Theophrastus Paracelsus

1493
Einsiedeln, Switzerland
1541
Salzburg, Austria

Physician and reformer

The Swiss-born physician Theophrastus Paracelsus is considered the first to use chemicals to treat disease. His ideas were not widely accepted until the seventeenth century, when physicians and chemists studied his works and incorporated his methods into mainstream European medicine.

Paracelus's actual name was Phillippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim. After his death he was commonly known as Theophrastus Paracelsus or simply Paracelsus. He was born in Einsiedeln, a village in Switzerland, where his German father practiced medicine. His mother, a native of the village, served at a nearby monastery. After his mother's death, Paracelsus and his father moved to Villach, in a mining region of Carinthia. Paracelsus claimed that he was tutored by his father and various priests, including Abbot Johannes Trithermius (also called Heidenberg; 1462–1516), who was well known as an occult philosopher (one who studies the action or influence of supernatural or supranormal powers or some secret knowledge of them).

Wanders throughout Europe

Paracelsus's written work shows his wide-ranging informal education, which included religious studies, medical knowledge, and an acquaintance with the ideas of late medieval mysticism (intense awareness of supernatural forces). He was also acquainted with Neoplatonism, a philosophical movement of the Renaissance that revived the ideas of the ancient Greek philosopher Plato (428–c. 347 b.c.). In addition, he studied alchemy, a medieval science devoted to turning base metals into gold, finding a universal cure for disease, and prolonging life. Paracelsus demonstrated knowledge of folk-healing methods, popular superstitions, and widespread beliefs about the sources of good and evil in the world. Although he knew some Latin and was able to converse on the basic theories of academic medicine, he had unconventional ideas regarding human anatomy (structure of the body), human reproduction (functions of male and female bodies in the production of offspring), and natural philosophy (natural sciences, such as physics, chemistry, and biology). On the basis of this knowledge about Paracelsus's work, historians suggest he did not attend a university long enough to earn a degree. Paracelsus was one of the many religious thinkers and reformers who wandered throughout Europe in the early sixteenth century. He extended his travels into Russia and the Middle East (countries in southwest Asia and North Africa). After practicing as a physician in Germany and Switzerland, he settled in Salzburg, Austria.

Paracelsus's writings show that he was immersed in the social and intellectual turmoil of the radical Reformation. This was a movement led by religious reformers who called for more drastic changes in the Roman Catholic Church than those advocated by Martin Luther (1483–1546; see entry), the German priest whose "Ninety-Five Theses" triggered the Protestant Reformation. Paracelsus's involvement is shown by his behavior at Salzburg, where he narrowly avoided prosecution for supporting the rebel cause in the violently suppressed Peasants' War. The Peasants' War was a series of revolts that began in Germany in 1524 and then spread across central Europe as Protestant peasants expressed discontent with their lack of social and political rights. Like other radical reformers, Paracelsus gave mystical interpretations to the Trinity, the three aspects of the Christian God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Challenges medical authorities

Although Paracelsus's religious beliefs are evident in his writings, he had a more direct influence on the ideas of the next two generations of physicians. He is remembered primarily for questioning the medical theories of the ancient Greek thinkers Aristotle (384–322 b.c.) and Galen (a.d. 129–c. 199). Their ideas had been interpreted by the Islamic philosopher and scientist Avicenna (Ibn Sīnā; 980–1037), who wrote more than two hundred scientific works that greatly influenced medicine. Avicenna's concepts were fiercely upheld by elite professors in colleges of medicine throughout Europe. In 1527, during a student midsummer celebration at the university in Basel, Switzerland, Paracelsus threw Avicenna's Canon of Medicine onto a bonfire. It was one of the most expensive textbooks used at the university. That year Paracelsus had been hired as the Basel municipal physician, a post that permitted him to give public lectures. His use of that privilege to challenge accepted ideas made him unpopular in the medical establishment.

In particular, Paracelsus strongly disagreed with the theory of humors introduced by the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates (460–370 b.c.) and the theory of temperaments later developed by Galen (see accompanying box). Paracelsus thought the treatments based on these theories were ineffective against new diseases that were ravaging Europe. Paracelsus believed that diseases were specific ailments and could be cured with specific remedies. He advocated the use of powerful drugs that in many cases were made through the distillation of toxic, or poisonous, material and plants. Perfected in the Middle Ages (c. 400–1400), distillation is the process of producing a solvent by purifying a liquid through evaporation and condensation at high temperatures in a furnace. Paracelsus was among the first to utilize a new furnace design that improved the process and produced better solvents for medical purposes. For this reason he is regarded today as a pioneer of healing chemistry, called iatrochemistry. He also emphasized the value of observation and experience in the treatment of disease. He is credited with recognizing the medicinal benefits of opium, mercury, lead, sulfur, iron, arsenic, and copper sulfate. The theory of healing chemistry, as well as Paracelsus's methods of using it, was not well received during his lifetime, and even considered dangerous by some critics. Alarmed medical authorities took steps to discredit Paracelsus in public. In 1528, while suing a rich citizen in an attempt to collect an exorbitant medical bill, Paracelsus fled Basel and resumed his life of wandering. After practicing medicine in various places in Germany and Switzerland, he finally settled in Salzburg, where he produced his written works. He died in Salzburg in 1541.

Humors

The theory of humors was introduced by the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates, who is considered the "father" of medicine. According to Hippocrates, the body is composed of four fluids, or humors—blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile. He believed these humors control a human being's health, and an imbalance causes illness, disease, and pain. Good health, he argued, is achieved through a perfect balance of the humors. Since most illnesses are caused by an excess of a particular humor, good health could be achieved by reducing the amount found in the body. To produce such a balance, a physician usually examined a patient's astrological chart, not his or her body. (An astrological chart is a prediction of future events made by an astrologer on the basis of observations of the positions of the stars and planets.) After reading the chart the physician would give the patient a blood-letting (draining of blood from the body), most commonly through the use of leeches (blood-sucking worms). Hippocrates's theory of humors was the standard medical practice for centuries.

The Greek physician Galen introduced a new aspect of this theory when he suggested that there were four basic temperaments, or behaviors, determined by the humors: the sanguine, or healthy, type corresponds to the blood; the phlegmatic, or sluggish, type is related to phlegm; the choleric, or hot-tempered, type is associated with black bile; and the melancholic, or depressed, type correlates with yellow bile. A person's psychology, or mental state, as well as health was explained in terms of the humors until the nineteenth century, when Rudolf Virchow (1821–1902) presented his ideas on cellular pathology (diseases transmitted in the cells of the body). As a result of Virchow's ideas, the theory of humors was then abandoned.

Considered a thinker ahead of his time

Paracelsus's scholarly reputation was damaged by his unsettled life, lack of education, and acceptance of questionable medical practices and heretical religious ideas. Few of his treatises were published in his lifetime. Although he wrote in German—as opposed to Latin, which was the traditional language for scholarly works—his ideas were difficult to understand. If it were not for the next generation of medical scholars and publishers, who worked hard to interpret what Paracelsus was talking about, his theories would have had little impact on the scientific and medical world of the seventeenth century.

Among those who accepted Paraclesian medicine was Gerard Dorn (died 1584). He located, edited, and published Paracelsus's medical and philosophical manuscripts, sometimes even writing works under the master's name. Dorn interpreted Paracelsus's theories in the light of Neoplatonic philosophy, which reached its height in the sixteenth century. Dorn defended Paracelsus against the vigorous attacks of the Swiss theologian and physician Thomas Erastus (Thomas Lüber; 1524–1583), who condemned Paracelsus's theories as not only heretical but also an attack on university-supported medicine. Dorn compiled a dictionary of Paraclesus's peculiar terminology, which was reprinted and translated into several languages.

The Champions of Paracelsus

Petrus Severinus (c. 1542–1602), Dorn's younger contemporary, wrote Ideal of Philosophical Medicine (1571), in which he interpreted Paracelsus's theories so they could be used along with those of Hippocrates, Galen, and Aristotle. Severinus wanted to create a frame of well-articulated biological theory that explained the physiology and pathology (disease) of the organic world in terms of spiritual forces and divinely ordained patterns of development. His book inspired Oswald Croll (1560–1609) and Johann Hartmann (1568–1631) to make Paracelsian medical concepts and drugs the foundation of seventeenth-century medicine. Croll wrote Basilica chymica (1609), a popular introduction to chemical methods and recipes for preparing Paraclesian-style medicaments (substances used in therapy). Severinus's vision of Paraclesian "vital philosophy" was adopted by Hartman, who is regarded as the holder of the first university chair in chemistry (at Marburg, Germany, in 1609). Hartmann taught medical chemistry as a laboratory subject and later expanded Croll's book.

As a result of the work of these scholars and chemists, chemical drugs were accepted by European pharmacists and even adopted by Galenic physicians. Chemical physicians, who were trained in laboratory methods and followed new principles of medical treatment, provided an alternative to the classical methods of medicine that were taught in the universities. By the end of the seventeenth century, chemical treatments described in Paracelsus's works were absorbed into mainstream medicine. Paracelsus is now considered the first to connect goiter (swelling of the thyroid gland) with minerals in drinking water and the first to describe syphilis (a contagious sexually transmitted disease). Paracelus introduced the therapeutic use of mineral baths. He was also the first to describe silicosis (disease of the lungs caused by inhaling dusts), and his work On Diseases of Miners was the first study devoted to an occupational disease (disease caused by a work environment). In 1752 the city of Salzburg erected a statue in Paracelsus's honor.

For More Information

Books

Webster, Charles. From Paracelsus to Newton: Magic and the Making of Modern Science. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1982.

Web Sites

Debus, Allen G. Paracelsus, Theophrastus—Medical Revolution. [Online] Available http://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/paracelsus/paracelsus_2.html, April 5, 2002.

"Paracelsus, Theophrastus." Coelum Philosophorum. [Online] Available http://www.levity.com/alchemy/coelum.html, January 3, 2002.