Prognosticon

and cause quarrels, and by the remembrance of lovely things, and by dwelling with those who are beloved." Whence Damascenus in his aphorisms short, pithy statements of truth: "The temperament of the soul follows the complexion of the body." When, therefore, the body suffers, and especially the principal members, you should not neglect to exhibit the medicine of the soul, so that the patient may rejoice, such as through smell, sight, and hearing, for this is a part of some medicine. Furthermore, I cannot in this place sufficiently pray and adjure all those who are professors of medicine, that they apply and confer all their study, care, diligence, and finally all their thought upon curing human bodies, and that they diligently remember the divine opinion of Galen: "The nobility of an experiment," he says, "is made by the subject itself, which is not assimilated to other subjects, when we work medicine upon it." For in stone, leather, wood, and similar things, in which we labor artificially, almost no corruption follows if the arts do not succeed well in them, but there is the greatest fear of testing if an experiment turns out poorly concerning a human body. For the subject itself is destroyed, and it is as if its ruin has occurred. Finally, let neither love nor hatred turn them away from rectitude. For the high, blessed, and glorious God is present, who judges the human being. There are also the heavens, which argue, and the elements, which rage. And if nothing else remains in the future, there is the torture of the underworld. Lastly, I would like to warn them not to altogether disregard the poor on account of their poverty while panting after the gold of the rich. For reason cries out to judgment, Mesue exclaims: "If you foolishly abandon mercy, rejoicing in large tributes while denying small ones." And if riches are desired and contribute to life, yet a famous name is more famous and better than all riches, says Solomon.

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