LINKAGE WITH THE MODERN TIME 



acceptance of the principles of Hippocratic 

 practice. Not improperly was Sydenham 

 called " the English Hippocrates." Although 

 conversant with the natural sciences of his 

 time, he refused to base the practice of medi- 

 cine upon any theory drawn from them, even 

 as Hippocrates and his school had refused to 

 base their medicine upon the theories of the 

 Greek physical philosophers. 



Like Hippocrates, Sydenham set himself in 

 every case to study the whole course of the 

 patient's disease, observing the succession of 

 symptoms, and the response of the patient to 

 the treatment employed. Like Hippocrates, 

 he conceived a disease as the struggle of the 

 body's healing energy — the vis medicatrix 

 naturae — with the noxious agent. He divided 

 the symptoms into: (i) those essentially per- 

 taining to the action of the noxious cause; (2) 

 those arising from the reaction of the patient's 

 system; and (3) those induced by the treat- 

 ment. He developed the conception of succes- 

 sive phases of disease, and of the pernicious 

 or benignant symptoms pertaining to them. 



Sydenham, again like Hippocrates, con- 

 cerned himself chiefly with acute disease. A 

 malady became chronic through the slowness 



[135] 



