Aphorisms of Hippocrates

disease: for if it is such, it will be entirely beneficial, and the patient will easily tolerate it. Wherefore, it is necessary to look, as Hippocrates says in establishing a diet, to the region, time, age, and diseases. The region; because the region renders men more or less hungry and thirsty: for he writes in the Book on Airs, Waters, and Places that those who inhabit the northern region are hungry, but not much thirsty: that those who inhabit the opposite region are not prone to eating and drinking: that those between these hold themselves in a middle way. Time: for the seasons of the year make men more or less apt for eating, as is recounted in aphorism 15 of this book, when he says: "Bellies in winter and spring are by nature the hottest." Age; because age also accomplishes the same: for old men bear fasting most easily, children least of all, as is discussed in aphorism 13. And while Hippocrates names age, he signifies also the person of the man: for under the person are contained sex, age, kinship, state of the body good or bad, faculties, heats, spirits, humors, similar and dissimilar parts, custom, fortune, studies, affections of the mind, and exercises. Finally diseases: since in acute diseases the diet ought to be thin, but in long ones not so, as he explains in aphorism 4 of this book. And to disease can be referred causes and symptoms.

APHORISM III.

The habit of those who exercise, who attain to the highest peak of goodness, is dangerous if they have stood at the extreme: for they can neither remain in the same, nor rest. But when they do not rest, nor can they advance to better. It remains, therefore, that they fall into worse. For these reasons, it is expedient to loosen a good habit immediately, so that the body may begin to be nourished again, nor let the compression