Knowing the properties of the nature of medicines through testing

The properties of drugs are known in two ways: by comparison and by testing. Let's talk first about the test and say: the test leads to reliable knowledge of the properties of the medicine only after certain conditions are met. The first of these conditions is that the medicine should be free from any acquired quality, be it incoming heat, incoming coldness, or a quality acquired by the medicine as a result of a change in its substances or combination with other substances. Thus, water, although it is cold by nature, if heated, warms while it itself remains hot, and furbiyun resin, although hot by nature, if cooled, cools while it itself remains cold. Almonds, being moderately rarefied, when rancid, are very warming, and fish, although cold, if salted, is also very warming.

The second condition is that the disease on which the medicine is tested should be simple, since if the disease is complex, then there are two phenomena that require two opposing methods of treatment. When they try to use medicine against them, and it helps, the exact reason for this remains unknown. Suppose, for example, that if a person has a mucous fever, we give him agaric and the fever goes away. From this we should not conclude that agaric is cold, since it helped against hot illness, that is, against fever. On the contrary, agaric may have helped only by dissolving the mucous matter and emptying the body of it, for when this matter dries up, the fever goes away. In fact, agaric helps both essentially and indirectly. Essentially it helps with matter, and indirectly with fever.

Thirdly, the medicine should be tested in two opposite diseases, so that if it helps against both, it cannot be concluded that it is only contrary to the nature of one of the diseases: a medicine sometimes helps against one of the diseases by its essence, and against the other - as a side effect. Such, for example, is scammonium. If tested against a cold disease, it may well help and warm, and if tested against a hot disease, such as intermittent fever, it may help by emptying the body of yellow bile. And since this is so, the test gives us confidence that the scammonium is hot or cold, only after we know that one of these actions is caused by its essence, and the other is incidental.

Fourthly, the strength of the medicine must be contrasted with the same strength of the disease, because in some medicines the warmth cannot overcome the coldness of a particular disease, and the medicine has no effect on it at all. Sometimes the medicine, when used, turns out to be less cold than the heating required by the disease. Therefore, you should first test the medicine against the weakest disease and gradually move on to stronger ones in order to know the strength of the medicine and not have doubts.

Fifthly, one should take into account the time when the action and influence of the medicine manifests itself. If the medicine acts the first time it is used, then this proves that it acts essentially, but if after the first use of the medicine an effect is found that is the opposite of what will appear later, or it happens that the medicine at first does not counteract the disease, but in the end it does action, then this is where doubts and difficulties arise. After all, maybe the medicine did what it did because of a side effect it seemed to first produce a hidden effect, which was then followed by an obvious side effect. These doubts and difficulties relate to the strength of the medicine.

The suspicion that the effect of the medicine was only a side effect is strengthened if the effect appeared only when the contact of the medicine with the organ ceased. After all, if a medicine acted by its essence, it would probably act upon contact with an organ, for it is impossible for it to be weak when in contact with an organ, but to have an effect when it leaves it. This is the convincing opinion of most doctors.

It often happens that a medicine acts on some bodies with its essence after it has had a side effect. This happens if the medicine acquires an extraneous property that overpowers nature. Hot water, for example, immediately warms, and the next day or at a subsequent time, during which its incoming effect passes, it necessarily generates cold in the body, because its heated particles return to their natural cold state.

Sixthly, one should observe whether a given medicine acts constantly or at least in most cases, for if it does not, then the effect comes from it as a side effect, since natural things flow from their principles either constantly or in most cases.

Seventhly, it is required that the experiment be carried out on the human body, because if the experiment is not carried out on the human body, differences are possible for two reasons.

The first is that the medicine can be hot in relation to the human body and cold in relation to the body, for example, of a lion or a horse, if it is hotter than a person and colder than a horse and a lion. It seems that I believe that rhubarb, for example, is very cold towards a horse, while towards a person it is hot.

The second reason is that a medicine may have a healing property in relation to one of the two bodies and not have this property in relation to the other. Such, for example, is aconite, because this plant has a poisonous property in relation to the human body, but in relation to the body of starlings it does not.

These are the rules that must be observed when investigating the powers of drugs by trial.