HISTORY OF THERAPEUTICS 11 



AsclepiadsB and a teacher in the medical temple school at Cos. He 

 was a contemporary of Pericles. He travelled in Asia Minor, 

 Greece, Scythia, and Lybia and resided subsequently in Thes- 

 saly, where he died in Larissa in 364 (375?). He published 

 the medical secrets of the priests of the Asclepiadae and his own 

 experiences in several books (Aphorisms, Prognostics, Epidem- 

 ics, Treatment of Inflammatory Diseases, Wounds of the 

 Head, Herniae). His expression, " Life is short, art is long, oppor- 

 tunity fleeting, experience deceptive, judgment difficult," is well 

 known. 



The Theory of Hippocrates. — The humoral pathology of Hippoc- 

 rates attributed all diseases to changes in the fluids of the body. 

 The body contained four cardinal fluids or humors : the blood, the 

 mucus, the yellow and the black bile. The normal mixture of these 

 four fluids (i.e., health) is the crasia, while an unequal mixture 

 generates disease, or dyscrasia. The problem of therapeutics is 

 to change dyscrasia into crasia. This can be accomplished in three 

 ways: 1, by removal of the superfluous fluid, — e.g., of the blood 

 by phlebotomy, of the bile by cholagogues, of mucus by drugs that 

 increase the secretion of mucus (derivative, depletive method) ; 2, 

 by altering or rendering harmless the superfluous fluid in the body 

 by cooking, ripening, or transforming, — pepsis, coctio, maturatio, 

 alteratio (alterative method); 3, by restoring deficient cardinal 

 fluids (dietetic method). 



In addition to the crasia theory, Hippocrates also formulated a 

 crisis theory. According to this latter theory the fever reaches the 

 crisis or turning point on certain so-called critical days. The 

 seventh day especially was regarded as the critical day and as the 

 proper time for therapeutic interference. Depleting drugs espe- 

 cially were administered on these days to increase the critical elimi- 

 nations. Cathartics and emetics, especially the vegetable drastics 

 (veratrum, cuphorbium, daphne), were used for their derivative 

 action. Phlebotomy was employed to reduce fever only in strong 

 and full-blooded individuals. In addition to the external reme- 

 dies, he assumed the presence of an internal, primitive healing force 

 which induces the crisis. 



