An Essay on the Agreement Betwixt Ancient and Modern Physicians; Or, a Comparison Between the Practice of Hippocrates, Galen, Sydenham, and Boerhaave, in Acute Diseases. Intended to Shew What the Practice of Physick, in Such Distempers, Ought to Be (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Having thus fhewn what is meant by Chap. Nature, let us proceed to confider what I. Nature does, or what her Operations in the human Body are. It is an Axiom in Phyfick, then, as old as the Art itfclf, that Nature cures Diseases, Thus Galen tells us, that it is the Bufinefs of one and the fame Art to form a Thing, and to preferve and repair it after it is formed. As therefore Nature formed the Body at firft, it is her Office to reftore it again to Health, when it becomes difeafed -f-. But however this be, it is certain from repeated Experience, (the fureft Guide), that Nature has the chief Hand in curing many Difeafes, and in particular acute ones of all kinds, as the Cri/is which carries off thefe Difeafes is entirely Nature's Work. ? But it muft be ob- ferved I Hipi-oc. de Morbis Vulgaribus, Lib. vi. Seh V. t Gal, in Lib. vi. HiP.de MgrbisVulgar, Com.V. Chap, fefVed in this Place, that when we fay Na- ture cures Difeafes, we ufe the Appellation in an active Senfe, and, in this Senfe, me may be juftly faid not only to cure Difeafes, but to produce them like- wife, fince, in this Senfe, me is the Author of all the Operations and Changes in the human Body, whether they be good or bad. The Truth of this Doctrine, then, cannot be called in queftion. But there have been two Opinions founded on it, which are by no means true. The firft is, That Nature is fufficient of herfelf to cure Difeafes, and the fecond, That fhe acts in curing Difeafes with Confcioufnefs or Defign. In confequence of the former of thefe Opinions, fome People have thought, that the Art of Phyfick is an unneceflary Art. But in anfwer to this, it muft be remembered, that Nature, confidered as an active Principle, or efficient Caufe, is only a fuperior kind of Art, and, like all other Arts, ...