραχὺ καὶ πρῶτον μέν, ὥστε τὸν μικρὸν δάκτυλον
καθιέναι, διεστηκέναι φασίν, ἔπειτ' ἤδη καὶ μεῖζον
καὶ κατὰ βραχὺ δὴ πυνθανομένοις ἡμῖν ἀποκρίνονται τὸ
μέγεθος τῆς διαστάσεως ἐπαυξανόμενον. ὅταν δ' ἱκανὸν
ᾖ πρὸς τὴν τοῦ κυουμένου δίοδον, ἀνιστᾶσιν αὐτὰς καὶ
καθίζουσι καὶ προθυμεῖσθαι κελεύουσιν ἀπώσασθαι τὸ
παιδίον. ἐστι δ' ἤδη τοῦτο τὸ ἔργον, ὃ παρ' ἑαυτῶν
αἱ κύουσαι προστιθέασιν, οὐκέτι τῶν ὑστερῶν, ἀλλα
τῶν κατ' ἐπιγάστριον μυῶν, οἳ πρὸς τὴν ἀποπάτησίν τε
καὶ τὴν οὔρησιν ἡμῖν συνεργοῦσιν.
IV
Thus the two faculties are clearly to be seen in the case of the
uterus; in the case of the _stomach_ they appear as follows:—Firstly
in the condition of _gurgling_, which physicians are persuaded, and
with reason, to be a symptom of weakness of the stomach; for sometimes
when the very smallest quantity of food has been ingested this does
not occur, owing to the fact that the stomach is contracting
accurately upon the food and constricting it at every point; sometimes
when the stomach is full the gurglings yet make themselves heard as
though it were empty. For if it be in a natural condition, employing
its contractile faculty in the ordinary way, then, even if its
contents be very small, it grasps the whole of them and does not leave
any empty space. When it is weak, however, being unable to lay hold of
its contents accurately, it produces a certain amount of vacant space,
and allows the liquid contents to flow about in different directions
in accordance with its changes of shape, and so to produce gurglings.
Thus those who are troubled with this symptom expect, with good
reason, that they will also be unable to digest adequately; proper
digestion cannot take place in a weak stomach. In such people also,
the mass of food may be plainly seen to remain an abnormally long time
in the stomach, as would be natural if their digestion were slow.
Indeed, the chief way in which these people will surprise one is in
the length of time that not food alone but even fluids will remain in
their stomachs. Now, the actual cause of this is not, as one would
imagine, that the lower outlet of the stomach,[311] being fairly
narrow, will allow nothing to pass before being reduced to a fine
state of division. There are a great many people who frequently
swallow large quantities of big fruit-stones; one person, who was
holding a gold ring in his mouth, inadvertently swallowed it; another
swallowed a coin, and various people have swallowed various hard and
indigestible objects; yet all these people easily passed by the bowel
what they had swallowed, without there being any subsequent symptoms.
Now surely if narrowness of the gastric outlet were the cause of
untriturated food remaining for an abnormally long time, none of these
articles I have mentioned would ever have escaped. Furthermore, the
fact that it is liquids which remain longest in these people’s
stomachs is sufficient to put the idea of narrowness of the outlet out
of court. For, supposing a rapid descent were dependent upon
emulsification,[312] then soups, milk, and barley-emulsion[313] would
at once pass along in every case. But as a matter of fact this is not
so. For in people who are extremely asthenic it is just these fluids
which remain undigested, which accumulate and produce gurglings, and
which oppress and overload the stomach, whereas in strong persons not
merely do none of these things happen, but even a large quantity of
bread or meat passes rapidly down.
And it is not only because the stomach is distended and loaded and
because the fluid runs from one part of it to another accompanied by
gurglings—it is not only for these reasons that one would judge that
there was an unduly long continuance of the food in it, in those
people who are so disposed, but also from the _vomiting_. Thus, there
are some who vomit up every particle of what they have eaten, not
after three or four hours, but actually in the middle of the night, a
lengthy period having elapsed since their meal.
Suppose you fill any animal whatsoever with liquid food—an experiment
I have often carried out in pigs, to whom I give a sort of mess of
wheaten flour and water, thereafter cutting them open after three or
four hours; if you will do this yourself, you will find the food still
in the stomach. For it is not _chylification_[314] which determines
the length of its stay here—since this can also be effected outside
the stomach; the determining factor is _digestion_[315] which is a
different thing from chylification, as are blood-production and
nutrition. For, just as it has been shown[316] that these two
processes depend upon a _change of qualities_, similarly also the
digestion of food in the stomach involves a transmutation of it into
the quality proper to that which is receiving nourishment.[317] Then,
when it is completely digested, the lower outlet opens and the food is
quickly ejected through it, even if there should be amongst it
abundance of stones, bones, grape-pips, or other things which cannot
be reduced to chyle. And you may observe this yourself in an animal,
if you will try to hit upon the time at which the descent of food from
the stomach takes place. But even if you should fail to discover the
time, and nothing was yet passing down, and the food was still
undergoing digestion in the stomach, still even then you would find
dissection not without its uses. You will observe, as we have just
said, that the pylorus is accurately closed, and that the whole
stomach is in a state of contraction upon the food very much as the
womb contacts upon the foetus. For it is never possible to find a
vacant space in the uterus, the stomach, or in either of the two
bladders—that is, either in that called bile-receiving[318] or in the
other; whether their contents be abundant or scanty, their cavities
are seen to be replete and full, owing to the fact that their coats
contract constantly upon the contents—so long, at least, as the
animal is in a natural condition.
Now Erasistratus for some reason declares that it is the
contractions[319] of the stomach which are the cause of
everything—that is to say, of the softening of the food,[320] the
removal of waste matter, and the absorption of the food when chylified
[emulsified].
Now I have personally, on countless occasions, divided the peritoneum
of a still living animal and have always found all _the intestines_
contracting peristaltically[321] upon their contents. The condition of
_the stomach_, however, is found less simple; as regards the
substances freshly swallowed, it had grasped these accurately both
above and below, in fact at every point, and was as devoid of movement
as though it had grown round and become united with the food.[322] At
the same time I found the pylorus persistently closed and accurately
shut, like the os uteri on the foetus.
In the cases, however, where digestion had been completed the pylorus
had opened, and the stomach was undergoing peristaltic movements,
similar to those of the intestines.
IV
Οὕτω μὲν ἐπὶ τῶν μητρῶν ἐναργῶς αἱ δύο φαίνονται
δυνάμεις, ἐπὶ δὲ τῆς γαστρὸς ὧδε. πρῶτον μὲν τοῖς
κλύδωσιν, οἳ δὴ καὶ πεπίστευνται τοῖς ἰατροῖς
ἀρρώστου κοιλίας εἶναι συμπτώματα καὶ κατὰ λόγον
πεπίστευνται· ἐνίοτε μὲν γὰρ ἐλάχιστα
προσενηνεγμένων οὐ γίγνονται περιστελλομένης ἀκριβῶς
αὐτοῖς τῆς γαστρὸς καὶ σφιγγούσης πανταχόθεν, ἐνίοτε
δὲ μεστὴ μὲν ἡ γαστήρ ἐστιν, οἱ κλύ||δωνες δ' ὡς ἐπὶ 153
κενῆς ἐξακούονται. κατὰ φύσιν μὲν γὰρ ἔχουσα καὶ
χρωμένη καλῶς τῇ περισταλτικῇ δυνάμει, κἂν ὀλίγον ᾖ
τὸ περιεχόμενον, ἅπαν αὐτὸ περιλαμβάνουσα χώραν
οὐδεμίαν ἀπολείπει κενήν, ἀρρωστοῦσα δὲ, καθότι ἂν
ἀδυνατήσῃ περιλαβεῖν ἀκριβῶς, ἐνταῦθ' εὐρυχωρίαν
τιν' ἐργαζομένη συγχωρεῖ τοῖς περιεχομένοις ὑγροῖς
κατὰ τὰς τῶν σχημάτων μεταλλαγὰς ἄλλοτ' ἀλλαχόσε
μεταρρέουσι κλύδωνας ἀποτελεῖν.
Εὐλόγως οὖν, ὅτι μηδὲ πέψουσιν ἱκανῶς, οἱ ἐν τῷδε τῷ
συμπτώματι γενόμενοι προσδοκῶσιν· οὐ γὰρ ἐνδέχεται
πέψαι καλῶς ἄρρωστον γαστέρα. τοῖς τοιούτοις δὲ καὶ
μέχρι πλείονος ἐν αὐτῇ φαίνεται παραμένον τὸ βάρος,
ὡς ἂν καὶ βραδύτερον πέττουσι. καὶ μὴν θαυμάσειεν ἂν
τις ἐπ' αὐτῶν τούτων μάλιστα τὸ πολυχρόνιον τῆς ἐν
τῇ γαστρὶ διατριβῆς οὐ τῶν σιτίων μόνον ἀλλα καὶ τοῦ
πόματος· οὐ γάρ, ὅπερ ἂν οἰηθείη τις, ὡς τὸ τῆς
γαστρὸς στόμα τὸ κάτω στενὸν ἱκανῶς ὑπάρχον οὐδὲν
παρίησι πρὶν ἀκριβῶς λειωθῆναι, τοῦτ' αἴτιον ὄντως
ἐστί. πολλὰ γοῦν πολλάκις ὀπωρῶν ὀστᾶ μέγιστα
καταπίνουσι || πάμπολλοι καὶ τις δακτύλιον χρυσοῦν 154
ἐν τῷ στόματι φυλάττων ἄκων κατέπιε καὶ ἄλλος τις
νόμισμα καὶ ἄλλος ἄλλο τι σκληρὸν καὶ
δυσκατέργαστον, ἀλλ' ὅμως ἅπαντες οὗτοι ῥᾳδίως
ἀπεπάτησαν, ἃ κατέπιον, οὐδενὸς αὐτοῖς
ἀκολουθήσαντος συμπτώματος. εἰ δὲ γ' ἡ στενότης τοῦ
πόρου τῆς γαστρὸς αἰτία τοῦ μένειν ἐπὶ πλέον ἦν τοῖς
ἀτρίπτοις σιτίοις, οὐδὲν ἂν τούτων ποτὲ διεχώρησεν.
ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ τὰ πόματ' αὐτοῖς ἐν τῇ γαστρὶ παραμένειν
ἐπὶ πλεῖστον ἱκανὸν ἀπάγειν τὴν ὑπόνοιαν τοῦ πόρου
τῆς στενότητος· ὅλως γάρ, εἴπερ ἦν ἐν τῷ κεχυλῶσθαι
τὸ θᾶττον ὑπιέναι, τά τε ῥοφήματ' ἂν οὕτω καὶ τὸ
γάλα καὶ ὁ τῆς πτισάνης χυλὸς αὐτίκα διεξῄει πᾶσιν.
ἀλλ' οὐχ ὧδ' ἔχει· τοῖς μὲν γὰρ ἀσθενέσιν ἐπὶ
πλεῖστον ἐμπλεῖ ταῦτα καὶ κλύδωνας ἐργάζεται
παραμένοντα καὶ θλίβει καὶ βαρύνει τὴν γαστέρα, τοῖς
δ' ἰσχυροῖς οὐ μόνον τούτων οὐδὲν συμβαίνει, ἀλλὰ
καὶ πολὺ πλῆθος ἄρτων καὶ κρεῶν ὑποχωρεῖ ταχέως.
Ὀυ μόνον δ' ἐκ τοῦ περιτετάσθαι τὴν γαστέρα καὶ
βαρύνεσθαι || καὶ μεταρρεῖν ἄλλοτ' εἰς ἄλλα μέρη 155
μετὰ κλύδωνος τὸ παραμένειν ἐπὶ πλέον ἐν αὐτῇ πάντως
τοῖς οὕτως ἔχουσι τεκμήραιτ' ἄν τις ἀλλα κἀκ τῶν
ἐμέτων· ἔνιοι γὰρ οὐ μετὰ τρεῖς ὥρας ἢ τέτταρας ἀλλα
νυκτῶν ἤδη μέσων παμπόλλου μεταξὺ χρόνου διελθόντος
ἐπὶ ταῖς προσφοραῖς ἀνήμεσαν ἀκριβῶς ἅπαντα τὰ
ἐδηδεσμένα.
Καὶ μὲν δὴ καὶ ζῷον ὁτιοῦν ἐμπλήσας ὑγρᾶς τροφῆς,
ὥσπερ ἡμεῖς πολλάκις ἐπὶ συῶν ἐπειράθημεν ἐξ ἀλεύρων
μέθ' ὕδατος οἷον κυκεῶνά τινα δόντες αὐτοῖς, ἔπειτα
μετὰ τρεῖς που καὶ τέτταρας ὥρας ἀνατεμόντες, εἰ
οὕτω καὶ σὺ πράξειας, εὑρήσεις ἔτι κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα
τὰ ἐδηδεσμένα· πέρας γὰρ αὐτοῖς ἐστι τῆς ἐνταῦθα
μονῆς οὐχ ἡ χύλωσις, ἣν καὶ ἐκτὸς ἔτι ὄντων
μηχανήσασθαι δυνατόν ἐστιν, ἀλλ' ἡ πέψις, ἕτερον τι
τῆς χυλώσεως οὖσα, καθάπερ ἁιμάτωσις τε καὶ θρέψις.
ὡς γὰρ κἀκεῖνα δέδεικται ποιοτήτων μεταβολῇ
γιγνόμενα, τὸν αὐτὸν τρόπον καὶ ἡ ἐν τῇ γαστρὶ πέψις
τῶν σιτίων εἰς τὴν οἰκείαν ἐστὶ τῷ τρεφομένῳ
ποιότητα || μεταβολὴ καὶ ὅταν γε πεφθῇ τελέως, 156
ἀνοίγνυται μὲν τηνικαῦτα τὸ κάτω στόμα, διεκπίπτει
δ' αὐτοῦ τὰ σιτία ῥᾳδίως, εἰ καὶ πλῆθος τι μεθ'
ἑαυτῶν ἔχοντα τύχοι λίθων ἢ ὀστῶν ἢ γιγάρτων ἤ τινος
ἄλλου χυλωθῆναι μὴ δυναμένου. καί σοι τοῦτ' ἔνεστιν
ἐπὶ ζῴου θεάσασθαι στοχασαμένῳ τὸν καιρὸν τῆς κάτω
διεξόδου. καὶ μέν γε καὶ εἰ σφαλείης ποτὲ τοῦ καιροῦ
καὶ μηδὲν μήπω κάτω παρέρχοιτο πεττομένων ἔτι κατὰ
τὴν γαστέρα τῶν σιτίων, οὐδ' οὕτως ἄκαρπος ἡ ἀνατομή
σοι γενήσεται· θεάσῃ γὰρ ἐπ' αὐτῶν, ὅπερ ὀλίγῳ
πρόσθεν ἐλέγομεν, ἀκριβῶς μὲν μεμυκότα τὸν πυλωρόν,
ἅπασαν δὲ τὴν γαστέρα περιεσταλμένην τοῖς σιτίοις
τρόπον ὁμοιότατον, οἷόνπερ καὶ αἱ μῆτραι τοῖς
κυουμένοις. οὐ γὰρ ἔστιν οὐδέποτε κενὴν εὑρεῖν χώραν
οὔτε κατὰ τὰς ὑστέρας οὔτε κατὰ τὴν κοιλίαν οὔτε
κατὰ τὰς κύστεις ἀμφοτέρας οὔτε κατὰ τὴν χοληδόχον
ὀνομαζομένην οὔτε τὴν ἑτέραν· ἀλλ' εἴτ' ὀλίγον εἴη
τὸ περιεχόμενον ἐν αὐταῖς ἔιτε πολύ, μεσταὶ καὶ
πλήρεις αὐτῶν αἱ κοιλίαι φαίνονται περιστελλομένων
ἀεὶ τῶν χιτώνων τοῖς περιεχομένοις, ὅταν γε κατὰ
φύσιν ἔχῃ τὸ ζῷον. || 157
Ἐρασίστρατος δ' οὐκ οἶδ' ὅπως τὴν περιστολὴν τῆς
γαστρὸς ἁπάντων αἰτίαν ἀποφαίνει καὶ τῆς λειώσεως
τῶν σιτίων καὶ τῆς τῶν περιττωμάτων ὑποχωρήσεως καὶ
τῆς τῶν κεχυλωμένων ἀναδόσεως.
Ἐγὼ μὲν γὰρ μυριάκις ἐπὶ ζῶντος ἔτι τοῦ ζῴου διελὼν
τὸ περιτόναιον εὗρον ἀεὶ τὰ μὲν ἔντερα πάντα
περιστελλόμενα τοῖς ἐνυπάρχουσι, τὴν κοιλίαν δ' οὐχ
ἁπλῶς, ἀλλ' ἐπὶ μὲν ταῖς ἐδωδαῖς ἄνωθέν τε καὶ
κάτωθεν αὐτὰ καὶ πανταχόθεν ἀκριβῶς περιειληφυῖαν
ἀκίνητον, ὡς δοκεῖν ἡνῶσθαι καὶ περιπεφυκέναι τοῖς
σιτίοις· ἐν δὲ τούτῳ καὶ τὸν πυλωρὸν εὕρισκον ἀεὶ
μεμυκότα καὶ κεκλεισμένον ἀκριβῶς ὥσπερ τὸ τῶν
ὑστερῶν στόμα ταῖς ἐγκύμοσιν.
Ἐπὶ μέντοι ταῖς πέψεσι συμπεπληρωμέναις ἀνέῳκτο μὲν
ὁ πυλωρός, ἡ γαστὴρ δὲ περισταλτικῶς ἐκινεῖτο
παραπλησίως τοῖς ἐντέροις.
V
Thus all these facts agree that the stomach, uterus, and bladders
possess certain inborn faculties which are retentive of their own
proper qualities and eliminative of those that are foreign. For it has
been already shown[323] that the bladder by the liver draws bile into
itself, while it is also quite obvious that it eliminates this daily
into the stomach. Now, of course, if the eliminative were to succeed
the attractive faculty and there were not a _retentive_ faculty
between the two, there would be found, on every occasion that animals
were dissected, an equal quantity of bile in the gall-bladder. This
however, we do not find. For the bladder is sometimes observed to be
very full, sometimes quite empty, while at other times you find in it
various intermediate degrees of fulness, just as is the case with the
other bladder—that which receives the urine; for even without
resorting to anatomy we may observe that the urinary bladder continues
to collect urine up to the time that it becomes uncomfortable through
the increasing quantity of urine or the irritation caused by its
acidity—the presumption thus being that here, too, there is a
retentive faculty.
Similarly, too, the stomach, when, as often happens, it is irritated
by acidity, gets rid of the food, although still undigested, earlier
than proper; or again, when oppressed by the quantity of its contents,
or disordered from the co-existence of both conditions, it is seized
with _diarrhoea_. _Vomiting_ also is an affection of the upper [part
of the] stomach analogous to diarrhoea, and it occurs when the stomach
is overloaded or is unable to stand the quality of the food or surplus
substances which it contains. Thus, when such a condition develops in
the lower parts of the stomach, while the parts about the inlet are
normal, it ends in diarrhoea, whereas if this condition is in the
upper stomach, the lower parts being normal, it ends in vomiting.
V
Ἅπαντ' οὖν ἀλλήλοις ὁμολογεῖ ταῦτα καὶ τῇ γαστρὶ καὶ
ταῖς ὑστέραις καὶ ταῖς κύστεσιν εἶναι τινας ἐμφύτους
δυνάμεις καθεκτικὰς μὲν τῶν οἰκείων ποιοτήτων, || 158
ἀποκριτικὰς δὲ τῶν ἀλλοτρίων. ὅτι μὲν γὰρ ἕλκει τὴν
χολὴν εἰς ἑαυτὴν ἡ ἐπὶ τῷ ἥπατι κύστις, ἔμπροσθεν
δέδεικται, ὅτι δὲ καὶ ἀποκρίνει καθ' ἑκάστην ἡμέραν
εἰς τὴν γαστέρα, καὶ τοῦτ' ἐναργῶς φαίνεται. καὶ μὴν
εἰ διεδέχετο τὴν ἑλκτικὴν δύναμιν ἡ ἐκκριτικὴ καὶ μὴ
μέση τις ἀμφοῖν ἦν ἡ καθεκτική, διὰ παντὸς ἐχρῆν
ἀνατεμνομένων τῶν ζῴων ἴσον πλῆθος χολῆς εὑρίσκεσθαι
κατὰ τὴν κύστιν· οὐ μὴν εὑρίσκεταί γε. ποτὲ μὲν γὰρ
πληρεστάτη, ποτὲ δὲ κενοτάτη, ποτὲ δὲ τὰς ἐν τῷ
μεταξὺ διαφορὰς ἔχουσα θεωρεῖται, καθάπερ καὶ ἡ
ἑτέρα κύστις ἡ τὸ οὖρον ὑποδεχομένη. ταύτης μέν γε
καὶ πρὸ τῆς ἀνατομῆς αἰσθανόμεθα, πρὶν ἀνιαθῆναι τῷ
πλήθει βαρυνθεῖσαν ἢ τῇ δριμύτητι δηχθεῖσαν,
ἀθροιζούσης ἔτι τὸ οὖρον, ὡς οὔσης τινὸς κἀνταῦθα
δυνάμεως καθεκτικῆς.
Οὕτω δὲ καὶ ἡ γαστὴρ ὑπὸ δριμύτητος πολλάκις
δηχθεῖσα πρωιαίτερον τοῦ δέοντος ἄπεπτον ἔτι τὴν
τροφὴν ἀποτρίβεται. αὖθις δ' ἄν ποτε τῷ πλήθει
βαρυνθεῖσα ἢ καὶ κατ' ἄμφω συνελθόντα κακῶς
διατεθεῖσα διαρροίαις ἑάλω. καὶ μέν γε καὶ οἱ
ἔμετοι, τῷ πλήθει βαρυνθείσης || αὐτῆς ἢ τὴν 159
ποιότητα τῶν ἐν αὐτῇ σιτίων τε καὶ περιττωμάτων μὴ
φερούσης, ἀνάλογόν τι ταῖς διαρροίαις πάθημα τῆς ἄνω
γαστρός ἐστιν. ὅταν μὲν γὰρ ἐν τοῖς κάτω μέρεσιν
αὐτῆς ἡ τοιαύτη γένηται διάθεσις, ἐρρωμένων τῶν κατὰ
τὸν στόμαχον, εἰς διαρροίας ἐτελεύτησεν, ὅταν δ' ἐν
τοῖς κατὰ τὸ στόμα, τῶν ἄλλων εὐρωστούντων, εἰς
ἐμέτους.
VI
This may often be clearly observed in those who are disinclined for
food; when obliged to eat, they have not the strength to swallow, and,
even if they force themselves to do so, they cannot retain the food,
but at once vomit it up. And those especially who have a dislike to
some particular kind of food, sometimes take it under compulsion, and
then promptly bring it up; or, if they force themselves to keep it
down, they are nauseated and feel their stomach turned up, and
endeavouring to relieve itself of its discomfort.
Thus, as was said at the beginning, all the observed facts testify
that there must exist in almost all parts of the animal a certain
inclination towards, or, so to speak; an appetite for their own
special quality, and an aversion to, or, as it were, a hatred[324] of
the foreign quality. And it is natural that when they feel an
inclination they should attract, and that when they feel aversion they
should expel.
From these facts, then, again, both the attractive and the propulsive
faculties have been demonstrated to exist in everything.[325]
But if there be an inclination or attraction, there will also be some
benefit derived; for no existing thing attracts anything else for the
mere sake of attracting, but in order to benefit by what is acquired
by the attraction. And of course it cannot benefit by it if it cannot
retain it. Herein, then, again, the retentive faculty is shown to have
its necessary origin: for the stomach obviously inclines towards its
own proper qualities and turns away from those that are foreign to
it.[326]
But if it aims at and attracts its food and benefits by it while
retaining and contracting upon it, we may also expect that there will
be some _termination_ to the benefit received, and that thereafter
will come the time for the exercise of the eliminative faculty.
VI
Ἔνεστι δὲ καὶ τοῦτο πολλάκις ἐναργῶς ἰδεῖν ἐπὶ τῶν
ἀποσίτων· ἀναγκαζόμενοι γὰρ ἐσθίειν οὔτε καταπίνειν
εὐσθενοῦσιν οὔτ', εἰ καὶ βιάσαιντο, κατέχουσιν, ἀλλ'
εὐθὺς ἀνεμοῦσι. καὶ οἱ ἄλλως δὲ τῶν ἐδεσμάτων πρὸς
ὁτιοῦν δυσχεραίνοντες βιασθέντες ἐνίοτε προσάρασθαι
ταχέως ἐξεμοῦσιν, ἢ εἰ κατάσχοιεν βιασάμενοι,
ναυτιώδεις τ' εἰσὶ καὶ τῆς γαστρὸς ὑπτίας
αἰσθάνονται καὶ σπευδούσης ἀποθέσθαι τὸ λυποῦν.
Οὕτως ἐξ ἁπάντων τῶν φαινομένων, ὅπερ ἐξ ἀρχῆς
ἐρρέθη, μαρτυρεῖται τὸ δεῖν ὑπάρχειν τοῖς τοῦ ζῴου
μορίοις σχεδὸν ἅπασιν ἔφεσιν μέν τινὰ καὶ οἷον
ὄρεξιν τῆς οἰκείας ποιότητος, ἀποστροφὴν δὲ τινα || 160
καὶ οἷον μῖσός τι τῆς ἀλλοτρίας, ἀλλ' ἐφιέμενα μὲν
ἕλκειν εὔλογον, ἀποστρεφόμενα δ' ἐκκρίνειν.
Κἀκ τούτων πάλιν ἥ θ' ἑλκτικὴ δύναμις ἀποδείκνυται
καθ' ἅπαν ὑπάρχουσα καὶ ἡ προωστική.
Ἀλλ' εἴπερ ἔφεσίς τέ τίς ἐστι καὶ ἕλξις, εἴη ἄν τις
καὶ ἀπόλαυσις· οὐδὲν γὰρ τῶν ὄντων ἕλκει τι δι' αὐτὸ
τὸ ἕλκειν, ἀλλ' ἵν' ἀπολαύσῃ τοῦ διὰ τῆς ὁλκῆς
εὐπορηθέντος. καὶ μὴν ἀπολαύειν οὐ δύναται μὴ
κατασχόν. κἀν τούτῳ πάλιν ἡ καθεκτικὴ δύναμις
ἀποδείκνυται τὴν γένεσιν ἀνανκαίαν ἔχουσα· σαφῶς γὰρ
ἐφίεται μὲν τῶν οἰκείων ποιοτήτων ἡ γαστήρ,
ἀποστρέφεται δὲ τὰς ἀλλοτρίας.
Ἀλλ' εἴπερ ἐφίεταί τε καὶ ἕλκει καὶ ἀπολαύει
κατέχουσα καὶ περιστελλομένη, εἴη ἄν τι καὶ πέρας
αὐτῇ τῆς ἀπολαύσεως κἀπὶ τῷδ' ὁ καιρὸς ἤδη τῆς
ἐκκριτικῆς δυνάμεως ἐνεργούσης.
VII
But if the stomach both retains and benefits by its food, then it
employs it for the end for which it [the stomach] naturally exists.
And it exists to partake of that which is of a quality befitting and
proper to it. Thus it attracts all the most useful parts of the food
in a vaporous[327] and finely divided condition, storing this up in
its own coats, and applying[328] it to them. And when it is
sufficiently full it puts away from it, as one might something
troublesome, the rest of the food, this having itself meanwhile
obtained some profit from its association with the stomach. For it is
impossible for two bodies which are adapted for acting and being acted
upon to come together without either both acting or being acted upon,
or else one acting and the other being acted upon. For if their forces
are equal they will act and be acted upon equally, and if the one be
much superior in strength, it will exert its activity upon its passive
neighbour; thus, while producing a great and appreciable effect, it
will itself be acted upon either little or not at all. But it is
herein also that the main difference lies between nourishing food and
a deleterious drug; the latter masters the forces of the body, whereas
the former is mastered by them.[329]
There cannot, then, be food which is suited for the animal which is
not also correspondingly subdued by the qualities existing in the
animal. And to be subdued means to undergo _alteration_.[330] Now,
some parts are stronger in power and others weaker; therefore, while
all will subdue the nutriment which is proper to the animal, they will
not all do so equally. Thus the stomach will subdue and alter its
food, but not to the same extent as will the liver, veins, arteries,
and heart.
We must therefore observe to what extent it does alter it. The
alteration is more than that which occurs in the mouth, but less than
that in the liver and veins. For the latter alteration changes the
nutriment into the _substance_ of blood, whereas that in the mouth
obviously changes it into a new _form_, but certainly does not
completely transmute it. This you may discover in the food which is
left in the intervals between the teeth, and which remains there all
night; the bread is not exactly bread, nor the meat, for they
have a smell similar to that of the animal’s mouth, and have been
disintegrated and dissolved, and have had the qualities of the
animal’s flesh impressed upon them. And you may observe the extent of
the alteration which occurs to food in the mouth if you will chew some
corn and then apply it to an unripe [undigested] boil: you will see it
rapidly transmuting—in fact entirely digesting—the boil, though it
cannot do anything of the kind if you mix it with water. And do not
let this surprise you; this phlegm [saliva] in the mouth is also a
cure for _lichens_[331]; it even rapidly destroys scorpions; while, as
regards the animals which emit venom, some it kills at once, and
others after an interval; to all of them in any case it does great
damage. Now, the masticated food is all, firstly, soaked in and mixed
up with this phlegm; and secondly, it is brought into contact with the
actual skin of the mouth; thus it undergoes more change than the food
which is wedged into the vacant spaces between the teeth.
But just as masticated food is more altered than the latter kind, so
is food which has been swallowed more altered than that which has been
merely masticated. Indeed, there is no comparison between these two
processes; we have only to consider what the stomach contains—phlegm,
bile, pneuma, [innate] heat,[332] and, indeed the whole substance of
the stomach. And if one considers along with this the adjacent
viscera, like a lot of burning hearths around a great cauldron—to the
right the liver, to the left the spleen, the heart above, and along
with it the diaphragm (suspended and in a state of constant movement),
and the omentum sheltering them all—you may believe what an
extraordinary alteration it is which occurs in the food taken into the
stomach.
How could it easily become blood if it were not previously prepared by
means of a change of this kind? It has already been shown[333] that
nothing is altered all at once from one quality to its opposite. How
then could bread, beef, beans, or any other food turn into blood if
they had not previously undergone some other alteration? And how could
the faeces be generated right away in the small intestine?[334] For
what is there in this organ more potent in producing alteration than
the factors in the stomach? Is it the number of the coats, or the way
it is surrounded by neighbouring viscera, or the time that the food
remains in it, or some kind of innate heat which it contains? Most
assuredly the intestines have the advantage of the stomach in none of
these respects. For what possible reason, then, will objectors have it
that bread may often remain a whole night in the stomach and still
preserve its original qualities, whereas when once it is projected
into the intestines, it straightway becomes ordure? For, if such a
long period of time is incapable of altering it, neither will the
short period be sufficient, or, if the latter is enough, surely the
longer time will be much more so! Well, then, can it be that, while
the nutriment does undergo an alteration in the stomach, this is a
different kind of alteration and one which is not dependent on the
nature of the organ which alters it? Or if it be an alteration of this
latter kind, yet one perhaps which is not proper to the body of the
animal? This is still more impossible. Digestion was shown to be
nothing else than an alteration to the quality proper to that which is
receiving nourishment.[335] Since, then, this is what digestion means
and since the nutriment has been shown to take on in the stomach a
quality appropriate to the animal which is about to be nourished by
it, it has been demonstrated adequately that nutriment does undergo
digestion in the stomach.
And Asclepiades is absurd when he states that the quality of the
digested food never shows itself either in eructations or in the
vomited matter, or on dissection.[336] For of course the mere fact
that the food smells of the body shows that it has undergone gastric
digestion. But this man is so foolish that, when he hears the Ancients
saying that the food is converted in the stomach into something
“good,” he thinks it proper to look out not for what is good in its
possible effects, but for what is _good to the taste_: this is like
saying that apples (for so one has to argue with him) become more
apple-like [in flavour] in the stomach, or honey more honey-like!
Erasistratus, however, is still more foolish and absurd, either
through not perceiving in what sense the Ancients said that digestion
is similar to the process of _boiling_, or because he purposely
confused himself with sophistries. It is, he says, inconceivable that
digestion, involving as it does such trifling warmth, should be
related to the boiling process. This is as if we were to suppose that
it was necessary to put the fires of Etna under the stomach before it
could manage to alter the food; or else that, while it was capable of
altering the food, it did not do this by virtue of its innate heat,
which of course was moist, so that the word _boil_ was used instead of
_bake_.
What he ought to have done, if it was facts that he wished to dispute
about, was to have tried to show, first and foremost, that the food is
not transmuted or altered in quality by the stomach at all, and
secondly, if he could not be confident of this, he ought to have tried
to show that this alteration was not of any advantage to the
animal.[337] If, again, he were unable even to make this
misrepresentation, he ought to have attempted to confute the postulate
concerning _the active principles_—to show, in fact, that the
functions taking place in the various parts do not depend on the way
in which the Warm, Cold, Dry, and Moist are mixed, but on some other
factor. And if he had not the audacity to misrepresent facts even so
far as this, still he should have tried at least to show that the Warm
is not the most active of all the principles which play a part in
things governed by Nature. But if he was unable to demonstrate this
any more than any of the previous propositions, then he ought not to
have made himself ridiculous by quarrelling uselessly with a mere
name—as though Aristotle had not clearly stated in the fourth book of
his “Meteorology,” as well as in many other passages, in what way
digestion can be said to be allied to boiling, and also that the
latter expression is not used in its primitive or strict sense.
But, as has been frequently said already,[338] the one starting-point
of all this is a thoroughgoing enquiry into the question of the Warm,
Cold, Dry and Moist; this Aristotle carried out in the second of his
books “On Genesis and Destruction,” where he shows that all the
transmutations and alterations throughout the body take place as a
result of these principles. Erasistratus, however, advanced nothing
against these or anything else that has been said above, but occupied
himself merely with the word “boiling.”
VII
Ἀλλ' εἰ καὶ κατέχει καὶ ἀπολαύει, καταχρῆται πρὸς ὃ
πέφυκε. πέφυκε δὲ τοῦ προσήκοντος ἑαυτῇ || κατὰ 161
ποιότητα καὶ οἰκείου μεταλαμβάνειν· ὥσθ' ἕλκει τῶν
σιτίων ὅσον χρηστότατον ἀτμωδῶς τε καὶ κατὰ βραχὺ
καὶ τοῦτο τοῖς ἑαυτῆν χιτῶσιν ἐναποτίθεταί τε καὶ
προστίθησιν. ὅταν δ' ἱκανῶς ἐμπλησθῇ, καθάπερ ἄχθος
τι τὴν λοιπὴν ἀποτίθεται τροφὴν ἐσχηκυῖάν τι χρηστὸν
ἤδη καὶ αὐτὴν ἐκ τῆς πρὸς τὴν γαστέρα κοινωνίας·
οὐδὲ γὰρ ἐνδέχεται δύο σώματα δρᾶν καὶ πάσχειν
ἐπιτήδεια συνελθόντα μὴ οὐκ ἤτοι πάσχειν θ' ἅμα καὶ
δρᾶν ἢ θάτερον μὲν δρᾶν, θάτερον δὲ πάσχειν. ἐὰν μὲν
γὰρ ἰσάζῃ ταῖς δυνάμεσιν, ἐξ ἴσου δράσει τε καὶ
πείσεται, ἂν δ' ὑπερέχῃ πολὺ καὶ κρατῇ θάτερον,
ἐνεργήσει περὶ τὸ πάσχον· ὥστε δράσει μέγα μέν τι
καὶ αἰσθητόν, αὐτὸ δ' ἤτοι σμικρόν τι καὶ οὐκ
αἰσθητὸν ἢ παντάπασιν οὐδὲν πείσεται. ἀλλ' ἐν τούτῳ
δὴ καὶ μάλιστα διήνεγκε φαρμάκου δηλητηρίου τροφή·
τὸ μὲν γὰρ κρατεῖ τῆς ἐν τῷ σώματι δυνάμεως, ἡ δὲ
κρατεῖται.
Οὐκουν ἐνδέχεται τροφὴν μὲν εἶναί τι τῷ ζῴῳ
προσήκουσαν, οὐ μὴν καὶ κρατεῖσθαί γ' ὁμοίως πρὸς
τῶν || ἐν τῷ ζῴῳ ποιοτήτων· τὸ κρατεῖσθαι δ' ἦν 162
ἀλλοιοῦσθαι. ἀλλ' ἐπεὶ τὰ μὲν ἰσχυρότερα ταῖς
δυνάμεσίν ἐστι μόρια, τὰ δ' ἀσθενέστερα, κρατήσει
μὲν πάντα τῆς οἰκείας τῷ ζῴῳ τροφῆς, οὐχ ὁμοίως δὲ
πάντα· κρατήσει δ' ἄρα καὶ ἡ γαστὴρ καὶ ἀλλοιώσει
μὲν τὴν τροφήν, οὐ μὴν ὁμοίως ἥπατι καὶ φλεψὶ καὶ
ἀρτηρίαις καὶ καρδίᾳ.
Πόσον οὖν ἐστιν, ὃ ἀλλοιοῖ, καὶ δὴ θεασώμεθα· πλέον
μὲν ἢ κατὰ τὸ στόμα, μεῖον δ' ἢ κατὰ τὸ ἧπάρ τε καὶ
τὰς φλέβας. αὕτη μὲν γὰρ ἡ ἀλλοίωσις εἰς αἵματος
οὐσίαν ἄγει τὴν τροφήν, ἡ δ' ἐν τῷ στόματι μεθίστησι
μὲν αὐτὴν ἐναργῶς εἰς ἕτερον εἶδος, οὐ μέν εἰς τέλος
γε μετακοσμεῖ. μάθοις δ' ἂν ἐπὶ τῶν ἐγκαταλειφθέντων
ταῖς διαστάσεσι τῶν ὀδόντων σιτίων καὶ καταμεινάντων
δι' ὅλης νυκτός· οὔτε γὰρ ἄρτος ἀκριβῶς ὁ ἄρτος οὔτε
κρέας ἐστί τὸ κρέας, ἀλλ' ὄζει μὲν τοιοῦτον, οἷόνπερ
καὶ τοῦ ζῴου τὸ στόμα, διαλέλυται δὲ καὶ διατέτηκε
καὶ τὰς ἐν τῷ ζῴῳ τῆς σαρκὸς ἀπομέμακται ποιότητας.
ἔνεστι δέ σοι θεάσασθαι τὸ μέγεθος τῆς ἐν τῷ στόματι
|| τῶν σιτίων ἀλλοιώσεως, εἰ πυροὺς μασησάμενος 163
ἐπιθείης ἀπέπτοις δοθιῆσιν· ὄψει γὰρ αὐτοὺς τάχιστα
μεταβάλλοντάς τε καὶ συμπέττοντας, οὐδὲν τοιοῦτον,
ὅταν ὕδατι φυραθῶσιν, ἐργάσασθαι δυναμένους. καὶ μὴ
θαυμάσῃς· τὸ γὰρ τοι φλέγμα τουτὶ τὸ κατὰ τὸ στόμα
καὶ λειχήνων ἐστὶν ἄκος καὶ σκορπίους ἀναιρεῖ
παραχρῆμα καὶ πολλὰ τῶν ἰοβόλων θηρίων τὰ μὲν εὐθέως
ἀποκτείνει, τὰ δ' ἐς ὕστερον· ἅπαντα γοῦν βλάπτει
μεγάλως. ἀλλα τὰ μεμασημένα σιτία πρῶτον μὲν τούτῳ
τῷ φλέγματι βέβρεκταί τε καὶ πεφύραται, δεύτερον δὲ
καὶ τῷ χρωτὶ τοῦ στόματος ἅπαντα πεπλησίακεν, ὥστε
πλείονα μεταβολὴν εἴληφε τῶν ἐν ταῖς κεναῖς χώραις
τῶν ὀδόντων ἐσφηνωμένων.
Ἀλλ' ὅσον τὰ μεμασημένα τούτων ἐπὶ πλέον ἠλλοίωται,
τοσοῦτον ἐκείνων τὰ καταποθέντα. μὴ γὰρ οὐδὲ
παραβλητὸν ᾖ τὸ τῆς ὑπερβολῆς, εἰ τὸ κατὰ τὴν
κοιλίαν ἐννοήσαιμεν φλέγμα καὶ χολὴν καὶ πνεῦμα καὶ
θερμασίαν καὶ ὅλην τὴν οὐσίαν τῆς γαστρός. εἰ δὲ καὶ
συνεπινοήσαις αὐτῇ τὰ παρακείμενα || σπλάγχνα 164
καθάπερ τινὶ λέβητι μεγάλῳ πυρὸς ἑστίας πολλάς, ἐκ
δεξιῶν μὲν τὸ ἧπαρ, ἐξ ἀριστερῶν δὲ τὸν σπλῆνα, τὴν
καρδίαν δ' ἐκ τῶν ἄνω, σὺν αὐτῇ δὲ καὶ τὰς φρένας
αἰωρουμένας τε καὶ διὰ παντὸς κινουμένας, ἐφ' ἅπασι
δὲ τούτοις σκέπον τὸ ἐπίπλοον, ἐξαίσιόν τινα
πεισθήσῃ τὴν ἀλλοίωσιν γίγνεσθαι τῶν εἰς τὴν γαστέρα
καταποθέντων σιτίων.
Πῶς δ' ἂν ἠδύνατο ῥᾳδίως αἱματοῦσθαι μὴ
προπαρασκευασθέντα τῇ τοιαύτῃ μεταβολῇ; δέδεικται
γὰρ οὖν καὶ πρόσθεν, ὡς οὐδὲν εἰς τὴν ἐναντίαν
ἀθρόως μεθίσταται ποιότητα. πῶς οὖν ὁ ἄρτος αἷμα
γίγνεται, πῶς δὲ τὸ τεῦτλον ἢ ὁ κύαμος ἢ τι τῶν
ἄλλων, εἰ μὴ πρότερόν τιν' ἑτέραν ἀλλοίωσιν ἐδέξατο;
πῶς δ' ἡ κόπρος ἐν τοῖς λεπτοῖς ἐντέροις ἀθρόως
γεννηθήσεται; τι γὰρ ἐν τούτοις σφοδρότερον εἰς
ἀλλοίωσίν ἐστι τῶν κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα; πότερα τῶν
χιτώνων τὸ πλῆθος ἢ τῶν γειτνιώντων σπλάγχνων ἡ
περίθεσις ἢ τῆς μονῆς ὁ χρόνος ἢ σύμφυτός τις ἐν
τοῖς ὀργάνοις θερμασία; καὶ μὴν κατ' οὐδὲν τούτων
πλεονεκτεῖ τὰ ἔντερα τῆς γαστρὸς. τί ποτ' οὖν ἐν μὲν
τῇ γαστρὶ νυκτὸς || ὅλης πολλάκις μείναντα τὸν ἄρτον 165
ἔτι φυλάττεσθαι βούλονται τὰς ἀρχαίας διασῴζοντα
ποιότητας, ἐπειδὰν δ' ἅπαξ ἐμπέσῃ τοῖς ἐντέροις,
εὐθὺς γίγνεσθαι κόπρον; εἰ μὲν γὰρ ὁ τοσοῦτος χρόνος
ἀδύνατος ἀλλοιοῦν, οὐδ' ὁ βραχὺς ἱκανός· εἰ δ' οὕτος
αὐτάρκης, πῶς οὐ πολὺ μᾶλλον ὁ μακρός; ἆρ' οὖν
ἀλλοιοῦται μὲν ἡ τροφὴ κατὰ τὴν κοιλίαν, ἄλλην δέ
τιν' ἀλλοίωσιν καὶ οὐχ οἵαν ἐκ τῆς φύσεως ἴσχει τοῦ
μεταβάλλοντος ὀργάνου; ἢ ταύτην μέν, οὐ μὴν τήν γ'
οἰκείαν τῷ τοῦ ζῴου σώματι; μακρῷ τοῦτ' ἀδυνατώτερόν
ἐστι. καὶ μὴν οὐκ ἄλλο γ' ἦν ἡ πέψις ἢ ἀλλοίωσις εἰς
τὴν οἰκείαν τοῦ τρεφομένου ποιότητα. εἴπερ οὖν ἡ
πέψις τοῦτ' ἔστί καὶ ἡ τροφὴ κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα
δέδεικται δεχομένη ποιότητα τῷ μέλλοντι πρὸς αὐτῆς
θρέψεσθαι ζῴῳ προσήκουσαν, ἱκανῶς ἀποδέδεικται τὸ
πέττεσθαι κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα τὴν τροφήν.
Καὶ γελοῖος μὲν Ἀσκληπιάδης οὔτ' ἐν ταῖς ἐρυγαῖς
λέγων ἐμφαίνεσθαί ποτε τὴν ποιότητα τῶν πεφθέντων
σιτίων οὔτ' ἐν τοῖς ἐμέτοις οὔτ' ἐν ταῖς
ἀνα||τομαῖς· αὐτὸ γὰρ δὴ τὸ τοῦ σώματος ἐξόζειν αὐτὰ 166
τῆς κοιλίας ἐστὶ τὸ πεπέφθαι. ὁ δ' οὕτως ἐστὶν
εὐήθης, ὥστ', ἐπειδὴ τῶν παλαιῶν ἀκούει λεγόντων ἐπὶ
τὸ χρηστὸν ἐν τῇ γαστρὶ μεταβάλλειν τὰ σιτία,
δοκιμάζει ζητεῖν οὐ τὸ κατὰ δύναμιν ἀλλα τὸ κατὰ
γεῦσιν χρηστὸν, ὥσπερ ἢ τοῦ μήλου μηλωδεστέρου—χρὴ
γὰρ οὕτως αὐτῷ διαλέγεσθαι—γιγνομένου κατὰ τὴν
κοιλίαν ἢ τοῦ μέλιτος μελιτωδεστέρου.
Πολὺ δ' εὐηθέστερός ἐστι καὶ γελοιότερος ὁ
Ἐρασίστρατος ἢ μὴ νοῶν, ὅπως εἴρηται πρὸς τῶν
παλαιῶν ἡ πέψις ἑψήσει παραπλήσιος ὑπάρχειν, ἢ ἑκὼν
σοφιζόμενος ἑαυτόν. ἑψήσει μὲν οὖν, φησίν, οὕτως
ἐλαφρὰν ἔχουσαν θερμασίαν οὐκ εἰκὸς εἶναι
παραπλησίαν τὴν πέψιν, ὥσπερ ἢ τὴν Αἴτνην δέον
ὑποθεῖναι τῇ γαστρὶ ἢ ἄλλως αὐτῆς ἀλλοιῶσαι τὰ σιτία
μὴ δυναμένης ἢ δυναμένης μὲν ἀλλοιοῦν, οὐ κατὰ τὴν
ἔμφυτον δὲ θερμασίαν, ὑγρὰν οὖσαν δηλονότι καὶ διὰ
τοῦθ' ἕψειν οὐκ ὀπτᾶν εἰρημένην.
Ἐχρῆν δ' αὐτὸν, εἴπερ περὶ πραγμάτων ἀντιλέγειν
ἐβούλετο, πειραθῆναι δεῖξαι μάλιστα μὲν καὶ || 167
πρῶτον, ὡς οὐδὲ μεταβάλλει τὴν ἀρχὴν οὐδ' ἀλλοιοῦται
κατὰ ποιότητα πρὸς τῆς γαστρὸς τὰ σιτία, δεύτερον
δ', εἴπερ μὴ οἷός τ' ἦν τοῦτο πιστώσασθαι, τὸ τὴν
ἀλλοίωσιν αὐτῶν ἄχρηστον εἶναι τῷ ζῴῳ· εἰ δὲ μηδὲ
τοῦτ' εἶχε διαβάλλειν, ἐξελέγξαι τὴν περὶ τὰς
δραστικὰς ἀρχάς ὑπόληψιν καὶ δεῖξαι τὰς ἐνεργείας ἐν
τοῖς μορίοις οὐ διὰ τὴν ἐκ θερμοῦ καὶ ψυχροῦ καὶ
ξηροῦ καὶ ὑγροῦ ποιὰν κρᾶσιν ὑπάρχειν ἄλλὰ δι' ἄλλο
τι· εἰ δὲ μηδὲ τοῦτ' ἐτόλμα διαβάλλειν, ἀλλ' ὅτι γε
μὴ τὸ θερμὸν ἐστιν ἐν τοῖς ὑπὸ φύσεως διοικουμένοις
τὸ τῶν ἄλλων δραστικώτατον. ἢ εἰ μήτε τοῦτο μήτε τῶν
ἄλλων τι τῶν ἔμπροσθεν εἶχεν ἀποδεικνύναι, μὴ ληρεῖν
ὀνόματι προσπαλαίοντα μάτην, ὥσπερ οὐ σαφῶς
Ἀριστοτέλους ἔν τ' ἄλλοις πολλοῖς κἀν τῷ τετάρτῳ τῶν
μετεωρολογικῶν ὅπως ἡ πέψις ἑψήσει παραπλήσιος εἶναι
λέγεται, καὶ ὅτι μὴ πρώτως μηδὲ κυρίως ὀνομαζόντων,
εἰρηκότος.
Ἀλλ', ὡς ἤδη λέλεκται πολλάκις, ἀρχὴ τούτων ἁπάντων
ἐστὶ μία τὸ περὶ θερμοῦ καὶ ψυχροῦ καὶ ξηροῦ καὶ
ὑγροῦ διασκέψασθαι, καθάπερ Ἀριστοτέλης ἐποίησεν ἐν
τῷ δευτέρῳ περὶ γενέσεως καὶ φθορᾶς, ἀπο||δείξας 168
ἁπάσας τὰς κατὰ τὰ σώματα μεταβολὰς καὶ ἀλλοιώσεις
ὑπὸ τούτων γίγνεσθαι. ἀλλ' Ἐρασίστρατος οὔτε τούτοις
οὔτ' ἄλλῳ τινὶ τῶν προειρημένων ἀντειπὼν ἐπὶ τοὔνομα
μόνον ἐτράπετο τῆς ἑψήσεως.
VIII
Thus, as regards _digestion_, even though he neglected everything
else, he did at least attempt to prove his point—namely, that
digestion in animals differs from boiling carried on outside; in
regard to the question of _deglutition_, however, he did not go even
so far as this. What are his words?
“The stomach does not appear to exercise any traction.”[339]
Now the fact is that the stomach possesses two coats, which certainly
exist for some purpose; they extend as far as the mouth, the internal
one remaining throughout similar to what it is in the stomach, and the
other one tending to become of a more fleshy nature in the gullet. Now
simple observation will testify that these coats have their fibres
inserted in contrary directions.[340] And, although Erasistratus did
not attempt to say for what reason they are like this, I am going to
do so.
The inner coat has its fibres straight, since it exists for the
purpose of traction. The outer coat has its fibres transverse, for the
purpose of peristalsis.[341] In fact, the movements of each of the
_mobile_ organs of the body depend on the setting of the fibres. Now
please test this assertion first in the muscles themselves; in these
the fibres are most distinct, and their movements visible owing to
their vigour. And after the muscles, pass to the _physical_
organs,[342] and you will see that they all move in correspondence
with their fibres. This is why the fibres throughout the intestines
are circular in both coats—they only contract peristaltically, they
do not exercise traction. The stomach, again, has some of its fibres
longitudinal for the purpose of traction and the others transverse for
the purpose of peristalsis.[342] For just as the movements in the
muscles[343] take place when each of the fibres becomes tightened and
drawn towards its origin, such also is what happens in the stomach;
when the transverse fibres tighten, the breadth of the cavity
contained by them becomes less; and when the longitudinal fibres
contract and draw in upon themselves, the length must necessarily be
curtailed. This curtailment of length, indeed, is well seen in the act
of swallowing: the larynx is seen to rise upwards to exactly the same
degree that the gullet is drawn downwards; while, after the process of
swallowing has been completed and the gullet is released from tension,
the larynx can be clearly seen to sink down again. This is because the
inner coat of the stomach, which has the longitudinal fibres and which
also lines the gullet and the mouth, extends to the interior of the
larynx, and it is thus impossible for it to be drawn down by the
stomach without the larynx being involved in the traction.
Further, it will be found acknowledged in Erasistratus’s own writings
that the circular fibres (by which the stomach as well as other parts
performs its contractions) do not curtail its length, but contract and
lessen its breadth. For he says that the stomach contracts
peristaltically round the food during the whole period of digestion.
But if it contracts, without in any way being diminished in length,
this is because downward traction of the gullet is not a property of
the movement of circular peristalsis. For what alone happens, as
Erasistratus himself said, is that when the upper parts contract the
lower ones dilate.[344] And everyone knows that this can be plainly
seen happening even in a dead man, if water be poured down his throat;
this symptom[345] results from the passage of matter through a narrow
channel; it would be extraordinary it the channel did not dilate when
a mass was passing through it.[346] Obviously then the dilatation of
the lower parts along with the contraction of the upper is common both
to dead bodies, when anything whatsoever is passing through them, and
to living ones, whether they contract peristaltically round their
contents or attract them.[347]
Curtailment of length, on the other hand, is peculiar to organs which
possess longitudinal fibres for the purpose of attraction. But the
gullet was shown to be pulled down; for otherwise it would not have
drawn upon the larynx. It is therefore clear that the stomach attracts
food by the gullet.
Further, in _vomiting_, the mere passive conveyance of rejected matter
up to the mouth will certainly itself suffice to keep open those parts
of the oesophagus which are distended by the returned food; as it
occupies each part in front [above], it first dilates this, and of
course leaves the part behind [below] contracted. Thus, in this
respect at least, the condition of the gullet is precisely similar to
what it is in the act of swallowing.[348] But there being no
_traction_, the whole length remains equal in such cases.
And for this reason it is easier to swallow than to vomit, for
deglutition results from _both_ coats of the stomach being brought
into action, the inner one exerting a pull and the outer one helping
by peristalsis and propulsion, whereas emesis occurs from the outer
coat alone functioning, without there being any kind of pull towards
the mouth. For, although the swallowing of food is ordinarily preceded
by a feeling of desire on the part of the stomach, there is in the
case of vomiting no corresponding desire from the mouth-parts for the
experience; the two are opposite dispositions of the stomach itself;
it yearns after and tends towards what is advantageous and proper to
it, it loathes and rids itself of what is foreign. Thus the actual
process of swallowing occurs very quickly in those who have a good
appetite for such foods as are proper to the stomach; this organ
obviously draws them in and down before they are masticated; whereas
in the case of those who are forced to take a medicinal draught or who
take food as medicine, the swallowing of these articles is
accomplished with distress and difficulty.
From what has been said, then, it is clear that the inner coat of the
stomach (that containing longitudinal fibres) exists for the purpose
of exerting a pull from mouth to stomach, and that it is only in
deglutition that it is active, whereas the external coat, which
contains transverse fibres, has been so constituted in order that it
may contract upon its contents and propel them forward; this coat
furthermore, functions in vomiting no less than in swallowing. The
truth of my statement is also borne out by what happens in the case of
the _channae_ and _synodonts_[349]; the stomachs of these animals are
sometimes found in their mouths, as also Aristotle writes in his
_History of Animals_; he also adds the cause of this: he says that it
is owing to their voracity.
The facts are as follows. In all animals, when the appetite is very
intense, the stomach rises up, so that some people who have a clear
perception of this condition say that their stomach “creeps out” of
them; in others, who are still masticating their food and have not yet
worked it up properly in the mouth, the stomach obviously snatches
away the food from them against their will. In those animals,
therefore, which are naturally voracious, in whom the mouth cavity is
of generous proportions, and the stomach situated close to it (as in
the case of the synodont and channa), it is in no way surprising that,
when they are sufficiently hungry and are pursuing one of the smaller
animals, and are just on the point of catching it, the stomach should,
under the impulse of desire, spring into the mouth. And this cannot
possibly take place in any other way than by the stomach drawing the
food to itself by means of the gullet, as though by a hand. In fact,
just as we ourselves, in our eagerness to grasp more quickly something
lying before us, sometimes stretch out our whole bodies along with our
hands, so also the stomach stretches itself forward along with the
gullet, which is, as it were, its hand. And thus, in these animals in
whom those three factors co-exist—an excessive propensity for food, a
small gullet, and ample mouth proportions—in these, any slight
tendency to movement forwards brings the whole stomach into the mouth.
Now the constitution of the organs might itself suffice to give a
naturalist an indication of their functions. For Nature would never
have purposelessly constructed the oesophagus of two coats with
contrary dispositions; they must also have each been meant to have a
different action. The Erasistratean school, however, are capable of
anything rather than of recognizing the effects of Nature. Come,
therefore, let us demonstrate to them by animal dissection as well
that each of the two coats does exercise the activity which I have
stated. Take an animal, then; lay bare the structures surrounding the
gullet, without severing any of the nerves,[350] arteries, or veins
which are there situated; next divide with vertical incisions, from
the lower jaw to the thorax, the outer coat of the oesophagus (that
containing transverse fibres); then give the animal food and you will
see that it still swallows although the peristaltic function has been
abolished. If, again, in another animal, you cut through both
coats[351] with transverse incisions, you will observe that this
animal also swallows although the inner coat is no longer functioning.
From this it is clear that the animal can also swallow by either of
the two coats, although not so well as by both. For the following
also, in addition to other points, may be distinctly observed in the
dissection which I have described—that during deglutition the gullet
becomes slightly filled with air which is swallowed along with the
food, and that, when the outer coat is contracting, this air is easily
forced with the food into the stomach, but that, when there only
exists an inner coat, the air impedes the conveyance of food, by
distending this coat and hindering its action.
But Erasistratus said nothing about this, nor did he point out that
the oblique situation of the gullet clearly confutes the teaching of
those who hold that it is simply by virtue of the impulse from above
that food which is swallowed reaches the stomach. The only correct
thing he said was that many of the long-necked animals bend down to
swallow. Hence, clearly, the observed fact does not show how we
swallow but how we do not swallow. For from this observation it is
clear that swallowing is not due merely to the impulse from above; it
is yet, however, not clear whether it results from the food being
attracted by the stomach, or conducted by the gullet. For our part,
however, having enumerated all the different considerations—those
based on the constitution of the organs, as well as those based on the
other symptoms which, as just mentioned, occur both before and after
the gullet has been exposed—we have thus sufficiently proved that the
inner coat exists for the purpose of attraction and the outer for the
purpose of propulsion.
Now the original task we set before ourselves was to demonstrate that
the _retentive_ faculty exists in every one of the organs, just as in
the previous book we proved the existence of the _attractive_, and,
over and above this, the _alterative_ faculty. Thus, in the natural
course of our argument, we have demonstrated these four faculties
existing in the stomach—the attractive faculty in connection with
swallowing, the retentive with digestion, the expulsive with vomiting
and with the descent of digested food into the small intestine—and
digestion itself we have shown to be a process of _alteration_.
VIII
Ἐπὶ μὲν οὖν τῆς πέψεως, εἰ καὶ τἆλλα πάντα παρέλιπε,
τὸ γοῦν ὅτι διαφέρει τῆς ἐκτὸς ἑψήσεως ἡ ἐν τοῖς
ζῴοις πέψις, ἐπειράθη δεικνύναι, περὶ δὲ τῆς
καταπόσεως οὐδ' ἄχρι τοσούτου. τί γὰρ φησιν;
“Ὁλκὴ μὲν οὖν τῆς κοιλίας οὐδεμία φαίνεται εἶναι.”
Καὶ μὴν δύο χιτῶνας ἡ γαστὴρ ἔχει πάντως ἕνεκα του
γεγονότας καὶ διήκουσιν οὗτοι μέχρι τοῦ στόματος, ὁ
μὲν ἔνδον, οἷός ἐστι κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα, τοιοῦτος
διαμένων, ὁ δ' ἕτερος ἐπὶ τὸ σαρκωδέστερον ἐν τῷ
στομάχῳ τρεπόμενος. ὅτι μὲν οὖν ἐναντίας ἀλλήλαις
τὰς ἐπιβολὰς τῶν ἰνῶν ἔχουσιν οἱ χιτῶνες οὗτοι, τὸ
φαινόμενον αὐτὸ μαρτυρεῖ. τινὸς δ' ἕνεκα τοιοῦτοι
γεγόνασιν, Ἐρασίστρατος μὲν οὐδ' ἐπεχείρησεν εἰπεῖν,
ἡμεῖς δ' ἐροῦμεν.
Ὁ μὲν ἔνδον εὐθείας ἔχει τὰς ἶνας, ὁλκῆς γὰρ ἕνεκα
γέ||γονεν· ὁ δ' ἔξωθεν ἐγκαρσίας ὑπὲρ τοῦ κατὰ 169
κύκλον περιστέλλεσθαι· ἑκάστῳ γὰρ τῶν κινουμένων
ὀργάνων ἐν τοῖς σώμασι κατὰ τὰς τῶν ἰνῶν θέσεις αἱ
κινήσεις εἰσίν. ἐπ' αὐτῶν δὲ πρῶτον τῶν μυῶν, εἰ
βούλει, βασάνισον τὸν λόγον, ἐφ' ὧν καὶ αἱ ἶνες
ἐναργέσταται καὶ αἱ κινήσεις αὐτῶν ὁρῶνται διὰ
σφοδρότητα. μετὰ δὲ τοὺς μῦς ἐπὶ τὰ φυσικὰ τῶν
ὀργάνων ἴθι καὶ πάντ' ὄψει κατὰ τὰς ἶνας κινούμενα
καὶ διὰ τοῦθ' ἑκάστῳ μὲν τῶν ἐντέρων στρογγύλαι καθ'
ἑκάτερον τῶν χιτώνων αἱ ἶνές εἰσι· περιστέλλονται
γὰρ μόνον, ἕλκουσι δ' οὐδὲν. ἡ γαστὴρ δὲ τῶν ἰνῶν
τὰς μὲν εὐθείας ἔχει χάριν ὁλκῆς, τὰς δ' ἐγκαρσίας
ἕνεκα περιστολῆς· ὥσπερ γὰρ ἐν τοῖς μυσὶν ἑκάστης
τῶν ἰνῶν τεινομένης τε καὶ πρὸς τὴν ἀρχὴν ἑλκομένης
αἱ κινήσεις γίγνονται, κατὰ τὸν αὐτὸν λόγον κἀν τῇ
γαστρί· τῶν μὲν οὖν ἐγκαρσίων ἰνῶν τεινομένων
ἔλαττον ἀνάγκη γίγνεσθαι τὸ εὖρος τῆς περιεχομένης
ὑπ' αὐτῶν κοιλότητος, τῶν δ' εὐθειῶν ἑλκομένων τε
καὶ εἰς ἑαυτὰς συναγομὲνων οὐκ ἐνδέχεται μὴ οὐ
συναιρεῖσθαι τὸ μῆκος. ἄλλα μὴν || ἐναργῶς γε 170
φαίνεται καταπινόντων συναιρούμενον καὶ τοσοῦτον ὁ
λάρυγξ ἀνατρέχων, ὅσον ὁ στόμαχος κατασπᾶται, καὶ
ὅταν γε συμπληρωθείσης τῆς ἐν τῷ καταπίνειν
ἐνεργείας ἀφεθῇ τῆς τάσεως ὁ στόμαχος, ἐναργῶς πάλιν
φαίνεται καταφερόμενος ὁ λάρυγξ· ὁ γὰρ ἔνδον χιτὼν
τῆς γαστρὸς ὁ τὰς εὐθείας ἶνας ἔχων ὁ καὶ τὸν
στόμαχον ὑπαλείφων καὶ τὸ στόμα τοῖς ἐντὸς μέρεσιν
ἐπεκτείνεται τοῦ λάρυγγος, ὥστ' οὐκ ἐνδέχεται
κατασπώμενον αὐτὸν ὑπὸ τῆς κοιλίας μὴ οὐ
συνεπισπᾶσθαι καὶ τὸν λάρυγγα.
Ὅτι δ' αἱ περιφερεῖς ἶνες, αἷς περιστέλλεται τὰ τ'
ἄλλα μόρια καὶ ἡ γαστήρ, οὐ συναιροῦσι τὸ μῆκος,
ἀλλα συστέλλουσι καὶ στενοῦσι τὴν εὐρύτητα, καὶ παρ'
αὐτοῦ λαβεῖν ἔστιν ὁμολογούμενον Ἐρασιστράτου·
περιστέλλεσθαι γὰρ φησι τοῖς σιτίοις τὴν γαστέρα
κατὰ τὸν τῆς πέψεως ἅπαντα χρόνον. ἀλλ' εἰ
περιστέλλεται μέν, οὐδὲν δὲ τοῦ μήκους ἀφαιρεῖται
τῆς κοιλίας, οὐκ ἔστί τῆς περισταλτικῆς κινήσεως
ἴδιον τὸ κατασπᾶν κάτω τὸν στόμαχον. ὅπερ γὰρ αὐτὸς
ὁ Ἐρασίστρατος εἶπέ, τοῦτο μόνον αὐτὸ συμβήσεται τὸ
τῶν ἄνω συστελ||λομένων διαστέλλεσθαι τὰ κάτω. τοῦτο 171
δ' ὅτι, κἂν εἰς νεκροῦ τὸν στόμαχον ὕδατος ἐγχέῃς,
φαίνεται γιγνόμενον, οὐδεὶς ἀγνοεῖ. ταῖς γὰρ τῶν
ὑλῶν διὰ στενοῦ σώματος ὁδοιπορίαις ἀκόλουθον ἐστι
τὸ σύμπτωμά· θαυμαστὸν γάρ, εἰ διερχομένου τινὸς
αὐτὸν ὄγκου μὴ διασταλήσεται. οὐκοῦν τὸ μὲν τῶν ἄνω
συστελλομένων διαστέλλεσθαι τὰ κάτω κοινόν ἐστι καὶ
τοῖς νεκροῖς σώμασι, δι' ὧν ὁπωσοῦν τι διεξέρχεται,
καὶ τοῖς ζῶσιν, εἴτε περιστέλλοιτο τοῖς διερχομένοις
εἴθ' ἕλκοιτο.
Τὸ δὲ τῆς τοῦ μήκους συναιρέσεως ἴδιον τῶν τὰς
εὐθείας ἶνας ἐχόντων ὀργάνων, ἵν' ἐπισπάσωνταί τι.
ἀλλὰ μὴν ἐδείχθη κατασπώμενος ὁ στόμαχος, οὐ γὰρ ἂν
ἕιλκε τὸν λάρυγγα· δῆλον οὖν, ὡς ἡ γαστὴρ ἕλκει τὰ
σιτία διὰ τοῦ στομάχου.
Καὶ ἡ κατὰ τὸν ἔμετον δὲ τῶν ἐμουμένων ἄχρι τοῦ
στόματος φορὰ πάντως μέν που καὶ αὐτὴ τὰ μὲν ὑπὸ τῶν
ἀναφερομένων διατεινόμενα μέρη τοῦ στομάχου διεστῶτα
κέκτηται, τῶν πρόσω δ' ὁ τι ἂν ἑκάστοτ'
ἐπιλαμβάνηται, τοῦτ' ἀρχόμενον διαστέλλεται, τὸ δ'
|| ὄπισθεν καταλείπει δηλονότι συστελλόμενον, ὥσθ' 172
ὁμοίαν εἶναι πάντη τὴν διάθεσιν τοῦ στομάχου κατά γε
τοῦτο τῇ τῶν καταπινόντων· ἀλλα τῆς ὁλκῆς μὴ
παρούσης τὸ μῆκος ὅλον ἴσον ἐν τοῖς τοιούτοις
συμπτώμασι διαφυλάττεται.
Διὰ τοῦτο δὲ καὶ καταπίνειν ῥᾷον ἐστιν ἢ ἐμεῖν, ὅτι
καταπίνεται μὲν ἀμφοῖν τῆς γαστρὸς τῶν χιτώνων
ἐνεργούντων, τοῦ μὲν ἐντὸς ἕλκοντος, τοῦ δ' ἐκτὸς
περιστελλομένου τε καὶ συνεπωθοῦντος, ἐμεῖται δὲ
θατέρου μόνου τοῦ ἔξωθεν ἐνεργοῦντος, οὐδενὸς
ἕλκοντος εἰς τὸ στόμα. οὐ γὰρ δὴ ὥσπερ ἡ τῆς γαστρὸς
ὄρεξις προηγεῖτο τοῦ καταπίνειν τὰ σιτία, τὸν αὐτὸν
τρόπον κἀν τοῖς ἐμέτοις ἐπιθυμεῖ τι τῶν κατὰ τὸ
στόμα μορίων τοῦ γιγνομένου παθήματος, ἀλλ' ἄμφω τῆς
γαστρὸς αὐτῆς εἰσιν ἐναντίαι διαθέσεις, ὀρεγομένης
μὲν καὶ προσιεμένης τὰ χρήσιμά τε καὶ οἰκεῖα,
δυσχεραινούσης δὲ καὶ ἀποτριβομένης τὰ ἀλλότρια. διὸ
καὶ τὸ καταπίνειν αὐτὸ τοῖς μὲν ἱκανῶς ὀρεγομένοις
τῶν οἰκείων ἐδεσμάτων τῇ γαστρὶ τάχιστα γίγνεται,
σαφῶς ἑλκούσης αὐτὰ καὶ κατασπώσης πρὶν ἢ μασηθῆναι,
τοῖς δ' ἤτοι φάρμακόν τι κατ' ἀνάν||κην πίνουσιν ἢ 173
σιτίον ἐν χώρᾳ φαρμάκου προσφερομένοις ἀνιαρὰ καὶ
μόγις ἡ κατάποσις αὐτῶν ἐπιτελεῖται.
Δῆλος οὖν ἐστιν ἐκ τῶν είρημένων ὁ μὲν ἔνδον χιτὼν
τῆς γαστρὸς ὁ τὰς εὐθείας ἔχων ἶνας τῆς ἐκ τοῦ
στόματος εἰς αὐτὴν ὁλκῆς ἕνεκα γεγονὼς καὶ διὰ τοῦτ'
ἐν ταῖς καταπόσεσι μόναις ἐνεργῶν, ὁ δ' ἔξωθεν ὁ τὰς
ἐγκαρσίας ἔχων ἕνεκα μὲν τοῦ περιστέλλεσθαι τοῖς
ἐνυπάρχουσι καὶ προωθεῖν αὐτὰ τοιοῦτος ἀποτελεσθείς,
ἐνεργῶν δ' οὐδὲν ἧττον ἐν τοῖς ἐμέτοις ἢ ταῖς
καταπόσεσιν. ἐναργέστατα δὲ μαρτυρεῖ τῷ λεγομένῳ καὶ
τὸ κατὰ τὰς χάννας τε καὶ τοὺς συνόδοντας
γιγνόμενον· ἑυρίσκεται γὰρ ἐνίοτε τούτων ἡ γαστὴρ ἐν
τῷ στόματι καθάπερ καὶ ὁ Ἀριστοτέλης ἐν ταῖς περὶ
ζῴων ἔγραψεν ἱστορίαις καὶ προστίθησί γε τὴν αἰτίαν
ὑπὸ λαιμαργίας αὐτοῖς τοῦτο συμβαίνειν φάσκων.
Ἔχει γὰρ ὧδε· κατὰ τὰς σφοδροτέρας ὀρέξεις ἄνω
προστρέχει πᾶσι τοῖς ζῴοις ἡ γαστήρ, ὥστε τινὲς τοῦ
πάθους αἴσθησιν ἐναργῆ σχόντες ἐξέρπειν αὑτοῖς φασι
τὴν κοιλίαν, ἐνίων δὲ μασωμένων ἔτι καὶ μήπω || 174
καλῶς ἐν τῷ στόματι τὰ σιτία κατεργασαμένων
ἐξαρπάζει φανερῶς ἀκόντων. ἐφ' ὧν οὖν ζῴων φύσει
λαιμάργων ὑπαρχόντων ἥ τ' εὐρυχωρία τοῦ στόματος
ἐστι δαψιλὴς ἥ τε τῆς γαστρὸς θέσις ἐγγύς, ὡς ἐπὶ
συνόδοντός τε καὶ χάννης, οὐδὲν θαυμαστὸν, ὅταν
ἱκανῶς πεινάσαντα διώκῃ τι τῶν μικροτέρων ζῴων, εἶτ'
ἤδη πλησίον ᾖ τοῦ συλλαβεῖν, ἀνατρέχειν ἐπειγούσης
τῆς ἐπιθυμίας εἰς τὸ στόμα τὴν γαστέρα. γενέσθαι δ'
ἄλλως ἀμήχανον τοῦτο μὴ οὐχ ὥσπερ διὰ χειρὸς τοῦ
στομάχου τῆς γαστρὸς ἐπισπωμένης εἰς ἑαυτὴν τὰ
σιτία. καθάπερ γὰρ καὶ ἡμεῖς ὑπὸ προθυμίας ἐνίοτε τῇ
χειρὶ συνεπεκτείνομεν ὅλους ἡμᾶς αὐτοὺς ἕνεκα τοῦ
θᾶττον ἐπιδράξασθαι τοῦ προκειμένου σώματος, οὕτω
καὶ ἡ γαστὴρ οἷον χειρὶ τῷ στομάχῳ συνεπεκτείνεται.
καὶ διὰ τοῦτ' ἐφ' ὧν ζῴων ἅμα τὰ τρία ταυτὶ
συνέπεσεν, ἔφεσίς τε σφοδρὰ τῆς τροφῆς ὅ τε στόμαχος
μικρὸς ἥ τ' εὐρυχωρία τοῦ στόματος δαψιλής, ἐπὶ
τούτων ὀλίγη ῥοπὴ τῆς ἐπεκτάσεως εἰς τὸ στόμα τὴν
κοιλίαν ὅλην ἀναφέρει.
Ἤρκει μὲν οὖν ἴσως ἀνδρὶ φυσικῷ παρ' αὐτῆς μόνης τῆς
κατασκευῆς τῶν ὀργά||νων τὴν ἔνδειξιν τῆς ἐνεργείας 175
λαμβάνειν. οὐ γὰρ δὴ μάτην γ' ἂν ἡ φύσις ἐκ δυοῖν
χιτώνων ἐναντίως ἀλλήλοις ἐχόντων ἀπειργάσατο τὸν
οἰσοφάγον, εἰ μὴ καὶ διαφόρως ἑκάτερος αὐτῶν
ἐνεργεῖν ἔμελλεν. ἀλλ' ἐπεὶ πάντα μᾶλλον ἢ τὰ τῆς
φύσεως ἔργα διαγιγνώσκειν οἱ περὶ τὸν Ἐρασίστρατόν
εἰσιν ἱκανοί, φέρε κἀκ τῆς τῶν ζῴων ἀνατομῆς
ἐπιδείξωμεν αὐτοῖς, ὡς ἑκάτερος τῶν χιτώνων ἐνεργεῖ
τὴν εἰρημένην ἐνέργειαν. εἰ δή τι λαβὼν ζῷον, εἶτα
γυμνώσας αὐτοῦ τὰ περικείμενα τῷ στομάχῳ σώματα
χωρὶς τοῦ διατεμεῖν τινα τῶν νεύρων ἢ τῶν ἀρτηριῶν ἢ
τῶν φλεβῶν τῶν αὐτόθι τεταγμένων ἐθέλοις ἀπὸ τῆς
γένυος ἕως τοῦ θώρακος εὐθείαις τομαῖς διελεῖν τὸν
ἔξω χιτῶνα τὸν τὰς ἐγκαρσίας ἶνας ἔχοντα κἄπειτα τῷ
ζῴῳ τροφὴν προσενέγκοις, ὄψει καταπῖνον αὐτὸ καίτοι
τῆς περισταλτικῆς ἐνεργείας ἀπολωλυίας. εἰ δ' αὖ
πάλιν ἐφ' ἑτέρου ζῴου διατέμοις ἀμφοτέρους τοὺς
χιτῶνας τομαῖς ἐγκαρσίαις, θεάσῃ καὶ τοῦτο καταπῖνον
οὐκέτ' ἐνεργοῦντος τοῦ ἐντὸς. ᾧ δῆλον, ὅτι καὶ διὰ
θατέρου μὲν αὐτῶν καταπίνειν οἷόν τ' ἐστίν, || ἀλλὰ 176
χεῖρον ἢ δι' ἀμφοτέρων. πρὸς γὰρ αὖ τοῖς ἄλλοις καὶ
τοῦτ' ἔστι θεάσασθαι σαφῶς ἐπὶ τῆς εἰρημένης
ἀνατομῆς, ὡς ἐν τῷ καταπίνειν ὑποπίμπλαται πνεύματος
ὁ στόμαχος τοῦ συγκαταπινομένου τοῖς σιτίοις, ὃ
περιστελλομένου μὲν τοῦ ἔξωθεν χιτῶνος ὠθεῖται
ῥᾳδίως εἰς τὴν γαστέρα σὺν τοῖς ἐδέσμασι, μόνου δὲ
τοῦ ἔνδον ὑπάρχοντος ἐμποδὼν ἵσταται τῇ φορᾷ τῶν
σιτίων διατεῖνον τ' αὐτὸν καὶ τὴν ἐνέργειαν
ἐμποδίζον.
Ἀλλ' οὔτε τούτων οὐδὲν Ἐρασίστρατος εἶπεν ὄυθ' ὡς ἡ
σκολιὰ θέσις τοῦ στομάχου διαβάλλει σαφῶς τὸ δόγμα
τῶν νομιζόντων ὑπὸ τῆς ἄνωθεν βολῆς μόνης
ποδηγούμενα μέχρι τῆς γαστρὸς ἰέναι τὰ καταπινόμενα.
μόνον δ' ὅτι πολλὰ τῶν μακροτραχήλων ζῴων
ἐπικεκυφότα καταπίνει, καλῶς εἶπεν. ᾧ δῆλον, ὅτι τὸ
φαινόμενον οὐ τὸ πῶς καταπίνομεν ἀποδείκνυσιν, ἀλλὰ
τὸ πῶς οὐ καταπίνομεν· ὅτι γὰρ μὴ διὰ μόνης τῆς
ἄνωθεν βολῆς, ἐκ τούτου δῆλον· οὐ μὴν εἴθ' ἑλκούσης
τῆς κοιλίας ἔιτε παράγοντος αὐτὰ τοῦ στομάχου, δῆλον
ἤδη πω. ἀλλ' ἡμεῖς γε || πάντας τοὺς λογισμοὺς 177
εἰπόντες τούς τ' ἐκ τῆς κατασκευῆς τῶν ὀργάνων
ὁρμωμένους καὶ τοὺς ἀπὸ τῶν ἄλλων συμπτωμάτων τῶν τε
πρὸ τοῦ γυμνωθῆναι τὸν στόμαχον καὶ γυμνωθέντος, ὡς
ὀλίγῳ πρόσθεν ἐλέγομεν, ἱκανῶς ἐνεδειξάμεθα τοῦ μὲν
ἕλκειν ἕνεκα τὸν ἐντὸς χιτῶνα, τοῦ δ' ἀπωθεῖν τὸν
ἐκτὸς γεγονέναι.
Προὐθέμεθα μὲν οὖν ἀποδεῖξαι τὴν καθεκτικὴν δύναμιν
ἐν ἑκάστῳ τῶν ὀργάνων οὖσαν, ὥσπερ ἐν τῷ πρόσθεν
λόγῳ τὴν ἑλκτικήν τε καὶ προσέτι τὴν ἀλλοιωτικήν.
ὑπὸ δὲ τῆς ἀκολουθίας τοῦ λόγου τὰς τέτταρας
ἀπεδείξαμεν ὑπαρχούσας τῇ γαστρὶ, τὴν ἑλκτικὴν μὲν
ἐν τῷ καταπίνειν, τὴν καθεκτικὴν δ' ἐν τῷ πέττειν,
τὴν ἀπωστικὴν δ' ἐν τοῖς ἐμέτοις καὶ ταῖς τῶν
πεπεμμένων σιτίων εἰς τὸ λεπτὸν ἔντερον
ὑποχωρήσεσιν, αὐτὴν δὲ τὴν πέψιν ἀλλοίωσιν ὑπάρχειν.
IX
Concerning the spleen, also, we shall therefore have no further
doubts[352] as to whether it attracts what is proper to it, rejects
what is foreign, and has a natural power of altering and retaining all
that it attracts; nor shall we be in any doubt as to the liver, veins,
arteries, heart, or any other organ. For these four faculties have
been shown to be necessary for every part which is to be nourished;
this is why we have called these faculties the _handmaids of
nutrition_. For just as human faeces are most pleasing to dogs, so the
residual matters from the liver are, some of them, proper to the
spleen,[353] others to the gall-bladder, and others to the kidneys.
IX
Οὔκουν ἔτ' ἀπορήσομεν οὐδὲ περὶ τοῦ σπληνός, εἰ
ἕλκει μὲν τὸ οἰκεῖον, ἀποκρίνει δὲ τὸ ἀλλότριον,
ἀλλοιοῦν δὲ καὶ κατέχειν, ὅσον ἂν ἐπισπάσηται,
πέφυκεν, οὐδὲ περὶ ἥπατος ἢ φλεβός ἢ ἀρτηρίας ἢ
καρδίας ἢ τῶν || ἄλλων τινός· ἀνανκαῖαι γὰρ 178
ἐδείχθησαν αἱ τέτταρες αὗται δυνάμεις ἅπαντι μορίῳ
τῷ μέλλοντι θρέψεσθαι καὶ διὰ τοῦτ' αὐτὰς ὑπηρέτιδας
εἶναι θρέψεως ἔφαμεν· ὡς γὰρ τὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπων
ἀποπάτημα τοῖς κυσὶν ἥδιστον, οὕτω καὶ τὰ τοῦ ἥπατος
περιττώματα τὸ μὲν τῷ σπληνί, τὸ δὲ τῇ χοληδόχῳ
κύστει, τὸ δὲ τοῖς νεφροῖς οἰκεῖόν.
X
I should not have cared to say anything further as to the origin of
these [surplus substances] after Hippocrates, Plato, Aristotle,
Diocles, Praxagoras, and Philotimus, nor indeed should I even have
said anything about the _faculties_, if any of our predecessors had
worked out this subject thoroughly.
While, however, the statements which the Ancients made on these points
were correct, they yet omitted to defend their arguments with logical
proofs; of course they never suspected that there could be sophists so
shameless as to try to contradict obvious facts. More recent
physicians, again, have been partly conquered by the sophistries of
these fellows and have given credence to them; whilst others who
attempted to argue with them appear to me to lack to a great extent
the power of the Ancients. For this reason I have attempted to put
together my arguments in the way in which it seems to me the Ancients,
had any of them been still alive, would have done, in opposition to
those who would overturn the finest doctrines of our art.
I am not, however, unaware that I shall achieve either nothing at all
or else very little. For I find that a great many things which have
been conclusively demonstrated by the Ancients are unintelligible to
the bulk of the Moderns owing to their ignorance—nay, that, by reason
of their laziness, they will not even make an attempt to comprehend
them; and even if any of them have understood them, they have not
given them impartial examination.
The fact is that he whose purpose is to know anything better than the
multitude do must far surpass all others both as regards his nature
and his early training. And when he reaches early adolescence he must
become possessed with an ardent love for truth, like one inspired;
neither day nor night may he cease to urge and strain himself in order
to learn thoroughly all that has been said by the most illustrious of
the Ancients. And when he has learnt this, then for a prolonged period
he must test and prove it, observing what part of it is in agreement,
and what in disagreement with obvious fact; thus he will choose this
and turn away from that. To such an one my hope has been that my
treatise would prove of the very greatest assistance.... Still, such
people may be expected to be quite few in number, while, as for the
others, this book will be as superfluous to them as a tale told to an
ass.
X
Καὶ λέγειν ἔτι περὶ τῆς τούτων γενέσεως οὐκ ἂν
ἐθέλοιμι μεθ' Ἱπποκράτην καὶ Πλάτωνα καὶ Ἀριστοτέλην
καὶ Διοκλέα καὶ Πραξαγόραν καὶ Φιλότιμον· οὐδὲ γὰρ
οὐδὲ περὶ τῶν δυνάμεων εἶπον ἄν, εἴ τις τῶν
ἔμπροσθεν ἀκριβῶς ἐξειργάσατο τὸν ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν λόγον.
Ἐπει δ' οἱ μὲν παλαιοὶ καλῶς ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν ἀποφηνάμενοι
παρέλιπον ἀγωνίσασθαι τῷ λόγῳ, μηδ' ὑπονοήσαντες
ἔσεσθαί τινας εἰς τοσοῦτον ἀναισχύντους σοφιστάς, ὡς
ἀντιλέγειν ἐπιχειρῆσαι τοῖς ἐναργέσιν, οἱ νεώτεροι
δὲ τὸ μὲν τι νικηθέντες ὑπὸ τῶν σοφισμάτων
ἐπείσθησαν αὐτοῖς, τὸ δὲ τι καὶ ἀντιλέγειν
ἐπιχειρήσαντες ἀποδεῖν μοι πολὺ τῆς τῶν παλαιῶν
ἔδοξαν δυνάμεως, || διὰ τοῦθ', ὡς ἂν ἐκείνων αὐτῶν, 179
εἴπερ ἔτ' ἦν τις, ἀγωνίσασθαί μοι δοκεῖ πρὸς τοὺς
ἀνατρέποντας τῆς τέχνης τὰ κάλλιστα, καὶ αὐτὸς οὕτως
ἐπειράθην συνθεῖναι τοὺς λόγους.
Ὅτι δ' ἢ οὐδὲν ἢ παντάπασιν ἀνύσω τι σμικρὸν, οὐκ
ἀγνοῶ· πάμπολλα γὰρ εὑρίσκω τελέως μὲν ἀποδεδειγμένα
τοῖς παλαιοῖς, οὔτε δὲ συνετὰ τοῖς πολλοῖς τῶν νῦν
δι' ἀμαθίαν ἀλλ' οὐδ' ἐπιχειρούμενα γιγνώσκεσθαι διὰ
ῥᾳθυμίαν, οὔτ', εἰ καὶ γνωσθείη τινί, δικαίως
ἐξεταζόμενα.
Χρὴ γὰρ τὸν μέλλοντα γνώσεσθαί τι τῶν πολλῶν ἄμεινον
εὐθὺς μὲν καὶ τῇ φύσει καὶ τῇ πρώτη διδασκαλίᾳ πολὺ
τῶν ἄλλων διενεγκεῖν· ἐπειδὰν δὲ γένηται μειράκιον,
ἀληθείας τινὰ σχεῖν ἐρωτικὴν μανίαν, ὥσπερ
ἐνθουσιῶντα καὶ μήθ' ἡμέρας μήτε νυκτὸς διαλείπειν
σπεύδοντά τε καὶ συντεταμένον ἐκμαθεῖν, ὅσα τοῖς
ἐνδοξοτάτοις εἴρηται τῶν παλαιῶν· ἐπειδὰν δ' ἐκμάθῃ,
κρίνειν αὐτὰ καὶ βασανίζειν χρόνῳ παμπόλλῳ καὶ
σκοπεῖν, πόσα μὲν ὁμολογεῖ τοῖς ἐναργῶς φαινομένοις,
πόσα δὲ διαφέρεται, || καὶ οὕτω τὰ μὲν αἱρεῖσθαι, τὰ 180
δ' ἀποστρέφεσθαι. τῷ μὲν δὴ τοιούτῳ πάνυ σφόδρα
χρησίμους ἤλπικα τοὺς ἡμετέρους ἔσεσθαι λόγους· εἶεν
δ' ἂν ὀλίγοι παντάπασιν οὗτοι· τοῖς δ' ἄλλοις οὕτω
γενήσεται τὸ γράμμα περιττὸν, ὡς εἰ καὶ μῦθον ὄνῳ
τις λέγοι.
XI
For the sake, then, of those who are aiming at truth, we must complete
this treatise by adding what is still wanting in it. Now, in people
who are very hungry, the stomach obviously attracts or draws down the
food before it has been thoroughly softened in the mouth, whilst in
those who have no appetite or who are being forced to eat, the stomach
is displeased and rejects the food.[354] And in a similar way each of
the other organs possesses both faculties—that of attracting what is
proper to it, and that of rejecting what is foreign. Thus, even if
there be any organ which consists of only one coat (such as the two
bladders,[355] the uterus, and the veins), it yet possesses both kinds
of fibres, the longitudinal and the transverse.
But further, there are fibres of a third kind—the _oblique_—which
are much fewer in number than the two kinds already spoken of. In the
organs consisting of two coats this kind of fibre is found in the one
coat only, mixed with the longitudinal fibres; but in the organs
composed of one coat it is found along with the other two kinds. Now,
these are of the greatest help to the action of the faculty which we
have named _retentive_. For during this period the part needs to be
tightly contracted and stretched over its contents at every point—the
stomach during the whole period of digestion,[356] and the uterus
during that of gestation.
Thus too, the coat of a vein, being single, consists of various kinds
of fibres; whilst the outer coat of an artery consists of circular
fibres, and its inner coat mostly of longitudinal fibres, but with a
few oblique ones also amongst them. Veins thus resemble the uterus or
the bladder as regards the arrangement of their fibres, even though
they are deficient in thickness; similarly arteries resemble the
stomach. Alone of all organs the intestines consist of two coats of
which both have their fibres transverse.[357] Now the proof that it
was _for the best_ that all the organs should be naturally such as
they are (that, for instance, the intestines should be composed of two
coats) belongs to the subject of the _use of parts_[358]; thus we must
not now desire to hear about matters of this kind nor why the
anatomists are at variance regarding the number of coats in each
organ. For these questions have been sufficiently discussed in the
treatise “On Disagreement in Anatomy.” And the problem as to why each
organ has such and such a character will be discussed in the treatise
“On the Use of Parts.”
XI
Συμπεραντέον οὖν ἡμῖν τὸν λόγον ἕνεκα τῶν τῆς
ἀληθείας ἐφιεμένων ὅσα λείπει κατ' αὐτὸν ἔτι
προσθεῖσιν. ὡς γὰρ ἡ γαστὴρ ἕλκει μὲν ἐναργῶς καὶ
κατασπᾷ τὰ σιτία τοῖς σφόδρα πεινώδεσι, πρὶν ἀκριβῶς
ἐν τῷ στόματι λειωθῆναι, δυσχεραίνει δὲ καὶ
ἀπωθεῖται τοῖς ἀποσίτοις τε καὶ πρὸς ἀνάγκην
ἐσθίουσιν, οὕτω καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ὀργάνων ἕκαστον
ἀμφοτέρας ἔχει τὰς δυνάμεις, τήν τε τῶν οἰκείων
ἑλκτικὴν καὶ τὴν τῶν ἀλλοτρίων ἀποκριτικήν. καὶ διὰ
τοῦτο, κἂν ἐξ ἑνὸς ᾖ χιτῶνος ὄργανον τι συνεστώς,
ὥσπερ καὶ αἱ κύστεις ἀμφότεραι καὶ αἱ μῆτραι καὶ αἱ
φλέβες, ἀμφότερα τῶν ἰνῶν ἔχει τὰ γένη, τῶν εὐθειῶν
τε καὶ τῶν ἐγκαρσίων.
Καὶ μὲν γε καὶ τρίτον τι || γένος ἰνῶν ἐστι <τῶν> 181
λοξῶν, ἔλαττον πολὺ τῷ πλήθει τῶν προειρημένων δύο
γενῶν. εὑρίσκεται δ' ἐν μὲν τοῖς ἐκ δυοῖν χιτώνων
συνεστηκόσιν ὀργάνοις ἐν θατέρῳ μόνῳ ταῖς εὐθείαις
ἰσὶν ἀναμεμιγμένον, ἐν δὲ τοῖς ἐξ ἑνὸς ἅμα τοῖς
ἄλλοις δύο γένεσι. συνεπιλαμβάνουσι δ' αὗται
μέγιστον τῇ τῆς καθεκτικῆς ὀνομασθείσης δυνάμεως
ἐνεργείᾳ· δεῖται γὰρ ἐν τούτῳ τῷ χρόνῳ πανταχόθεν
ἐσφίγχθαι καὶ περιτετάσθαι τοῖς ἐνυπάρχουσι τὸ
μόριον, ἡ μὲν γαστήρ ἐν τῷ τῆς πέψεως, αἱ μῆτραι δ'
ἐν τῷ τῆς κυήσεως χρόνῳ παντί.
Ταῦτ' ἄρα καὶ ὁ τῆς φλεβός χιτὼν εἷς ὢν ἐκ πολυειδῶν
ἰνῶν ἐγένετο καὶ τῶν τῆς ἀρτηρίας ὁ μὲν ἔξωθεν ἐκ
τῶν στρογγύλων, ὁ δ' ἔσωθεν ἐκ μὲν τῶν εὐθειῶν
πλείστων, ὀλίγων δέ τινων σὺν αὐταῖς καὶ τῶν λοξῶν,
ὥστε τὰς μὲν φλέβας ταῖς μήτραις καὶ ταῖς κύστεσιν
ἐοικέναι κατά γε τὴν τῶν ἰνῶν σύνθεσιν, εἰ καὶ τῷ
πάχει λείπονται, τὰς δ' ἀρτηρίας τῇ γαστρί. μόνα δὲ
πάντων ὀργάνων ἐκ δυοῖν θ' ἅμα καὶ ἀμφοτέρων
ἐγκαρσίας ἐχόντων τὰς ἶνας ἐγένετο τὰ ἔντερα. τὸ δ'
ὅτι βέλτιον ἦν || τῶν τ' ἄλλων ἑκαστῳ τοιούτῳ τὴν 182
φύσιν ὑπάρχειν, οἷόνπερ καὶ νῦν ἐστι, τοῖς τ'
ἐντέροις ἐκ δυοῖν ὁμοίων χιτώνων συγκεῖσθαι, τῆς
περὶ χρείας μορίων πραγματείας ἐστίν. οὔκουν νῦν χρὴ
ποθεῖν ἀκούειν περὶ τῶν τοιούτων, ὥσπερ οὐδὲ διὰ τί
περὶ τοῦ πλήθους τῶν χιτώνων ἑκάστου τῶν ὀργάνων
διαπεφώνηται τοῖς ἀνατομικοῖς ἀνδράσιν. ὑπὲρ μὲν γὰρ
τούτων αὺτάρκως ἐν τοῖς περὶ τῆς ἀνατομικῆς
διαφωνίας εἴρηται· περὶ δὲ τοῦ διότι τοιοῦτον
ἕκαστον ἐγένετο τῶν ὀργάνων, ἐν τοῖς περὶ χρείας
μορίων εἰρήσεται.
XII
It is not, however, our business to discuss either of these questions
here, but to consider duly the _natural faculties_, which, to the
number of four, exist in each organ. Returning then, to this point,
let us recall what has already been said, and set a crown to the whole
subject by adding what is still wanting. For when every part of the
animal has been shewn to draw into itself the juice which is proper to
it (this being practically _the first of the natural faculties_), the
next point to realise is that the part does not get rid either of this
attracted nutriment as a whole, or even of any superfluous portion of
it, until either the organ itself, or the major part of its contents
also have their condition reversed. Thus, when the stomach is
sufficiently filled with the food and has absorbed and stored away the
most useful part of it in its own coats, it then rejects the rest like
an alien burden. The same happens to the bladders, when the matter
attracted into them begins to give trouble either because it distends
them through its quantity or irritates them by its quality.
And this also happens in the case of the uterus; for it is either
because it can no longer bear to be stretched that it strives to
relieve itself of its annoyance, or else because it is irritated by
the quality of the fluids poured out into it. Now both of these
conditions sometimes occur with actual violence, and then
_miscarriage_ takes place. But for the most part they happen in a
normal way, this being then called not miscarriage but _delivery_ or
_parturition_. Now abortifacient drugs or certain other conditions
which destroy the embryo or rupture certain of its membranes are
followed by abortion, and similarly also when the uterus is in pain
from being in a bad state of tension; and, as has been well said by
Hippocrates, excessive movement on the part of the embryo itself
brings on labour. Now _pain_ is common to all these conditions, and of
this there are three possible causes—either excessive bulk, or
weight, or irritation; bulk when the uterus can no longer support the
stretching, weight when the contents surpass its strength, and
irritation when the fluids which had previously been pent up in the
membranes, flow out, on the rapture of these, into the uterus itself,
or else when the whole foetus perishes, putrefies, and is resolved
into pernicious ichors, and so irritates and bites the coat of the
uterus.
In all organs, then, both their natural effects and their disorders
and maladies plainly take place on analogous lines,[359] some so
clearly and manifestly as to need no demonstration, and others less
plainly, although not entirely unrecognizable to those who are willing
to pay attention.
Thus, to take the case of the stomach: the irritation is evident here
because this organ possesses most sensibility, and among its other
affections those producing nausea and the so-called heartburn clearly
demonstrate the eliminative faculty which expels foreign matter. So
also in the case of the uterus and the urinary bladder; this latter
also may be plainly observed to receive and accumulate fluid until it
is so stretched by the amount of this as to be incapable of enduring
the pain; or it may be the quality of the urine which irritates it;
for every superfluous substance which lingers in the body must
obviously putrefy, some in a shorter, and some in a longer time, and
thus it becomes pungent, acrid, and burdensome to the organ which
contains it. This does not apply, however, in the case of the bladder
alongside the liver, whence it is clear that it possesses fewer nerves
than do the other organs. Here too, however, at least the
physiologist[360] must discover an analogy. For since it was shown
that the gall-bladder attracts its own special juice, so as to be
often found full, and that it discharges it soon after, this desire to
discharge must be either due to the fact that it is burdened by the
quantity or that the bile has changed in quality to pungent and acrid.
For while food does not change its original quality so fast that it is
already ordure as soon as it falls into the small intestine, on the
other hand the bile even more readily than the urine becomes altered
in quality as soon as ever it leaves the veins, and rapidly undergoes
change and putrefaction. Now, if there be clear evidence in relation
to the uterus, stomach, and intestines, as well as to the urinary
bladder, that there is either some distention, irritation, or burden
inciting each of these organs to elimination, there is no difficulty
in imagining this in the case of the gall-bladder also, as well as in
the other organs,—to which obviously the arteries and veins also
belong.
XII
Νυνὶ δ' οὐδέτερον τούτων πρόκειται λέγειν, ἀλλα τὰς
φυσικὰς δυνάμεις μόνας ἀποδεικνύειν ἐν ἑκάστῳ τῶν
ὀργάνων τέτταρας ὑπαρχούσας. ἐπὶ τοῦτ' οὖν πάλιν
ἐπανελθόντες ἀναμνήσωμέν τε τῶν ἔμπροσθεν εἰρημένων
ἐπιθῶμέν τε κεφαλὴν ἤδη τῷ λόγῳ παντὶ τὸ λεῖπον ἔτι
προσθέντες. ἐπειδὴ γὰρ ἕκαστον τῶν ἐν τῷ ζῴῳ μορίων
ἕλκειν εἰς ἑαυτὸ τὸν οἰκεῖον χυμὸν ἀποδέδεικται καὶ
πρώτη σχεδὸν αὕτη τῶν φυσικῶν ἐστι δυνάμεων, ἐφεξῆς
|| ἐκείνῳ γνωστέον, ὡς οὐ πρότερον ἀποτρίβεται τὴν 183
ἑλχθεῖσαν <τροφὴν> ἤτοι σύμπασαν ἢ καί τι περίττωμα
αὐτῆς, πρὶν ἂν εἰς ἐναντίαν μεταπέσῃ διάθεσιν ἢ αὐτὸ
τὸ ὄργανον ἢ καὶ τῶν περιεχομένων ἐν αὐτῷ τὰ
πλεῖστα. ἡ μὲν οὖν γαστήρ, ἐπειδὰν μὲν ἱκανῶς
ἐμπλησθῇ τῶν σιτίων καὶ τὸ χρηστότατον αὐτῶν εἰς
τοὺς ἑαυτῆς χιτῶνας ἐναπόθηται βδάλλουσα, τηνικαῦτ'
ἤδη τὸ λοιπὸν ἀποτρίβεται καθάπερ ἄχθος ἀλλότριον·
αἱ κύστεις δ', ἐπειδὰν ἕκαστον τῶν ἑλχθέντων ἢ τῷ
πλήθει διατεῖνον ἢ τῇ ποιότητι δάκνον ἀνιαρὸν
γένηται.
Τῷ δ' αὐτῷ τρόπῳ καὶ αἱ μῆτραι· ἤτοι γάρ, ἐπειδὰν
μηκέτι φέρωσι διατεινόμεναι, τὸ λυποῦν ἀποθέσθαι
σπεύδουσιν ἢ τῇ ποιότητι δακνόμεναι τῶν ἐκχυθέντων
εἰς αὐτὰς ὑγρῶν. ἑκάτερόν δὲ τῶν εἰρημένων γίγνεται
μὲν καὶ βιαίως ἔστιν ὅτε καὶ ἀμβλώσκουσι τηνικαῦτα,
γίγνεται δ' ὡς τὰ πολλὰ καὶ προσηκόντως, ὅπερ οὐκ
ἀμβλώσκειν ἀλλ' ἀποκυΐσκειν τε καὶ τίκτειν
ὀνομάζεται. τοῖς μὲν οὖν ἀμβλωθριδίοις φαρμάκοις ἤ
τισιν ἄλλοις παθήμασι διαφθεί||ρουσι τὸ ἔμβρυον ἤ 184
τινας τῶν ὑμένων αὐτοῦ ῥηγνύουσιν αἱ ἀμβλώσεις
ἕπονται, οὕτω δὲ κἀπειδὰν ἀνιαθῶσί ποθ' αἱ μῆτραι
κακῶς ἔχουσαι τῇ διατάσει, ταῖς δὲ τῶν ἐμβρύων αὐτῶν
κινήσεσι ταῖς σφοδροτάταις οἱ τόκοι, καθάπερ καὶ
τοῦθ' Ἱπποκράτει καλῶς εἴρηται. κοινὸν δ' ἁπασῶν τῶν
διαθέσεων ἡ ἀνία καὶ ταύτης αἴτιον τριττὸν ἢ ὄγκος
περιττὸς ἤ τι βάρος ἢ δῆξις· ὄγκος μὲν, ἐπειδὰν
μηκέτι φέρωσι διατεινόμεναι, βάρος δ', ἐπειδὰν ὑπὲρ
τὴν ῥώμην αὐτῶν ᾖ τὸ περιεχόμενον, δῆξις δ', ἐπειδὰν
ἤτοι τὰ πρότερον ἐν τοῖς ὑμέσιν ὑγρὰ στεγόμενα
ῥαγέντων αὐτῶν εἰς αὐτὰς ἐκχυθῇ τὰς μήτρας ἢ καὶ
σύμπαν ἀποφθαρὲν τὸ κύημα σηπόμενόν τε καὶ
διαλυόμενον εἰς μοχθηροὺς ἰχῶρας οὕτως ἐρεθίζῃ τε
καὶ δάκνῃ τὸν χιτῶνα τῶν ὑστερῶν.
Ἀνάλογον οὖν ἐν ἅπασι τοῖς ὀργάνοις ἕκαστα τῶν τ'
ἔργων αὐτῶν τῶν φυσικῶν καὶ μέντοι τῶν παθημάτων τε
καὶ νοσημάτων φαίνεται γιγνόμενα, τὰ μὲν ἐναργῶς καὶ
σαφῶς οὕτως, ὡς ἀποδείξεως δεῖσθαι μηδέν, τὰ δ'
ἧττον μὲν ἐναργῶς, οὐ μὴν ἄγνωστα γε παντάπασι τοῖς
|| ἐθέλουσι προσέχειν τὸν νοῦν. 185
Ἐπὶ μὲν οὖν τῆς γαστρὸς αἵ τε δήξεις ἐναργεῖς, διότι
πλείστης αἰσθήσεως μετέχει, τά τ' ἄλλα παθήματα τά
τε ναυτίαν ἐμποιοῦντα καὶ οἱ καλούμενοι καρδιωγμοὶ
σαφῶς ἐνδείκνυνται τὴν ἀποκριτικήν τε καὶ ἀπωστικὴν
τῶν ἀλλοτρίων δύναμιν, οὕτω δὲ κἀπὶ τῶν ὑστερῶν τε
καὶ τῆς κύστεως τῆς τὸ οὖρον ὑποδεχομένης· ἐναργῶς
γὰρ οὖν καὶ αὕτη φαίνεται μέχρι τοσούτου τὸ ὑγρόν
ὑποδεχομένη τε καὶ ἀθροίζουσα, ἄχρις ἂν ἤτοι πρὸς
τοῦ πλήθους αὐτοῦ διατεινομένη μηκέτι φέρῃ τὴν ἀνίαν
ἢ πρὸς τῆς ποιότητος δακνομένη· χρονίζον γὰρ ἕκαστον
τῶν περιττωμάτων ἐν τῷ σώματι σήπεται δηλονότι, τὸ
μὲν ἐλάττονι, τὸ δὲ πλείονι χρόνῳ, καὶ οὕτω δακνῶδές
τε καὶ δριμὺ καὶ ἀνιαρὸν τοῖς περιέχουσι γίγνεται.
οὐ μὴν ἐπὶ γε τῆς ἐπὶ τῷ ἥπατι κύστεως ὁμοίως ἔχει·
ᾧ δῆλον, ὅτι νεύρων ἥκιστα μετέχει. χρὴ δὲ κἀνταῦθα
τὸν γε φυσικὸν ἄνδρα τὸ ἀνάλογον ἐξευρίσκειν. εἰ γὰρ
ἕλκειν τε τὸν οἰκεῖον ἀπεδείχθη χυμόν, ὡς φαίνεσθαι
πολλάκις μεστήν, ἀποκρί||νειν τε τὸν αὐτὸν τούτον 186
οὐκ εἰς μακράν, ἀναγκαῖόν ἐστιν αὐτὴν ἢ διὰ τὸ
πλῆθος βαρυνομένην ἢ τῆς ποιότητος μεταβαλλούσης ἐπὶ
τὸ δακνῶδές τε καὶ δριμὺ τῆς ἀποκρίσεως ἐφίεσθαι. οὐ
γὰρ δὴ τὰ μὲν σιτία τὴν ἀρχαίαν ὑπαλλάττει ποιότητα
ταχέως οὕτως, ὥστ', ἐπειδὰν ἐμπέσῃ τοῖς λεπτοῖς
ἐντέροις, εὐθὺς εἶναι κόπρον, ἡ χολὴ δ' οὐ πολὺ
μᾶλλον ἢ τὸ οὖρον, ἐπειδὰν ἅπαξ ἐκπέσῃ τῶν φλεβῶν,
ἐξαλλάττει τὴν ποιότητα, τάχιστα μεταβάλλοντα καὶ
σηπόμενα. καὶ μὴν εἴπερ ἐπί τε τῶν κατὰ τὰς ὑστέρας
καὶ τὴν κοιλίαν καὶ τὰ ἔντερα καὶ προσέτι τὴν τὸ
οὖρον ὑποδεχομένην κύστιν ἐναργῶς φαίνεται διάτασίς
τις ἢ δῆξις ἢ ἄχθος ἐπεγεῖρον ἕκαστον τῶν ὀργάνων
εἰς ἀπόκρισιν, οὐδὲν χαλεπὸν κἀπὶ τῆς χοληδόχου
κύστεως ταὐτὸ τοῦτ' ἐννοεῖν ἐπὶ τε τῶν ἄλλων ἁπάντων
ὀργάνων, ἐξ ὧν δηλονότι καὶ αἱ ἀρτηρίαι καὶ αἱ
φλέβες εἰσίν.
XIII
Nor is there any further difficulty in ascertaining that it is through
the same channel that both attraction and discharge take place at
different times. For obviously the inlet to the stomach does not
merely conduct food and drink into this organ, but in the condition of
nausea it performs the opposite service. Further, the neck of the
bladder which is beside the liver, albeit single, both fills and
empties the bladder. Similarly the canal of the uterus affords an
entrance to the semen and an exit to the foetus.
But in this latter case, again, whilst the eliminative faculty is
evident, the attractive faculty is not so obvious to most people. It
is, however, the cervix which Hippocrates blames for inertia of the
uterus when he says:—“Its orifice has no power of attracting
semen.”[361]
Erasistratus, however, and Asclepiades reached such heights of wisdom
that they deprived not merely the stomach and the womb of this faculty
but also the bladder by the liver, and the kidneys as well. I have,
however, pointed out in the first book that it is impossible to assign
any other cause for the secretion of urine or bile.[362]
Now, when we find that the uterus, the stomach and the bladder by the
liver carry out attraction and expulsion through one and the same
duct, we need no longer feel surprised that Nature should also
frequently discharge waste-substances into the stomach through the
veins. Still less need we be astonished if a certain amount of the
food should, during long fasts, be drawn back from the liver into the
stomach through the same veins[363] by which it was yielded up to the
liver during absorption of nutriment.[364] To disbelieve such things
would of course be like refusing to believe that purgative drugs draw
their appropriate humours from all over the body by the same stomata
through which absorption previously takes place, and to look for
separate stomata for absorption and purgation respectively. As a
matter of fact one and the same stoma subserves two distinct
faculties, and these exercise their pull at different times in
opposite directions—first it subserves the pull of the liver and,
during catharsis, that of the drug. What is there surprising, then, in
the fact that the veins situated between the liver and the region of
the stomach[365] fulfil a double service or purpose? Thus, when there
is abundance of nutriment contained in the food-canal, it is carried
up to the liver by the veins mentioned; and when the canal is empty
and in need of nutriment, this is again attracted from the liver by
the same veins.
For everything appears to attract from and to go shares with
everything else, and, as the most divine Hippocrates has said, there
would seem to be a consensus in the movements of fluids and
vapours.[366] Thus the stronger draws and the weaker is evacuated.
Now, one part is weaker or stronger than another either absolutely, by
nature, and in all cases, or else it becomes so in such and such a
particular instance. Thus, by nature and in all men alike, the heart
is stronger than the liver at attracting what is serviceable to it and
rejecting what is not so; similarly the liver is stronger than the
intestines and stomach, and the arteries than the veins. In each of us
personally, however, the liver has stronger drawing power at one time,
and the stomach at another. For when there is much nutriment contained
in the alimentary canal and the appetite and craving of the liver is
violent, then the viscus[367] exerts far the strongest traction.
Again, when the liver is full and distended and the stomach empty and
in need, then the force of the traction shifts to the latter.
Suppose we had some food in our hands and were snatching it from one
another; if we were equally in want, the stronger would be likely to
prevail, but if he had satisfied his appetite, and was holding what
was over carelessly, or was anxious to share it with somebody, and if
the weaker was excessively desirous of it, there would be nothing to
prevent the latter from getting it all. In a similar manner the
stomach easily attracts nutriment from the liver when it [the stomach]
has a sufficiently strong craving for it, and the appetite of the
viscus is satisfied. And sometimes the surplusage of nutriment in the
liver is a reason why the animal is not hungry; for when the stomach
has better and more available food it requires nothing from extraneous
sources, but if ever it is in need and is at a loss how to supply the
need, it becomes filled with waste-matters; these are certain biliary,
phlegmatic [mucous] and serous fluids, and are the only substances
that the liver yields in response to the traction of the stomach, on
the occasions when the latter too is in want of nutriment.
Now, just as the parts draw food from each other, so also they
sometimes deposit their excess substances in each other, and just as
the stronger prevailed when the two were exercising traction, so it is
also when they are depositing; this is the cause of the so-called
fluxions,[368] for every part has a definite inborn tension, by virtue
of which it expels its superfluities, and, therefore, when one of
these parts,—owing, of course, to some special condition—becomes
weaker, there will necessarily be a confluence into it of the
superfluities from all the other parts. The strongest part deposits
its surplus matter in all the parts near it; these again in other
parts which are weaker; these next into yet others; and this goes on
for a long time, until the superfluity, being driven from one part
into another, comes to rest in one of the weakest of all; it cannot
flow from this into another part, because none of the stronger ones
will receive it, while the affected part is unable to drive it away.
When, however, we come to deal again with the origin and cure of
disease, it will be possible to find there also abundant proofs of all
that we have correctly indicated in this book. For the present,
however, let us resume again the task that lay before us, _i.e._ to
show that there is nothing surprising in nutriment coming from the
liver to the intestines and stomach by way of the very veins through
which it had previously been yielded up from these organs into the
liver. And in many people who have suddenly and completely given up
active exercise, or who have had a limb cut off, there occurs at
certain periods an evacuation of blood by way of the intestines—as
Hippocrates has also pointed out somewhere. This causes no further
trouble but sharply purges the whole body and evacuates the plethoras;
the passage of the superfluities is effected, of course, through the
same veins by which absorption took place.
Frequently also in disease Nature purges the animal through these same
veins—although in this case the discharge is not sanguineous, but
corresponds to the humour which is at fault. Thus in _cholera_ the
entire body is evacuated by way of the veins leading to the intestines
and stomach.
To imagine that matter of different kinds is carried in one direction
only would characterise a man who was entirely ignorant of all the
natural faculties, and particularly of the eliminative faculty, which
is the opposite of the attractive. For opposite movements of matter,
active and passive, must necessarily follow opposite faculties; that
is to say, every part, after it has attracted its special nutrient
juice and has retained and taken the benefit of it hastens to get rid
of all the surplusage as quickly and effectively as possible, and this
it does in accordance with the mechanical tendency of this surplus
matter.[369]
Hence the stomach clears away by vomiting those superfluities which
come to the surface of its contents,[370] whilst the sediment it
clears away by diarrhœa. And when the animal becomes sick, this means
that the stomach is striving to be evacuated by vomiting. And the
expulsive faculty has in it so violent and forcible an element that in
cases of _ileus_ [volvulus], when the lower exit is completely closed,
vomiting of faeces occurs; yet such surplus matter could not be
emitted from the mouth without having first traversed the whole of the
small intestine, the jejunum, the pylorus, the stomach, and the
oesophagus. What is there to wonder at, then, if something should also
be transferred from the extreme skin-surface and so reach the
intestines and stomach? This also was pointed out to us by
Hippocrates, who maintained that not merely pneuma or excess-matter,
but actual nutriment is brought down from the outer surface to the
original place from which it was taken up. For the slightest
mechanical movements[371] determine this expulsive faculty, which
apparently acts through the transverse fibres, and which is very
rapidly transmitted from the source of motion to the opposite
extremities. It is, therefore, neither unlikely nor impossible that,
when the part adjoining the skin becomes suddenly oppressed by an
unwonted cold, it should at once be weakened and should find that the
liquid previously deposited beside it without discomfort had now
become more of a burden than a source of nutrition, and should
therefore strive to put it away. Finally, seeing that the passage
outwards was shut off by the condensation [of tissue], it would turn
to the remaining exit and would thus forcibly expel all the
waste-matter at once into the adjacent part; this would do the same to
the part following it; and the process would not cease until the
transference finally terminated at the inner ends of the veins.[372]
Now, movements like these come to an end fairly soon, but those
resulting from internal irritants (_e.g._, in the administration of
purgative drugs or in cholera) become much stronger and more lasting;
they persist as long as the condition of things[373] about the mouths
of the veins continues, that is, so long as these continue to attract
what is adjacent. For this condition[374] causes evacuation of the
contiguous part, and that again of the part next to it, and this never
stops until the extreme surface is reached; thus, as each part keeps
passing on matter to its neighbour, the original affection[375] very
quickly arrives at the extreme termination. Now this is also the case
in _ileus_; the inflamed intestine is unable to support either the
weight or the acridity of the waste substances and so does its best to
excrete them, in fact to drive them as far away as possible. And,
being prevented from effecting an expulsion downwards when the
severest part of the inflammation is there, it expels the matter into
the adjoining part of the intestines situated above. Thus the tendency
of the eliminative faculty is step by step upwards, until the
superfluities reach the mouth.
Now this will be also spoken of at greater length in my treatise on
disease. For the present, however, I think I have shewn clearly that
there is a universal conveyance or transference from one thing into
another, and that, as Hippocrates used to say, there exists in
everything a consensus in the movement of air and fluids. And I do not
think that anyone, however slow his intellect, will now be at a loss
to understand any of these points,—how, for instance, the stomach or
intestines get nourished, or in what manner anything makes its way
inwards from the outer surface of the body. Seeing that all parts have
the faculty of attracting what is suitable or well-disposed and of
eliminating what is troublesome or irritating, it is not surprising
that opposite movements should occur in them consecutively—as may be
clearly seen in the case of the heart, in the various arteries, in the
thorax, and lungs. In all these[376] the active movements of the
organs and therewith the passive movements of [their contained]
matters may be seen taking place almost every second in opposite
directions. Now, you are not astonished when the trachea-artery[377]
alternately draws air into the lungs and gives it out, and when the
nostrils and the whole mouth act similarly; nor do you think it
strange or paradoxical that the air is dismissed through the very
channel by which it was admitted just before. Do you, then, feel a
difficulty in the case of the veins which pass down from the liver
into the stomach and intestines, and do you think it strange that
nutriment should at once be yielded up to the liver and drawn back
from it into the stomach by the same veins? You must define what you
mean by this expression “at once.” If you mean “at the same time” this
is not what we ourselves say; for just as we take in a breath at one
moment and give it out again at another, so at one time the liver
draws nutriment from the stomach, and at another the stomach from the
liver. But if your expression “at once” means that in one and the same
animal a single organ subserves the transport of matter in opposite
directions, and if it is this which disturbs you, consider inspiration
and expiration. For of course these also take place through the same
organs, albeit they differ in their manner of movement, and in the way
in which the matter is conveyed through them.
Now the lungs, the thorax, the arteries rough and smooth, the heart,
the mouth, and the nostrils reverse their movements at very short
intervals and change the direction of the matters they contain. On the
other hand, the veins which pass down from the liver to the intestines
and stomach reverse the direction of their movements not at such short
intervals, but sometimes once in many days.
The whole matter, in fact, is as follows:—Each of the organs draws
into itself the nutriment alongside it, and devours all the useful
fluid in it, until it is thoroughly satisfied; this nutriment, as I
have already shown, it stores up in itself, afterwards making it
adhere and then assimilating it—that is, it becomes nourished by it.
For it has been demonstrated with sufficient clearness already[378]
that there is something which necessarily precedes actual nutrition,
namely _adhesion_, and that before this again comes _presentation_.
Thus as in the case of the _animals_ themselves the end of eating is
that the stomach should be filled, similarly in the case of each of
the _parts_, the end of presentation is the filling of this part with
its appropriate liquid. Since, therefore, every part has, like the
stomach, a _craving_[379] to be nourished, it too envelops its
nutriment and clasps it all round as the stomach does. And this
[action of the stomach], as has been already said, is necessarily
followed by the digestion of the food, although it is not to make it
suitable for the other parts that the stomach contracts upon it; if it
did so, it would no longer be a physiological organ,[380] but an
animal possessing reason and intelligence, with the power of choosing
the better [of two alternatives].
But while the stomach contracts for the reason that the whole body
possesses a power of attracting and of utilising appropriate
qualities, as has already been explained, it also happens that, in
this process, the food undergoes alteration; further, when filled and
saturated with the fluid pabulum from the food, it thereafter looks on
the food as a burden; thus it at once gets rid of the excess—that is
to say, drives it downwards—itself turning to another task, namely
that of causing adhesion. And during this time, while the nutriment is
passing along the whole length of the _intestine_, it is caught up by
the vessels which pass into the intestine; as we shall shortly
demonstrate,[381] most of it is seized by the veins, but a little also
by the arteries; at this stage also it becomes _presented_ to the
coats of the intestines.
Now imagine the whole economy of nutrition divided into three periods.
Suppose that in the first period the nutriment remains in the stomach
and is digested and presented to the stomach until satiety is reached,
also that some of it is taken up from the stomach to the liver.[382]
During the second period it passes along the intestines and becomes
presented both to them and to the liver—again until the stage of
satiety—while a small part of it is carried all over the body.[382]
During this period, also imagine that what was presented to the
stomach in the first period becomes now adherent to it.
During the third period the stomach has reached the stage of receiving
nourishment; it now entirely assimilates everything that had become
adherent to it: at the same time in the intestines and liver there
takes place adhesion of what had been before presented, while
dispersal [anadosis] is taking place to all parts of the body,[383] as
also presentation. Now, if the animal takes food immediately after
these [three stages] then, during the time that the stomach is again
digesting and getting the benefit of this by presenting all the useful
part of it to its own coats, the intestines will be engaged in final
assimilation of the juices which have adhered to them, and so also
will the liver: while in the various parts of the body there will be
taking place adhesion of the portions of nutriment presented. And if
the stomach is forced to remain without food during this time, it will
draw its nutriment from the veins in the mesentery and liver; for it
will not do so from the actual body of the liver (by _body of the
liver_ I mean first and foremost its flesh proper, and after this all
the vessels contained in it), for it is irrational to suppose that one
part would draw away from another part the juice already contained in
it, especially when adhesion and final assimilation of that juice were
already taking place; the juice, however, that is in the cavity of the
veins will be abstracted by the part which is stronger and more in
need.
It is in this way, therefore, that the stomach, when it is in need of
nourishment and the animal has nothing to eat, seizes it from the
veins in the liver. Also in the case of the spleen we have shown in a
former passage[384] how it draws all material from the liver that
tends to be thick, and by working it up converts it into more useful
matter. There is nothing surprising, therefore, if, in the present
instance also, some of this should be drawn from the spleen into such
organs as communicate with it by veins, _e.g._ the omentum, mesentery,
small intestine, colon, and the stomach itself. Nor is it surprising
that the spleen should disgorge its surplus matters into the stomach
at one time, while at another time it should draw some of its
appropriate nutriment from the stomach.
For, as has already been said, speaking generally, everything has the
power at different times of attracting from and of adding to
everything else. What happens is just as if you might imagine a number
of animals helping themselves at will to a plentiful common stock of
food; some will naturally be eating when others have stopped, some
will be on the point of stopping when others are beginning, some
eating together, and others in succession. Yes, by Zeus! and one will
often be plundering another, if he be in need while the other has an
abundant supply ready to hand. Thus it is in no way surprising that
matter should make its way back from the outer surface of the body to
the interior, or should be carried from the liver and spleen into the
stomach by the same vessels by which it was carried in the reverse
direction.
In the case of the arteries[385] this is clear enough, as also in the
case of heart, thorax, and lungs; for, since all of these dilate and
contract alternately, it must needs be that matter is subsequently
discharged back into the parts from which it was previously drawn. Now
Nature foresaw this necessity,[386] and provided the cardiac openings
of the vessels with membranous attachments,[387] to prevent their
contents from being carried backwards. How and in what manner this
takes place will be stated in my work “On the Use of Parts,” where
among other things I show that it is impossible for the openings of
the vessels to be closed so accurately that nothing at all can run
back. Thus it is inevitable that the reflux into the _venous
artery_[388] (as will also be made clear in the work mentioned) should
be much greater than through the other openings. But what it is
important for our present purpose to recognise is that every thing
possessing a large and appreciable cavity must, when it dilates,
abstract matter from all its neighbours, and, when it contracts, must
squeeze matter back into them. This should all be clear from what has
already been said in this treatise and from what Erasistratus and I
myself have demonstrated elsewhere respecting the tendency of a vacuum
to become refilled.[389]
XIII
Οὐ μὴν οὐδὲ τὸ διὰ τοῦ αὐτοῦ πόρου τήν θ' ὁλκὴν
γίγνεσθαι καὶ τὴν ἀπόκρισιν ἐν διαφέρουσι || χρόνοις 187
οὐδὲν ἔτι χαλεπὸν ἐξευρεῖν, εἴ γε καὶ τῆς γαστρὸς ὁ
στόμαχος οὐ μόνον ἐδέσματα καὶ πόματα παράγων εἰς
αὐτήν, ἀλλὰ κἀν ταῖς ναυτίαις τὴν ἐναντίαν ὑπηρεσίαν
ὑπηρετῶν ἐναργῶς φαίνεται, καὶ τῆς ἐπὶ τῷ ἥπατι
κύστεως ὁ αὐχὴν εἷς ὢν ἅμα μὲν πληροῖ δι' αὑτοῦ τὴν
κύστιν, ἅμα δ' ἐκκενοῖ, καὶ τῶν μητρῶν ὁ στόμαχος
ὡσαύτως ὁδός ἐστιν εἴσω μὲν τοῦ σπέρματος, ἔξω δὲ
τοῦ κυήματος.
Ἀλλὰ κἀνταῦθα πάλιν ἡ μὲν ἐκκριτικὴ δύναμις ἐναργής,
οὐ μὴν ὁμοίως γ' αὐτῇ σαφὴς τοῖς πολλοῖς ἡ ἑλκτική·
ἀλλ' Ἱπποκράτης μὲν ἀρρώστου μήτρας αἰτιώμενος
αὐχένα φησί· “Οὐ γὰρ δύναται αὐτέης ὁ στόμαχος
εἰρύσαι τὴν γονήν.”
Ἐρασίστρατος δὲ καὶ Ἀσκληπιάδης εἰς τοσοῦτον ἥκουσι
σοφίας, ὥστ' οὐ μόνον τὴν κοιλίαν καὶ τὰς μήτρας
ἀποστεροῦσι τῆς τοιαύτης δυνάμεως ἀλλα καὶ τὴν ἐπὶ
τῷ ἥπατι κύστιν ἅμα τοῖς νεφροῖς. καὶτοι γ' ὅτι μηδ'
εἰπεῖν δυνατὸν ἕτερον αἴτιον ἢ οὔρων ἢ χολῆς
διακρίσεως, ἐν τῷ πρώτῳ δέδεικται λόγῳ.
Καὶ μήτραν οὖν καὶ γαστέρα καὶ τὴν ἐπὶ τῷ ἥπατι
κύστιν δι' ἑνὸς καὶ ταὐτοῦ στο||μάχου τήν θ' ὁλκὴν 188
καὶ τὴν ἀπόκρισιν εὑρίσκοντες ποιουμένας μηκέτι
θαυμάζωμεν, εἰ καὶ διὰ τῶν φλεβῶν ἡ φύσις ἐκκρίνει
πολλάκις εἰς τὴν γαστέρα περιττώματα. τούτου δ' ἔτι
μᾶλλον οὐ χρὴ θαυμάζειν, εἰ, δι' ὧν εἰς ἧπαρ ἀνεδόθη
φλεβῶν ἐκ γαστρὸς, αὖθις εἰς αὐτὴν ἐξ ἥπατος ἐν ταῖς
μακροτέραις ἀσιτίαις ἕλκεσθαί τις δύναται τροφή. τὸ
γὰρ τοῖς τοιούτοις ἀπιστεῖν ὅμοιον ἐστί δήπου τῷ
μηκέτι πιστεύειν μηδ' ὅτι τὰ καθαίροντα φάρμακα διὰ
τῶν αὐτῶν στομάτων ἐξ ὅλου τοῦ σώματος εἰς τὴν
γαστέρα τοὺς οἰκείους ἐπισπᾶται χυμούς, δι' ὧν
ἔμπροσθεν ἡ ἀνάδοσις ἐγένετο, ἀλλ' ἕτέρα μὲν ζητεῖν
ἀναδόσεως, ἕτέρα δὲ καθάρσεως στόματα. καὶ μὴν εἴπερ
ἓν καὶ ταὐτὸ στόμα διτταῖς ὑπηρετεῖ δυνάμεσιν, ἐν
διαφόροις χρόνοις εἰς τἀναντία τὴν ὁλκὴν
ποιουμέναις, ἔμπροσθεν μὲν τῇ κατὰ τὸ ἧπαρ, ἐν δὲ τῷ
τῆς καθάρσεως καιρῷ τῇ τοῦ φαρμάκου, τί θαυμαστὸν
ἐστι διττὴν ὑπηρεσίαν τε καὶ χρείαν εἶναι ταῖς φλεψὶ
ταῖς ἐν τῷ μέσῳ τεταγμέναις ἥπατος τε καὶ τῶν κατὰ
τὴν κοιλίαν, ὥσθ', ὁπότε μὲν ἐν τούτοις ἄφθονος εἴη
περιεχομένη τροφή, διὰ τῶν εἰρημένων εἰς || ἧπαρ 189
ἀναφέρεσθαι φλεβῶν, ὁπότε δ' ἔιη κενὰ καὶ δεόμενα
τρέφεσθαι, διὰ τῶν αὐτῶν αὖθις ἐξ ἥπατος ἕλκεσθαι;
Πᾶν γὰρ ἐκ παντὸς ἕλκειν φαίνεται καὶ παντὶ
μεταδιδόναι καὶ μία τις εἶναι σύρροια καὶ σύμπνοια
πάντων, καθάπερ καὶ τοῦθ' ὁ θειότατος Ἱπποκράτης
εἶπεν. ἕλκει μὲν οὖν τὸ ἰσχυρότερον, ἐκκενοῦται δὲ
τὸ ἀσθενέστερον.
Ἰσχυρότερον δὲ καὶ ἀσθενέστερον ἕτερον ἑτέρου μόριον
ἢ ἁπλῶς καὶ φύσει καὶ κοινῇ πᾶσίν ἐστιν ἢ ἰδίως τῷδε
τινι γίγνεται. φύσει μὲν καὶ κοινῇ πᾶσιν ἀνθρώποις
θ' ἅμα καὶ ζῴοις ἡ μὲν καρδία τοῦ ἥπατος, τὸ δ' ἧπαρ
τῶν ἐντέρων τε καὶ τῆς γαστρός, αἱ δ' ἀρτηρίαι τῶν
φλεβῶν ἑλκύσαι τε τὸ χρήσιμον ἑαυταῖς ἀποκρῖναί τε
τὸ μὴ τοιοῦτον ἰσχυρότεραι. καθ' ἕκαστον δ' ἡμῶν
ἰδίως ἐν μὲν τῷδε τῷ καιρῷ τὸ ἧπαρ ἰσχυρότερον
ἕλκειν, ἡ γαστὴρ δ' ἐν τῷδε. πολλῆς μὲν γὰρ ἐν τῇ
κοιλίᾳ περιεχομένης τροφῆς καὶ σφοδρῶς ὀρεγομένου τε
καὶ χρῇζοντος τοῦ ἥπατος, πάντως ἰσχυρότερον ἕλκει
τὸ σπλάγχνον· ἔμπαλιν δὲ τοῦ μὲν ἥπατος
ἐμπεπλησμένου τε καὶ δια||τεταμένου, τῆς γαστρὸς δ' 190
ὀρεγομένης καὶ κενῆς ὑπαρχούσης ἡ τῆς ὁλκῆς ἰσχὺς
εἰς ἐκείνην μεθίσταται.
Ὡς γάρ, εἰ κἂν ταῖς χερσί τινα σιτία κατέχοντες
ἀλλήλων ἁρπάζοιμεν, εἰ μὲν ὁμοίως ἔιημεν δεόμενοι,
περιγίγνεσθαι τὸν ἰσχυρότερον ἐικός, εἰ δ' οὗτος μὲν
ἐμπεπλησμένος εἴη καὶ διὰ τοῦτ' ἀμελῶς κατέχων τὰ
περιττὰ ἢ καὶ τινι μεταδοῦναι ποθῶν, ὁ δ'
ἀσθενέστερος ὀρέγοιτο δεινῶς, οὐδὲν ἂν εἴη κώλυμα
τοῦ μὴ πάντα λαβεῖν αὐτὸν, οὕτω καὶ ἡ γαστήρ ἐκ τοῦ
ἥπατος ἐπισπᾶται ῥᾳδίως, ὅταν αὐτὴ μὲν ἱκανῶς
ὀρέγηται τροφῆς, ἐμπεπλησμένον δ' ᾖ τὸ σπλάγχνον.
καὶ τοῦ γε μὴ πεινῆν ἐνίοτε τὸ ζῷον ἡ περιουσία τῆς
ἐν ἥπατι τροφῆς αἰτία· κρείττονα γὰρ ἔχουσα καὶ
ἑτοιμοτέραν ἡ γαστὴρ τροφὴν οὐδὲν δεῖται τῆς ἔξωθεν·
εἰ δέ γέ ποτε δέοιτο μέν, ἀποροίη δέ, πληροῦται
περιττωμάτων. ἰχῶρες δέ τινές εἰσι ταῦτα χολώδεις τε
καὶ φλεγματώδεις καὶ ὀρρώδεις, οὓς μόνους ἑλκούσῃ
μεθίησιν αὐτῇ τὸ ἧπαρ, ὅταν ποτὲ καὶ αὐτὴ δέηται
τροφῆς.
Ὥσπερ οὖν ἐξ ἀλλήλων ἕλκει τὰ μόρια || τροφήν, οὕτω 191
καὶ ἀποτίθεταί ποτ' εἰς ἄλληλα τὸ περιττὸν καὶ ὥσπερ
ἑλκόντων ἐπλεονέκτει τὸ ἰσχυρότερον, οὕτω καὶ
ἀποτιθεμένων καὶ τῶν γε καλουμένων ῥευμάτων ἥδε ἡ
πρόφασις. ἕκαστον γὰρ τῶν μορίων ἔχει τινὰ τόνον
σύμφυτον, ᾧ διωθεῖται τὸ περιττὸν. ὅταν οὖν ἓν ἐξ
αὐτῶν ἀρρωστότερον γένηται κατὰ δή τινα διάθεσιν, ἐξ
ἁπάντων εἰς ἐκεῖνο συρρεῖν ἀνάγκη τὰ περιττώματα. τὸ
μὲν γὰρ ἰσχυρότατον ἐναποτίθεται τοῖς πλησίον
ἅπασιν, ἐκείνων δ' αὖ πάλιν ἕκαστον εἰς ἕτερ' ἄττα
τῶν ἀσθενεστέρων, εἶτ' αὖθις ἐκείνων ἕκαστον εἰς
ἄλλα καὶ τοῦτ' ἐπὶ πλεῖστον γίγνεται, μέχρι περ ἂν
ἐξ ἁπάντων ἐλαυνόμενον τὸ περίττωμα καθ' ἕν τι μείνη
τῶν ἀσθενεστάτων· ἐντεῦθεν γὰρ οὐκέτ' εἰς ἄλλο
δύναται μεταρρεῖν, ὡς ἂν μήτε δεχομένου τινὸς αὐτὸ
τῶν ἰσχυροτέρων μήτ' ἀπώσασθαι δυναμένου τοῦ
πεπονθότος.
Ἀλλὰ περὶ μὲν τῶν παθῶν τῆς γενέσεως καὶ τῆς ἰάσεως
αὖθις ἡμῶν ἐπιδεικνύντων ἱκανὰ κἀξ ἐκείνων ἔσται
λαβεῖν μαρτύρια τῶν ἐν τῷδε τῷ λόγῳ παντὶ || 192
δεδειγμένων ὀρθῶς. ὁ δ' ἐν τῷ παρόντι δεῖξαι
προὔκειτο, πάλιν ἀναλάβωμεν, ὡς οὐδὲν θαυμαστὸν ἐξ
ἥπατος ἥκειν τινὰ τροφὴν ἐντέροις τε καὶ γαστρὶ διὰ
τῶν αὐτῶν φλεβῶν, δι' ὧν ἔμπροσθεν ἐξ ἐκείνων εἰς
ἧπαρ ἀνεδίδοτο. καὶ πολλοῖς ἀθρόως τε καὶ τελέως
ἀποστᾶσιν ἰσχυρῶν γυμνασίων ἤ τι κῶλον ἀποκοπεῖσιν
αἵματος διὰ τῶν ἐντέρων γίγνεται κένωσις ἔκ τινων
περιόδων, ὥς που καὶ Ἱπποκράτης ἔλεγεν, οὐδὲν μὲν
ἄλλο λυποῦσα, καθαίρουσα δ' ὀξέως τὸ πᾶν σῶμα καὶ
τὰς πλησμονὰς ἐκκενοῦσα, διὰ τῶν αὐτῶν δήπου φλεβῶν
τῆς φορᾶς τῶν περιττῶν ἐπιτελουμένης, δι' ὧν
ἔμπροσθεν ἡ ἀνάδοσις ἐγίγνετο.
Πολλάκις δ' ἐν νόσοις ἡ φύσις διὰ μὲν τῶν αὐτῶν
δήπου φλεβῶν τὸ πᾶν ἐκκαθαίρει ζῷον, οὐ μὴν
αἱματώδης γ' ἡ κένωσις αὐτοῖς, ἀλλὰ κατὰ τὸν
λυποῦντα γίγνεται χυμόν. οὕτω δὲ κἀν ταῖς χολέραις
ἐκκενοῦται τὸ πᾶν σῶμα διὰ τῶν εἰς ἔντερά τε καὶ
γαστέρα καθηκουσῶν φλεβῶν.
Τὸ δ' οἴεσθαι μίαν εἶναι ταῖς ὕλαις φορὰν τελέως
ἀγνοοῦντός ἐστι τὰς φυσικὰς || δυνάμεις τὰς τ' ἄλλας 193
καὶ τὴν ἐκκριτικὴν ἐναντίαν οὖσαν τῇ ἑλκτικτῇ· ταῖς
γὰρ ἐναντίαις δυνάμεσιν ἐναντίας κινήσεις τε καὶ
φορὰς τῶν ὑλῶν ἀναγκαῖον ἀκολουθεῖν. ἕκαστον γὰρ τῶν
μορίων, ὅταν ἑλκύσῃ τὸν οἰκεῖον χυμόν, ἔπειτα
κατάσχῃ καὶ ἀπολαύσῃ, τὸ περιττὸν ἅπαν ἀποθέσθαι
σπεύδει, καθότι μάλιστα δύναται τάχιστα θ' ἅμα καὶ
κάλλιστα, κατὰ τὴν τοῦ περιττοῦ ῥοπήν.
Ὅθεν ἡ γαστὴρ τὰ μὲν ἐπιπολάζοντα τῶν περιττωμάτων
ἐμέτοις ἐκκαθαίρει, τὰ δ' ὑφιστάμενα διαρροίαις. καὶ
τὸ γε ναυτιῶδες γίγνεσθαι τὸ ζῷον τοῦτ' ἔστιν
ὁρμῆσαι τὴν γαστέρα κενωθῆναι δι' ἐμέτου. οὕτω δὲ δή
τι βίαιον καὶ σφοδρὸν ἡ ἐκκριτικὴ δύναμις ἔχει, ὥστ'
ἐν τοῖς εἰλεοῖς, ὅταν ἀποκλεισθῇ τελέως ἡ κάτω
διέξοδος, ἐμεῖται κόπρος. καίτοι πρὶν διελθεῖν τὸ τε
λεπτὸν ἔντερον ἅπαν καὶ τὴν νῆστιν καὶ τὸν πυλωρὸν
καὶ τὴν γαστέρα καὶ τὸν οἰσοφάγον οὐχ οἷόν τε διὰ
τοῦ στόματος ἐκπεσεῖν οὐδενὶ τοιούτῳ περιττώματι. τί
δὴ θαυμαστόν, εἰ κἀκ τῆς ἐσχάτης ἐπιφανείας τῆς κατὰ
τὸ δέρμα μέχρι τῶν ἐντέρων τε καὶ τῆς γαστρὸς
ἀφικνοῖτό τι || μεταλαμβανόμενον, ὡς καὶ τοῦθ' 194
Ἱπποκράτης ἡμᾶς ἐδίδαξεν, οὐ πνεῦμα μόνον ἢ
περίττωμα φάσκων ἀλλα καὶ τὴν τροφὴν αὐτὴν ἐκ τῆς
ἐσχάτης ἐπιφανείας αὖθις ἐπὶ τὴν ἀρχήν, ὅθεν
ἀνηνέχθη, καταφέρεσθαι. ἐλάχισται γὰρ ῥοπαὶ κινήσεων
τὴν ἐκκριτικὴν ταύτην οἰακίζουσι δύναμιν, ὡς ἂν διὰ
τῶν ἐγκαρσίων μὲν ἰνῶν γιγνομένην, ὠκύτατα δὲ
διαδιδομένην ἀπὸ τῆς κινησάσης ἀρχῆς ἐπὶ τὰ
καταντικρὺ πέρατα. οὔκουν ἀπεικὸς οὐδ' ἀδύνατον
ἀήθει ποτὲ ψύξει τὸ πρὸς τῷ δέρματι μόριον ἐξαίφνης
πιληθὲν ἅμα μὲν ἀρρωστότερον αὐτὸ γενόμενον, ἅμα δ'
οἷον ἄχθος τι μᾶλλον ἢ παρασκευὴν θρέψεως ἔχον τὴν
ἔμπροσθεν ἀλύπως αὐτῷ παρεσπαρμένην ὑγρότητα καὶ διὰ
τοῦτ' ἀπωθεῖσθαι σπεῦδον, ἅμα δὲ τῆς ἔξω φορᾶς
ἀποκεκλεισμένης τῇ πυκνώσει, πρὸς τὴν λοιπὴν
ἐπιστραφῆναι καὶ οὕτω βιασάμενον εἰς τὸ παρακείμενον
αὐτῷ μόριον ἀθρόως ἀπώσασθαι τὸ περιττόν, ἐκεῖνο δ'
αὖ πάλιν εἰς τὸ μετ' αὐτὸ, || καὶ τοῦτο μὴ παύσασθαι 195
γιγνόμενον, ἄχρις ἂν ἡ μετάληψις ἐπὶ τὰ ἐντὸς πέρατα
τῶν φλεβῶν τελευτήσῃ.
Αἱ μὲν δὴ τοιαῦται κινήσεις θᾶττον ἀποπαύονται, αἱ
δ' ἀπὸ τῶν ἔνδοθεν διερεθιζόντων, ὡς ἔν τε τοῖς
καθαίρουσι φαρμάκοις καὶ ταῖς χολέραις ἰσχυρότεραι
τε πολὺ καὶ μονιμώτεραι γίγνονται καὶ διαμένουσιν,
ἔστ' ἂν καὶ ἡ περὶ τοῖς στόμασι τῶν ἀγγείων
διάθεσις, ἡ τὸ πλησίον ἕλκουσα, παραμένῃ. αὕτη μὲν
γὰρ τὸ συνεχὲς ἐκκενοῖ μόριον, ἐκεῖνο δ' αὖ τὸ μετ'
αὐτὸ καὶ τοῦτ' οὐ παύεται μέχρι τῆς ἐσχάτης
ἐπιφανείας, ὥστε διαδιδόντων τῶν ἐφεξῆς ἀεὶ μορίων
ἑτέρων ἑτέροις τὸ πρῶτον πάθος ὠκύτατα διικνεῖσθαι
μέχρι τῶν ἐσχάτων. οὕτως οὖν ἔχει κἀπὶ τῶν εἰλεῶν.
αὐτὸ μὲν γὰρ τὸ φλεγμαῖνον ἔντερον οὔτε τοῦ βάρους
οὔτε τῆς δριμύτητος ἀνέχεται τῶν περιττωμάτων καὶ
διὰ τοῦτ' ἐκκρίνειν αὐτὰ σπεύδει καὶ ἀπωθεῖσθαι
πορρωτάτω. κωλυόμενον δὲ κάτω ποιεῖσθαι τὴν δίωσιν,
ὅταν ἐνταυθοῖ ποτε τὸ σφοδρότατον ᾖ τῆς φλεγμονῆς,
εἰς τὰ πλησιάζοντα τῶν ὑπερκειμένων ἐντέρων
ἀπωθεῖται. καὶ οὕτως ἤδη κατὰ || τὸ συνεχὲς τὴν 196
ῥοπὴν τῆς ἐκκριτικῆς δυνάμεως ἄνω ποιησαμένης ἄχρι
τοῦ στόματος ἐπανέρχεται τὰ περιττώματα.
Ταῦτα μὲν οὖν δὴ κἀν τοῖς τῶν νοσημάτων λογισμοῖς
ἐπὶ πλέον εἰρήσεται. τὸ δ' ἐκ παντὸς εἰς πᾶν
φέρεσθαί τι καὶ μεταλαμβάνεσθαι καὶ μίαν ἁπάντων
εἶναι σύμπνοιάν τε καὶ σύρροιαν, ὡς Ἱπποκράτης
ἔλεγεν, ἤδη μοι δοκῶ δεδεῖχθαι σαφῶς καὶ μηκέτ' ἂν
τινα, μηδ' εἰ βραδὺς αὐτῷ νοῦς ἐνείη, περὶ τῶν
τοιούτων ἀπορῆσαι μηδενός, οἷον ὅπως ἡ γαστὴρ ἢ τὰ
ἔντερα τρέφεται καὶ τίνα τρόπον ἐκ τῆς ἐσχάτης
ἐπιφανείας ἔισω τι διικνεῖται. πάντων γὰρ τῶν μορίων
ἕλκειν μὲν τὸ προσῆκόν τε καὶ φίλιον, ἀποκρίνειν δὲ
τὸ βαρῦνον ἢ δάκνον ἐχόντων δύναμιν οὐδὲν θαυμαστὸν
ἐναντίας συνεχῶς γίγνεσθαι κινήσεις ἐν αὐτοῖς, ὥσπερ
ἐπί τε τῆς καρδίας ὁρᾶταί σαφῶς καὶ τῶν ἀρτηριῶν
ἁπασῶν καὶ τοῦ θώρακος καὶ τοῦ πνεύμονος. ἐπὶ μέν γε
τούτων ἁπάντων μόνον οὐ καθ' ἑκάστην καιροῦ ῥοπὴν
τὰς ἐναντίας κινήσεις θ' ἅμα τῶν ὀργάνων καὶ φορὰς
τῶν ὑλῶν || ἐναργῶς ἔστιν ἰδεῖν γιγνομένας. εἶτ' ἐπὶ 197
μὲν τῆς τραχείας ἀρτηρίας οὐκ ἀπορεῖς ἐναλλὰξ ποτὲ
μὲν εἴσω παραγούσης εἰς τὸν πνεύμονα τὸ πνεῦμα, ποτὲ
δ' ἔξω, καὶ τῶν κατὰ τὰς ῥῖνας πόρων καὶ ὅλου τοῦ
στόματος ὡσαύτως οὐδ' εἶναί σοι δοκεῖ θαυμαστὸν οὐδὲ
παράδοξον, εἰ, δι' οὗ μικρῷ πρόσθεν ἔισω
παρεκομίζετο τὸ πνεῦμα, διὰ τούτου νῦν ἐκπέμπεται,
περὶ δὲ τῶν ἐξ ἥπατος εἰς ἔντερά τε καὶ γαστέρα
καθηκουσῶν φλεβῶν ἀπορεῖς καὶ σοι θαυμαστὸν εἶναι
φαίνεται, διὰ τῶν αὐτῶν ἀναδίδοσθαί θ' ἅμα τὴν
τροφὴν εἰς ἧπαρ ἕλκεσθαί τ' ἐξ ἐκείνου πάλιν εἰς
γαστέρα; διόρισαι δὴ τὸ ἅμα τοῦτο ποτέρως λέγεις. εἰ
μὲν γὰρ κατὰ τὸν αὐτὸν χρόνον, οὐδ' ἡμεῖς τοῦτό γέ
φαμεν. ὥσπερ γὰρ ἐισπνέομεν ἐν ἑτέρῳ χρόνῳ καὶ αὖθις
πάλιν ἐν ἑτέρῳ ἀντεκπνέομεν, οὕτω καὶ τροφὴν ἐν
ἑτέρῳ μὲν χρόνῳ τὸ ἧπαρ ἐκ τῆς γαστρός, ἐν ἑτέρῳ δ'
ἡ γαστὴρ ἐκ τοῦ ἥπατος ἐπισπᾶται. εἰ δ' ὅτι καθ' ἓν
καὶ ταὐτὸ ζῷον ἓν ὄργανον ἐναντίαις φοραῖς ὑλῶν
ὑπηρετεῖ, τοῦτό σοι βούλεται δηλοῦν τὸ ἅμα καὶ τοῦτό
σε ταράττει, τήν τ' || ἐισπνοὴν ἰδὲ καὶ τὴν ἐκπνοήν. 198
πάντως που καὶ αὗται διὰ μὲν τῶν αὐτῶν ὀργάνων
γίγνονται, τρόπῳ δὲ κινήσεώς τε καὶ φορᾶς τῶν ὑλῶν
διαφέρουσιν.
Ὁ πνεύμων μὲν οὖν καὶ ὁ θώραξ καὶ ἀρτηρίαι αἱ
τραχεῖαι καὶ αἱ λεῖαι καὶ καρδία καὶ στόμα καὶ ῥῖνες
ἐν ἐλαχίσταις χρόνου ῥοπαις εἰς ἐναντίας κινήσεις
αὐτά τε μεταβάλλει καὶ τὰς ὕλας μεθίστησιν. αἱ δ' ἐξ
ἥπατος εἰς ἔντερα καὶ γαστέρα καθήκουσαι φλέβες οὐκ
ἐν οὕτω βραχέσι χρόνου μορίοις ἀλλ' ἐν πολλαῖς
ἡμέραις ἅπαξ ἐνίοτε τὴν ἐναντίαν κινοῦνται κίνησιν.
Ἔχει γὰρ ὧδε τὸ σύμπαν. ἕκαστον τῶν ὀργάνων εἰς
ἑαυτὸ τὴν πλησιάζουσαν ἐπισπᾶται τροφὴν ἐκβοσκόμενον
αὐτῆς ἅπασαν τὴν χρηστὴν νοτίδα, μέχρις ἂν ἱκανῶς
κορεσθῇ, καὶ ταύτην, ὡς καὶ πρόσθεν ἐδείκνυμεν,
ἐναποτίθεται ἑαυτῷ καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα προσφύει τε καὶ
ὁμοιοῖ, τουτέστι τρέφεται. διώρισται γὰρ ἱκανῶς
ἔμπροσθεν ἕτερον τι τῆς θρέψεως ἐξ ἀνάγκης αὐτῆς
προηγούμενον ἡ πρόσφυσις ὑπάρχειν, ἐκείνης δ' ἔτι
πρότερον ἡ πρόσθεσις. ὥσπερ οὖν || τοῖς ζῴοις αὐτοῖς 199
ὅρος ἐστὶ τῆς ἐδωδῆς τὸ πληρῶσαι τὴν γαστέρα, κατὰ
τὸν αὐτὸν τρόπον ἑκάστῳ τῶν μορίων ὅρος ἐστὶ τῆς
προσθέσεως ἡ πλήρωσις τῆς οἰκείας ὑγρότητος. ἐπεὶ
τοίνυν ἅπαν μόριον τῇ γαστρὶ ὁμοίως ὀρέγεται
τρέφεσθαι, καὶ περιπτύσσεται τῇ τροφῇ καὶ οὕτω
σφίγγει πανταχόθεν αὐτὴν ὡς ἡ γαστήρ. ἕπεται δ' ἐξ
ἀνάγκης τούτῳ, καθάπερ καὶ πρόσθεν ἐρρέθη, τὸ
πέττεσθαι τοῖς σιτίοις, τῆς γαστρὸς οὐ διὰ τοῦτο
περιστελλομένης αὐτοῖς, ἵν' ἐπιτήδεια τοῖς ἄλλοις
ἐργάσηται μορίοις· οὕτω γὰρ ἂν οὐκέτι φυσικὸν
ὄργανον ἀλλὰ ζῷόν τι γίγνοιτο λογισμόν τε καὶ νοῦν
ἔχον, ὡς αἱρεῖσθαι τὸ βέλτιον.
Ἀλλ' αὕτη μὲν περιστέλλεται τῷ τὸ πᾶν σῶμα δύναμιν
ἑλκτικήν τινα καὶ ἀπολαυστικὴν κεκτῆσθαι τῶν οἰκείων
ποιοτήτων, ὡς ἔμπροσθεν ἐδείκνυτο· συμβαίνει δ' ἐν
τούτῳ τοῖς σιτίοις ἀλλοιοῦσθαι. καὶ μέντοι καὶ
πληρωθεῖσα τῆς ἐξ αὐτῶν ὑγρότητος καὶ κορεσθεῖσα
βάρος ἡγεῖται τὸ λοιπὸν αὐτά. τὸ περιττὸν οὖν εὐθὺς
ἀποτρίβεται τε καὶ ὠθεῖ κάτω πρὸς || ἕτερον ἔργον 200
αὐτὴ τρεπομένη, τὴν πρόσφυσιν. ἐν δὲ τούτῳ τῷ χρόνῳ
διερχομένη τὸ ἔντερον ἅπαν ἡ τροφὴ διὰ τῶν εἰς αὐτὸ
καθηκόντων ἀγγείων ἀναρπάζεται, πλείστη μὲν εἰς τὰς
φλέβας, ὀλίγη δὲ τις εἰς τὰς ἀρτηρίας, ὡς μικρὸν
ὕστερον ἀποδείξομεν. ἐν τούτῳ δ' αὖ τῷ χρόνῳ καὶ
τοῖς τῶν ἐντέρων χιτῶσι προστίθεται.
Καί μοι τεμὼν ἤδη τῷ λογισμῷ τὴν τῆς τροφῆς
οἰκονομίαν ἅπασαν εἰς τρεῖς μοίρας χρόνων, ἐν μὲν τῇ
πρώτῃ νόει μένουσάν θ' ἅμα κατὰ τὴν κοιλίαν αὐτὴν
καὶ πεττομένην καὶ προστιθεμένην εἰς κόρον τῇ γαστρὶ
καὶ τι καὶ τῷ ἥπατι παρ' αὐτῆς ἀναφερόμενον.
Ἐν δὲ τῇ δευτέρα, διερχομένην τά τ' ἔντερα καὶ
προστιθεμένην εἰς κόρον αὐτοῖς τε τούτοις καὶ τῷ
ἥπατι καὶ τι βραχὺ μέρος αὐτῆς πάντη τοῦ σώματος
φερόμενον· ἐν δὲ δὴ τούτῳ τῷ καὶρῷ τὸ προστεθὲν ἐν
τῷ πρώτῳ χρόνῳ προσφύεσθαι νόει τῇ γαστρί.
Κατὰ δὲ τὴν τρίτην μοῖραν τοῦ χρόνου τρέφεσθαι μὲν
ἤδη τὴν κοιλίαν ὁμοιώσασαν ἑαυτῇ τελέως τὰ
προσφύντα, πρόσφυσιν δὲ τοῖς ἐντέροις καὶ τῷ ἥπατι
γίγνεσθαι τῶν προστεθέντων, ἀνά||δοσιν δὲ πάντη τοῦ 201
σώματος καὶ πρόσθεσιν. εἰ μὲν οὖν ἐπὶ τούτοις εὐθέως
τὸ ζῷον λαμβάνοι τροφήν, ἐν ᾧ πάλιν ἡ γαστὴρ χρόνῳ
πέττει τε ταύτην καὶ ἀπολαύει προστιθεῖσα πᾶν ἐξ
αὐτῆς τὸ χρηστὸν τοῖς ἑαυτῆς χιτῶσι, τὰ μὲν ἔντερα
τελέως ὁμοιώσει τὸν προσφύντα χυμόν, ὡσαύτως δὲ καὶ
τὸ ἧπαρ. ἐν ὅλῳ δὲ τῷ σώματι πρόσφυσις τῶν
προστεθέντων τῆς τροφῆς ἔσται μορίων. εἰ δ' ἄσιτος
ἀναγκάζοιτο μένειν ἡ γαστὴρ ἐν τούτῳ τῷ χρόνῳ, παρὰ
τῶν ἐν μεσεντερίῳ τε καὶ ἥπατι φλεβῶν ἕλξει τὴν
τροφήν· οὐ γὰρ ἐξ αὐτοῦ γε τοῦ σώματος τοῦ ἥπατος.
λέγω δὲ σῶμα τοῦ ἥπατος αὐτήν τε τὴν ἰδίαν αὐτοῦ
σάρκα πρώτην καὶ μάλιστα, μετὰ δὲ τήνδε καὶ τῶν
ἀγγείων ἕκαστον τῶν κατ' αὐτό. τὸν μὲν γὰρ ἐν ἑκάστῳ
τῶν μορίων ἤδη περιεχόμενον χυμὸν οὐκέτ' εὔλογον
ἀντισπᾶν ἑτέρῳ μορίῳ καὶ μάλισθ' ὅταν ἤδη πρόσφυσις
ἢ ἐξομοίωσις αὐτοῦ γίγνηται. τὸν δ' ἐν ταῖς
ἐυρυχωρίαις τῶν φλεβῶν τὸ μᾶλλον ἰσχύον θ' ἅμα καὶ
δεόμενον ἀντισπᾷ μόριον.
Οὕτως οὖν καὶ ἡ γαστὴρ ἐν || ᾧ χρόνῳ δεῖται μὲν αὐτὴ 202
τροφῆς, ἐσθίει δ' οὐδέπω τὸ ζῷον, ἐν τούτῳ τῶν κατὰ
τὸ ἧπαρ ἐξαρπάζει φλεβῶν. ἐπεὶ δὲ καὶ τὸν σπλῆνα διὰ
τῶν ἔμπροσθεν ἐδείκνυμεν ὅσον ἐν ἥπατι παχύτερον
ἕλκοντα κατεργάζεσθαί τε καὶ μεταβάλλειν ἐπὶ τὸ
χρηστότερον, οὐδὲν οὐδ' ἐνταῦθα θαυμαστὸν ἕλκεσθαί
τι κἀκ τοῦ σπληνὸς εἰς ἕκαστον τῶν κοινωνούντων αὐτῷ
κατὰ τὰς φλέβας ὀργάνων, οἷον εἰς ἐπίπλοον καὶ
μεσεντέριον καὶ λεπτὸν ἔντερον καὶ κῶλον καὶ αὐτὴν
τὴν γαστέρα· κατὰ δὲ τὸν αὐτὸν τρόπον ἐξερεύγεσθαι
μὲν εἰς τὴν γαστέρα τὸ περίττωμα καθ' ἕτερον χρόνον,
αὐτὸν δ' αὖθις ἐκ τῆς γαστρὸς ἕλκειν τι τῆς οἰκείας
τροφῆς ἐν ἑτέρῳ καιρῷ.
Καθόλου δ' εἰπεῖν, ὃ καὶ πρόσθεν ἤδη λέλεκται, πᾶν
ἐκ παντὸς ἕλκειν τε καὶ πέμπειν ἐγχωρεῖ κατὰ
διαφέροντας χρόνους, ὁμοιοτάτου γιγνομένου τοῦ
συμβαίνοντος, ὡς εἰ καὶ ζῷα νοήσαις πολλὰ τροφὴν
ἄφθονον ἐν κοινῷ κατακειμένην, εἰς ὅσον βούλεται,
προσφερόμενα. καθ' ὃν γὰρ ἤδη πέπαυται χρόνον ἕτέρα,
κατὰ τούτον ἐικὸς ἐσθίειν ἕτέρα, καὶ μέλλειν γε τὰ
μὲν || παύεσθαι, τὰ δ' ἄρχεσθαι, καὶ τινα μὲν 203
συνεσθίοντα, τὰ δ' ἀνὰ μέρος ἐσθίοντα καὶ ναὶ μὰ Δία
γε τὸ ἕτερον ἁρπάζειν θατέρου πολλάκις, εἰ τὸ μὲν
ἕτερον ἐπιδέοιτο, τῷ δ' ἀφθόνως παρακέοιτο. καὶ
οὕτως οὐδὲν θαυμαστὸν οὔτ' ἐκ τῆς ἐσχάτης ἐπιφανείας
ἔισω τι πάλιν ὑποστρέφειν οὔτε διὰ τῶν αὐτῶν ἀγγείων
ἐξ ἥπατος τε καὶ σπληνὸς εἰς κοιλίαν ἀνενεχθῆναι τι,
δι' ὧν ἐκ ταύτης εἰς ἐκεῖνα πρότερον ἀνηνέχθη.
Κατὰ μὲν γὰρ τὰς ἀρτηρίας ἱκανῶς ἐναργὲς τὸ
τοιοῦτον, ὥσπερ καὶ κατὰ τὴν καρδίαν τε καὶ τὸν
θώρακα καὶ τὸν πνεύμονα. τούτων γὰρ ἁπάντων
διαστελλομένων τε καὶ συστελλομένων ἐναλλὰξ
ἀναγκαῖον, ἐξ ὧν εἱλκύσθη τι πρότερον, εἰς ταῦθ'
ὕστερον ἐκπέμπεσθαι. καὶ ταύτην ἄρα τὴν ἀνάγκην ἡ
φύσις προγιγνώσκουσα τοῖς ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ στόμασι τῶν
ἀγγείων ὑμένας ἐπέφυσε κωλύσοντας εἰς τοὐπίσω
φέρεσθαι τὰς ὕλας. ἀλλ' ὅπως μὲν τοῦτο γίγνεται καὶ
καθ' ὅντινα τρόπον, ἐν τοῖς περὶ χρείας μορίων
εἰρήσεται δεικνύντων ἡμῶν τά τ' ἄλλα καὶ ὡς ἀδύνατον
οὕτως ἀκριβῶς κλείεσθαι τὰ στόματα τῶν ἀγγείων, ὡς
|| μηδὲν παλινδρομεῖν. εἰς μὲν γὰρ τὴν ἀρτηρίαν τὴν 204
φλεβώδη, καὶ γὰρ καὶ τοῦτ' ἐν ἐκείνοις δειχθήσεται,
πολὺ πλέον ἢ διὰ τῶν ἄλλων στομάτων εἰς τοὐπίσω
πάλιν ἀναγκαῖον ἐπανέρχεσθαι. τὸ δ' εἰς τὰ παρόντα
χρήσιμον, ὡς οὐκ ἐνδέχεταί τι τῶν ἀισθητὴν καὶ
μεγάλην ἐχόντων εὐρύτητα μὴ οὐκ ἤτοι διαστελλόμενον
ἕλκειν ἐξ ἁπάντων τῶν πλησίον ἢ ἐκθλίβειν αὖθις εἰς
ταῦτα συστελλόμενον ἔκ τε τῶν ἤδη προειρημένων ἐν
τῷδε τῷ λόγῳ σαφὲς ἂν εἴη κἀξ ὧν Ἐρασίστρατός τε καὶ
ἡμεῖς ἑτέρωθι περὶ τῆς πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίας
ἐδείξαμεν.
XIV
And further, it has been shown in other treatises that all the
arteries possess a power which derives from the heart, and by virtue
of which they dilate and contract.
Put together, therefore, the two facts—that the arteries have this
motion, and that everything, when it dilates, draws neighbouring
matter into itself—and you will find nothing strange in the fact that
those arteries which reach the skin draw in the outer air when they
dilate, while those which anastomose at any point with the veins
attract the thinnest and most vaporous part of the blood which these
contain, and as for those arteries which are near the heart, it is on
the heart itself that they exert their traction. For, by virtue of the
tendency by which a vacuum becomes refilled, the lightest and thinnest
part obeys the tendency before that which is heavier and thicker. Now
the lightest and thinnest of anything in the body is firstly pneuma,
secondly vapour, and in the third place that part of the blood which
has been accurately elaborated and refined.
These, then, are what the arteries draw into themselves on every side;
those arteries which reach the skin draw in the outer air[390] (this
being near them and one of the lightest of things); as to the other
arteries, those which pass up from the heart into the neck, and that
which lies along the spine, as also such arteries as are near
these—draw mostly from the heart itself; and those which are further
from the heart and skin necessarily draw the lightest part of the
blood out of the veins. So also the traction exercised by the diastole
of the arteries which go to the stomach and intestines takes place at
the expense of the heart itself and the numerous veins in its
neighbourhood; for these arteries cannot get anything worth speaking
of from the thick heavy nutriment contained in the intestines and
stomach,[391] since they first become filled with lighter elements.
For if you let down a tube into a vessel full of water and sand, and
suck the air out of the tube with your mouth, the sand cannot come up
to you before the water, for in accordance with the principle of the
refilling of a vacuum the lighter matter is always the first to
succeed to the evacuation.
XIV
Ἀλλὰ μὴν καὶ ὡς ἐν ἑκάστῃ τῶν ἀρτηριῶν ἐστί τις
δύναμις ἐκ τῆς καρδίας ἐπιρρέουσα, καθ' ἣν
διαστέλλονταί τε καὶ συστέλλονται, δέδεικται δι'
ἑτέρων.
Εἴπερ οὖν συνθείης ἄμφω τό τε ταύτην εἶναι τὴν
κίνησιν αὐταῖς τὸ τε πᾶν τὸ διαστελλόμενον ἕλκειν ἐκ
τῶν πλησίον εἰς ἑαυτό, θαυμαστὸν οὐδέν σοι φανεῖται
τὰς ἀρτηρίας, ὅσαι μὲν εἰς τὸ δέρμα περαίνουσιν
αὐτῶν, ἐπισπᾶσθαι τὸν ἔξωθεν ἀέρα διαστελλομένας,
ὅσαι δὲ κατά τι πρὸς τὰς || φλέβας ἀνεστόμωνται, τὸ 205
λεπτότατον ἐν αὐταῖς καὶ ἀτμωδέστατον ἐπισπᾶσθαι τοῦ
αἵματος, ὅσαι δ' ἐγγὺς τῆς καρδίας εἰσίν, ἐξ αὐτῆς
ἐκείνης ποιεῖσθαι τὴν ὁλκήν. ἐν γὰρ τῇ πρὸς τὸ
κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ τὸ κουφότατόν τε καὶ λεπτότατον
ἕπεται πρῶτον τοῦ βαρυτέρου τε καὶ παχυτέρου·
κουφότατον δ' ἐστὶ καὶ λεπτότατον ἁπάντων τῶν κατὰ
τὸ σῶμα πρῶτον μὲν τὸ πνεῦμα, δεύτερον δ' ὁ ἀτμός,
ἐπὶ τούτῳ δὲ τρίτον, ὅσον ἂν ἀκριβῶς ᾖ
κατειργασμένον τε καὶ λελεπτυσμένον αἷμα.
Ταῦτ' οὖν εἰς ἑαυτὰς ἕλκουσιν αἱ ἀρτηρίαι
πανταχόθεν, αἱ μὲν εἰς τὸ δέρμα καθήκουσαι τὸν
ἔξωθεν ἀέρα· πλησίον τε γὰρ αὐταῖς οὗτός ἐστι καὶ
κουφότατος ἐν τοῖς μάλιστα· τῶν δ' ἄλλων ἡ μὲν ἐπὶ
τὸν τράχηλον ἐκ τῆς καρδίας ἀνιοῦσα καὶ ἡ κατὰ
ῥάχιν, ἤδη δὲ καὶ ὅσαι τούτων ἐγγὺς ἐξ αὐτῆς μάλιστα
τῆς καρδίας· ὅσαι δὲ καὶ τῆς καρδίας πορρωτέρω καὶ
τοῦ δέρματος, ἕλκειν ταύταις ἀναγκαῖον ἐκ τῶν φλεβῶν
τὸ κουφότατον τοῦ αἵματος· ὥστε καὶ τῶν εἰς τὴν
γαστέρα τε καὶ τὰ ἔντερα καθηκουσῶν ἀρτηριῶν τὴν
ὁλκὴν ἐν τῷ διαστέλλεσθαι γίγνεσθαι παρά τε τῆς || 206
καρδίας αὐτῆς καὶ τῶν παρακειμένων αὐτῇ φλεβῶν
παμπόλλων οὐσῶν. οὐ γὰρ δὴ ἔκ γε τῶν ἐντέρων καὶ τῆς
κοιλίας τροφὴν οὕτω παχεῖάν τε καὶ βαρεῖαν ἐν
ἑαυτοῖς ἐχόντων δύνανταί τι μεταλαμβάνειν, ὅ τι καὶ
ἄξιον λόγου, φθάνουσαι πληροῦσθαι τοῖς κουφοτέροις.
οὐδὲ γὰρ εἰ καθεὶς αὐλίσκον εἰς ἀγγεῖον ὕδατός τε
καὶ ψάμμου πλῆρες ἐπισπάσαιο τῷ στόματι τὸν ἐκ τοῦ
αὐλίσκου ἀέρα, δύναιτ' ἂν ἀκολουθῆσαι σοι πρὸ τοῦ
ὕδατος ἡ ψάμμος· ἀεὶ γὰρ ἐν τῇ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον
ἀκολουθίᾳ τὸ κουφότερον ἕπεται πρότερον.
XV
It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that only a very little
[nutrient matter] such, namely, as has been accurately
elaborated—gets from the stomach into the arteries, since these first
become filled with lighter matter. We must understand that _there are
two kinds of attraction_, that by which a vacuum becomes refilled and
that caused by appropriateness of quality;[392] air is drawn into
bellows in one way, and iron by the lodestone in another. And we must
also understand that the traction which results from evacuation acts
primarily on what is light, whilst that from appropriateness of
quality acts frequently, it may be, on what is heavier (if this should
be naturally more nearly related[393]). Therefore, in the case of the
heart and the arteries, it is in so far as they are hollow organs,
capable of diastole, that they always attract the lighter matter
first, while, in so far as they require nourishment, it is actually
into their _coats_ (which are the real _bodies_ of these organs) that
the appropriate matter is drawn.[394] Of the blood, then, which is
taken into their cavities when they dilate, that part which is most
proper to them and most able to afford nourishment is attracted by
their actual coats.
Now, apart from what has been said,[395] the following is sufficient
proof that something is taken over from the veins into the arteries.
If you will kill an animal by cutting through a number of its large
arteries, you will find the veins becoming empty along with the
arteries: now, this could never occur if there were not anastomoses
between them. Similarly, also, in the heart itself, the thinnest
portion of the blood is drawn from the right ventricle into the left,
owing to there being perforations in the septum between them: these
can be seen for a great part [of their length]; they are like a kind
of fossae [pits] with wide mouths, and they get constantly narrower;
it is not possible, however, actually to observe their extreme
terminations, owing both to the smallness of these and to the fact
that when the animal is dead all the parts are chilled and
shrunken.[396] Here, too, however, our argument,[397] starting from
the principle that nothing is done by Nature in vain, discovers these
anastomoses between the ventricles of the heart; for it could not be
at random and by chance that there occurred fossae ending thus in
narrow terminations.
And secondly [the presence of these anastomoses has been assumed] from
the fact that, of the two orifices in the right ventricle, the one
conducting blood in and the other out, the former[398] is much the
larger. For, the fact that the insertion of the vena cava into the
heart[399] is larger than the vein which is inserted into the
lungs[400] suggests that not all the blood which the vena cava gives
to the heart is driven away again from the heart to the lungs. Nor can
it be said that any of the blood is expended in the nourishment of the
actual body of the heart, since there is another vein[401] which
breaks up in it and which does not take its origin nor get its share
of blood from the heart itself. And even if a certain amount is so
expended, still the vein leading to the lungs is not to such a slight
extent smaller than that inserted into the heart as to make it likely
that the blood is used as nutriment for the heart: the disparity is
much too great for such an explanation. It is, therefore, clear that
something _is_ taken over into the left ventricle.[402]
Moreover, of the two vessels connected with it, that which brings
pneuma into it from the lungs[403] is much smaller than the great
outgrowing artery[404] from which the arteries all over the body
originate; this would suggest that it not merely gets pneuma from the
lungs, but that it also gets blood from the right ventricle through
the anastomoses mentioned.
Now it belongs to the treatise “On the Use of Parts” to show that it
was best that some parts of the body should be nourished by pure,
thin, and vaporous blood, and others by thick, turbid blood, and that
in this matter also Nature has overlooked nothing. Thus it is not
desirable that these matters should be further discussed. Having
mentioned, however, that there are two kinds of attraction, certain
bodies exerting attraction along wide channels during diastole (by
virtue of the principle by which a vacuum becomes refilled) and others
exerting it by virtue of their appropriateness of quality, we must
next remark that the former bodies can attract even from a distance,
while the latter can only do so from among things which are quite
close to them; the very longest tube let down into water can easily
draw up the liquid into the mouth, but if you withdraw iron to a
distance from the lodestone or corn from the jar (an instance of this
kind has in fact been already given[405]) no further attraction can
take place.
This you can observe most clearly in connection with _garden
conduits_. For a certain amount of moisture is distributed from these
into every part lying close at hand but it cannot reach those lying
further off: therefore one has to arrange the flow of water into all
parts of the garden by cutting a number of small channels leading from
the large one. The intervening spaces between these small channels are
made of such a size as will, presumably, best allow them [the spaces]
to satisfy their needs by drawing from the liquid which flows to them
from every side. So also is it in the bodies of animals. Numerous
conduits distributed through the various limbs bring them pure blood,
much like the garden water-supply, and, further, the intervals between
these conduits have been wonderfully arranged by Nature from the
outset so that the intervening parts should be plentifully provided
for when absorbing blood, and that they should never be deluged by a
quantity of superfluous fluid running in at unsuitable times.
For the way in which they obtain nourishment is somewhat as follows.
In the body[406] which is continuous throughout, such as Erasistratus
supposes his _simple vessel_ to be, it is the superficial parts which
are the first to make use of the nutriment with which they are brought
into contact; then the parts coming next draw their share from these
by virtue of their contiguity; and again others from these; and this
does not stop until the quality of the nutrient substance has been
distributed among all parts of the corpuscle in question. And for such
parts as need the humour which is destined to nourish them to be
altered still further, Nature has provided a kind of storehouse,
either in the form of a central cavity or else as separate
caverns,[407] or something analogous to caverns. Thus the flesh of the
viscera and of the muscles is nourished from the blood directly, this
having undergone merely a slight alteration; the bones, however, in
order to be nourished, require very great change, and what blood is to
flesh marrow is to bone; in the case of the small bones, which do not
possess central cavities, this marrow is distributed in their caverns,
whereas in the larger bones which do contain central cavities the
marrow is all concentrated in these.
For, as was pointed out in the first book,[408] things having a
similar substance can easily change into one another, whereas it is
impossible for those which are very different to be assimilated to one
another without intermediate stages. Such a one in respect to
cartilage is the myxoid substance which surrounds it, and in respect
to ligaments, membranes, and nerves the viscous liquid dispersed
inside them; for each of these consists of numerous fibres, which are
homogeneous[409]—in fact, actual _sensible elements_; and in the
intervals between these fibres is dispersed the humour most suited for
nutrition; this they have drawn from the blood in the veins, choosing
the most appropriate possible, and now they are assimilating it step
by step and changing it into their own substance.
All these considerations, then, agree with one another, and bear
sufficient witness to the truth of what has been already demonstrated;
there is thus no need to prolong the discussion further. For, from
what has been said, anyone can readily discover in what way all the
particular [vital activities] come about. For instance, we could in
this way ascertain why it is that in the case of many people who are
partaking freely of wine, the fluid which they have drunk is rapidly
absorbed[410] through the body and almost the whole of it is passed by
the kidneys within a very short time. For here, too, the rapidity with
which the fluid is absorbed depends on appropriateness of quality, on
the thinness of the fluid, on the width of the vessels and their
mouths, and on the efficiency of the attractive faculty. The parts
situated near the alimentary canal, by virtue of their appropriateness
of quality, draw in the imbibed food for their own purposes, then the
parts next to them in their turn snatch it away, then those next again
take it from these, until it reaches the vena cava, whence finally the
kidneys attract that part of it which is proper to them. Thus it is in
no way surprising that wine is taken up more rapidly than water, owing
to its appropriateness of quality, and, further, that the white clear
kind of wine is absorbed more rapidly owing to its thinness, while
black turbid wine, is checked on the way and retarded because of its
thickness.
These facts, also, will afford abundant proof of what has already been
said about the arteries; everywhere, in fact, such blood as is both
specifically appropriate and at the same time thin in consistency
answers more readily to their traction than does blood which is not
so; this is why the arteries which, in their diastole, absorb vapour,
pneuma, and thin blood attract either none at all or very little of
the juices contained in the stomach and intestines.
XV
Οὔκουν χρὴ θαυμάζειν, εἰ παντελῶς ὀλίγον ἐκ τῆς
κοιλίας, ὅσον ἂν ἀκριβῶς ᾖ κατειργασμένον, εἰς τὰς
ἀρτηρίας παραγίγνεται φθανούσας πληροῦσθαι τῶν
κουφοτέρων, ἀλλ' ἐκεῖνο γιγνώσκειν, ὡς δύ' ἐστὸν
ὁλκῆς εἴδη, τὸ μὲν τῇ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ,
τὸ δ' οἰκειότητι ποιότητος γιγνόμενον· ἑτέρως μὲν
γὰρ εἰς τὰς φύσας ὁ ἀήρ, ἑτέρως δ' ὁ σίδηρος ὑπὸ τῆς
ἡρακλείας ἐπισπᾶται λίθου· καὶ ὡς ἡ μὲν πρὸς τὸ
κενούμενον ἀκολουθία || τὸ κουφότερον ἕλκει 207
πρότερον, ἡ δὲ κατὰ τὴν τῆς ποιότητος οἰκειότητα
πολλάκις, εἰ οὕτως ἔτυχε, τὸ βαρύτερον, ἂν τῇ φύσει
συγγενέστερον ὑπάρχῃ. καὶ τοίνυν καὶ ταῖς ἀρτηρίαις
τε καὶ τῇ καρδίᾳ, ὡς μὲν κοίλοις τε καὶ
διαστέλλεσθαι δυναμένοις ὀργάνοις, ἀεὶ τὸ κουφότερον
ἀκολουθεῖ πρότερον, ὡς δὲ τρέφεσθαι δεομένοις, εἰς
αὐτοὺς τοὺς χιτῶνας, οἱ δὴ τὰ σώματα τῶν ὀργάνων
εἰσίν, ἕλκεται τὸ οἰκεῖον. ὅσον ἂν οὖν εἰς τὴν
κοιλότητα διαστελλομένων αὐτῶν αἵματος μεταληφθῇ,
τούτου τὸ οἰκειότατόν τε καὶ μάλιστα τρέφειν
δυνάμενον οἱ χιτῶνες αὐτοὶ τῶν ἀγγείων ἐπισπῶνται.
Τοῦ δ' ἐκ τῶν φλεβῶν εἰς τὰς ἀρτηρίας
μεταλαμβάνεσθαί τι πρὸς τοῖς εἰρημένοις ἱκανὸν καὶ
τοῦτο γε τεκμήριον. εἰ πολλὰς καὶ μεγάλας ἀρτηρίας
διατεμὼν ἀποκτεῖναι τὸ ζῷον βουληθείης, εὑρήσεις
αὐτοῦ τὰς φλέβας ὁμοίως ταῖς ἀρτηρίας ἐκκενουμένας,
οὐκ ἂν τούτου ποτὲ γενομένου χωρὶς τῶν πρὸς ἀλλήλας
αὐταῖς ἀναστομώσεων. ὡσαύτος δὲ καὶ κατ' αὐτὴν τὴν
καρδίαν ἐκ τῆς δεξιᾶς κοιλίας εἰς τὴν ἀριστερὰν
ἕλκεται τὸ λεπτό||τατον ἔχοντός τινα τρήματα τοῦ 208
μέσου διαφράγματος αὐτῶν, ἃ μέχρι μὲν πλείστου
δυνατόν ἐστιν ἰδεῖν, οἷον βοθύνους τινὰς ἐξ
εὐρυτέρου στόματος ἀεὶ καὶ μᾶλλον εἰς στενότερον
προϊόντας. οὐ μὴν αὐτά γε τὰ ἔσχατα πέρατα δυνατὸν
ἔτι θεάσασθαι διά τε σμικρότητα καὶ ὅτι τεθνεῶτος
ἤδη τοῦ ζῴου κατέψυκταί τε καὶ πεπύκνωται πάντα.
ἀλλ' ὁ λόγος κἀνταῦθα πρῶτον μὲν ἐκ τοῦ μηδὲν ὑπὸ
τῆς φύσεως γίγνεσθαι μάτην ὁρμώμενος ἐξευρίσκει τὰς
ἀναστομώσεις ταύτας τῶν κοιλιῶν τῆς καρδίας· οὐ γὰρ
δὴ εἰκῇ γε καὶ ὡς ἔτυχεν οἱ ἐς στενὸν οὕτω
τελευτῶντες ἐγένοντο βόθυνοι.
Δεύτερον δὲ κἀκ τοῦ δυοῖν ὄντοιν στομάτοιν ἐν τῇ
δεξιᾷ τῆς καρδίας κοιλίᾳ τοῦ μὲν ἐισάγοντος τὸ αἷμα,
τοῦ δ' ἐξάγοντος πολὺ μεῖζον εἶναι τὸ εἰσάγον. ὡς
γὰρ οὐ παντὸς τοῦ αἵματος, ὅσον ἡ κοίλη φλὲψ δίδωσι
τῇ καρδίᾳ, πάλιν ἐξ ἐκείνης ἐκπεμπομένου τῷ
πνεύμονι, μείζων ἐστὶν ἡ ἀπὸ τῆς κοίλης εἰς αὐτὴν
ἔμφυσις τῆς ἐμφυομένης εἰς τὸν πνεύμονα φλεβός. οὐδὲ
|| γὰρ τοῦτ' ἐστιν εἰπεῖν, ὡς ἐδαπανήθη τι τοῦ 209
αἵματος εἰς τὴν αὐτοῦ τοῦ σώματος τῆς καρδίας
θρέψιν. ἑτέρα γάρ ἐστι φλὲψ ἡ εἰς ἐκεῖνο
κατασχιζομένη μήτε τὴν γένεσιν ἐκ τῆς καρδίας αὐτῆς
μήτε τὴν τοῦ αἵματος ἔχουσα μετάληψιν. εἰ δὲ καὶ
δαπανᾶταί τι, ἀλλ' οὐ τοσοῦτον γε μείων ἐστὶν ἡ εἰς
τὸν πνεύμονα φλὲψ ἄγουσα τῆς εἰς τὴν καρδίαν
ἐμφυομένης, ὅσον ἐικὸς εἰς τὴν τροφὴν ἀνηλῶσθαι τῆς
καρδίας, ἀλλὰ πλέον πολλῷ. δῆλον οὖν, ὡς εἰς τὴν
ἀριστεράν τι μεταλαμβάνεται κοιλίαν.
Καὶ γὰρ οὖν καὶ τῶν κατ' ἐκείνην ἀγγείων δυοῖν ὄντων
ἔλαττόν ἐστι πολλῷ τὸ ἐκ τοῦ πνεύμονος εἰς αὐτὴν
ἐισάγον τὸ πνεῦμα τῆς ἐκφυομένης ἀρτηρίας τῆς
μεγάλης, ἀφ' ἧς αἱ κατὰ τὸ σῶμα σύμπασαι πεφύκασιν,
ὡς ἂν μὴ μόνον ἐκ τοῦ πνεύμονος πνεῦμα
μεταλαμβανούσης αὐτῆς, ἀλλὰ κἀκ τῆς δεξιᾶς κοιλίας
αἵμα διὰ τῶν εἰρημένων ἀναστομώσεων.
Ὅτι δ' ἄμεινον ἦν τοῖς τοῦ σώματος μορίοις τοῖς μὲν
ὑπὸ καθαροῦ καὶ λεπτοῦ καὶ ἀτμώδους αἵματος
τρέφεσθαι, τοῖς δ' ὑπὸ παχέος καὶ θολεροῦ καὶ ὡς
οὐδ' ἐνταῦθά τι παρεώραται τῇ φύσει, τῆς || περὶ 210
χρείας μορίων πραγματείας ἐστίν, ὥστ' οὐ χρὴ νῦν
ὑπὲρ τούτων ἔτι λέγειν, ἀλλ' ὑπομνήσαντας, ὡς δύο
ἐστὸν ὁλκῆς ἔιδη, τῶν μὲν εὐρείαις ὁδοῖς ἐν τῷ
διαστέλλεσθαι τῇ πρὸς τὸ κενούμενον ἀκολουθίᾳ τὴν
ἕλξιν ποιουμένων, τῶν δ' οἰκειότητι ποιότητος,
ἐφεξῆς λέγειν, ὡς τὰ μὲν πρότερα καὶ πόρρωθεν ἕλκειν
τι δύναται, τὰ δὲ δεύτερα ἐκ τῶν ἐγγυτάτω μόνων.
αὐλίσκον μὲν γὰρ ὅτι μήκιστον εἰς ὕδωρ ἔνεστι
καθέντα ῥᾳδίως ἀνασπᾶν εἰς τὸ στόμα δι' αὐτοῦ τὸ
ὑγρόν· οὐ μὴν εἴ γ' ἐπὶ πλέον ἀπαγάγοις τῆς
ἡρακλείας λίθου τὸν σίδηρον ἢ τοὺς πυροὺς τοῦ
κεραμίου—καὶ γὰρ καὶ τοιοῦτόν τι πρόσθεν ἐλέγετο
παράδειγμα—δύναιτ' ἂν ἔτι γενέσθαι τις ὁλκή.
Σαφέστατα δ' ἂν αὐτὸ μάθοις ἐπὶ τῶν ἐν τοῖς κήποις
ὀχετῶν· ἐκ τούτων γὰρ εἰς μὲν τὰ παρακείμενα καὶ
πλησίον ἅπαντα διαδίδοταί τις ἰκμάς, εἰς δὲ τὰ
πορρωτέρω προσελθεῖν οὐκέτι δύναται, καὶ διὰ τοῦτ'
ἀναγκάζονται πολλοῖς ὀχετοῖς μικροῖς ἀπὸ τοῦ μεγάλου
τετμημένοις εἰς ἕκαστον μέρος τοῦ κήπου τὴν
ἐπίρρυσιν τοῦ ὕδατος ἐπιτεχνάσθαι· καὶ τηλικαῦτά γε
τὰ || μεταξύ διαστήματα τούτων τῶν μικρῶν ὀχετῶν 211
ποιοῦσιν, ἡλίκα μάλιστα νομίζουσιν ἀρκεῖν εἰς τὸ
ἱκανῶς ἀπολαύειν ἕλκοντα τῆς ἑκατέρωθεν αὐτοῖς
ἐπιρρεούσης ὑγρότητος. οὕτως οὖν ἔχει κἀν τοῖς τῶν
ζῴων σώμασιν. ὀχετοὶ πολλοὶ κατὰ πάντα τὰ μέλη
διεσπαρμένοι παράγουσιν αὐτοῖς αἵμα καθάπερ ἐν
κήποις ὑδρείαν τινά. καὶ τούτων τῶν ὀχετῶν τὰ μεταξὺ
διαστήματα θαυμαστῶς ὑπὸ τῆς φύσεως εὐθὺς ἐξ ἀρχῆς
διατέτακται πρὸς τὸ μήτ' ἐνδεῶς χορηγεῖσθαι τοῖς
μεταξὺ μορίοις ἕλκουσιν εἰς ἑαυτὰ τὸ αἵμα μήτε
κατακλύζεσθαί ποτ' αὐτὰ πλήθει περιττῆς ὑγρότητος
ἀκαίρως ἐπιρρεούσης.
Ὁ γὰρ δὴ τρόπος τῆς θρέψεως αὐτῶν τοιόσδε τις ἐστι.
τοῦ συνεχοῦς ἑαυτῷ σώματος, οἷόνπερ τὸ ἁπλοῦν
ἀγγεῖον Ἐρασίστρατος ὑποτίθεται, τὰ μὲν ἐπιπολῆς
μέρη πρῶτα τῆς ὁμιλούσης ἀπολαύει τροφῆς· ἐκ δὲ
τούτων αὖ μεταλαμβάνει κατὰ τὸ συνεχὲς ἕλκοντα τὰ
τούτων ἑξῆς, εἶτ' ἐξ ἐκείνων αὖθις ἑτέρα καὶ τοῦτ'
οὐ παύεται γιγνόμενον, ἄχρις ἂν εἰς ἅπαντ' αὐτοῦ
διαδοθῇ τὰ μόρια τῆς τρεφούσης οὐσίας ἡ ποιότης. ὅσα
δὲ τῶν μορίων ἐπὶ πλέον || ἀλλοιουμένου δεῖται τοῦ 212
μέλλοντος αὐτὰ θρέψειν χυμοῦ, τούτοις ὥσπερ τι
ταμιεῖον ἡ φύσις παρεσκεύασεν ἤτοι κοιλίας ἢ
σήραγγας ἤ τι ταῖς σήραγξιν ἀνάλογον. αἱ μὲν γὰρ
σάρκες αἵ τε τῶν σπλάγχνων ἁπάντων αἵ τε τῶν μυῶν ἐξ
αἵματος αὐτοῦ τρέφονται βραχεῖαν ἀλλοίωσιν
δεξαμένου. τὰ δ' ὀστᾶ παμπόλλης ἐν τῷ μεταξὺ δεῖται
τῆς μεταβολῆς, ἵνα τραφῇ, καὶ ἔστιν οἷόνπερ τὸ αἷμα
ταῖς σαρξί, τοιοῦτος ὁ μυελὸς τοῖς ὀστοῖς ἐν μὲν
τοῖς μικροῖς τε καὶ ἀκοιλίοις κατὰ τὰς σήραγγας
αὐτῶν διεσπαρμένος, ἐν δὲ τοῖς μείζοσί τε καὶ
κοιλίας ἔχουσιν ἐν ἐκείναις ἠθροισμένος.
Ὡς γὰρ καὶ διὰ τοῦ πρώτου γράμματος ἐδείκνυτο, τοῖς
μὲν ὁμοίαν ἔχουσι τὴν οὐσίαν εἰς ἄλληλα μεταβάλλειν
ἐγχωρεῖ, τοῖς δὲ πάμπολυ διεστῶσιν ἀμήχανον ἀλλήλοις
ὁμοιωθῆναι χωρὶς τῶν ἐν μέσῳ μεταβολῶν. τοιοῦτόν τι
καὶ τοῖς χόνδροις ἐστί τὸ περικεχυμένον μυξῶδες καὶ
τοῖς συνδέσμοις καὶ τοῖς ὑμέσι καὶ τοῖς νεύροις τὸ
παρεσπαρμένον ἐν αὐτοῖς ὑγρὸν γλίσχρον· ἕκαστον γὰρ
|| τούτων ἐξ ἰνῶν σύγκειται πολλῶν, αἵπερ 213
ὁμοιομερεῖς τ' εἰσὶ καὶ ὄντως αἰσθητὰ στοιχεῖα. κατὰ
δὲ τὰς μεταξὺ χώρας αὐτῶν ὁ οἰκειότατος εἰς θρέψιν
παρέσπαρται χυμός, ὃν εἵλκυσαν μὲν ἐκ τῶν φλεβῶν τοῦ
αἵματος, ὅσον οἷόν τ' ἦν ἐκλεξάμεναι τὸν
ἐπιτηδειότατον, ἐξομοιοῦσι δὲ κατὰ βραχὺ καὶ
μεταβάλλουσιν εἰς τὴν ἑαυτῶν οὐσίαν.
Ἅπαντ' οὖν ταῦτα καὶ ἀλλήλοις ὁμολογεῖ καὶ τοῖς
ἔμπροσθεν ἀποδεδειγμένοις ἱκανῶς μαρτυρεῖ καὶ οὐ χρὴ
μηκύνειν ἔτι τὸν λόγον· ἐκ γὰρ τῶν εἰρημένων ἔνεστιν
ἑκάστῳ τὰ κατὰ μέρος ἅπαντα καθ' ὅντινα γίγνεται
τρόπον ἐξευρίσκειν ἑτοίμως, ὥσπερ καὶ διὰ τι πολλοῖς
κωθωνιζομένοις πάμπολυ τάχιστα μὲν ἀναδίδοται τὸ
ποθέν, οὐρεῖται δ' ὀλίγου δεῖν ἅπαν ἐντὸς οὐ πολλοῦ
χρόνου. καὶ γὰρ κἀνταῦθα τῇ τε τῆς ποιότητος
οἰκειότητι καὶ τῇ τῆς ὑγρότητος λεπτότητι καὶ τῇ τῶν
ἀγγείων τε καὶ τῶν κατ' αὐτὰ στομάτων ἐυρύτητι καὶ
τῇ τῆς ἑλκτικῆς δυνάμεως εὐρωστίᾳ τὸ τάχος
συντελεῖται τῆς ἀναδόσεως, τῶν μὲν πλησίον τῆς
κοιλίας τεταγμένων μορίων οἰκειότητι ποιότητος || 214
ἑαυτῶν ἕνεκα ἑλκόντων τὸ πόμα, τῶν δ' ἑξῆς τούτοις
ἐξαρπαζόντων καὶ αὐτῶν εἰς ἑαυτὰ κἄπειτα τῶν ἐφεξῆς
πάλιν ἐκ τούτων μεταλαμβανόντων, ἄχρις ἂν εἰς τὴν
κοίλην ἀφίκηται φλέβα, τοὐντεῦθεν δ' ἤδη τῶν νεφρῶν
τὸ οἰκεῖον ἐπισπωμένων. ὥστ' οὐδὲν θαυμαστὸν οἶνον
μὲν ὕδατος ἀναλαμβάνεσθαι θᾶττον οἰκειότητι
ποιότητος, αὐτὸν δὲ τὸν οἶνον τὸν μὲν λευκὸν καὶ
καθαρὸν ἑτοίμως ἀναδίδοσθαι διὰ λεπτότητα, τὸν δ' αὖ
μέλανα καὶ θολερὸν ἴσχεσθαί τε κατὰ τὴν ὁδὸν καὶ
βραδύνειν ὑπὸ πάχους.
Εἴη δ' ἂν ταῦτα καὶ τῶν ὑπὲρ τῶν ἀρτηριῶν ἔμπροσθεν
εἰρημένων οὐ σμικρὰ μαρτύρια. πανταχοῦ γὰρ ὅσον
οἰκεῖόν τε καὶ λεπτὸν αἵμα τοῦ μὴ τοιούτου ῥᾷον
ἕπεται τοῖς ἕλκουσιν. ἀτμὸν οὖν ἕλκουσαι καὶ πνεῦμα
καὶ λεπτὸν αἷμα κατὰ τὰς διαστάσεις αἱ ἀρτηρίαι τῶν
κατὰ τὴν κοιλίαν καὶ τὰ ἔντερα περιεχομένων χυμῶν ἢ
οὐδ' ὅλως ἢ παντάπασιν ἐπισπῶνται βραχύ.
[299] “Of food to feeder,” _i.e._ of the environment to
the organism. _cf._ p. 39, chap. xi.
[300] “Drawing”; _cf._ p. 116, note 2 (168).
[301] For these terms (_prosthesis_ and _prosphysis_ in
Greek) _cf._ p. 39, notes 5 (66) and 6 (67).
[302] Lit. “through the _energizing_ (or _functioning_)
of the attractive faculty”; the faculty (δύναμις)
_in operation_ is an activity (ἐνέργεια). _cf._ p. 3,
note 2 (6).
[303] This chapter is an excellent example of Galen’s
method of reasoning _a priori_. The complementary
inductive method, however, is employed in the next
chapter. _cf._ p. 209, note 1 (288).
[304] The deductive.
[305] The _logos_ is the argument or “theory” arrived at
by the process of λογικὴ θεωρία or
“theorizing”; _cf._ p. 151, note 3 (214); p. 205, note 1
(282).
[306] The Greek words for the uterus (_mêtrae_ and
_hysterae_) probably owe their plural form to the belief
that the organ was bicornuate in the human, as it is in
some of the lower species.
[307] Note this expression. For Galen’s views on the
origin of species, _cf._ Introduction, p. xxxi.,
footnote (3).
[308] Herophilus of Chalcedon (_circa_ 300 B.C.) was,
like Erasistratus, a representative of the anatomical
school of Alexandria. His book on Midwifery was known
for centuries. _cf._ Introduction, p. xii.
[309] Relaxation of utero-sacral ligaments as an
important predisposing cause of prolapsus uteri.
[310] That is, at the end of the first stage of labour.
[311] The pylorus.
[312] “Chylosis,” chylification. _cf._ p. 240, note 1
(314).
[313] Lit. barley-“chyle,” _i.e._ barley-water.
[314] _i.e._ not the mere mechanical breaking down of
food, but a distinctively vital action of “alteration.”
[315] _Pepsis._
[316] Book I., chaps. x., xi.
[317] _cf._ p. 222, note 1 (299).
[318] _Choledochous_.
[319] More exactly _peristolé_; _cf._ p. 97, note 1
(146).
[320] Neuburger says of Erasistratus that “dissection
had taught him to think in terms of anatomy.” It was
chiefly the gross movements or structure of organs with
which he concerned himself. Where an organ had no
obvious function, he dubbed it “useless”; _e.g._ the
spleen (_cf._ p. 143).
[321] _i.e._ contracting and dilating; no longitudinal
movements involved; _cf._ p. 263, note 2 (341).
[322] _cf._ p. 282, note 1 (356).
[323] Book II., chaps. ii. and viii.
[324] Note use of psychological terms in biology. _cf._
also p. 133, note 3 (191).
[325] “In everything.” _cf._ p. 66, note 3 (104).
[326] Galen confuses the nutrition of organs with that
of the ultimate living elements or cells; the stomach
does not, of course, feed itself in the way a cell does.
_cf._ Introduction, p. xxxii.
[327] _cf._ Asclepiades’s theory regarding the urine, p.
51.
[328] The process of _application_ or _prosthesis_.
_cf._ p. 223, note 3 (301).
[329] Mutual influence of organism and environment.
[330] Qualitative change. _cf._ Book I., chap. ii.
[331] Apparently skin-diseases in which a superficial
crust (resembling the lichen on a tree-trunk)
forms—_e.g._ psoriasis.
[332] Note especially pneuma and innate heat, which
practically stand for oxygen and the heat generated in
oxidation. _cf._ p. 41, note 3 (70).
[333] Book I., chap. x.
[334] That is to say, faeces are obviously altered food.
This alteration cannot have taken place entirely in the
small intestine: therefore alteration of food must take
place in the stomach.
[335] _cf._ p. 39.
[336] Asclepiades held that there was no such thing as
real qualitative change; the food was merely broken up
into its constituent molecules, and absorbed unaltered.
_cf._ p. 49, note 5 (82).
[337] _i.e._ denial of forethought in the Physis.
[338] _v._ p. 9, _et passim_.
[339] _cf._ p. 97.
[340] It appears to me, from comparison between this and
other passages in Galen’s writings (notably _Use of
Parts_, iv., 8), that he means by the “two coats” simply
the mucous and the muscular coats. In this case the
“straight” or “longitudinal” fibres of the inner coat
would be the _rugae_; the “circular” fibres of the inner
intestinal coat would be the _valvulae conniventes_.
[341] The term here rendered _peristalsis_ is
_peristolé_ in Greek; it is applied only to the
intermittent movements of muscles placed circularly
round a lumen or cavity, and comprehends _systolé_ or
contraction and _diastolé_ or dilatation. In its modern
significance, _peristalsis_, however, also includes the
movements of _longitudinal_ fibres. _cf._ p. 97, note 1
(146).
[342] _i.e._ those containing non-striped or
“involuntary” muscle fibres; organs governed by the
“natural” pneuma; _cf._ p. 186, note 3 (265).
[343] By this term is meant only what we should call the
“voluntary” muscles.
[344] _cf._ p. 97.
[345] For “symptom,” _cf._ p. 13, and p. 12, note 3
(24). “Transitum namque materiae per angustum corpus id
accidens consequitur” (Linacre). Less a “result” or
“consequence” than an “accompaniment.”
[346] _i.e._ this is a purely mechanical process.
[347] _i.e._. this phenomenon is a proof neither of
_peristolé_ nor of attraction. _cf._ p. 97, note 2
(147).
[348] Contraction and dilatation of course being
reversed.
[349] The _channa_ is a kind of sea-perch; “a species of
_Serranus_, either _S. scriba_ or _S. cabrilla_” (D’Arcy
W. Thompson). _cf._ Aristotle’s _Nat. Hist._ (D’Arcy
Thompson’s edition, Oxford, 1910), IV., xi., 538 A, 20.
The _synodont_ “is not to be identified with certainty,
but is supposed to be _Dentex vulgaris_,” that is, an
edible Mediterranean perch. “It is not the stomach,”
adds Prof. Thompson, “but the air-bladder that gets
everted and hangs out of the mouth in fishes, especially
when they are hauled in from a considerable depth.”
_cf._ _H. A._, VIII., ii., 591 B, 5.
[350] Under the term “neura,” tendons were often
included as well as nerves. Similarly in modern Dutch
the word _zenuw_ (“sinew”) means both a tendon and a
nerve; _zenuwachtig_ = “nervous.”
[351] Rather than the alternative reading, τὸν ἔσωθεν
χιτῶνα. Galen apparently supposes that the outer coat
will not be damaged, as the cuts will pass _between_
its fibres. These cuts would be, presumably, short
ones, at various levels, no single one of them
involving the whole circumference of the gullet.
[352] _cf._ p. 205.
[353] Thus Galen elsewhere calls the spleen a mere
_emunctory_ (ἐκμαγεῖον) of the liver. _cf._ p. 214,
note 1 (295).
[354] _cf._ p. 269.
[355] The urinary bladders of pigs (such as Galen
dissected) are thin, and appear to have only one coat.
[356] _cf._ p. 243.
[357] My suggestion is that Galen refers to (1) the
_mucous_ coat, with its _valvulae conniventes_, and (2)
the _muscular_ coat, of which the chief layer is made up
of circular fibres. _cf._ p. 262, note 1 (340).
[358] Or _utility_.
[359] Relationship between physiology and pathology
again emphasized. _cf._ p. 188, note 2 (267).
[360] Or physicist—the investigator of the Physis or
Nature. _cf._ p. 196, note 2 (274). Note here the use of
analogical reasoning. _cf._ p. 113, note 2 (166).
[361] _cf._ p. 95.
[362] I. xiii.; II. ii.
[363] Galen’s idea is that if reversal of the direction
of flow can occur in the _primae viae_ (in vomiting), it
may also be expected to occur in the _secundae viae_ or
absorptive channels.
[364] For this “delivery,” “up-yield,” or _anadosis_,
_v._ p. 13, note 5 (26).
[365] The mesenteric veins.
[366] Linacre renders: “Una omnium confluxio ac
conspiratio”; and he adds the marginal note “Totum
corpus nostrum est conspirabile et confluxile per meatus
communes.” _cf._ p. 48.
[367] The alimentary canal, as not being edible, is not
considered a _splanchnon_ or viscus.
[368] Lit. _rheums_; hence our term _rheumatism_.
[369] Here Galen apparently indicates that vital
functions are at least partly explicable in terms of
mechanical law. _cf._ Introduction, p. xxviii.
[370] _cf._ pp. 211, 247.
[371] See p. 298, note 1 (369).
[372] The ends of the veins in the alimentary canal from
which absorption or _anadosis_ had originally taken
place.
[373] _Diathesis_.
[374] _Diathesis_.
[375] _Pathos_.
[376] He means, not only under the stress of special
circumstances, but also normally.
[377] Lit. “rough artery.” The air-passages as well as
the arteries proper were supposed by the Greeks to carry
air (pneuma); diastole of arteries was, like expansion
of the chest, a movement for drawing in air. _cf._ p.
317, note 1 (390).
[378] _cf._ p. 39, chap. xi.
[379] Lit. _orexis_.
[380] Lit. a “physical” organ; that is, a mere
instrument or organon of the Physis,—not one of the
Psyche or conscious personality. _cf._ semen, p. 132,
note 1 (189).
[381] _cf._ p. 317, note 2 (391); p. 319, chap. xv.
[382] Note that absorption takes place from the stomach
as well as the intestines. _cf._ p. 118, note 1 (171).
[383] That is, among the ultimate tissues or cells.
[384] Pp. 205-9.
[385] By this term, of course, the air-passages are also
meant; _cf._ p. 305.
[386] _cf._ p. 34, note 1 (57).
[387] _cf._ p. 121, note 4 (177).
[388] Pulmonary vein, or rather, left auricle. Galen
means a reflux through the mitral orifice; the left
auricle was looked on rather as the termination of the
pulmonary veins than as a part of the heart. _cf._ p.
323, note 4 (403). He speaks here of a kind of
“physiological” mitral incompetence.
[389] _Horror vacui._
[390] _cf._ p. 305, note 2 (377).
[391] _cf._ p. 308, note 1 (381).
[392] The “mechanical” principle of _horror vacui_
contrasted with the “physical” or semi-physiological
principle of specific attraction. _Appropriateness_ here
might almost be rendered _affinity_ or _kinship_. _cf_.
note 2 (393), _infra_.
[393] “Related,” “akin.” _cf._ p. 36, note 2 (61).
[394] The coats exercise the _vital_ traction, the
cavities the merely _mechanical_. _cf_. p. 165, note 2
(232).
[395] Chap. xiv.
[396] These fossae were probably the recesses between
the _columnae carnae_.
[397] On _logos_ _cf._ p. 226, note 2 (305).
[398] He means the tricuspid orifice. _cf._ p. 121, note
4 (177).
[399] The right auricle was looked on less as a part of
the heart than as an expansion or “insertion” of the
vena cava.
[400] This “vein” (really the pulmonary artery) was
supposed to be the channel by which the lungs received
nutriment from the right heart. _cf._ p. 121, note 3
(176).
[401] The coronary vein.
[402] Galen’s conclusion, of course, is, so far,
correct, but he has substituted an imaginary direct
communication between the ventricles for the actual and
more roundabout pulmonary circulation, of whose
existence he apparently had no idea. His views were
eventually corrected by the Renascence anatomists. _cf._
Introduction, pp. xxii.-xxiii.
[403] He means the left auricle, considered as the
termination of the pulmonary “arteries”; _cf._ p. 314,
note 3 (388).
[404] The aorta, its orifice being circular, appears
bigger than the slit-like mitral orifice.
[405] p. 87.
[406] Or we may render it “corpuscle”; Galen practically
means the _cell_. _cf._ p. 153, note 2 (216).
[407] _cf._ the term “cavernous tissue.”
[408] I. x.
[409] Lit. _homoeomerous_, _i.e._ “the same all
through,” of similar structure throughout, the
_elements_ of living matter, _cf._ p. 20, note 3 (38),
and _cf._ also the “cell” of Erasistratus, p. 153.
[410] “Delivered,” “dispersed”; _cf._ p. 13, note 5
(26).
INDEX AND GLOSSARY
(The numbers refer to the pages of the present edition;
fuller references will be found in the footnotes.)
Abortifacient drugs, 285
Abortion, 231, 285
Absorption from digestive tract (_v. Anadosis_)
Acidity of urine, 245, 287
Activity (function), 13
Adhesion (prosphysis) of nutriment to tissues, 39
Affinity, 33
Alimentary canal, 119, 309
coats of, 23, 263
Allopathic treatment, 199
Alteration (qualitative change), 7, 9, 241, 251
Anadosis (absorption from digestive tract), 63, 119
Anæmia, 173
Anasarca (dropsy), 41
Anastomoses (communications between arteries and veins), 321
Anaxagoras, “preformationist” doctrine of, 7
Ancient writers, value of, 279
Animal life, 3
Animals (_v._ also _History, Natural_)
cold-blooded, 181
long-necked, 275
Anorexia (want of appetite), 247
Aorta (main artery of body), 143, 323
Appetite, 249
Aristotle, 9, _et passim_ (_v._ also _Peripatetic School_)
Arrows, drugs for extracting heads of, 83
“Art” of Nature (_i.e._ of the living organism), 57
Arteries, structure of, 283
to-and-fro motion in, 313
attraction of air by, through skin, 317
Artery, pulmonary, 121, 323
Artificer, 133
Asclepiades, 49, _et passim_
Asepsis (absence of corruption), 201
Assimilation, 33
Asthenia (weakness), 239
Atomist School in Medicine, 45
Atrabiliary (melancholic) humour, 209
Attraction (_v._ also _Horror vacui_)
physiological, 45
magnetic, 73
Auricle, left, of heart, 315
right, of heart, 321
Authority, value of, 279
Aversion, 249
Baking, 259
Beauty, 47
Bile, yellow, 63, 123, 177, 191, 289
“vitelline,” 209
black, 203 (_v._ also _Melancholic humour_)
Bile-passages, mechanical blocking of, 171
Biliousness, 193
Biology, repudiation of, by Atomist School, 45
Bladder, urinary, 51, 53, _et passim_
for bile (_v. Gall-bladder_)
Blood-production, 17, 169, 183, 191, 201
Boiling, 259
Boils, 253
Bone, structure of, 327
Bone-marrow, 327
Borborygmi (gurglings) in stomach, 237
Bread, constitution of, 11
Bubo (swollen lymphatic glands in groin), 185
Butchers (as the primitive anatomists), 51
Cadaver (corpse), experiment on, 265
Cartilage (gristle), 329
Catarrh (mucous discharge), 215
Cattle (as typifying “herd-morality”), 47
“Cell,” of animal tissues, 153
nutrition of, 327
Change, qualitative (_v. Alteration_)
Channels (_v. Morphological hypothesis_)
Cheese-making, 91
Childbirth, 231, 285
Children’s game, 27
Chill, 171, 203 (_v._ also _Cold_)
Cholagogues (drugs that draw off bile), 65
Cholera, 299
Chorion (membrane enclosing unborn child), 229
Chrysippus, 9
Chyle (emulsified contents of stomach), (_v. Emulsification_)
Cirrhosis (induration) of liver, 171
Coats (tunics), 23
Cold, action of, on skin, 301
Cold-in-the-head, 215 (_v._ also _Chill_)
Colon (large intestine), 313
Colour, 5
Conception, of semen, 233
Congius (measure), 111
Contractions (_v. Peristalsis_)
Cooking, 191
Corn, attractive power of, 87
Coryza (mucous discharge: now a “cold”), 215
Crisis, 75
Cyathus (measure), 65
Decay, 7
Deductive reasoning, 227
Deglutition (swallowing), 95, 261, 265, 273
Democritus, 153
Deposits (in tissues), 297
Desire (appetite), 249, 269
Destruction (act of perishing), 7
Diaphragm (midriff), 255
Diarrhœa, 247, 299
Diet, 35, 179, 255
Digestion, cause of, 243
impairment of, 185, 217, 237
Digestive tract, action on food, 251, _et seq._
structure (_v. Alimentary Canal_)
Diocles, 51
Disease, definition of, 197
Diseases, the four primary, 185
Disjunctive argument, 167
Distribution (diadosis) of nutriment to tissues, 163
Dropsy, 41, 67, 171
Drugs, 65, 285, 293 (_v._ also _Poisons_)
Dyscrasia (abnormal blending of the four qualities), 189
Dysentery, 205
Dyspepsia (_v. Indigestion_)
Education, 279
Effect (product, work done), 13
Emaciation, 161
Emanations, 77
Embryo, 229
Emesis (_v. Vomiting_)
Empiricist physicians, 69, 193
Emulsification, 239
Epicurus, 71
Epigastric muscles, 237
Epispastic (attractive), 117
Erasistratus, 95
Erasistrateans, 105
Etna, 259
Eucrasia (proper blending of the four qualities), 189
Evaporation, 51, 87, 251
Experience (_v. Empiricist physicians_)
Expulsive faculty, 231
Faculty (potentiality), 13
Fæces (ordure from bowel), 255
Fermentation, 209
Fever as a cause of indigestion, 185
Fibres, 329
of blood, 215
circular and longitudinal, 263
oblique, 281
Filtration, 91
Fish, voraciousness of, 269
Flavour, 5
Fluxions, 297
Fœtus (unborn child), 233
death of, 287
Forced-feeding, 247
Forces, material, 127, 301
Function (activity), cause of, 197
Gall-bladder, 147, 245
absence of nerves in, 289
Gardens, irrigation of, 325
Genesis (development of embryo), 19
Germander (drug), 67
Gestation (carrying of embryo by mother), 229
Give-and-take between organs, 295
Gravity (explaining secretion of urine), 107
Greediness, 271
Growth, 27, 137
Gullet, 263
use of, by stomach, 271
function of its two coats, 273
Gurgling in stomach, 237
Habit of body, 69
Hæmorrhage, intestinal, 297
Hæmorrhoids (_v. Piles_)
Heartburn, 287
Heat, innate, 41, 141, 185
Hepatic veins (entering vena cava from liver), 147
Herophilus, 233
Hippocrates, 9, _et passim_
Histogenesis (tissue-production), 21
History, natural, 269
Homœomeries (similar parts), 169
Homœopathy, p. 199, Note 1 (276)
Honey, 179, 191
Horror vacui (“Nature’s abhorrence of a vacuum”), 99, 155
Humours, the four, origin of, 167, 183, 209
Hydragogues (drugs that draw water out of the system), 65
Ileus volvulus (obstruction of bowels), 299, 303
Illusions, sensory, 7
Indigestion, 185, 217, 237
Inductive reasoning, 227
Inflammation, 89, 233
Interaction of any two bodies, 251
Intestine, small, 255
Intestines, structure of, 283
movements of, 243
Ionia, 29
Iron, 71
Irrigation of gardens and tissues, 325
Jaundice, 179, 207
Jejunum (part of small intestine), 299
Kidneys, 49, 89
Labour (_v. Childbirth_)
Larynx (voice-box), involved in swallowing, 265
Leprosy, 41
Leucippus, 153
Lichen (a skin-disease), 253
Liver, proper tissue of, 311
transverse fissure of, 147
induration of, 171
give-and-take between it and stomach, 291
Lodestone, 71
Love, 47
Lumen (internal cavity of a vessel), 119
Lycus, 109
Magnetism, 71
Marrow of bones, 327
Mastication, 253
Material forces, 127
Medicine, taking of, 269 (_v._ also _Drugs_)
Melancholic (_v. Atrabiliary_)
Membranes, fœtal, 231, 285 (_v._ also _Chorion_)
Menander, 105
Menodotus, 81
Menstrual blood, 131, 171
Metabolism, diseases of, 41
Midwife, 235
Miscarriage, (_v. Abortion_)
Molecules (of Asclepiades), 63
Morphological hypothesis of bile-secretion, 125, 147
Motion, active and passive, 57
Mouth, lining of, 261
digestion in, 253
Mucus, 203, 215
Muscles, voluntary, 263
“Nature,” 2;
its “Art,” 57
Nature-lore (_v. Physiology_)
Nausea, 287
“Nerve,” 151, 273
Nutriment, 41
Nutrition, 31, 149
Obstetric chair, 235
Obstruction of bowels, 299, 303
Œsophagus (_v. Gullet_)
Omentum (an apron-like fold of fat, overlying the intestine), 143,
255, 313
Organism, unity of, 61
Organs, nutrition of, 307
Os uteri (mouth of womb), 229
Ovum, human, 135
Oxidation, 211
Oxygen (_v. Pneuma_)
Pain, 287
Parturition, 231
Pathology, relation to Physiology, 189, 287
Peasants, 87
Perch (_v. Fish_)
Peripatetic (Aristotelian) School, 139
Peristalsis (contraction and dilatation), 97, 243, 263
Peritoneum, 53
Phidias, 129
Philistion, 173
Philotimus, 183
Phlegm, 67, 201, 215
Phlegmatic temperament, 193
“Physiology,” 139
Piles, 171
Plant-life, 3
Plato, 173, 203, 215
Plethora (congestion), 119
Pneuma (as a vital principle), 153;
(as oxygen), 187
Poisons, action of, 251
Porch, the (Stoic School), 145
“Pores” (_v. Channels_)
Portal vein, 147
Potter’s earth, 213
Practitioner, 197
Praxagoras, 51
Praxiteles, 129
“Preformationist” doctrine of Anaxagoras, p. 7, Note 5 (14)
Presentation (prosthesis) of nutriment to tissues, 39
Prevention and Cure, 169
Principles, the four fundamental (_v. Qualities_)
Prodicus, 201
Prolapse of uterus, 235
Propulsive faculty, 231
Prosphysis (_v. Adhesion_)
Prosthesis (_v. Presentation_)
Psyche, 3, 153
Psychology, repudiation of, by Atomist School, 45
Pulmonary artery, 121
Pylorus (outlet of stomach), 239
regurgitation through, 289
Pyrrhonists (typical sceptics), 197
Qualities, the four fundamental, 9, 183, 259
derivative, 21
Relativity, 17
Renal veins, 107
Respiration, 175, 305
Retentive faculty, 225
Rhetoric, 97
Safflower (drug), 67
Saliva, action of, 253
Scammony (drug), 67
Schools, two contrasted, in Medicine, 45
Scientist, 197
Scorpions, 253
Sculpture, 129
Sectarianism, 55
Sects, medical (_v. Schools_)
Self-control, 47
Self-education, 279
Semen, 131, 233
Sensation, 47
Septum, perforated, between ventricles of heart, 321
Serum (watery part of blood or milk), 91, 213
Shaping (development of organs), 19
Sieves, 91
Skin-diseases, 253 (_v._ also _Leprosy_ and _Lichens_)
Slaves, 103
Sociability, 47
Sophistry, 219, 279
Sophists, 7
Soul, 45
Specific selection of nutriment by tissues (_v. Attraction,
physiological_)
Spermatic ducts, 57
Spirit (_v. Pneuma_)
Spleen, function and diseases of, 205
“uselessness” of, 143
as an emunctory of the liver, 277
Statues, 129
Sting-ray (fish), bite of, 85
Stoics, 15, 145
Stomach, function of, 197, 237, 251, 255
coats of, 261
independent habits of, 271
give-and-take between it and liver, 291
Stone in bladder, 51
Strength, relative, of different organs, 293
Substance, 9
Superfluities (waste-substances), 35, 291
Swallowing (_v. Deglutition_)
Symptoms, 13
Synapse, 147
Teeth, 253
Temperament (crasis, mixture of elementary principles), 15, 139, 193
Temperance, 47
Theophrastus, 139
Thorns, drugs for extracting, 83
Tissues, development of, 21
their action in producing humours, 179, 195
Trachea (windpipe), 305
Transference (passive motion), 7
Transpiration, 153
Treatment, principles of, 199
Tricuspid orifice of heart, 321
Tubes, rigid, 119, 317, 325
Unity of organism, 61
Ureters, 23, 51
Urine, 51
“Useless” organs (Erasistratus), 143
Uterus (womb), 227
Vacuum, tendency to refill (_v. Horror vacui_)
Valves of heart, 121, 315
Vaporisation (_v. Evaporation_)
Vegetable diet, 35, 179
Vegetative life, 3
Veins, structure of, 283
“arterial” (_v. Pulmonary artery_)
coronary, 323
hepatic, 147
mesenteric, 293, 305
portal, 147
renal, 107, 143
vena cava (chief vein of body), 91
collapse of, 119
Ventricles of heart, communication between, 321
Vipers, 85
Vitalist School in Medicine, 45
Vivisection, 59, 241, 273
Voluntary motion, 3
Volvulus (intestinal obstruction), 299, 303
Vomiting, 241, 247, 267
fæcal, 299
Waste-products (_v. Superfluities_)
Whey (_v. Serum_)
Wine, 209, 329
Womb (_v. Uterus_)
Wounds, 185
Wrestling, 125
Zeno, of Citium, 9
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