Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variationsin hyphenation and accents have been standardised but all otherspelling and punctuation remains unchanged.
A variety astrological, alchemical and mystical symbols are used, forthe sake of consistency all have been represented by images from theoriginal book.
The anchor of footnote 22 on page 41 was missing. The present locationwas chosen by the transcriber.
The contents list shows five chapters, with chapter V being entitled TheMedicine of the Future. In the body chapter IV is followed immediatelyby Chapter VI entitled The Physician of the Future. It is assumed thatthis is a missprint rather than a missing chapter and has been alteredaccordingly.
BY
FRANZ HARTMANN, M.D.
(All rights reserved.)
THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY
7, Duke Street, Adelphi, London, W.C.
“The Path,” 144, Madison Avenue, New York, U.S.A.
“The Theosophist” Office, Adyar, Madras, India.
1893.
DEDICATED
TO EVERY STUDENT OF MEDICINE
“That which is looked upon by one generation as the apex ofhuman knowledge is often considered an absurdity by thenext, and that which is regarded as a superstition in onecentury, may form the basis of science for the followingone.” (Theophrastus Paracelsus.)
[Pg 5]
“Nothing designates the character of people so well as that whichthey find ridiculous.”—Goethe.
It is a fact not entirely unknown to those who havestudied nature, that there is a certain law of periodicity,according to which forms disappear and the truths whichthey contained reappear again, embodied in new forms.Seasons go and come, civilizations pass away and growagain, exhibiting the same characteristics possessed by theformer, sciences are lost and rediscovered, and the scienceof medicine forms no exception to this general rule. Manyvaluable treasures of the past have been buried in forgetfulness;many ideas that shone like luminous stars in thesky of ancient medicine have disappeared during therevolution of thought, and begin to rise again on themental horizon, where they are christened with new namesand stared at in surprise as something supposed never tohave existed before.
Ages of spirituality have preceded the past age ofmateriality, and other eras of higher spiritual thought arecertain to follow. During these preceding ages manyeminently valuable truths were known, which have beenlost sight of in modern times, and although the popularscience of the present, which deals with the externalappearances of physical nature, is undoubtedly greaterthan that of former times, a study of the ancient books onmedicine shows that the sages of former times knew moreof the fundamental laws of nature than what is admittedto-day.
There is a great science and a little science; one thatflies around the spires of the temple of wisdom, anotherthat penetrates into the sanctuary; both are right in theirplaces; but the one is superficial and popular, the otherprofound and mysterious; the one makes a great deal ofclamour and show, the other