Physician and patient

by Worthington Hooker

The principles of this system shall be stated in the language of its founder.

“My system of practice is founded upon these few, simple, and I think, just principles.

1st. That the constitutions of all mankind are essentially alike, and differ only in the different temper of the same materials of which they are composed. The materials, of which all men are formed, may be resolved into the four elements. Earth and water constitute the solids of the body, which is made active by air and fire. And this last element in a peculiar manner gives life and motion to the rest; and when entirely overpowered, from whatever cause, by the other elements, death ensues.

2d. That the construction and organization of the human frame is in all men essentially the same. They have similar solids and fluids, viz., bones, cartilages, tendons, nerves, muscles, veins, arteries, flesh, blood, and other juices, body and parts, or members.

3d. That all are sustained in a manner as similar as their formation, from the earth, the common mother of us all. Of the elements man is made, and by the same elements he is supported.

4th. That a state of perfect health arises from a due balance or temperature of these elements. But when it is by any means destroyed, the body is more or less disordered. And when this is the case, there is always an actual diminution or absence of the element, fire or heat, and in proportion to this diminution or absence, the body is affected with its opposite, cold. The former may be denominated nature itself, the best physician of the body, the latter its enemy; the first is the health and life of the body; the last its disease and death.

5th. That all diseases, however various the symptoms, and different the names by which they are called, arise directly from obstructed perspiration. The many evils derived from hence, must be obvious, when it is considered that the discharge from the body thereby is greater than by all the other evacuations combined. Obstructed perspiration may be produced from a great variety of effects which produce the same cause, originating from cold.

Now as all men have similar constitutions, being formed of the same materials differently tempered; as their construction and organization essentially agree; as they are all sustained from the same elements which form their composition; as a just balance or temperature of these elements produces a state of health, and the reverse destroys it; as all disease takes its immediate rise from obstructed perspiration in a greater or less degree; and as this is an effect universally produced, it is evident that those medicines which are most agreeable to nature, and efficacious in removing obstructions, and the evils thereby produced, and restoring the perfect equilibrium, activity and energy of the system, must be the best, and universally applicable.

I shall now describe the fuel which continues the fire or life of man. This is contained in two things—food and medicine, which are in harmony with each other, often grow in the same field, and are created to be used by the same people. People who are capable of raising their food and preparing the same, may as easily learn to collect and prepare their own medicine, and administer the same when it is needed. Our life depends on heat; food is the fuel that kindles and continues that heat. The digestive powers being correct causes the food to consume; this continues the warmth of the body, by continually supporting the fire.

The stomach is the deposit from which the whole body is supported. The heat is kindled in the stomach by its consuming the food; and all the body and limbs receive their proportion of nourishment and heat from that source; as the whole room is warmed by the fire which is consumed in the fire-place. The greater the quantity of wood consumed in the fire-place, the greater the heat in the whole room. So in the body; the more food well digested, the more heat and support through the whole man. But by constantly receiving food into the stomach, which is sometimes not suitable for the best nourishment, the stomach becomes foul, so that the food is not well digested. This causes the body to lose its heat; then the appetite fails; the bones ache, and the man is sick in every part of the whole frame.