| [p. 15]
no need of an empty postulate, | Or, reading χαινῆσ2, "a
novel postulate." But the writer's
objection is not that the postulate is novel, but that it is a
postulate. A postulate, he says, is "empty" in a sphere
where accurate and verifiable knowledge is possible. Only
in regions where science cannot penetrate are ὑποθέσεισ2
legitimate. For this reason I read κενῆς2. |
as do insoluble
mysteries, about which any exponent must use a
postulate, for example, things in the sky or below
the earth. If a man were to learn and declare the
state of these, neither to the speaker himself nor to
his audience would it be clear whether his statements
were true or not. For there is no test the
application of which would give certainty.
PART 2
II. But medicine has long had all its means to
hand, and has discovered both a principle and a
method, through which the discoveries made during
a long period are many and excellent, while full discovery
will be made, if the inquirer be competent,
conduct his researches with knowledge of the discoveries
already made, and make them his starting-point.
But anyone who, casting aside and rejecting
all these means, attempts to conduct research in
any other way or after another fashion, and asserts
that he has found out anything, is and has been the
victim of deception. | Or, with the reading suggested, "both deceives
and is
deceived." |
His assertion is impossible ;
the causes of its impossibility I will endeavour to
expound by a statement and exposition of what the
art is.| Or, reading ὅτι ἔς1τιν, "that the art really is
an art,
really exists." |
In this way it will be manifest that by any
other means discoveries are impossible. But it is
particularly necessary, in my opinion, for one who
discusses this art to discuss things familiar to ordinary
folk. For the subject of inquiry and discussion
is simply and solely the sufferings of these same
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