Part 12 (1/2)
[66] _Historia animalium_, iii. 3, where it is ascribed to Polybus.
The same pa.s.sage is, however, repeated twice in the Hippocratic writings, viz. in the pe?? f?s??? a????p?? {peri physios anthropou}, _On the nature of man_, Littre, vi. 58, and in the pe?? ?ste??
f?s??? {peri osteon physios}, _On the nature of bones_, Littre, ix.
174.
[67] ?a?a??e??a? {Parangeliai}, -- 6.
The numerous busts of him which have reached our time are no portraits.
But the best of them are something much better and more helpful to us than any portrait. They are idealized representations of the kind of man a physician should be and was in the eyes of the best and wisest of the Greeks.[68]
[68] See Fig. 1.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 1. HIPPOCRATES British Museum, second or third century B. C.]
[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 2. ASCLEPIUS British Museum, fourth century B. C.]
The method of the Hippocratic writers is that known to-day as the 'inductive'. Without the vast scientific heritage that is in our own hands, with only a comparatively small number of observations drawn from the Coan and neighbouring schools, surrounded by all manner of bizarre oriental religions in which no adequate relation of cause and effect was recognized, and above all constantly urged by the exuberant genius for speculation of that Greek people in the midst of whom they lived and whose intellectual temptations they shared, they remain nevertheless, for the most part, patient observers of fact, sceptical of the marvellous and the unverifiable, hesitating to theorize beyond the data, yet eager always to generalize from actual experience; calm, faithful, effective servants of the sick. There is almost no type of mental activity known to us that was not exhibited by the Greeks and cannot be paralleled from their writings; but careful and constant return to verification from experience, expressed in a record of actual observations--the habitual method adopted in modern scientific departments--is rare among them except in these early medical authors.
The spirit of their practice cannot be better ill.u.s.trated than by the words of the so-called 'Hippocratic oath'. That doc.u.ment, though of late date in its present form, throws a flood of light on the ethics of Greek medicine.
'I swear by Apollo the physician and Asclepius and Hygieia and Panacea, invoking all the G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses to be my witnesses, that I will fulfil this Oath and this written covenant to the best of my power and of my judgment.
'I will look upon him who shall have taught me this art even as on mine own parents; I will share with him my substance, and supply his necessities if he be in need; I will regard his offspring even as my own brethren, and will teach them this art, if they desire to learn it, without fee or covenant. I will impart it by precept, by lecture and by all other manner of teaching, not only to my own sons but also to the sons of him who has taught me, and to disciples bound by covenant and oath according to the law of the physicians, but to none other.
'The regimen I adopt shall be for the benefit of the patients to the best of my power and judgment, not for their injury or for any wrongful purpose. I will not give a deadly drug to any one, though it be asked of me, nor will I lead the way in such counsel; and likewise I will not give a woman a pessary to procure abortion. But I will keep my life and my art in purity and holiness. Whatsoever house I enter, I will enter for the benefit of the sick, refraining from all voluntary wrongdoing and corruption, especially seduction of male or female, bond or free. Whatsoever things I see or hear concerning the life of men, in my attendance on the sick or even apart from my attendance, which ought not to be blabbed abroad, I will keep silence on them, counting such things to be as religious secrets.
'If I fulfil this oath and confound it not, be it mine to enjoy life and art alike, with good repute among all men for all time to come; but may the contrary befall me if I transgress and violate my oath.'[69]
[69] Translation by Professor Arthur Platt.
Respected equally throughout the ages by Arab, Jew, and Christian, the oath remains the watchword of the profession of medicine.[70] The ethical value of such a declaration could not escape the attention even of a Byzantine formalist, and it is interesting to observe that in our oldest Greek ma.n.u.script of the Hippocratic text, dating from the tenth century, this magnificent pa.s.sage is headed by the words 'from the oath of Hippocrates according as it may be sworn by a Christian.'[71]
[70] It must, however, be admitted that in the Hippocratic collection are breaches of the oath, e. g. in the induction of abortion related in pe?? f?s??? pa?d??? {peri physios paidiou}.
There is evidence, however, that the author of this work was not a medical pract.i.tioner.
[71] Rome Urbinas 64, fo. 116.
When we examine the Hippocratic corpus more closely, we discern that not only are the treatises by many hands, but there is not even a uniform opinion and doctrine running through them. This is well brought out by some of the more famous of the phrases of this remarkable collection.
Thus a well-known pa.s.sage from the _Airs, Waters, and Places_ tells us that the Scythians attribute a certain physical disability to a G.o.d, 'but it appears to me', says the author, 'that these affections are just as much divine as are all others and that no disease is either more divine or more human than another, but that all are equally divine, for each of them has its own nature, and none of them arise without a natural cause.' But, on the other hand, the author of the great work on _Prognostics_ advises us that when the physician is called in he must seek to ascertain the nature of the affections that he is treating, and especially 'if there be anything divine in the disease, and to learn a foreknowledge of this also.'[72] We may note too that this sentence almost immediately precedes what is perhaps the most famous of all the Hippocratic sentences, the description of what has since been termed the _Hippocratic facies_. This wonderful description of the signs of death may be given as an ill.u.s.tration of the habitual att.i.tude of the Hippocratic school towards prognosis and of the very careful way in which they noted details:
'He [the physician] should observe thus in acute diseases: first, the countenance of the patient, if it be like to those who are in health, _and especially if it be like itself, for this would be the best_; but the more unlike to this, the worse it is; such would be these: _sharp nose, hollow eyes, collapsed temples; ears cold, contracted, and their lobes turned out; skin about the forehead rough, distended, and parched; the colour of the whole face greenish or dusky_. If the countenance be so at the beginning of the disease, and if this cannot be accounted for from the other symptoms, inquiry must be made whether he has pa.s.sed a sleepless night; whether his bowels have been very loose; or whether he is suffering from hunger; and if any of these be admitted the danger may be reckoned as less; and it may be judged in the course of a day and night if the appearance of the countenance proceed from these. But if none of these be said to exist, and the symptoms do not subside in that time, be it known for certain that death is at hand.'[73]
[72] Kuhlewein, i. 79, regards this as an interpolated pa.s.sage.
[73] Littre, ii. 112; Kuhlewein, i. 79. The texts vary: Kuhlewein is followed except in the last sentence.
Again, in the work _On the Art_ [_of Medicine_] we read: 'I hold it to be physicianly to abstain from treating those who are overwhelmed by disease',[74] a prudent if inhumane procedure among a people who might regard the doctor's powers as partaking of the nature of magic, and perhaps a wise course to follow at this day in some places not very far from Cos. Yet in the book _On Diseases_ we are advised even in the presence of an incurable disease 'to give relief with such treatment as is possible'.[75]
[74] ?e?? te???? {Peri technes}, -- 3.
[75] ?e?? ???s?? a' {Peri nouson a'}, -- 6.