De podagra et podagricorum curatione doctrina

35. The sending member is either the brain or the liver, along with the veins arising from these.
36. The brain, when it is cold and moist, combined with weakness.
37. For if it becomes such, a phlegmatic humor is aggravated within it, which, being dissolved, distills downwards both because of its quantity and its weight.
38. And this occurs either from the pericranium under the skin through the upper parts of the body, or from the ventricles of the brain through the spine.
39. The liver suggests gouty matter to the feet if it generates only raw and serous humors.
40. Transmitting them through the veins and interior viscera:
41. And most especially Gout arises if it flows down along the fourth nerve of the thigh.
42. The receiving member is the joint of the foot itself.
43. The weaker this is, the more easily it receives the humors.
44. And if it attracts them, it does so because of both the pain and the heat.
45. Finally, to these is added an instrument, the width of the vapors or passages through which the matter descends.
46. For experience argues that this also has great power, which teaches that almost any immoderate drink suddenly flows down to the feet, especially in the evening.
47. However, to diagnose all these things, the associated symptoms must be observed.
48. Namely, signs that are both diagnostic and prognostic.
49. Diagnostic signs, which look at the present nature of the disease, are either pathognomonic symptoms specific to a disease or aitiognomonica causal signs.
50. Pathognomonic signs, which indicate the affection itself, are pains in the joint of the big toe, or in the heel, or in the hollow of the foot, and redness of those parts.
51. Also, a smaller quantity of sweat and urine excretion than is usual.
52. Aitiognomonica causal signs reveal its origin and causes, namely the source or the quality of the humor.
53. The source, whether the head or the remaining parts.