Medicine and philosophy - Classical Homeopathy Online

To help, or to do no harm 113distinguishes between treatment by drugs, venesection and clystering, 35and elsewhere between regimen, fomentations and drugs; 36 and the authorof On Internal Affections distinguishes on one occasion between treatmentby fomentations, drugs, foods and exercises, 37 and on another occasionbetween treatment by drugs, drink, food and exercises. 38With dietetics, matters seem to be more complicated. The verb diaitan() is often used by Hippocratic authors to describe a treatmentconsisting of measures characteristic of what we would call dietetics, suchas foods and drinks, walking, baths, exercise and sleep. But sometimes itjust seems to be equivalent to ‘treatment’, as in a well-known statement ofthe doctor’s primary requirements in Epidemics 3.16; 39 and indeed in thetreatise On Ancient Medicine dietetics seems to be just what medicine isall about – although even here a brief reference to cupping instrumentsindicates that, to this author, medicine is not entirely a matter of food,drink and exercise. 40 At the same time this work, as well as the explicitlydietetic writings such as On Regimen and On Regimen in Acute Diseases,make it clear that dietetics is not only used for therapeutic purposes, thatis, for the treatment of diseases, but also for the preservation and promotionof health () and the prevention of disease. 41This raises the question whether it is correct to regard dietetics as a partor branch of therapeutics. It could be argued that it should rather be definedmore generally as a care for the body both – and perhaps predominantly –in healthy states as well as (perhaps secondarily) in unhealthy states, or onthe interface between the two, as seems to be the position of the author ofOn Regimen. 42 More importantly, as far as unhealthy states are concerned,dietetics seems to be a care for the body which does not necessarily aim35 Appendix 4 (2.400 L.): .36 Appendix 56–7 (2.508–10 L.): .37 Int. Aff. 50 (7.292 L.): .38 Int. Aff. 24 (7.228 L.): . Cf. the wellknownHippocratic Aphorism 7.87 (4.608 L.): ‘Diseases that are not cured by drugs, the iron willcure; and those that are not cured by the iron, fire will cure; and those that are not cured by fire oneshould consider incurable.’39 Epidemics 3.16 (3.102 L.): ‘To know about these things means to know whom one should treat byregimen and when and how’ ( ).40 On Ancient Medicine 22 (1.626 L.): ‘On the other hand, cupping instruments, which are broad andtapering, have been designed for this purpose, that they withdraw and attract [material] from theflesh, and there are many other instruments of a similar kind’ ( ). On this see Festugière (1948) 66–7. See also, in thesame treatise, ch. 12 (1.596 L.), where the mention of ‘many species of medicine’ ( ) seems to envisage different parts of medicine.41 On Ancient Medicine 3, 5 and 7 (1.574, 580 and 584 L.).42 On Regimen 1.2 (6.470–2 L.); 3.67 (6.592 L.); 3.69 (6.606 L.).