THE PARADOXICAL TEXT `ON THE HEART', Part I

THE TREATISE IN Vol. IX, pp. 80-93 of Littre s edition of the Hippocratic Corpus, De Cordel is one of the most attractive in that collection, despite the wretched state of its text. It is a real pleasure, after reading some Hippocratic treatises, to come upon something which we can instantly recognize as scientific exposition of a familiar kind. It is attractive in its manner of presentation: there is a remarkable absence of that egotistic style, 'Ich-Stil', so characteristic of some fifth-century scientific writing. The author is no sophist or iatrosophist, calling us into hushed and reverent attention with some high-faluting piece of bombast. Contrast the beginning of De Genitura (VII, 470L.): 'Law governs all things', with the matter of fact tone of De Corde: 'In shape, the heart is like a pyramid'. This tone is maintained until the equally quiet conclusion: 'that is what I have to say concerning the heart'. The author does not obtrude himself. He does not leave us with the impression, so frequently derived from Hippocratic writings, that we have heard a spectacular oration from a sophist, justly confident of his reputation but concerned also to maintain that reputation. The tone is quiet and businesslike: there is the lecturer, there before him is the subject of his lecture, the heart in its anatomy, and thus he gets on with it. His personality is absorbed by his subject, and what pride is there is not personal pride, but an entirely altruistic pride in the handiwork ofthe Craftsman who made the heart. He is a pious man. We are engaged by the manner-but also by the matter. Despite great difficulties in interpretation of particular passages, we receive a clear and distinct impression of the author's anatomical subject, the heart. It is precisely this clarity, so unlike the anatomical essays of other works in the Collection, that stimulates us to investigate those passages where the outline seems to have been lost, or the details have become blurred