Veins and Blood-making

The vein and each of the other parts, functions in such and such a way according to the manner in which the four qualities are mixed.

There are, however, a considerable number of not undistinguished men—philosophers and physicians—who refer action to the Warm and the Cold, and who subordinate to these, as passive, the Dry and the Moist;

Aristotle first attempted to bring back the causes of the various special activities to these principles, and he was followed later by the Stoic school.

These latter, of course, could logically make active principles of the Warm and Cold, since they refer the change of the elements themselves into one another to certain diffusions and condensations.28

This does not hold of Aristotle, however; seeing that he employed the four qualities to explain the genesis of the elements, he ought properly to have also referred the causes of all the special activities to these. How is it that he uses the four qualities in his book “On Genesis and Destruction,” whilst in his “Meteorology,” his “Problems,” and many other works he uses the two only?

Of course, if anyone were to maintain that in the case of animals and plants the Warm and Cold are more active, the Dry and Moist less so, he might perhaps have even Hippocrates on his side; but if he were to say that this happens in all cases, he would, I imagine, lack support, not merely from Hippocrates, but even from Aristotle himself—if, at least, Aristotle chose to remember what he himself taught us in his work “On Genesis and Destruction,” not as a matter of simple statement, but with an accompanying demonstration. I have, however, also investigated these questions, in so far as they are of value to a physician, in my work “On Temperaments.”

Chapter 4

The so-called blood-making29 faculty in the veins, then, as well as all the other faculties, fall within the category of relative concepts;

primarily because the faculty is the cause of the activity, but also, accidentally, because it is the cause of the effect.

But if the cause is relative to something—for it is the cause of what results from it, and of nothing else—it is obvious that the faculty also falls into the category of the relative; and so long as we are ignorant of the true essence of the cause which is operating, we call it a faculty.

Thus we say that there exists in the veins a blood-making faculty, as also a digestive30 faculty in the stomach, a pulsatile31 faculty in the heart, and in each of the other parts a special faculty corresponding to the function or activity of that part. If, therefore, we are to investigate methodically the number and kinds of faculties, we must begin with the effects; for each of these effects comes from a certain activity, and each of these again is preceded by a cause.

Chapter 5

The effects of Nature, then, while the animal is still being formed in the womb, are all the different parts of its body;

After it has been born, an effect in which all parts share is the progress of each to its full size, and thereafter its maintenance of itself as long as possible.

The activities corresponding to the three effects mentioned are necessarily three—one to each—namely, Genesis, Growth, and Nutrition. Genesis, however, is not a simple activity of Nature, but is compounded of alteration and of shaping.32 That is to say, in order that bone, nerve, veins, and all other [tissues] may come into existence, the underlying substance from which the animal springs must be altered;

and in order that the substance so altered may acquire its appropriate shape and position, its cavities, outgrowths, attachments, and so forth, it has to undergo a shaping or formative process.33 One would be justified in calling this substance which undergoes alteration the material of the animal, just as wood is the material of a ship, and wax of an image.

Growth is an increase and expansion in length, breadth, and thickness of the solid parts of the animal (those which have been subjected to the moulding or shaping process). Nutrition is an addition to these, without expansion.

Chapter 6

Genesis results from alteration together with shaping.

The seed having been cast into the womb or into the earth (for there is no difference),34 then, after a certain definite period, a great number of parts become constituted in the substance which is being generated; these differ as regards moisture, dryness, coldness and warmth,35 and in all the other qualities which naturally derive therefrom.36 These derivative qualities, you are acquainted with, if you have given any sort of scientific consideration to the question of genesis and destruction.

For, first and foremost after the qualities mentioned come the other so-called tangible distinctions, and after them those which appeal to taste, smell, and sight. Now, tangible distinctions are hardness and softness, viscosity, friability, lightness, heaviness, density, rarity, smoothness, roughness, thickness and thinness; all of these have been duly mentioned by Aristotle.37

And of course you know those which appeal to taste, smell, and sight. Therefore, if you wish to know which alterative faculties are primary and elementary, they are moisture, dryness, coldness, and warmth, and if you wish to know which ones arise from the combination of these, they will be found to be in each animal of a number corresponding to its sensible elements. The name sensible elements is given to all the homogeneous38 parts of the body, and these are to be detected not by any system, but by personal observation of dissections.39

Now Nature constructs bone, cartilage, nerve, membrane, ligament, vein, and so forth, at the first stage of the animal’s genesis,40 employing at this task a faculty which is, in general terms, generative and alterative, and, in more detail, warming, chilling, drying, or moistening; or such as spring from the blending of these, for example, the bone-producing, nerve-producing, and cartilage-producing faculties41 (since for the sake of clearness these names must be used as well).

Now the peculiar42 flesh of the liver is of this kind as well, also that of the spleen, that of the kidneys, that of the lungs, and that of the heart; so also the proper substance of the brain, stomach, gullet, intestines, and uterus is a sensible element, of similar parts all through, simple, and uncompounded. That is to say, if you remove from each of the organs mentioned its arteries, veins, and nerves,43 the substance remaining in each organ is, from the point of view of the senses, simple and elementary.

As regards those organs consisting of two dissimilar coats,44 of which each is simple, of these organs the coats are the elements—for example, the coats of the stomach, oesophagus, intestines, and arteries; each of these two coats has an alterative faculty peculiar to it, which has engendered it from the menstrual blood of the mother.

Thus the special alterative faculties in each animal are of the same number as the elementary parts45; and further, the activities must necessarily correspond each to one of the special parts, just as each part has its special use—for example, those ducts which extend from the kidneys into the bladder, and which are called ureters; for these are not arteries, since they do not pulsate nor do they consist of two coats; and they are not veins, since they neither contain blood, nor do their coats in any way resemble those of veins; from nerves they differ still more than from the structures mentioned.

“What, then, are they?” someone asks—as though every part must necessarily be either an artery, a vein, a nerve, or a complex of these,46 and as though the truth were not what I am now stating, namely, that every one of the various organs has its own particular substance. For in fact the two bladders—that which receives the urine, and that which receives the yellow bile—not only differ from all other organs, but also from one another. Further, the ducts which spring out like kinds of conduits from the gall-bladder and which pass into the liver have no resemblance either to arteries, veins or nerves. But these parts have been treated at a greater length in my work “On the Anatomy of Hippocrates,” as well as elsewhere.

As for the actual substance of the coats of the stomach, intestine, and uterus, each of these has been rendered what it is by a special alterative faculty of Nature; while the bringing of these together,47 the combination therewith of the structures which are inserted into them, the outgrowth into the intestine,48 the shape of the inner cavities, and the like, have all been determined by a faculty which we call the shaping or formative faculty49; this faculty we also state to be artistic—nay, the best and highest art—doing everything for some purpose, so that Pg 27 Greek text there is nothing ineffective or superfluous, or capable of being better disposed. This, however, I shall demonstrate in my work “On the Use of Parts.”