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

Fam. lib. 16.in the scales, which is called an examen the tongue of a balance, which some contend is the proper notion of this word. When transferred to men, it is accepted for an improver and director, which in Greek is called diorthōtēs. Cicero used it thus in his letters to Tiro: "But hey, you, who are accustomed to be the canon of my writings, whence comes that so akuron invalid/improper way of serving health faithfully?" Therefore, a writing, completed by a man who is an improver and director, or one serving this office, is also called a canon. Polycletus was the first (as far as can be gathered) to use this name. According to Galen, he wrote a little book in which he pursued all the congruities of the body, the summetrias symmetries, and he called it a canon. Soon after, proving his speech with work, he crafted a statue according to the precepts of the little book, and he called it by the same name, namely canon. Mention of this is frequent in Galen, about which Pliny says: "He also made that which artists call the Canon, seeking the lineaments of art from it as if from a certain law, and he alone of men is judged to have created art itself by a work of art." Therefore, regarding some excellent thing that is devoid of any error, it is customary to say "the Canon of Polycletus." Looking at this notion, those critics accuse Avicenna, but they did not see that from that primary notion and the similarity of straightness, many other things are called canons. Among the Arabs, an instrument is called a canon, which by another name is called in Arabic Almeftara, which is made of a board with strings adhering to it in a straight line, by which scribes mark lines on paper so that the writing proceeds straight. From this, the word was transferred to writings, and they began to be called a canon, and especially those which generally prescribe something, such as sentences and universal judgments, which prevent us from departing from the straight path. Hence, Canon Law finds its name from the fact that it contains certain universal precepts concerning religion. From this notion, frequent among the Arabs, the very modest Avicenna took his title, as if he had said "a discourse, or disputation, or treatise." Thus, it is also used among the Greeks, both canon itself and its diminutive kanonion, as Suidas testifies, who says in the word kanonion: etō kaleitai, hē oiadēpote pragmateia, kan pleionōn tunchanē ptychiōn, ē stichōn, ē paginōn A canonion is what any disputation is called, even if it happens to be of many folds, or lines, or pages. Furthermore, from that instrument for lining up papers in order, another notion of canon flowed among ecclesiastics, so that it is placed for a catalog. Hence, the Chronicle Canons of Eusebius, and Canonical books are used everywhere for those contained in the Canon, that is, the catalog of sacred books. The Canon of the Saints is called the Catalog itself, and the canonized are those inscribed into this catalog, and similar terms. From the same similarity of straightness, those which Hippocrates called kanonia were named, by which bellies were directed as if to a rule, similar indeed to reeds, which Galen explains as orthōs, kai prosetalmenous tas gasteras having straight and drawn-in bellies; therefore, some incorrectly, perhaps not understanding the metaphor, amend it to kakonias. From the same similarity of straightness, another notion of canon emanated among the Romans, transferred to incorporeal things, namely justice. And because it was just that tributes be paid to Emperors, the type of payment was called a canon. Pedianus mentions this, saying there were three types of payments: Canon, Oblation, and Indiction. Jurisconsults should be read about these, and especially Tholosanus in his Juris Syntagma, where there is much about the Canon. By this same reasoning, Spartianus called the Canon frumentarius grain canon the certain and equal method of dividing grain to the people by the Emperor. By this notion, among ecclesiastics, it is accepted for that portion distributed from the ecclesiastical treasury, which is commonly called a prebend, and those who are participants in it are called Canons. Finally, so as not to collect everything, this word is transferred to all straight things, even those lacking a body, to all rules and measures. And since (to turn myself back to the circle of my proposal, and from there to extricate myself briefly) the Canon is accepted generally (as has been proved) for any writing containing precepts, especially straight ones, there is no room to accuse Avicenna, who used the common name of a writing; rather, his modesty is to be praised. Nor, indeed, is he to be criticized because it is a metaphor. Although I do not deny that metaphor is faulty in titles and the beginnings of disputations, when translated terms have taken the place of proper ones, they are not to be criticized but tolerated in place of proper ones, which we see happen in practice in very many cases. Thus, the word method, although it is transferred from paths to the sciences, as Averroes says, because the word is already worn by use, it is applied in place of the proper term, and Galen himself was not afraid to inscribe his books On the Therapeutic Method. Since Avicenna has him as a companion in the criticism, he desires no further defense, and prefers to err and be criticized with Galen than to be praised and "wise" with these critics.

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