Translated by Francis Adams
PART 1
Medicine is of all the Arts the most noble; but, not withstanding, owing
to the ignorance of those who practice it, and of those who, inconsiderately,
form a judgment of them, it is at present far behind all the other arts.
Their mistake appears to me to arise principally from this, that in the
cities there is no punishment connected with the practice of medicine (and
with it alone) except disgrace, and that does not hurt those who are familiar
with it. Such persons are like the figures which are introduced in tragedies,
for as they have the shape, and dress, and personal appearance of an actor,
but are not actors, so also physicians are many in title but very few in
reality.
PART 2
Whoever is to acquire a competent knowledge of medicine, ought to be
possessed of the following advantages: a natural disposition; instruction;
a favorable position for the study; early tuition; love of labor; leisure.
First of all, a natural talent is required; for, when Nature opposes, everything
else is in vain; but when Nature leads the way to what is most excellent,
instruction in the art takes place, which the student must try to appropriate
to himself by reflection, becoming an early pupil in a place well adapted
for instruction. He must also bring to the task a love of labor and perseverance,
so that the instruction taking root may bring forth proper and abundant
fruits.
PART 3
Instruction in medicine is like the culture of the productions of the
earth. For our natural disposition is, as it were, the soil; the tenets
of our teacher are, as it were, the seed; instruction in youth is like
the planting of the seed in the ground at the proper season; the place
where the instruction is communicated is like the food imparted to vegetables
by the atmosphere; diligent study is like the cultivation of the fields;
and it is time which imparts strength to all things and brings them to
maturity.
PART 4
Having brought all these requisites to the study of medicine, and having
acquired a true knowledge of it, we shall thus, in traveling through the
cities, be esteemed physicians not only in name but in reality. But inexperience
is a bad treasure, and a bad fund to those who possess it, whether in opinion
or reality, being devoid of self-reliance and contentedness, and the nurse
both of timidity and audacity. For timidity betrays a want of powers, and
audacity a want of skill. There are, indeed, two things, knowledge and
opinion, of which the one makes its possessor really to know, the other
to be ignorant.
PART 5
Those things which are sacred, are to be imparted only to sacred persons; and it is not lawful to import them to the profane until they have been initiated in the mysteries of the science.
End of Etext The Law by Hippocrates
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