HIPPOCRATES: 5 



vations collected during several generations that 

 Hippocrates had access from the commencement of 

 his career. 



Owing to the peculiar constitution of the Asclepions, 

 medical and priestly pursuits had, before the time of 

 Hippocrates, become combined; and, consequently, 

 although rational means were to a certain extent applied 

 to the cure of diseases, the more common practice 

 was to resort chiefly to superstitious modes of working 

 upon the imagination. It is not surprising, therefore, 

 to find that every sickness, especially epidemics and 

 plagues, were attributed to the anger of some offended 

 god, and that penance and supplications often took the 

 place of personal and domestic cleanliness, fresh air, and 

 light. 



It was Hippocrates who emancipated medicine from 

 the thraldom of superstition, and in this way wrested 

 the practice of his art from the monopoly of the priests. 

 In his treatise on "The Sacred Disease" (possibly epi- 

 lepsy), he discusses the controverted question whether 

 or not this disease was an infliction from the gods ; and 

 he decidedly maintains that there is no such a thing 

 as a sacred disease, for all diseases arise from natural 

 causes, and no one can be ascribed to the gods more 

 than another. He points out that it is simply because 

 this disease is unlike other diseases that men have come 

 to regard its cause as divine, and yet it is not really 



