On Medicine (De Re Medica)

aid to their comrades-in-arms. Yet Homer indicates that they did not provide any relief for pestilence or for various types of diseases, but were accustomed to healing only wounds by means of iron surgical instruments and medications. From this it appears that these parts of medicine alone were attempted by them, and that they are the most ancient. It can also be learned from the same author that diseases at that time were attributed to the wrath of the immortal gods, and that help was usually requested from them. It is likely that among the few aids for ill health, it was nevertheless usually good, owing to good morals, which neither idleness nor luxury had corrupted; for indeed these two things have afflicted bodies first in Greece, and then among us. Therefore, this multifarious medicine, which was not necessary long ago among the Greeks or other nations, barely brings a few good people to the threshold of old age.

Therefore, even after those about whom I have spoken, some famous men practiced medicine, until the discipline of letters began to be pursued with greater zeal; which, just as it is necessary for the soul, is likewise hostile to the body. At first, the science of healing was considered a part of wisdom, so that both the cure of diseases and the contemplation of the nature of things were born under the same authors; obviously because those who had diminished the strength of their healthy bodies through restless thought and nightly vigils required this the most. And so we have learned that many of the professors of wisdom were skilled in it; but the most famous among them were Pythagoras, Empedocles, and Democritus. Hippocrates of Cos, as some have believed, was a student of the latter...