THE GENUINE WORKS OF HIPPOCRATES TRANSLATED FROM THE GREEK WITH A PRELIMINARY DISCOURSE AND ANNOTATIONS BY FRANCIS ADAMS, LL.D. SURGEON IN TWO VOLUMES VOL. I NEW YORK WILLIAM WOOD AND COMPANY 56 & 58 LAFAYETTE PLACE 1886 THE PUBLISHERS’ BOOK COMPOSITION AND ELECTROTYPING CO., 157 AND 159 WILLIAM ST., NEW YORK. TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE. The Council of the Sydenham Society having done me the honor of consulting me respecting a proposed volume of translations from the Works of Hippocrates, I ventured to give it as my opinion that such a selection ought to comprehend the whole of those Treatises which are now regarded as genuine; and this suggestion having been approved of, I was appointed to the task of translating and editing them according to the best of my judgment. The design, then, of the present Work,[1] is to give a translation of all the genuine remains of the GREAT HIPPOCRATES, along with such an amount of illustration as may be sufficient to render them intelligible to any well-educated member of the profession at the present day. It was understood, indeed, when I first engaged in this undertaking, that I was merely to give a faithful translation of the original; but I soon became satisfied, that a considerable amount of illustration, in the form of Annotations, Arguments, and so forth, would be indispensable to the general utility of such a publication. It is well known that many parts of my author’s works are very obscure, owing to the conciseness of the language, and the difficulty which now exists of properly apprehending the views entertained on certain abstruse questions at so very distant a period; and, consequently, it will readily be understood, that a simple version, without either comment or illustration, would have been nearly as unintelligible to most of my readers as the original itself. And that the works of Hippocrates stand in need of illustration is rendered apparent from the number of commentaries which have been written upon them in all ages, commencing almost with his own time. But whether or not I have been fortunate enough to give just such an amount of illustration as was necessary, and have taken proper care at the same time not to load my pages with superfluous matters of this description, must be left to the judgment of my readers to determine. However, I may be permitted to say, that whatever value shall be put