Medicine and philosophy - Classical Homeopathy Online

322 Late antiquitycombining accurate observation of a patient’s symptoms with a moderatelystrong theoretical apparatus. 83Yet here, too, the picture is more complicated. First, the question arisesof in what way the Methodist attitude to experience was different fromthat of the Empiricists; for we find Caelius, perhaps somewhat surprisingly,on several occasions speaking very scornfully about experimentum,experience, as it was used by the Empiricists. It is also unclear to whatextent the Methodists nevertheless allowed for a selective use of theoreticalreasoning; 84 for we often see Caelius appealing to reason (ratio) not onlyin polemical contexts (where he criticises the therapies proposed by otherpeople or schools for their ‘lack of reason’) but also when he sets forth hisown course of treatment.As for ratio, however, it is important to specify in what sense this wordis used:(i) One category of usages are polemical contexts, where Caelius wishes toreveal the absurdities and irrationalities of the therapeutic ideas of otherphysicians, as in the following passages:(30) dehinc sine ratione ad dierum numerum cibum dandum putat [sc. Diocles].(Acut. 2.29.155)Then without reason he [i.e. Diocles] holds that food should be given in accordancewith the number of days.(31) quae omnia, ut ratio demonstrat, sunt acria et propterea tumori contraria.(Acut. 2.29.156)All these measures, as reason proves, are sharp and therefore opposed to theswelling.In both passages, Caelius is criticising Diocles – a ‘Rationalist’ authority –for lack of rationality in his therapeutic instructions. There are several otherpassages in which other Dogmatists are criticised on the same grounds:their therapeutic, in particular their pharmacological recommendations aredismissed by Caelius for being sine ratione, 85 or nullius rationis, 86 or contra83 For a characterisation of the difference between Methodists and Empiricists see Frede (1987a)270.84 On the Methodists’ use of reason, i.e. their acceptance of ‘truths of reason’, see Frede (1987a) 265ff;for their use of reason as an instrument of refutation see Lloyd (1983) 190; for a critical reactionsee Gourevitch (1991) 69. I should stress that my discussion of reason and experience in CaeliusAurelianus lays no claim to comprehensiveness; a much more thorough investigation of all therelevant passages is very desirable.85 E.g. Acut. 2.19.121; 1.16.165 (against Themison); cf. 2.9.49 (against Themison); 3.8.97 (against theEmpiricists); Chron. 5.2.48.86 E.g. Acut. 1.16.157; cf. Soranus, Gyn. 1.46.