Kitap 1
13
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 Attractricem convenientis qualitatis vim (Linacre). cf. p. 36, note 2. are compelled repeatedly to deny obvious facts.Lit. obvious phenomena. For instance, Asclepiades, the physician,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 tratment, in accordance with his pathology, were mechano-therapeutical. cf. p. 64, note 3. 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,Diocles of Carystus was the chief representtive 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. 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,Sufferers from kidney-trouble. when they feel pain in the loins and pass sandy matter in their water.
