Copy 2, Volume 1

The genuine works of Hippocrates / translated from the Greek with a preliminary discourse and annotations by Francis Adams ... In two volumes.

  • Hippocrates
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The genuine works of Hippocrates / translated from the Greek with a preliminary discourse and annotations by Francis Adams ... In two volumes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    23/504 page 3
    SECTION I. ON THE ORIGIN OF GRECIAN MEDICINE, WITH A SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF HIPPOCRATES, Ir is well known that the oldest documents which we possess relative to the practice of Medicine, are the various treatises contained in the Collection which bears the name of Hippocrates. Their great excellence has been acknowledged in all ages, and it has always been a question which has naturally excited lite- rary curiosity, by what steps the art had attained to such per- fection at so early a period. ‘This investigation, however, is attended with peculiar difficulties, and has never been marked by any very satisfactory results. At one time, indeed, it was usual to solve the question by supposing that Greece had. derived all the arts and sciences, in a state of considerable ad- vancement, from the oriental nations, who are admitted to have possessed a considerable degree of civilization before the Hellenic race became distinguished for intellectual development.’ The question with regard to the origin of Medicine was thus supposed to have met with a satisfactory solution. For, it being generally admitted that the Hippocratic Medicine had emerged from the schools of philosophy, and it having been assumed as incontro- 1 This is the view which is taken regarding the origin of Grecian medicine by Schulze, in his Historia Medicine. He is a most learned and trustworthy authority on the history of medicine, but in the present instance his judgment is biassed by the opinion which was generally held in his age with respect to the origin of Grecian philosophy. At that time it was customary to follow the later Platonists in tracing the rise of philosophy to Egypt. Lord Monboddo, in his work on Ancient Metaphysics, strongly espouses this opinion, which, in fact, was the established belief of learned men down toa late period, Kant advocated the views which are here adopted.
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