The Canon of Medicine (Canon Medicinae), Vol. I

those who have pursued this particular genre of writing. Others condemn Avicenna on another count, saying that he brings nothing of his own but borrows everything from the Greeks, which can be read better in their own authors. And we, on the contrary, count this as his greatest praise, not as a fault—namely, that he reduced the almost infinite mass of Galenic and Greek doctrine, which was like a chaos, into this small and clear form, as it were a compendium and a globe, and perfected the whole body of medicine from head to toe, fitting all things aptly to their members. What might have seemed before, according to the poet, "a shapeless, huge monster," deterring lovers and the eager with its own vastness, now endowed with a suitable magnitude, and that εὐσύνοπτον easy to be seen at a glance and εὐμνημόνευτον easy to be remembered that Galen desires in an art, and polished with decent ornamentation, presents itself to the view like a nubile virgin, drawing spectators to its love and cultivation. And although (as the Comedian said quite well) "nothing is said which has not been said before," and therefore many suspect that Aristotle brought what other philosophers brought before him, and Galen what earlier physicians brought, and it is not the novelty of the facts (which rarely happens) that is praised, but the method—which, as in the art of rhetoric in speaking, this also has its own proper character in the explanation of doctrine, which many admire especially in Avicenna—many things can also be shown that were completely unspoken by others before him. For he was the first to distinguish the seat of the faculties of the soul in the ventricles of the brain, which neither Aristotle nor Galen had done, although some prove by certain conjectures that Galen did not ignore this. Among the signs, he was the first to indicate that the shortness of the fingers proves the smallness of the liver. In the method of maintaining health, he advised that those who abandon their accustomed exercises fall into a hectic fever, and he was the first to prescribe sleeping first on the right side, then on the left, then again on the right, and many other things which neither Galen nor others taught. In diseases, he was the first to deal with flatulence in the bones, of which Galen made no mention, likewise with the thickness of the eyelids, a defect which none of the Greeks mentioned. He also lists many remedies for a depraved appetite which none of them touched upon. Regarding colic, he brought forward many things untouched by the Greeks and completed that part of medicine more diligently than all the rest. He also was the first to deal with the disease Allachuot alopecia, about which not a word was said by any of the Greeks. He also deals with elephantiasis and the swelling of the feet, a disease unknown to the Greeks, and was the first to deal with measles, about which, although it seems one could collect something similar from certain places, it is the constant opinion of almost all physicians that the Greeks discussed nothing. What shall I say of the nature of the spirits and their medicine, which Avicenna alone and first, by the judgment of learned men without controversy, both discovered and perfected? Why shall I recount the various remedies, both compound and simple, most necessary for human health, both to be retained and to be recovered, such as Sandalwood, Cassia, Turbit, Musk, and many others, which it is not the place or time to pursue? Wherefore, so that my speech may return to where it diverted, having cast aside this duty of defending Avicenna from the calumnies of the malevolent for another more convenient time, I urge and ask you as much as I can that you propose this most learned writer to yourselves as a guide, especially in Practice, and I promise that the fruits of your study will soon be set before you, which you will not regret, and I trust that you will have no common gratitude toward me for this friendly admonition. Farewell.

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