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| Hpathy Ezine - October, 2008 | ||||
Precursor to the Organon: Hahnemann’s Occasional WritingsPart IV - Aesculapias in the Balance (1805)- Rudi Verspoor FHCH, HD(RHom.), DMH |
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| n this writing we start to gain a strong appreciation that the origin and destiny of man, as well as natural disease and its treatment, is divinely inspired, as is the knowledge that all seek to remedy disease. We also ?nd a mature criticism of the prevailing system of medicine and its degeneration into polypharmacy due to a profound misunderstanding of the nature of disease (a generative act).
Then Hahnemann condemns the heroic measures used (“such modes of treatment are not very unlike murders”).
The history of medicine has been one of
The true path of Hippocrates, simple observation of nature, led to increasingly complicated systems built upon confusion and lack of knowledge of remedies. At the same time, the original search for the universal remedy based on a uniformitarian notion of disease (commendable although misguided) degenerated into the indiscriminate use of many remedies to cover the case - the unipharmacy and polypharmacy axle of the failure to comprehend the true nature of disease.
To return to our earlier question, as to why Hahnemann made a clean break with the Old School of medicine around 1800-1803, we may perhaps consider the growing understanding of the dynamic nature of disease and the nullity of any measures that simply seek to remove disease effects (materia peccans), plus the growing consciousness of the dynamic nature of medicine, being the aspect that cures (crude doses being themselves disease inducing). These two tendencies came together in the discovery of a remedy for scarlet fever, both preventatively and for any sequelae of that disease then af?icting Europe. The epidemic emerged in the middle of 1799 and Hahnemann, using his new maxims, was able to examine the symptoms of the disease and ?nd Belladonna to be the “speci?c preservative remedy.” The results were all that could be expected of this new “medicine of experience.” What is also remarkable is the dose that Hahnemann was advocating. Prior to this, he had used relatively crude doses, but the medicinal aggravation caused initially in administering the similar substance (homeopathic aggravation), led him to attenuate the dose even more. In 1798, Hahnemann recommends doses of several grains to 30-40 grains, depending on the substance. Later that same year, he is recommending the giving of small doses in liquid form (1-2 milligrams - 0.001-0.002 grains - in solution). The next year he announces with no apparent explanation even smaller (so-called in?nitesimal) doses, being in the order of one ten millionth of a grain for Arsenic (0.00000001 grains) (Haehl, Vol. I, p. 312). However, the ?rst clear statement of these in?nitesimal diluted doses comes with the discovery of the remedy for scarlet fever.
Hahnemann gave the weak solution in drop form (up to 40 drops according to age), one dose every 72 hours “well stirred for a minute in any kind of drink.” (Haehl, Vol. I, p. 381) He seems to have favored the liquid dose, as it had more points of contact (although he thought the contact was in the stomach).
This reference to thorough solutions is to those well-shaken, which Hahnemann here found to make the solution “very intimate.” (For a more thorough examination of the issue of dose and potency, please refer to the article by this author in the March 2008 edition of Homeopathy4Everyone.) Such small doses now brought forth criticism as to its possible effectiveness. Hahnemann answered publicly in an edition of Hufeland’s journal of 1801. While Hahnemann continued to experiment with dosage in order to better understand the effects, and while he only came to more fully grasp that what was active was the dynamis of the medicine (referring to potency rather than dilution only around 1814 - see Haehl, Vol. I, p. 317), he now came to realize the power of medicine to cure without the need for other aid, which simply often worked to weaken the life force of the patient. Where other measures were needed, Hahnemann provided these in the form of regimen to build up the life force. He imitated nature in the context of health, not disease (which was what the allopaths sought to do). (Lesser Writings, p. 386)[1] Another interesting aspect of this small work on scarlet fever is the understanding that a constant disease can develop from its initial, primary (tonic) form into other disease forms that are more variable. Thus, while Belladonna seems to work for prevention (initial contact) and the early stages (as well as the sequelae), the later stages require other remedies according to the symptoms. This provides an early basis for what Hahnemann later discovered with the chronic diseases, namely that there were some remedies that seemed almost speci?c for initial stages of the chronic miasms (the primary disease itself), but that the number of remedies for later variable states of chronic disease the secondary diseases that were produced by the primary disease) increased as time went on. # # #
Rudi founded the National Association of Trained Homeopaths (NUPATH) in Canada, as well as the Canadian/International Heilkunst Association (C/IHA). He has advised the Canadian government on healthcare issues, made presentations to various federal and provincial governments on homeopathy, and has written for various journals as well as lectured around the world. His publications include: Homeopathy Renewed, A Sequential Approach to the Treatment of Chronic Illness (with Patty Smith); A Time for Healing; Homeopathy Re-examined: Beyond the Classical Paradigm (with Steven Decker); The Dynamic Legacy: Hahnemann from Homeopathy to Heilkunst (with Steven Decker) The website at www.heilkunst.com has more articles and resources about Heilkunst. |
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