Aphorisms

Perseus Greek · Perseus Greek · 413 sections

1.1.1
Life is short, and Art long; the crisis fleeting; experience perilous, and decision difficult. The physician must not only be prepared to do what is right himself, but also to make the patient, the attendants, and externals cooperate.
1.2.1
In disorders of the bowels and vomitings, occurring spontaneously, if the matters purged be such as ought to be purged, they do good, and are well borne; but if not, the contrary. And so artificial evacuations, if they consist of such matters as should be evacuated, do good, and are well borne; but if not, the contrary. One, then, ought to look to the country, the season, the age, and the diseases in which they are proper or not.
1.3.1
In the athletae, embonpoint, if carried to its utmost limit, is dangerous, for they cannot remain in the same state nor be stationary; and since, then, they can neither remain stationary nor improve, it only remains for them to get worse; for these reasons the embonpoint should be reduced without delay, that the body may again have a commencement of reparation. Neither should the evacuations, in their case, be carried to an extreme, for this also is dangerous, but only to such a point as the person’s constitution can endure. In like manner, medicinal evacuations, if carried to an extreme, are dangerous; and again, a restorative course, if in the extreme, is dangerous.
1.4.1
A slender restricted diet is always dangerous in chronic diseases, and also in acute diseases, where it is not requisite. And again, a diet brought to the extreme point of attenuation is dangerous; and repletion, when in the extreme, is also dangerous.
1.5.1
In a restricted diet, patients who transgress are thereby more hurt (than in any other?); for every such transgression, whatever it may be, is followed by greater consequences than in a diet somewhat more generous. On this account, a very slender, regulated, and restricted diet is dangerous to persons in health, because they bear transgressions of it more difficultly. For this reason, a slender and restricted diet is generally more dangerous than one a little more liberal.
1.6.1
For extreme diseases, extreme methods of cure, as to restriction, are most suitable.
1.7.1
When the disease is very acute, it is attended with extremely severe symptoms in its first stage; and therefore an extremely attenuating diet must be used. When this is not the case, but it is allowable to give a more generous diet, we may depart as far from the severity of regimen as the disease, by its mildness, is removed from the extreme.
1.8.1
When the disease is at its height, it will then be necessary to use the most slender diet.
1.9.1
We must form a particular judgment of the patient, whether he will support the diet until the acme of the disease, and whether he will sink previously and not support the diet, or the disease will give way previously, and become less acute.
1.10.1
In those cases, then, which attain their acme speedily, a restricted diet should be enjoined at first; but in those cases which reach their acme later, we must retrench at that period or a little before it; but previously we must allow a more generous diet to support the patient.
1.11.1
We must retrench during paroxysms, for to exhibit food would be injurious. And in all diseases having periodical paroxysms, we must restrict during the paroxysms.
1.12.1
The exacerbations and remissions will be indicated by the diseases, the seasons of the year, the reciprocation of the periods, whether they occur every day, every alternate day, or after a longer period, and by the supervening symptoms; as, for example, in pleuritic cases, expectoration, if it occur at the commencement, shortens the attack, but if it appear later, it prolongs the same; and in the same manner the urine, and alvine discharges, and sweats, according as they appear along with favorable or unfavorable symptoms, indicate diseases of a short or long duration.
1.13.1
Old persons endure fasting most easily; next, adults; young persons not nearly so well; and most especially infants, and of them such as are of a particularly lively spirit.
1.14.1
Growing bodies have the most innate heat; they therefore require the most food, for otherwise their bodies are wasted. In old persons the heat is feeble, and therefore they require little fuel, as it were, to the flame, for it would be extinguished by much. On this account, also, fevers in old persons are not equally acute, because their bodies are cold.
1.15.1
In winter and spring the bowels are naturally the hottest, and the sleep most prolonged; at these seasons, then, the most sustenance is to be administered; for as the belly has then most innate heat, it stands in need of most food. The well-known facts with regard to young persons and the athletae prove this.
1.16.1
A humid regimen is befitting in all febrile diseases, and particularly in children, and others accustomed to live on such a diet.
1.17.1
We must consider, also, in which cases food is to be given once or twice a day, and in greater or smaller quantities, and at intervals. Something must be conceded to habit, to season, to country, and to age.
1.18.1
Invalids bear food worst during summer and autumn, most easily in winter, and next in spring.
1.19.1
Neither give nor enjoin anything to persons during periodical paroxysms, but abstract from the accustomed allowance before the crisis.
1.20.1
When things are at the crisis, or when they have just passed it, neither move the bowels, nor make any innovation in the treatment, either as regards purgatives or any other such stimulants, but let things alone.
1.21.1
Those things which require to be evacuated should be evacuated, wherever they most tend, by the proper outlets.
1.22.1
We must purge and move such humors as are concocted, not such as are unconcocted, unless they are struggling to get out, which is mostly not the case.
1.23.1
The evacuations are to be judged of not by their quantity, but whether they be such as they should be, and how they are borne. And when proper to carry the evacuation to deliquium animi, this also should be done, provided the patient can support it.
1.24.1
Use purgative medicines sparingly in acute diseases, and at the commencement, and not without proper circumspection.
1.25.1
If the matters which are purged be such as should be purged, the evacuation is beneficial, and easily borne; but, not withstanding, if otherwise, with difficulty.
2.1.1
In whatever disease sleep is laborious, it is a deadly symptom; but if sleep does good, it is not deadly.
2.2.1
When sleep puts an end to delirium, it is a good symptom.
2.3.1
Both sleep and insomnolency, when immoderate, are bad.
2.4.1
Neither repletion, nor fasting, nor anything else, is good when more than natural.
2.5.1
Spontaneous lassitude indicates disease.
2.6.1
Persons who have a painful affection in any part of the body, and are in a great measure sensible of the pain, are disordered in intellect.
2.7.1
Those bodies which have been slowly emaciated should be slowly recruited; and those which have been quickly emaciated should be quickly recruited.
2.8.1
When a person after a disease takes food, but does not improve in strength, it indicates that the body uses more food than is proper; but if this happen when he does not take food, it is to be understood evacuation is required.
2.9.1
When one wishes to purge, he should put the body into a fluent state.
2.10.1
Bodies not properly cleansed, the more you nourish the more you injure.
2.11.1
It is easier to fill up with drink than with food.
2.12.1
What remains in diseases after the crisis is apt to produce relapses.
2.13.1
Persons in whom a crisis takes place pass the night preced-ing the paroxysm uncomfortably, but the succeeding night generally more comfortably.
2.14.1
In fluxes of the bowels, a change of the dejections does good, unless the change be of a bad character.
2.15.1
When the throat is diseased, or tubercles (phymata) form on the body, attention must paid to the secretions; for if they be bilious, the disease affects the general system; but if they resemble those of a healthy person, it is safe to give nourishing food.
2.16.1
When in a state of hunger, one ought not to undertake labor.
2.17.1
When more food than is proper has been taken, it occasions disease; this is shown by the treatment.
2.18.1
From food which proves nourishing to the body either immediately or shortly, the dejections also are immediate.
2.19.1
In acute diseases it is not quite safe to prognosticate either death or recovery.
2.20.1
Those who have watery discharges from their bowels when young have dry when they are old; and those who have dry discharges when they are young will have watery when they are old.
2.21.1
Drinking strong wine cures hunger.
2.22.1
Diseases which arise from repletion are cured by depletion; and those that arise from depletion are cured by repletion; and in general, diseases are cured by their contraries.
2.23.1
Acute disease come to a crisis in fourteen days.
2.24.1
The fourth day is indicative of the seventh; the eighth is the commencement of the second week; and hence, the eleventh being the fourth of the second week, is also indicative; and again, the seventeenth is indicative, as being the fourth from the fourteenth, and the seventh from the eleventh.
2.25.1
The summer quartans are, for the most part, of short duration; but the autumnal are protracted, especially those occurring near the approach of winter.
2.26.1
It is better that a fever succeed to a convulsion, than a convulsion to a fever.
2.27.1
We should not trust ameliorations in diseases when they are not regular, nor be much afraid of bad symptoms which occur in an irregular form; for such are commonly inconstant, and do not usually continue, nor have any duration.
2.28.1
In fevers which are not altogether slight, it is a bad symptom for the body to remain without any diminution of bulk, or to be wasted beyond measure; for the one state indicates a protracted disease, and the other weakness of body.
2.29.1
If it appear that evacuations are required, they should be made at the commencement of diseases; at the acme it is better to be quiet.
2.30.1
Toward the commencement and end of diseases all the symptoms are weaker, and toward the acme they are stronger.
2.31.1
When a person who is recovering from a disease has a good appetite, but his body does not improve in condition, it is a bad symptom.
2.32.1
For the most part, all persons in ill health, who have a good appetite at the commencement, but do not improve, have a bad appetite again toward the end; whereas, those who have a very bad appetite at the commencement, and afterward acquire a good appetite, get better off.
2.33.1
In every disease it is a good sign when the patient’s intellect is sound, and he is disposed to take whatever food is offered to him; but the contrary is bad.
2.34.1
In diseases, there is less danger when the disease is one to which the patient’s constitution, habit, age, and the season are allied, than when it is one to which they are not allied.
2.35.1
In all diseases it is better that the umbilical and hypogastric regions preserve their fullness; and it is a bad sign when they are very slender and emaciated; in the latter case it is dangerous to administer purgatives.
2.36.1
Persons in good health quickly lose their strength by taking purgative medicines, or using bad food.
2.37.1
Purgative medicines agree ill with persons in good health.
2.38.1
An article of food or drink which is slightly worse, but more palatable, is to be preferred to such as are better but less palatable.
2.39.1
Old have fewer complaints than young; but those chronic diseases which do befall them generally never leave them.
2.40.1
Catarrhs and coryza in very old people are not concocted.
2.41.1
Persons who have had frequent and severe attacks of swooning, without any manifest cause, die suddenly.
2.42.1
It is impossible to remove a strong attack of apoplexy, and not easy to remove a weak attack.
2.43.1
Of persons who have been suspended by the neck, and are in a state of insensibility, but not quite dead, those do not recover who have foam at the mouth.
2.44.1
Persons who are naturally very fat are apt to die earlier than those who are slender.
2.45.1
Epilepsy in young persons is most frequently removed by changes of air, of country, and of modes of life.
2.46.1
Of two pains occurring together, not in the same part of the body, the stronger weakens the other.
2.47.1
Pains and fevers occur rather at the formation of pus than when it is already formed.
2.48.1
In every movement of the body, whenever one begins to endure pain, it will be relieved by rest.
2.49.1
Those who are accustomed to endure habitual labors, although they be weak or old, bear them better than strong and young persons who have not been so accustomed.
2.50.1
Those things which one has been accustomed to for a long time, although worse than things which one is not accustomed to, usually give less disturbance; but a change must sometimes be made to things one is not accustomed to.
2.51.1
To evacuate, fill up, heat, cool, or otherwise, move the body in any way much and suddenly, is dangerous; and whatever is excessive is inimical to nature; but whatever is done by little and little is safe, more especially when a transition is made from one thing to another.
2.52.1
When doing everything according to indications, although things may not turn out agreeably to indication, we should not change to another while the original appearances remain.
2.53.1
Those persons who have watery discharges from the bowels when they are young, come off better than those who have dry; but in old age they come off worse, for the bowels in aged persons are usually dried up.
2.54.1
Largeness of person in youth is noble and not unbecoming; but in old age it is inconvenient, and worse than a smaller structure.
3.1.1
The changes of the season mostly engender diseases, and in the seasons great changes either of heat or of cold, and the rest agreeably to the same rule.
3.2.1
Of natures (temperaments?), some are well- or ill-adapted for summer, and some for winter.
3.3.1
Of diseases and ages, certain of them are well- or ill-adapted to different seasons, places, and kinds of diet.
3.4.1
In the seasons, when during the same day there is at one time heat and at another time cold, the diseases of autumn may be expected.
3.5.1
South winds induce dullness of hearing, dimness of visions, heaviness of the head, torpor, and languor; when these prevail, such symptoms occur in diseases. But if the north wind prevail, coughs, affections of the throat, hardness of the bowels, dysuria attended with rigors, and pains of the sides and breast occur. When this wind prevails, all such symptoms may be expected in diseases.
3.6.1
When summer is like spring, much sweating may be expected in fevers.
3.7.1
Acute diseases occur in droughts; and if the summer be particularly such, according to the constitution which it has given to the year, for the most part such diseases maybe expected.
3.8.1
In seasons which are regular, and furnish the productions of the season at the seasonable time, the diseases are regular, and come readily to a crisis; but in inconstant seasons, the diseases are irregular, and come to a crisis with difficulty.
3.9.1
In autumn, diseases are most acute, and most mortal, on the whole. The spring is most healthy, and least mortal.
3.10.1
Autumn is a bad season for persons in consumption.
3.11.1
With regard to the seasons, if the winter be of a dry and northerly character, and the spring rainy and southerly, in summer there will necessarily be acute fevers, ophthalmies, and dysenteries, especially in women, and in men of a humid temperament.
3.12.1
If the but the spring dry and northerly, women whose term of delivery should be in spring, have abortions from any slight cause; and those who reach their full time, bring forth children who are feeble, and diseased, so that they either die presently, or, if they live, are puny and unhealthy. Other people are subject to dysenteries and ophthalmies, and old men to catarrhs, which quickly cut them off.
3.13.1
If the summer be dry and northerly and the autumn rainy and southerly, headaches occur in winter, with coughs, hoarsenesses, coryzae, and in some cases consumptions.
3.14.1
But if the autumn be northerly and dry, it agrees well with persons of a humid temperament, and with women; but others will be subject to dry ophthalmies, acute fevers, coryzae, and in some cases melancholy.
3.15.1
Of the constitutions of the year, the dry, upon the whole, are more healthy than the rainy, and attended with less mortality.
3.16.1
The diseases which occur most frequently in rainy seasons are, protracted fevers, fluxes of the bowels, mortifications, epilepsies, apoplexies, and quinsies; and in dry, consumptive diseases, ophthalmies, arthritic diseases, stranguries, and dysenteries.
3.17.1
With regard to the states of the weather which continue but for a day, that which is northerly, braces the body, giving it tone, agility, and color, improves the sense of hearing, dries up the bowels, pinches the eyes, and aggravates any previous pain which may have been seated in the chest. But the southerly relaxes the body, and renders it humid, brings on dullness of hearing, heaviness of the head, and vertigo, impairs the movements of the eyes and the whole body, and renders the alvine discharges watery.
3.18.1
With regard to the seasons, in spring and in the commencement of summer, children and those next to them in age are most comfortable, and enjoy best health; in summer and during a certain portion of autumn, old people; during the remainder of the autumn and in winter, those of the intermediate ages.
3.19.1
All diseases occur at all seasons of the year, but certain of them are more apt to occur and be exacerbated at certain seasons.
3.20.1
The diseases of spring are, maniacal, melancholic, and epileptic disorders, bloody flux, quinsy, coryza, hoarseness, cough, leprosy, lichen alphos, exanthemata mostly ending in ulcerations, tubercles, and arthritic diseases.
3.21.1
Of summer, certain of these, and continued, ardent, and tertian fevers, most especially vomiting, diarrhoea, ophthalmy, pains of the ears, ulcerations of the mouth, mortifications of the privy parts, and the sudamina.

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