LIX. Περὶ φαρμάκων—On Purgative Medicines.
Though it must be admitted that this little fragment can boast of no competent authorities to establish its claim to be placed among the genuine works of Hippocrates, it bears undoubted marks of having been written by some person well acquainted with his principles, and having no ordinary acquaintance with professional matters. Thus the author states very correctly the effects of idiosyncrasy in modifying the operation both of purgatives and emetics, and advises the physician to make inquiry beforehand what effects such medicines, if formerly taken, had produced on the patient; for, he adds, it would be a disgraceful casualty to occasion a man’s death by the administration of a purgative medicine. He also interdicts the administration of purgatives during the heat of a fever, and during the very hot seasons of the year. These practical rules appear to me to be highly important, and yet how frequently do we see them disregarded! At the time we have mentioned, the author prudently remarks that it is safer to administer a clyster.
LX. Περὶ ἑλλεβορισμοῦ—On the Administration of Hellebore.
This little tract is usually published among the Epistolæ, and, as a matter of course, it has no evidence in support of its genuineness further than they have, which, as we shall presently see, is very slender. It contains, however, very acute and important observations on the administration of hellebore, to which it is well known that the Hippocratists were very partial. But these are mostly extracted from the Aphorisms, and need not be noticed in this place. The Book of Prognostics also is quoted, but seemingly by mistake.
LXI. Ἐπιστολαι—The Epistles.
No scholar can require to be informed that, since the memorable controversy in this country between the Honorable C. Boyle and the celebrated Dr. Bentley, respecting the authenticity of the Epistles which bear the name of Phalaris, the whole of the “Epistolæ Græcanicæ” have been generally condemned as spurious. Against this judgment I have no intention to protest; but I may be allowed to remark that many ancient works which are usually acknowledged as genuine have not so much external evidence in their favor as these Epistles possess. The Epistles ascribed to Plato, for example, are quoted as genuine by Cicero,[273] and by Diogenes Laertius.[274] Those of Hippocrates, too, are quoted and recognized by Erotian, Soranus, and other ancient authorities. Still, however, as I have stated, I have no intention to stand up against the general opinion of scholars from the Scaligers down to the present time, by which they have been condemned as supposititious; only I contend that, as it is admitted on all hands that they are very ancient,[275] that is to say, that they must have been composed within less than a hundred years after the death of Hippocrates, it is utterly incredible that the Sophists who wrote them, whether for a fraudulent purpose that they might derive profit from them by passing them off for the productions of the great name they bear, or whether for the purpose of displaying their own skill in sustaining an assumed character, should have made them turn upon alleged occurrences in the life of Hippocrates which every person at that early period must have been able to judge whether they were fictitious or not. I see no reason, then, to doubt that the main facts to which these Epistles relate are real, although the Epistles themselves be supposititious.[276]
Having thus stated my opinion of these Epistles in general terms, I shall now dismiss them with a very brief notice.
They are differently arranged by modern authorities; I shall follow M. Littré in the few remarks which I have to offer upon them.
The first series of these Epistles relates to the services which Hippocrates is said to have rendered to the people of Athens during the time of the memorable plague. The spuriousness of these, it is generally held, is proved beyond all doubt by the silence of Thucydides with regard to any such professional services rendered by Hippocrates on the occasion; and no doubt if it were maintained that these took place at the outbreak of the disease in Greece, that is to say, at the commencement of the Peloponnesian war, the inference would be most legitimate. But if we be permitted to suppose that, as the plague is known to have lurked about in different parts of Greece for a considerable time, the services of Hippocrates did not take place until several years afterwards, there is nothing in the story which bears the slightest air of falsehood, even if we adhere to the common chronology respecting the birth of our author. Indeed, I repeat, if the Sophist who composed these letters had founded them on tales which everybody knew to be false, he could never have hoped to impose upon the learned men of the next generation, and make his forgeries pass for genuine.