Hippocrates Quotes

Vita brevis, ars longa, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

All parts of the body which have a function, if used in moderation and exercised in labors in which each is accustomed, become thereby healthy, well developed and age more slowly, but if unused they become liable to disease, defective in growth and age quickly.

It is far more important to know what sort of person has the disease, rather than what sort of disease the person has.

ARS LONGA, VITA BREVIS

A cura está ligada ao tempo e, às vezes, também, às circunstâncias.

If we could give every individual the right amount of nourishment and exercise, not too little and not too much, we would have found the safest way to health.

Wherever the art of Medicine is loved, there is also a love of Humanity.

For if a man by magical arts and sacrifices will bring down the moon, and darken the sun, and induce storms, or fine weather, I should not believe that there was anything divine, but human, in these things, provided the power of the divine were overpowered by human knowledge and subjected to it.

I would give great praise to the physician whose mistakes are small, for perfect accuracy is seldom to be seen, since many physicians seem to me to be in the same plight as bad pilots, who, if they commit mistakes while conducting the ship in a calm do not expose themselves, but when a storm and violent hurricane overtake them, they then, from their ignorance and mistakes, are discovered to be what they are, by all men, namely, in losing their ship.

Life is short, and Art long; the crisis fleeting; experience perilous, and decision difficult.

[A]ll the causes of the sufferance refer themselves to this rule, that the strongest things most especially and decidedly hurt man, whether in health or in disease.

That which is used - develops. That which is not used wastes away.

Those diseases which medicines do not cure, iron cures; those which iron cannot cure, fire cures; and those which fire cannot cure, are to be reckoned wholly incurable.

A wise man should consider that health is the greatest of human blessings, and learn how by his own thought to derive benefit from his illnesses.

All disease begins in the gut.