Of Medicine, in Eight BooksCelsus, Aulus Cornelius
History
Of Medicine, in Eight Books
Celsus, Aulus Cornelius
Medicine, Greek and Roman
With regard to the varieties of weather, the north wind raises a
cough, exasperates the fauces, binds the belly, suppresses urine,
excites shudderings, also pain of the side and breast; yet it braces a
sound body(4), and renders it more mobile and brisk. The south wind
causes dulness of hearing, blunts the senses, raises a pain of the
head, opens the belly, and renders the whole body heavy, moist, and
languid. The other winds, by how much they approach more nearly to
either of these, produce effects the more similar to each of them. All
heat inflames the liver and spleen, enervates the mind, and occasions
faintings, and hæmorrhages. Cold causes sometimes convulsions, and
sometimes a tetanus, the Greek name for the first is spasmos[AL],
and for the other tetanos[AM]: it produces blackness in ulcers, and
a shuddering in fevers. In dry weather we meet with acute fevers,
lippitudes, dysenteries, stranguries, pains of the joints; in rainy,
tedious fevers, diarrhœas, angina, gangrenes, epilepsies, palsy, which
the Greeks call paralysis[AN]. Nor is the present weather only to
be considered, but also what has been its course for some time. If
a dry winter has been attended with northerly winds, and the spring
with southerly, and rains, there most commonly ensue lippitudes,
dysenteries, fevers, and these chiefly in more delicate bodies,
particularly women. But if southerly winds and rains have prevailed in
the winter, and the spring be cold and dry, then indeed pregnant women,
whose time is near, are in danger of a miscarriage; and those, that go
their full time, bring forth weakly children, not likely to live. Other
people are attacked with dry lippitudes, and if they are old, with bad
gravedoes and catarrhs. But if the southerly winds have continued from
the beginning of winter to the end of spring, people are very quickly
taken off by pleurisies, and fevers attended with a delirium, which is
called phrenitis[AO]. But when the heat begins with the spring, and
continues through the summer, profuse sweating in fevers necessarily
follows. But if a dry summer has been attended with northerly winds,
and the autumn with rains, and southerly, all the following winter
we find coughs, catarrhs, hoarseness, and in some a consumption. But
if the autumn too is equally dry, and the same northerly winds blow,
all the more delicate bodies, amongst which I placed women, enjoy a
good state of health: and for the more robust, they may possibly be
attacked with dry lippitudes, and fevers either acute, or tedious, and
atrabiliary disorders.
[AL] σπασμὸς.
[AM] τέτανος.
[AN] παράλυσις.
[AO] φρεν̃ιτιϛ.̃
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