Note 79 — Chapter I

In some respects our modern philosophers, who think they make new discoveries, can be compared to “the very clever, learned, and civil gentleman” whom Hippocrates having met at Samos one day, describes very good-naturedly. “He informed me,” the Father of Medicine proceeds to say, “that he had lately discovered an herb never before known in Europe or Asia, and that no disease, however malignant or chronic, could resist its marvellous properties. Wishing to be civil in turn, I permitted myself to be persuaded to accompany him to the conservatory in which he had transplanted the wonderful specific. What I found was one of the commonest plants in Greece, namely, garlic—the plant which above all others has least pretensions to healing virtues.” Hippocrates: “De optima prædicandi ratione item judicii operum magni.” I.