Homoeopathy Science of Therapeutics contains the author’s views on the cure of disease by homeopathy drugs. It is a compilation of articles written by Carol Dunham (1828-1877) between 1858 and 1870.
Therapeutics is the most complex of all the natural sciences. Each of the classes of phenomena requires for its study the aid of several auxiliary sciences. Thus, in order to know thoroughly the phenomena of disease, we must call to our aid Anatomy and Physiology, Chemistry, Physics and Psychology….
Such a Therapeutics must be necessarily based on a theory which is a generalization, and which therefore overlooks those phenomena of a given case which are peculiar to the individual patient and takes congizance only of those phenomena which are common to a great number of cases….
We are indebted to them also for the elaboration of those subsidiary sciences-Anatomy, Physiology, Pathology, Chemistry and the like-in which, indeed, the great glories of the medicine of to-day have been won, and without which, we cheerfully admit, Therapeutics as a science could not exist….
Now, morbid phenomena are deviations from healthy phenomena. How can we recognize the deviations unless we are familiar with the standard?…
These characteristic symptoms, so precious to the Therapeutist, may seem to be of little or no pathological value, to those who forget that there are no accidents in Nature. They would be valueless if we did not need to individualize….
An extensive and thorough knowledge of Physiology, Pathology and Hygiene are indispensable to the physician to enable him to make that preliminary analysis of a case by which he will determine under what category the case belongs….
Very many homoeopathists have so far deviated from Hahnemann’s method as to endeavor to blend with the use of his doses and remedies, an application of pathology as a basis of treatment….
The homoeopathic practitioner having got “a picture of the disease he is about to treat”, i.e., having got the “totality of the symptoms,” proceeds to compare this picture with the pathogenesis of various drugs. …
Hepar has many close relations with Mercurius. The distinction between them is, in fact, rather negative than positive. Almost all the symptoms of Hepar are found under Mercurius, but not all those of Mercurius under Hepar….
No candid observer of his actions, or candid reader of his writings, can hesitate for a moment to admit that Hahnemann was a very extraordinary man, one- whose name will descend to posterity as the exclusive excogitator and founder of an original system of medicine…
We are not in a position to discuss the relations of this science of Pathology, which treats of the phenomena of the diseased organism, to the science of Therapeutics, which proposes to cure disease….
Among the symptoms which he called primary (Erst wirkungen), Hahnemann recognized the occasional occurrence of what he called alternate (Wechselwirkungen), opposed, sometimes contradictory symptoms, which, nevertheless, were not secondary. …
The Central symptoms appear speedily after the drug is taken, are generally the result of comparatively large doses. The Peripheral symptoms appear more tardily, are generally the result of comparatively small doses, taken repeatedly or allowed to act without interruption for a long period….
By alternation, we think, practitioners generally understand the prescription, at one and the same time, of two or more remedies to follow each other at short intervals….
Some of the advocates of alternation of remedies have failed to perceive the necessity of raising their procedures to the level of a scientific method. They still rest on the rude empirical ground of unmethodized experience….
Two or more medicinal forces cannot together act upon the economy without so modifying each other that neither shall produce the effect it would if only one were acting….
As Hahnemann’s practical experience in the treatment of disease increased, so did his estimate of the advantage and necessity of using higher dilutions, in a least many cases, likewise increase….
Do you believe that the high potencies, from your own experience in the use of them and from what you have beheld in the practice of others, are far superior, in all respects, to the low preparation as remedial agents?…
The question of the dose is manifestly an open one. Experience must be accumulated before we can hope to discover a law for our guidance on the subject. …
The special relation of Conium to the sexual organs, especially the female, is very important. Its action is especially manifest in the breast and uterus, producing in these organs swelling, changes arrested, or abnormal secretion….
Mercurius has especial affinity for the two ends of the digestive canal. The stomach and upper intestine are but slightly affected; often not at all….
Aconite is generally indicated in all Inflammations in the beginning against the vascular excitement which always prevails, before the disease is fully developed. Its action is brief, and does not interfere with that of subsequent prescriptions….
In Calcarea, a cachectic habit is induced; decrease of temperature; puffiness of the soft parts; laxity and general debility, with increased sensibility to external influences, as changes of weather….
Bryonia is suitable for nervous and bilious temperaments, persons of dry and spare habit, dark complexion, excitable character, and predisposition to inflammation of the membranous tissues….
Rhus-tox is useful 1. For acute and sub-acute cases; less frequently to chronic. 2. In affections of the membranes, especially if accompanied by an evident dyscrasia, and attended by nervous phenomena. 3. In affections resulting from exposure to rain while perspiring….
Colchicum ranks, in almost all respects, next to Bryonia. It acts especially on the serous and fibrous tissues. Its characteristic pains are sticking….
Ledum ranks next to Colchicum in its action on the serous, fibrous, and mucous membranes. Its action is more powerful than that of Colchicum, producing not only irritation and an increased thickened secretion, but also a deposit of solid, earthy masses….
Sepia has more relation of the female sex, yet is not to be overlooked in reference to the male. Menses scanty or suppressed, or else occurring too early. During the suppression of the menses mental depression and apathy….
This intermediate position of Graphites between Sulphur and Arsenic and Carbon, indicates its very extended sphere of action, which, however, is distinct from that of the others, inasmuch as Graphites has so marked a tendency to the ulcerative and corresponding processes….
Ipecacuanha affects the stomach and chest but acts less strongly on the intestines. Nausea, inflation, constrictive sensation, vomiting (scanty), without giving relief, and the matters vomited not qualitatively altered….
China has much in common with Arsenic and Carbo vegetabilis. It develops its effects on the vitality of the blood; debility ensues, like that induced by venesection, in which the quantity and quality of the blood are altered, and, in consequence various functional disturbances manifest themselves. …
Chamomilla has Irritability, anger, chagrin, restlessness, anxiety, weeping, groaning, fright, crying out, speaking during sleep, and sudden starting, especially in children….
Nux-v is useful in gastric derangements from use of coffee; dynamic affections of the liver. In hernia, both free and incarcerated. In haemorrhoids. In neuralgia. In catarrh, with dry, laborious, tickling cough; with spasm, and even vomiting….
Inflammation of the ear, erysipelatous; ditto of the throat and fauces with constriction, which serves to distinguish Belladonna from Mercurius and from Nitric Acid, which last is indicated where aphthae appear on the tonsils….
We have comparatively few symptoms of drug-action upon women, because comparatively few women have been provers of drugs. And the symptoms we have are lacking in precision, because our women provers, have deficient knowledge of the structure and physiology of the organs distinctive of their sex….
The prover should find out by experiment, and should carefully state, what circumstances aggravate or ameliorate the pain (or other symptoms), and note its periodical recurrence, because periodicity is a very important element in the history of the action of drugs. …
One dose of Murex, fourth, was taken in six spoonfuls of water. Twelve hours after taking the medicine, acute pain in the right side of the uterus, which crossed the entire body and extended upward to the left breast….
No remedy gives us so striking a picture of the hysteric perversion of the disposition as Platina. The depression and anxiety which often increase in intensity, even up to actual apprehension of death, are characteristic indications of hysteria as well as of the Platina disease….
I have used Rumex chiefly in acute catarrhal affections of the larynx, trachea and bronchi. In these cases it seems to me to present a close analogy in its action, to Belladonna, Lachesis, Phosphorus and Causticum. …
Comocladia cures the bites of poisonous snakes; of the scorpions; prevents hydrophobia; antidotes poisons; is useful in relieving pain from wounds resulting from falls or floggings (it would be valuable in boarding-schools and on the plantation); favors menstrual flow and removes constipation…
Spigelia exerts a marked action on the trigeminal nerve, producing prosopalgia, which involves the orbit, the zygoma and the superior maxilla; also upon the nervous of the tongue….
A case of membranous croup of great severity, which had been in full blast at least twelve hours before I was called to it; in which the purple turgid face and the exhausted aspect of the child showed that the powers of life had already begun to fail….
Phosphorus patient is much excited. This excitement is manifested in gaiety and levity, in diminished sleep without consequent suffering; in restlessness and dreamful sleep, in entire sleeplessness, even in delirium. …
I have been using for several days a hair-wash, composed chiefly of the tincture of Wild Indigo (Baptisia). Could that have anything to do with my symptoms?…
A second conditions or test of a natural science, and therefore of any proposed science of Therapeutics, is that it shall provide for the prediction of future events within its own domain. …
If an attempt be made to inhale undiluted chlorine gas, it produces spasm of the glottis. The peculiar nature of the chlorine spasm, viz., is that it affects expiration almost exclusively….
Chlorine in Spasmus Glottidis. The desire to cough results from a tickling and a sensation or rawness behind the thyroid cartilage. When the patient seeks to yield to this desire, he finds it impossible to expel the air from the chest, as is required in the act of coughing….
Chlorine in Spasmus Glottidis. Any attempt to examine the throat, or, on the part of the child, to open the mouth to take food or drink, or any attempt to cough, produced a fearful spasm of the glottis, which seemed to admit the air well enough but to prevent its exit….
The secretions and excretions of patients are the results of efforts which nature is making to get rid of some poisonous morbific matter; and that the true indication is to favor rather than to check these excretions….
The mortality of cholera in the Homoeopathic Hospital was 16.4 per cent. Under allopathic treatment, during the same epidemic, the Medical Council’s return to Parliament gives the mortality as 59.2 per cent….
Diarrhoea Cured by Single Dose Of High Potency. The aggravations of Calcarea are frequently in the morning, and the pain in the abdomen is relieved by warmth as in this case. …
Pterygium Cured by a single remedy. The pain, smarting and pricking, and which was singularly confined to the inner angle of the eye, the pushing pain at the root of the nose, the marked aggravation in the evening, these symptoms together suggested Zincum metallicum….
Panama Fever Cured By Arsenicum. Prostration still excessive, restlessness moderate, intelligence good, tongue and hands less tremulous. Arsenicum 200 as before, every six hours….
She applied to me, March 16, stating that she had been flowing since March 1st; the discharge being thick, dark and abundant, and attended unusually severe, labor-like pains, night and day….
Ovarian Tumor Cured By Colocynth. Attempts at walking induced paroxysms of acute pain across the hypogastrium, in the sacral region, and around the hip-joint; from here the pains extended down the groin and along the femoral nerve….