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BOOK TWO
[p. 195]accomplished in the body. For if all articles of food contained bile from the beginning and of themselves, and did not produce it by undergoing change in the
animal body, then they would produce it similarly in all bodies; the food which was bitter to the taste would, I take it, be productive of bile, while that which tasted good and sweet would not generate even the smallest quantity of bile. Moreover, not only honey but all other sweet substances are readily converted into bile in the aforesaid bodies which are warm for any of the reasons mentioned.
Well, I have somehow or other been led into this discussion,- not in accordance with my plan, but compelled by the course of the argument. This subject has been treated at great length by Aristotle and Praxagoras, who have correctly expounded the view of Hippocrates and Plato.
PART 9
For this reason the things that we have said are not to be looked upon as proofs but rather as indications of the dullness
Lit. anaesthesia. Linacre renders it indocilitas.
of those who think differently, and who do not even recognise what is agreed on by everyone and is a matter of daily observation. As for
the scientific proofs of all this, they are to be drawn from these principles of which I have already spoken
p. 15
- namely, that bodies act upon and are acted upon by each other in virtue of the Warm, Cold, Moist and Dry. And if one is
