APPENDIX ON CHAPTER XX, p. 54.
οἰνος ἄκρητος πολλὸς ποθεὶς διατίθησί πως τὸν ἄνθρωπον· καὶ πάντες ἄν αἱ εἰδότες τοῦτο γνοίησαν, ὅτι αὕτη δύναμις οἲνου καὶ αὺτὸς αἴτιος.
So A; other MSS. have
ἀσθενέα after
ἄνθρωπον, ἰδόντες for
οἱ εἰδότες, ἡ after
αὕτη and
ἐστιν after
αὐτός.
This passage contradicts the general argument, which is that in medicine statements about foods must not be made
ἁπλῶς. Cheese is not bad food; it is only bad in certain conditions, and in certain ways, and at certain times. In these circumstances cheese has a
δύναμις which does not belong to cheese in itself, but is latent until certain conditions call it forth. The error, says the writer, is not made in the case of wine. Everybody knows that in itself wine is not bad; it is drinking to excess, or at wrong times, which is mischievous.
Now the reading of A (in fact any MS. reading) makes the writer say that wine itself
is to blame (
αὐτὸς αἴτιος)—an obvious contradiction of the general argument. My colleague the Rev. H. J. Chaytor most ingeniously suggests that
αὐτός refers not to wine but to the man. He would therefore translate
this
δύναμις of wine and the man himself are to blame. But not only is it more natural for
αὐτός to refer to wine, but the writer’s whole point is that in and by itself
no food is
αἴτιος. A food is a cause only in certain conditions, or, rather, certain conditions call forth certain
δυνάμεις.
I think, therefore, that the right reading is
ὅτι τοιαύτη δύναμις οἵνου καὶ οὐκ αὐτὸς αἵτιος.
Such and such a
δύναμις of wine (
i. e. a
δύναμις caused by excess of wine acting upon the human
φύσιις) is to blame and not mere wine by itself.
ὅτι τοιαύτη might easily turn into
ὅτι αὕτη, and the omission of
οὐ by scribes is not uncommon.
There is an attractive vigour about the reading
ἰδόντες for
οἱ εἰδότες, and it may be correct.
Anybody can see at a glance that in the case of wine it is excess, etc., and not merely wine itself which is to blame.
De prisca medicina. Hippocrates. ed. William Henry Samuel Jones. London. 1923.
Funding provided by National Library of Medicine History of Medicine Division.