BOOK

...that knowledge could be extracted from that point by Hippocrates and, being established under certain rules and principles, was advanced to the form of an art. It is certain, however, that the most wise old man A common honorific for Hippocrates. discovered this not by any chance or fortune, but by those most divine powers of intellect and training in which he excelled. Just as with everything else, he found this knowledge, refined it once found, and joined it to the curative part of medicine. In these branches of medicine, his ancient predecessors do not deserve less praise simply because there were many diseases which it is clear they neither recognized nor indicated a way of curing. For it was not the laziness of the ancients or their lack of skill that caused this, but rather the infinite temptations of gluttony, insatiable lust, and immense voracity. As Seneca wisely argued, and after him Plutarch, new types of Seneca, Letter 95, 18; Plutarch, Symposiacs, Question 9. diseases were born, and are still born every day, of which some received a cure late, and others never. For in this way, gout podagra: a painful form of arthritis, traditionally associated with rich food and drink, usually affecting the foot began to trouble boys and women after the time of Hippocrates. Likewise, during the lives of Pompey and Asclepiades, the dread of water, or hydrophobia hydrophobia: a symptom of rabies; literally "fear of water," where the sufferer is unable to swallow liquids—previously unknown to Aristotle and the older writers—and elephantiasis elephantiasis: a disease characterized by the thickening of the skin and underlying tissues, common in Egypt first showed themselves. These conditions received a cure so slowly that Scribonius Largus, who practiced the medical art in Rome during the time of the Emperor Claudius, wrote Chapter 171. Book 2, chapter 62. In the preface. that until his own time, no one was seen to be freed from hydrophobia. And even if Apuleius Celsus in Sicily (where many rabid dogs are found) had composed a certain antidote for that disease, and a certain barbarian driven by shipwreck to Crete boasted that he cured it with the skin of a hyena (which Aetius also reported of others), yet in the time of Cornelius Celsus, a certain woman, whose flesh had prolapsed from her private parts and withered, died within a few hours, so that the most noble physicians found neither the type of evil nor the remedy. Thus we have heard that the Emperor Tiberius was the very first to experience "pain of the colon" original: "Coli dolorem", unless we maintain that the ancients knew it under another name; for I believe Hippocrates himself included it under the Book 5, chapter 3. name of "ileus" ileus: a painful intestinal obstruction. Likewise, in the age of Pliny, the diseases mentagra mentagra: a skin disease affecting the chin, often spread by kissing, stomachace stomachace: a disease of the gums, likely scurvy, and sceltyrbis sceltyrbis: a condition characterized by trembling or weakness in the legs, also associated with scurvy were born as newcomers to our world. Thus, as Agatharchides reported in his treatise on the Red Sea, certain "little dragons" dracunculi: Guinea worms; parasitic nematodes that emerge from the skin appeared to many people falling ill around the Red Sea, eating away at the small parts of the legs and arms; as soon as they were touched, they immediately retreated, enclosing themselves in the muscular parts and causing intolerable inflammations and torments. Galen confesses Galen, On the Affected Parts, book 6. that he heard of this kind of disease from others, but knew neither its nature nor the reason for its generation. Thus, a certain man who had been long suffering from difficulty in urination at last passed barley straw between the [joints]...