Physiologia Medica

MEDICAL PROSCENIA

28

Although he could have changed this category in the definition, out of reverence for Herophilus and the ancients, he preferred to interpret it correctly. For just as sophia wisdom is used in two ways, so also is episteme science or knowledge. It is used partly in the Proper sense, for a true state of the intellect that knows things which exist always and by necessity, through eternal causes. In this sense, Medicine is a Science. Likewise, Wisdom is properly used for a state composed of both the mind and science. It is used partly in the Improper sense for a true state that knows things that exist, even if they are contingent, through similar, contingent, and non-necessary causes. In this sense, Medicine is called a Science because of the investigation of causes. Plato, in the Gorgias, says it is an Art because it can give the nature of that which it cures, the causes of the things it seeks, and the reasons for them. He says that cooking, however, is not an art, because it does not wish to investigate the causes of what it does, or cannot do so, but is content with the performance itself and the hoti the fact that it is so. In this same way, Wisdom is used for any Art, and not only for art, but also for Skill; as when Homer writes that Margites was not a farmer, nor a sailor, nor sophos wise or skilled in anything else.

The category of Bodies, Causes, and Signs acts as the subject matter of medical theorems: but in such a way that Bodies exist and subsist, Signs inhere in them, and Causes make an impression upon them. The categories of the Salubrious, the Unsalubrious, and the Neutral act as the medical forms which inform the consideration of the matter: they exist for the end that Health may be preserved, Ill-health may be driven away, and Neutrality may either be safeguarded so it does not decline, or assisted so it may rise. To this point also belongs Galen’s definition in To Thrasybulus, chapter 5: Medicine is the "Art preservative of health and curative of diseases."

MEDICAL 29

Likewise, the definition of Avicenna, "the Science by which the dispositions of the human body are known," contains the Subject, namely the Body: then also the End, which is the knowledge itself through its Signs. "Insofar as it is healthy or sick": the Form is Health and Disease. The presence of one always follows the removal of its opposite. "So that health may be preserved and disease driven away": this End is placed in action, which requires its own instruments as instrumental efficient causes.

For Averroës, it is an "operative Art." Thus it is distinguished from a purely contemplative Art by reason of the End: while for the latter only the knowledge of truth is proposed, for the former operation is also intended. This is the very precept of Hippocrates: "wisdom must be brought into art" original: "ἄμ μέγαραν σοφίως τέχνην", and "art into wisdom." This applies unless he intended "operative art" to mean "productive" original: "ποιητικὴν" rather than "practical" original: "πρακτικὴν". But according to Aristotle, art itself is a "productive state" original: "ἕξις ποιητικὴ": and therefore the word "operative" is added to "Art" in vain, since every art is operative.

"From true principles": what Aristotle has as a "true state" in the 6th book of the Ethics seems to intend what Plato expressed: that an Art must know not only the "fact that" original: "τὸ ὅτι" but also the "reason why" original: "τὸ διότι". Otherwise, it would only be skill, not art. However, if we keep Aristotle’s definition of Art, this small part in the definition of Medicine seems superfluous. "In which is sought the preservation of Health and the removal of sickness": this End is practical, joined with the Form. "As much as is possible for it": this is known through Signs and achieved through causes. Therefore this end is theoretical, joined with the instrumental efficient cause. "In every body": whose nature he weighs through Physiology, as if through a consideration of the Material.