Generals Divided into Three Grades.
(A) Mentals; (B) Physical; (C) Things affecting the whole physical body.
Group One: Mentals
The first general group of symptoms which are of the highest value are the symptoms of the mind. These are divided into three grades: The Will; Perversions of understanding; Perversions of memory.
(A) The group of symptoms referred to the will are of first importance in individualizing your case for repertory study and are manifest through perversions of loves with various fears.
In sickness, the patient’s nature often becomes changed; the mental symptoms are manifest. They may be quarrelsome, angry, irritable, tearful, they may hate their loved ones, they may be fearful, intolerant of sympathy. These are often the most difficult of all symptoms to obtain as they are most often concealed from the world, from friends and their physician. Among symptoms of this group, you will find ailments from anger, bad news, grief, love joy, reproach, sexual excesses, contrariness, cursing, cowardice, hatred, irritability, jealousness, loquacity, quarrelsomeness, indifference, sadness, etc.
(B) Perversions of understanding as manifest in delusions, hallucinations and illusions, etc. These take the second place in value for repertory work. Among symptoms of this group, which are not self-explanatory of the above, are found: absorbed, clairvoyance, confusion, dullness, comprehension, both difficult and easy; ecstasy, excitement, imbecility, mental activity, ailments from mental exertion, etc.
(C) Those of the lowest value of the mental symptoms are the perversions of memory. Such symptoms as absent minded, errors in answers, mistakes in writing and speech, disorders of speech, etc., are found in this group.
Note. – If mental symptoms are marked, especially if it is a change from normal, they are of the utmost importance to the case. Get these symptoms clear, then give them the highest standing in your repertory analysis.
The remedy which includes them will be curative.
Group Two: Physical
The next symptoms of importance among the generals are grouped as those which apply to the physical generals that deal with physical loves and sensations of the body as a whole. These may be sub-divided into two groups:
(a) The highest rank should be given to perversions of the sexual sphere, including menstrual generals. Symptoms found under the group would be those with aggravations before, during and after menses; effect of coition, urination, etc.; character of discharges. (Taking the normal as our guide any change, a decrease or increase or perversion would constitute a symptom.)
(b) The next of importance would be those symptoms pertaining to appetite, food desires and aversions and thirst. (Eating and drinking as they affect the stomach are particular, but as they affect the body as a whole are general (as the craving for salt as found under Natrum mur.).
Group Three: Physical Body
Things affecting the entire physical body. Weather and climatic influences, foods that aggravate, extremes of temperature, positions, motions, etc., as they affect the body as a whole (as worse from standing under Sulphur and Valerian is a marked general of those remedies), are all generals as found in this group. The effect of weather, climate and extremes of temperature are of great value, but are ofttimes difficult to get clearly. We must use great care in bringing out these symptoms if we are to rule out remedies thereby.
Many times we find patients stating, “I cannot stand heat,” but on enquiry we find that they hate cold, but that their aversion is to warm, close and stuffy rooms, or it may be that they are worse in summer.
In many conditions, such as rheumatism, we would expect aggravation from weather changes, the absence of these modalities, or that they might be better in wet damp weather, would transfer this system from a general to a peculiar, particular or characteristic.
Such symptoms as refer to aggravation and amelioration from bathing, wetting, pressure, touch, rubbing, jarring, defecation, sleep, dreams, parts of day, time, month and seasons, are all generals.
Sides of the body as left and right, semilateral, oblique (appearance of symptoms as found in Agaricus and Asclepias), alternate sides, changing about from side to side or various parts of the body, congestions, contractions, discoloration of parts, atrophy, chlorosis, etc., are all classed in this group of Generals.
Special senses are often so closely related to the whole man that a great many of their symptoms are general, as various odors make sick, the smell of cooking nauseates, the sight or smell of food sickens, oversensitiveness to sounds, noise, light, etc., would all be classed in this group.
