Occult Science in Medicine

Franz HartmannOccult Science in Medicine . Occult Science in Medicine is a book by the German doctor and theosophist Franz Hartmann (1838-1912) , published in 1893. The aim of the book was to raise awareness amongst doctors and medical students about valuable medical knowledge from the past that has been ignored and catalogued as occult. The treasures of the past, that the author is concerned with and on which he develops his argument, are mostly extracted from the work and perspective of Theophrastus Paracelsus. On a broad level, the book is a comparison between the medical knowledge, practices and system contemporary to the author and those predicated by Theophrastus Paracelsus and supported by Theosophy in general. Additionally, an implicit underlying theme of the book is the nature of science and knowledge - the author advocates against conservative science (i.e. the paradigm within which all the scientists, and in particular medical practitioners, conduct their research or perform their job; popular and superficial science) and contrasts it with progressive science (i.e. exploring new realms of knowledge without being constrained by contemporary fashionable theories) .From a psychological perspective, there is a dualistic representation of the mind and of the body (in accordance with Descartes' dualism) in relation to the constitution of man, diseases and their place in contemporary medicine.. The book consists of five parts, with the most general topic discussed in Part 1 and the most specific points being made in Part 5. Each part is structured as a comparison between contemporary knowledge, science, medicine and their occult counterpart.. Each part introduces a different topic with the heading describing what it is going to be approached:Part 1: The constitution of manPart 2: The four pillars of medicinePart 3: The five causes of diseasePart 4: The five classes of physiciansPart 5: The medicine of the futureThe structure being employed makes the argument easy to follow and provides it with unity by implicitly supporting the links between the different parts.