Health and Order in the Human Body

While Cavendish wrote a great deal about medicine, surprisingly little attention has been paid to this aspect of Cavendish’s thought. This chapter shows how focusing on the themes of peace and order illuminates Cavendish’s medical thinking. The chapter begins by locating Cavendish’s views in historical context, showing that she sided with Galenists rather than iatrochemists such as Paracelsus and van Helmont. Her objections to iatrochemistry are shown to be part of a broader rejection of alchemy. The chapter argues that Cavendish’s views on health, disease, causes of disease, and cures for diseases are firmly grounded in her natural-philosophical thinking, especially her theory of occasional causation and “imitation.”