Galen’s Commentary on Hippocrates’ Epidemics, Book 1

Commentary I

The terms epidemic and visitation original: "epidemata" and "epidemia" are written and spoken with either four or five syllables, as I have already mentioned. The most severe of these diseases are called pestilential pestilential: "loimōdē" in Greek or "pestilentes" in Latin, referring to diseases that are highly contagious and deadly, such as the plague. These diseases derive their cause from the state of the surrounding air. This is true for the entire category of epidemic diseases. Hippocrates described certain pestilential states, such as those mentioned in the third book of the Epidemics. He did this because a plague is, by its nature, an epidemic disease. It is better to have these terms defined before we begin the specific explanations of the text.

After this, I will turn to the commentary itself. First, I will repeat a point I have made in many of my previous books. I encourage those who wish to master the medical art medical art: the professional practice and scientific study of medicine to train themselves in observing specific cases using their senses. This allows them to recognize in the real world the general principles they have already studied.

The Empiricists Empiricists: a school of ancient doctors who believed that medical knowledge should be based only on visible symptoms and past experience, rather than searching for hidden causes claim that these specific observations are the very beginning of all general knowledge. They argue that only those medical rules that are formed directly from experience are true. We, however, do not hold this view. We believe that many rules are also discovered through the use of reason.