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ORGANON
                     8 7
OF
MEDICINE
BY
SAMUEL HAHNEMANN.
Amir, superr.
TRANSLATED FROM THE FITH EDITION, WITH
         AN APPENDIX'
R. E. DUDGEON, M  D.
Medical Advance Company,
    publishers.
      CHICAGO.
       1895. 
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 W

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      press of the

Eye Printing and Publishing Company,

       CHICAGO.
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TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.
   In this new edition of my translation of the Organon I
 have completely revised the text, in order to make it a  still
 more exact reproduction of  the original.  In the Appendix I
 have given all  the  more important variations of the previous
 editions.  I have also indicated the corresponding views as set
 forth in the Essay on a New Principle and the Medicine of
 Experience,  both  of which essays may be regarded as the
 precursors of the Organon.   I have added Hahnemann's later
 opinions on several subjects treated of in this work.   In the
 growth of such a complex thing  as a new system of medicine,
 it was inevitable that there  should be  considerable alterations
 and improvements effected in the course of forty-eight years,
 the  time occupied  by Hahnemann in the elaboration of  his
 novel doctrine and practice.   His first idea of the homoeopathic
 rule of practice occurred to him  while translating  Cullen's
 Materia Medica in 1790.  The Essay on a New Principle, in
 which he propounded the homoeopathic therapeutic rule, as yet
 believed by him to be  of only  "partial application," viz. to
 some chronic  diseases,  was published  in 1796.  Nine  years
 after this,  viz.  in  1805,  in the Medicine of Experience,  he
 enunciated the rule with no such limitations of its applicability.
 This essay contains much of what we find in the first and later
 editions of the Organon.  The first edition of this latter work
 appeared in 1810.   The second edition, differing  very consid-
 erably from  the first, was  published  in 1819.   The  third
 edition, which hardly differed at all from the previous  one,
appeared in  1824.    The  fourth edition, which  offers  some
important variations from the text of its immediate predecessor
(chiefly determined  by the  new  theory of chronic  diseases), 
IV
translator's preface.
bears the date of 1829.  The fifth and last edition, published
in 1833, contains several novelties, such as the theories of the
"vital force"  and  "the dynamization of  medicines."  In
previous  editions, Hahnemann had  in several places spoken
rather slightingly of the vital force and its influence on the
production and cure of disease,  but  these  expressions are
either eliminated or  greatly modified in the  last edition, and
the "vital force" occupies quite a different and a much more
important position in  regard to  disease,  its cause aud cure.
The doctrine of dynamization of medicines by the pharmaceuti-
cal processes  peculiar to homoeopathy, which  had only  been
hinted at in  previous editions,  is  in this edition distinctly
stated.  The directions as to the repetition of the dose are
also  different  from  those in  previous  editions.    These two
last-named points are still further modified in Hahnemann's
later work on  Chronic Diseases (1838), as will  be seen  by the
quotations I have made from that work.
   Thus while  the body of this work  contains the Organon
precisely as it  appears  in the  last edition, the Appendix gives a
detailed  history of  the origin, growth and progress of  the
homoeopathic system of medicine in the mind of its  author.
   I have not presumed to criticise the views or statements of
the author.  His denunciations of the practice of the old school,
though quite deserved when he wrote, are not applicable to the
present condition of allopathic medicine.   It is  beyond all
question  that   it was mainly owing  to the  treatment and
practice of Hahnemann and  his disciples that the disastrous
methods  in vogue for centuries previous to  and far into his
time have been abandoned.    It remains, however,  doubtful if
the allopathic methods of  the present day have any greater
claim to  scientific character  or success than those they have
superseded.  Were Hahnemann alive now we can easily imagine
how he would have inveighed against the old school-medicine of
the present day.  The tonic, stimulant, anti-pyretic and nar-
cotic  practice of  modern medicine is as far removed from the
scientific  simplicity of homoeopathy as  were the venesections,
blisters, cauteries, purgatives  and mercurializations  against
which Hahnemann waged successful war.  Hahnemann's vig-
orous protest  against  the  dominant medicine of  his day is 
TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.
V
useful as showing the negative  good effects of homoeopathy,
for almost all the irrational practices he denounced have been
abandoned;  it remains for his followers to exhibit its positive
effects in the victory of rational and scientific medicine.
  I am indebted to  Dr. Richard Hughes for several emenda-
tions  of  my first translation, whereby  the author's meaning
has been rendered  more exact  and clearer;  also for some
rectifications of Hahnemann's quotations and for the idea of a
comparative  table or concordance of the  aphorisms in  the
several editions,  which he gave in the  British  Journal  of
Homoeopathy, vol. xxxix.
  The references  in the text to the notes in the Appendix are
indicated by the  sign "(«)," and some needful explanatory
notes  are enclosed in square brackets, or divided from the text
by a  line.   The  latter are confined to  the quotations in  the
Appendix.
                                       R.  E.  DUDGEON.
 London, March, 1893. 
PREFACE TO  THE FIRST EDITION.
  According  to  the testimony of all  ages, no  occupation  is
more unanimously declared to be a conjectural art than medi-
cine ;  consequently none has less right to refuse a  searching
enquiry as to whether it  is well founded  than it,  on which
man's health, his most precious possession on earth, depends.
  I consider that it redounds to  my honor that  I am the only
one in recent times who has subjected it to a serious, honest
investigation, and has communicated to the world the results
of his convictions  in writings  published, some with,  some
without my name.
  In this investigation I found the way to the truth,  but I had
to tread  it alone, very far  from  the common highway  of
medical routine.   The farther I advanced from truth to truth,
the more  my conclusions (none of which  I  accepted unless
confirmed by experience)  led  me away from the old edifice,
which, being built up of opinions, was  only maintained by
opinions.
  The results of my convictions are  set forth in  this  book.
  It remains to  be seen whether physicians, who mean to act
honestly by  their conscience  and by their fellow-creatures,
will continue to  stick to the pernicious tissue  of conjectures
and caprice, or can open their  eyes to the salutary truth.
  I must warn  the  reader that  indolence, love of ease and
obstinacy preclude effective service  at the altar of truth, and
only freedom from prejudice and untiring zeal qualify for the
most  sacred of all human occupations, the practice of the true
system of medicine.   The physician who enters  on his work in
this spirit becomes directly assimilated to the Divine Creator
of the world, whose human creatures he helps to preserve, and
whose approval renders him thrice blessed. 
PREFACE TO THE  SECOND EDITION.
   Physicians are my brethren; I have  nothing against them
personally.   The medical art is my subject.
   I  have to enquire whether medicine as hitherto taught has,
in all  its parts, been merely developed out of  the  heads, the
self-deception and the caprice of its professors, or whether it
has been derived from  nature.
   If it be  merely a product of speculative subtlety, arbitrary
maxims, traditional  practices and capricious deductions drawn
from ambiguous  premises, it  is and  remains a  nullity, though
it may reckon its age by thousands of years,  and be decorated
with the charters of all the kings and emperors  of the  earth.
   The true healing art is in its nature a pure science of exper-
ience, and can and must rest on clear facts and  on the sensible
phenomena  pertaining to their  sphere  of action,  for all the
subjects it has to deal with are clearly and  satisfactorily cog-
nizable by  the senses through experience.   Knowledge of the
disease to be treated, knowledge of the effects of the medicines,
and how the ascertained effects of the medicines are to be em
ployed  for the removal of diseases, all this, experience alone
teaches adequately.  Its  subjects  can only  be derived  from
pure  experiences  and  observations, and it  dares  not take a
single step  out of  the sphere of pure well-observed experience
and experiment, if it would avoid becoming a nullity, a farce.
   But that the  whole  art of medicine as hitherto practiced,
though it has been, for want of something better, practiced
for these 2500 years by millions of physicians,  many  of whom
were earnest  high-minded men, is  yet in every respect an ex-
tremely stupid,  useless and  thoroughly null affair, is proved
by the following few incontrovertible considerations.
   Unaided  reason can  know nothing of  itself  (a priori), can 
viii
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.
evolve out of itself alone no conception of the nature of things,
of cause and  effect;  every one of its  conclusions about the
actual must always be based on sensible perceptions, facts and
experiences if it would elicit the truth.   If in its operations it
should deviate by a single step from  the guidance of  percep-
tion, it would lose itself in the illimitable region of phantasy
and of arbitrary speculation, the mother of pernicious  illusion
and of absolute nullity.
  In the pure sciences of experience, in  physics, chemistry and
medicine, merely speculative reason can consequently have no
voice; there,  when it acts alone,  it degenerates  into empty
speculation and  phantasy,  and  produces only hazardous hypo-
theses, which in millions of instances  are, and  by their very
nature must be,  self-deception and falsehood.
  Such has hitherto  been the splendid juggling of so-called
theoretical medicine, in which a priori  conceptions and specu-
lative subtleties raised a number of proud schools, which only
showed what each of  their founders had dreamed about things
which could not  be known, and which  were of  no use for the
cure of diseases.
  Out of these sublime systems, soaring far beyond all exper-
ience, medical practice could obtain   nothing  available  for
actual treatment.   So it pursued its course confidently at  the
patient's bedside in accord with the traditional prescriptions of
its books telling how physicians  had hitherto treated, and in
conformity with  the  methods of its  practical  authorities,  un-
concerned,  like them, about  the  teachings of  nature-guided
experience, unconcerned about the true reasons for its treat-
ment, and  quite  content with  the key to  easy practice—the
prescription book.
  A  healthy, unprejudiced, conscientious examination of this
confused business shows plainly that what has hitherto gone
by the name of  "the  art of medicine"  was merely  a  pseudo-
scientific fabrication,  remodelled from  time to time  to meet
the prevailing fashion in medical  systems,  like Gellert's hat in
the fable,  but, as regards  the treatment of disease, ever the
same blind, pernicious method.
   A  healing art conformable to nature  and experience did not
exist.  Everything in traditional  medicine was the outcome of 
             PREFACE TO  THE SECOND EDITION.            ix

art and imagination,  having no foundation in experience,  but
pranked out in the habiliaments of probability.
   The object of cure (the disease) was manufactured to order
by pathology.   It was arbitrarily settled what diseases, how
many and what forms and  kinds there should be.   Just think!
The whole range  of diseases, produced in innumerable and
always unforeseeable variety by infinite Nature in human beings
exposed to thousands of different conditions, the pathologist
cuts down so ruthlessly  that a mere handful of cut and  dry
forms  is the result!
   The wiseacres defined diseases a priori, and  attributed to
them transcendental  substrata not warranted by  experience
(how could plain pure experience ever sanction such fantastic
dreams?); no!  they  pretended to possess  an  insight into  the
inner nature of things and the invisible vital processes, which
no mortal can have.
   Now, in order to decide on something positive  with  regard
to the instruments of cure, the powers of the different medi-
cines in the materia medica were inferred from their physical,
chemical and other irrelevant  qualities, also from their odor,
taste and external aspect,  but chiefly from impure experiences
at the  sick bed, where, in the tumult of the morbid symptoms,
only mixtures  of  medicines were prescribed for imperfectly
described cases of disease.   Just think! the dynamic spiritual
power  of altering man's  health hidden in the invisible interior
of medicines, and never manifested purely and truly  in  any
other way than by their effects on  the  healthy human body,
was arbitrarily ascribed to  them,  without interrogating  the
medicines themselves in this  only admissible way of pure, expert-
ment, and listening to their response  when so questioned!
   Then therapeutics taught how to apply the medicines, whose
qualities had been thus  inferred,  ascribed or imagined, to the
supposed fundamental cause or to single symptoms of disease,
in conformity with the rule contraria  contrariis of  the hypo-
thesis-framer Galen, and in  direct opposition to nature;  and
this doctrine was held to be more than sufficiently established
if eminent authorities could be adduced in support of it.
  All these unnatural human doctrines, after being connected
together by all sorts of illogical false  deductions,  were then 
X
PREFACE TO THE SECOND  EDITION.
welded  into scholastic  forms by  the  noble art  that devotes
itself to  division,  subdivision  and tabulation,  and  lo!  the
manufactured article, the art of medicine, was ready for use,—
a thing the most opposed to nature and experience it is  possi
ble to conceive, a structure built up entirely of the opinions of
various kinds furnished by thousands of differently constituted
minds.   In all its parts this edifice is a pure nullity, a pitiable
self-deception, eminently fitted  to imperil  human life by its
methods of treatment,  blindly counter  to the end proposed,
incessantly ridiculed by the wisest men of  all ages, and labor-
ing under the curse of not being what it professes to be, and
not being able to perform what it  promises.
   Sober, unprejudiced reflection, on the other hand, can easily
convince us that to hold correct views about every case of
disease we have to cure, to obtain an accurate  knowledge of
the  true  powers of  medicines, to employ them  on a plan
adapted to each morbid condition and to administer  them in
proper dose,—in a word, the complete true healing art, can
never be  the work of self-satisfied ratiocination and illusory
opinions,  but that the requisites for this, the materials as well
as the rules for its exercise,  are only to be discovered by due
attention  to nature by  means of our senses, by careful honest
observations  and by experiments  conducted with all possible
purity, and in no other way; and, rejecting every falsifying
admixture of arbitrary dicta, must be  faithfully  sought in this
the  only way  commensurate  to  the  high value of  precious
human life.

   It remains to  be seen if by my conscientious  labors in this
way the true healing  art has been found.
                               Dr.  Samuel  Hahnemann.
  Leipzig, end of the year 1818. 
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.
    In the five years since the publication of the Second Edition,
 the truth of the homoeopathic healing art has found so much
 acceptance from physicians far and near, that it can no longer
 be obscured, still less  extinguished, by  abusive  writings, of
 which, however, there is no lack.   I rejoice at the benefit it
 has already conferred on  humanity, and look forward with
- intense pleasure to the not  distant time when, though I shall
 be no longer here below, a future generation of mankind will
 do justice to this  gift of a gracious God, and will thankfully
 avail themselves of the blessed means He  has provided for the
 alleviation of their bodily and  mental sufferings.
   A great help to the  spread of  the good cause in  foreign
 lands is won by the good French  translation of the  last edition,
 recently brought out at great sacrifice, by  that genuine philan-
 thropist, my  learned friend,  Baron  von Brunnow.*  He has
 enriched  it with a preface which  gives an exposition of the
 homoeopathic healing art and its  history, and at the same time
 serves as an introduction to the study of the work  itself.
   In this third  edition 1 have not refrained from  making any
 alterations and emendations suggested by increased knowledge
 and necessitated by further experience.               S. H.
  KGthen; Easter. 1824.

  * Organon de Vart guirir; traduit de Voriginal allemand du Dr. Samuel Hahne-
mann, Conseiller de Son Altesse Serenissime le Due d'Anhalt-Kothen, par
Erneste George de Brunnow; a Dresde, chez Arnold, libraire-editeur, 1824. 
PREFACE TO THE  FOURTH EDITION.
  Were that nature whose self-help in diseases is believed by
physicians  of  the  traditional school  to  be  the incomparable
healing art, a close imitation of which should be the physician's
highest aim, great Nature herself, i. e. the  voice in ineffable
wisdom of  the great Artificer of the infinite universe, we should
then feel constrained to be guided by  this infallible  voice,
though we  might be puzzled to understand why we physicians
should, with our artificial  interference by medicines, disturb
or injuriously aggravate these presumably incomparable opera-
tions of nature's self-help in diseases (vis medicatrix); but this
is far from being the case!  That  nature, whose self-help was
alleged by  the traditional school of medicine to be the incom-
parable healing  art and the only  thing worth imitating,  is
merely the  individual nature of the organic man,  is nothing
but the instinctive, irrational,  unreasoning vital force subject
to the organic laws of our body, which is ordained  by the
Creator to maintain  the  functions  and  sensations  of the
organism in marvellously perfect condition so long as the man
continues in good health, but was not intended nor adapted
for the restoration in the  best  manner of  deranged or lost
health.  For should our vital force have its integrity impaired
by injurious influences from without, then  this force strives
instinctively and automatically to free itself  from the adventi-
tious  derangement  (disease) by  revolutionary  processes; but
these  very  efforts  are  themselves  disease; they are a second
different nralady substituted for the original one.  The vital
force,  I say, produces, in accordance  with the laws of the
constitution of the organism to which it is a subject, a disease
of a different sort,  intended to expel the disease by which it
was attacked, which it strives to accomplish by pain, metas- 
PREFACE TO THE FOURTH  EDITION.          Xlll
tases and so forth, but mainly by evacuations and the sacrifice
of much of the fluid and solid constituents of the body, with
difficult,  often  dubious,  injurious, frequently even  disastrous
results.
  Were it not that men in all ages were aware of this imper-
fection, and the not infrequent inadequacy of these blind efforts
of the instinctive unreasoning vital  force  in its attempts at
self-help in diseases, they would not have longed so much nor
so zealously striven to assist the suffering vital  force, so pow-
erless to help itself efficiently,  by the employment of  better
remedial means in order to  terminate the morbid process in a
more speedy and sure manner, thereby restoring the wished-for
health as speedily as possible,—in  a word, they would not
have exerted themselves to discover a healing art.
  But as what has hitherto been termed "healing art" was a
mere (imperfect)  imitation of those unhelpful, useless, not  in-
frequently  injurious efforts and  operations of the instinctive,
unreasoning vital force (misnamed nature) when left  to  itself
in disease,  it will, I think, be conceded that before me the true
healing art was not discovered.
  But that homoeopathy is this healing art, which had hitherto
been sought for in vain, its  fundamental principles teach,  its
performances prove.
                                    Samuel Hahnemann.
  Kothen, January, 1829. 
PREFACE  TO  THE FIFTH  EDITION.
  In order to give a general notion of the treatment of diseases
pursued by the old school  of  medicine (allopathy), I may ob-
serve that it presupposes the existence sometimes of excess of
blood (plethora—which is never present),  sometimes of morbid
matters and acridities; hence it  taps off  the life's blood  and
exerts itself either to clear away the  imaginary disease-matter
or to conduct it elsewhere (by emetics, purgatives, sialogogues,
diaphoretics, diuretics, drawing  plasters, setons, issues, &c),
in the vain belief  that the disease will  thereby be weakened
and materially  eradicated;  in place of which, the patient's suf-
ferings are thereby increased, and by such and other painful
appliances the forces and nutritious juices indispensable to the
curative process are abstracted from the  organism.  It assails
the body  with large  doses of powerful  medicines, often re-
peated in rapid succession for a long time, whose long-enduring,
not infrequently frightful effects, it  knows not, and which it,
purposely, it would almost seem, makes  unrecognizable by its
commingling of several such  unknown substances in one pre-
scription,  and by their long-continued employment it develops
in the body new  and often ineradicable  medicinal  diseases.
Whenever it can,  too, it  employs, in order to  keep in favor
with its patient,1 remedies that immediately suppress and hide
the morbid symptoms by opposition (contraria contrariis) for a
short time (palliatives),  but that leave the disposition to these
symptoms (the disease itself) strengthened and aggravated.  It
considers  affections on the exterior of the body as purely local
and existing there independently, and vainly supposes that it
  1 For the same object the experienced allopath delights to Invent a  fixed
name,  by preference  a Greek one, for the  malady, in order to make the
patient believe that he has long known this disease as an old acquaintance.
and hence is the fittest person to cure it. 
PREFACE TO THE FIFTH EDITION.           XV
has cured them when  it has driven them away by means  of
external  remedies,  so  that the internal  affection is  thereby
compelled to break out on a nobler and more  important part.
When it  knows not what else to do for the disease which will
not yield or which grows  worse, the old  school  of medicine
undertakes to change it into something else, it knows not what,
by means of an alterative,—for example, by the life-under-
mining calomel, corrosive  sublimate and  other mercurial pre-
parations in large doses.
  To render, (through ignorance) if not  fatal, at all events
incurable, the  vast majority (Tyff) of  all diseases, namely,
those of a chronic character, by  continually weakening and
tormenting the  debilitated patient, already suffering  without
that from his  disease, and  by adding new destructive drug
diseases, this clearly seems to be the unhallowed main business
of the old school  of  medicine (allopathy)—and  a very  easy
business  it is when once one  has become an  adept  in this
pernicious practice, and is sufficiently insensible to the stings
of conscience!
  And yet for  all these mischievous  operations  the  ordinary
physician of the old  school can assign  his reasons, which,
however, rest only on  foregone conclusions of his books and
teachers, and on the authority of this or that distinguished
physician of the old school.   Even the most opposite and the
most senseless  modes of treatment find there  their defence,
their authority—let their disastrous effects speak ever so loudly
against them.   It  is only under  the  old physician who has
been at last gradually convinced, after many years of misdeeds,
of the mischievous nature of  his  so-called art, and  who  no
longer treats even the severest diseases with anything stronger
than plantain water mixed  with strawberry  syrup (i.  e. with
nothing), that the smallest number are injured and die.
  This non-healing art. which for many centuries has been
firmly established in full possession of the power to dispose of
the life and  death of  patients according to its own good will
and pleasure, and in that period has shortened the lives of ten
times as  many human beings as the most destructive wars, and
rendered many  millions of patients more diseased and wretched
than they were  originally—this allopathy,  I shall first expose 
XVI
PREFACE TO THE  FIFTH EDITION.
somewhat  more  minutely before teaching in detail its  exact
opposite, the newly discovered true healing art.
  As regards the latter (homoeopathy) it is quite otherwise.  It
can easily convince every reflecting person that  the diseases of
man are not caused by any substance, any acridity, that is to
say, any disease-matter,  but that  they are  solely spirit-like
(dynamic)  derangements of  the spirit-like  power (the  vital
force) that animates the human body.   Homoeopathy knows
that a cure can only take place  by the  reaction of the vital
force against the rightly chosen remedy that has been ingested,
and that the cure will be certain and rapid in proportion to the
strength with which the vital force still prevails in the patient.
Hence Homoeopathy avoids everything  in the  slightest degree
enfeebling,l and as  much  as  possible every excitation of  pain,
for pain also diminishes the strength,  and hence it employs for
the cure only those medicines  whose  effects in  altering ano1
deranging  (dynamically)  the health it  knows accurately, and
from these it selects one whose  pathogenetic power (its medi-
cinal disease)  is capable of  removing the natural  disease in
question by similarity (similia similibus), and this it administers
to the patient in simple form, but in rare  and minute doses (so
small that, without occasioning  pain or weakening, they just
suffice to remove the natural  malady by means of the reacting
energy of the vital force), with this result: that without weak-
ening, injuring or torturing  him in the very least, the natural
disease  is extinguished, and the  patient, even  whilst  he is
getting  better,  gains in strength and  thus is cured—an appar-
ently easy but  actually troublesome and difficult business, and
one  requiring  much  thought, but  which restores the patient
without suffering in a short time to perfect health,—and thus
it is a salutary and blessed business.
  Thus homceopnthy is a perfectly simple system  of  medicine,
remaining  always  fixed  in  its  principles as in  its practice,
which, like the doctrine whereon it is based, if rightly appre-
  1 Homoeopathy sheds not a drop of blood, administers no  emetics,  purga-
tives, laxatives or diaphoretics, drives off  no external affection by external
means, prescribes no warm baths or medicated clysters, applies no Spanish
flies or mustard plasters, no setons, no issues, excites no ptyalism, burns not
with moxa or red-hot iron to the very bone, and so forth, but gives with its
own hand its own preparations of simple uucompounded medicines, which it
is accurately acquainted with, never subdues pain by opium, etc. 
PREFACE TO THE FIFTH  EDITION.
XV11
hended will  be found to be so exclusive (and only in that v:ay
serviceable), that as the doctrine must be accepted in its purity,
so it  must be purely practiced,  and all backward straying1 to
the pernicious routine of  the old school (whose opposite  it is,
as day to night) is totally inadmissible, otherwise it ceases to
deserve the honorable name of homoeopathy.
   That some misguided physicians who would wish  to be con-
sidered homoeopathists, engraft  some, to them more familiar,
allopathic malpractices upon their  nominally  homoeopathic
treatment, is owing to ignorance of the doctrine, laziness,  con-
tempt for  suffering  humanity,  and ridiculous conceit;   and,
besides showing unpardonable negligence in searching for the
best homoeopathic specific for each  case of disease, has often a
base love of gain and other sordid motives for its spring—and
for its result? that they cannot cure all important and serious
diseases (which  pure  and  careful  homoeopathy can), and  that
they send many of their  patients to that place whence no one
returns,  whilst  the friends console themselves with  the reflec-
tion that everything (including  every hurtful allopathic  pro-
cess!) has been  done for the departed.
                                      Samuel Hahnemann.
  Kothen, March 28th, 1833.
  1 I am therefore sorry that T once gave the advice, savoring of allopathy.
to apply to the back in psoric diseases a resinous plaster to cause itching,
and to employ the finest electrical  sparks in paralytic affections.  For as
both these appliances have  seldom proved of service, and have furnished
the mongrel homoeopathists with an excuse for their allopathic transgres-
sions, I am grieved I should ever have proposed them, and I hereby wlemnly
retract them—for this reason also, that, since then, our homoeopathic system
has advanced so near to perfection that they are now no longer required. 
 
CONTENTS.
                      INTRODUCTION.
                                                         PAGE
Review of the  therapeutics, allopathy and palliative treat-
    ment, that have hitherto been practiced in the old school
    of medicine      --     -      -      -      -    -    1
Non-medical persons have also found the treatment on the prin-
    ciple of similarity of action to be the only efficacious mode   37
       Note.—Isopathy    -------      ;j;
Even some physicians of an earlier period suspected that this
    was the most excellent mode of treatment      -      -     40

                TEXT  OF THE ORGANON.       -      42

§ 1, 2.  The sole mission of the physician is to cure rapidly, gently,
        permanently.
           Note.—Not to construct theoretical systems, nor to attempt
          to explain phenomena.
  3, 4.  He must investigate what is to be  cured  in diseases and
        know what is curative in the various  medicines, in order
        to be able to adapt  the latter to the former, and muat also
        understand how to preserve the health of human beings.
  5. Attention to exciting and fundamental causes and other cir-
        cumstances, as helps to cure.
  6. For the physician, the disease consists only of the totality of
        its symptoms.
           Note.—The old school's futile attempts to discover the essen-
          tial nature of disease (prima causa).
  7. Whilst paying attention to  those circumstances (§ 5) the phy-
        sician needs only to remove the totality of the symptoms
        in order to cure the disease.
           Note 1.—The cause that manifestly produces and maintains
         the disease should be removed.
           Note 2.—The symptomatic palliative mode of treatment di-
         rected toward a single symptom is to be rejected.
  8. If all the symptoms be eradicated, the disease is always cured
        internally also.
           Note.—This is stupidly denied by the old school.
  9. During health a spiritual power (autocracy, vital force)  ani-
        mates the organism and keeps it in harmonious order. 
XX
CONTENTS.
I 10. Without this animating,  spirit-like power  the organism is
      dead.
  11. In disease, the vital force  only  is primarily  morbidly de-
      ranged, and expresses its  sufferings (the internal change)
      by abnormal sensations and functions of the organism.
          Note.—It is unnecessary  for the cure to know how the vital
         force produces the symptoms.
  12. By the disappearance of the totality of the symptoms by the
      cure, the affection  of the vital force, that is  to say, the
      whole internal and external morbid state is also removed.
  13. To regard those diseases that are not surgical  as a peculiar
      distinct thing residing in the human frame is an absurdity
      which has rendered  allopathy so pernicious.
  14. Everything of a morbid nature that is  curable makes itself
      known to the physician by  disease-symptoms.
  15. The affection  of  the  diseased  vival force  and the disease
      symptoms thereby  produced  constitute  an inseparable
      whole—they are one and the same.
  16. It is only by the spiritual influences of morbific  noxse that our
      spirit-like vital  force can  become ill; and in like manner,
      only by the spirit-like  (dynamic) operation  of medicines
      that it can be again restored to health.
  17. The practitioner, therefore, only  needs to take away the
      totality of the disease signs, and he has removed the entire
      disease.
          Notes 1 and 2.—Illustrative examples.
  18. The totality of the symptoms is the only indication, the only
      guide to the selection of a remedy.
  19. The alteration of the  state of the health in diseases (the dis-
      ease symptoms)  cannot be cured by the medicines otherwise
      than in so far as the latter have the power of also produc-
      ing alterations in man's health.
  20. This power of medicines to alter the state of the health can
      only be ascertained by their effects on (healthy)  persons.
  21. The morbid symptoms that medicines produce in  healthy in-
      dividuals are the only thing wherefrom we can learn their
      disease-curing power.
  22. If  experience should  show  that  by medicines that  possess
      similar symptoms to the  disease  the latter would be most
      certainly and permanently cured, we must select  for the
       cure, medicines with similar symptoms: but should it show
      that the disease is most  certainly and permanently cured
       by opposite  medicinal symptoms, we must choose for the
       cure medicines  with opposite symptoms.
           Note.—The employment of medicines whose  symptoms have no
         actual (patholog' :al) relation to the symptoms of the disease, but
         which act on tY.i body in  a different manner, is the cllopalhic
         method, which *s to be rejected. 
CONTENDS.
xxi
\ 23. By opposite medicinal symptoms (antipathic treatment) persist-
      ing disease-symptoms are not cured.
  24, 25. The  other remaining method  of  treatment,  the homoeo-
      pathic, by means of medicines with similar symptoms, is the
      only one that experience shows to be always salutary.
  26. This is  dependent  on the  therapeutic law of nature that a
      weaker dynamic affection in the living organism is per-
      manently extinguished by one that is very similar to and
      stronger than it, only differing from it in kind.
          Note.—This applies both to physical affections and moral mala-
        dies.
  27. The curative power of medicines, therefore, depends on the
      symptoms they have similar  to the disease.
  28, 29. Attempt to explain this therapeutic law of nature.
          Note.—Illustration of it.
  30—33. The human body is much more disposed to let its state
      of health be altered by  medicinal forces than by natural
      disease.
  34, C5. The  correctness  of the  homoeopathic  therapeutic law is
      shown in the want of  success attending every unhomceo-
      pathic treatment  of a long-standing disease, and in this
      also, that two natural diseases  meeting together in the
      body, if they be dissimilar to each other, do not remove or
      cure one another.
  36. I. The older disease existing  in the body, if it be equally
      strong or stronger, keeps away from the patient a new dis-
      similar disease.
  37. Thus, undo*1 unhomceopathic treatment that is not violent,
      chronic diseases remain as they were.
  38. II. Or a new, stronger disease, attacking an individual al-
      ready  ill, suppresses only, as long  as it lasts, the old dis-
      ease that is dissimilar to  it,  already present in the body,
      but never removes it.
  39. It is just in this way that violent treatment  with allopathic
      drugs does not cure a chronic disease, but suppresses it only
      as long as the action of the powerful medicines, which are
      unable to excite any symptoms similar to the disease, lasts;
      after that, the chronic  disease makes its appearance as bad
      or worse than before.
  40. III. Or the new disease, after having  long acted on  the body,
      joins the old one that is dissimilar to it, and thence arises a
      double (complex) disease; neither of these two dissimilar
      diseases removes the other.
 41. Much more frequently than  in the course of nature, an arti-
      ficial disease caused by the long-continued employment of
      powerful, inappropriate (allopathic) medicine in  ordinary
      practice, associates  itself with  the old natural disease, 
xxii
CONTENTS.
      which is dissimilar to (and therefore not curable by) the for-
      mer, and the chronic patient now becomes doubly diseased.
§ 42. These diseases that thus complicate one another take, on ac-
      count of their dissimilarity, each the place in the organism
      suited for it.
  43, 44. But quite otherwise  is it on the  accession of a stronger
      disease  to a pre-existing one similar to it; in that case the
      latter will be removed and cured by the former.
  45. Explanation of this phenomenon.
  40. Instances of chronic diseases being cured by the accidental
      accession of another similar but stronger disease.
  47—49. In cases where diseases come together in  the course of
      nature,  it  is only one that  displays similar  symptoms that
      can remove and cure the other, a  dissimilar disease  can
      never do this; this should  teach the physician what kind
      of medicines he can certainly cure with,  namely, with  ho-
      moeopathic ones alone.
  50. Nature has  but few diseases to send to the homoeopathic re-
      lief of other diseases, and these its remedial agents are ac-
      companied by many inconveniences.
  51. On the other hand, the physician  has innumerable remedial
      agents,  possessing great advantages over those.
  52. From what  takes place in nature, the physician may  learn
      never to treat diseases with other than  homoeopathically
      selected medicines,  whereby he will be able to cure them,
      which he  never could  do  with heterogeneous (allopathic)
      remedies,  that never cure, but only injure the patient.
  53, 54.  There are but three possible modes  of employing medi-
      cines against diseases:
     1. The homoeopathic, which alone is efficacious.
  55.  2. The allopathic, or heteropathic;
  56.  3. The antipathic (enantiopathic), or palliative.
         Note.—Remarks on isopathy, as it is termed.
  57.  The method of treatment in which a remedy which displays
      an opposite action [contraria contrariis) is prescribed for a
      single symptom of the disease.  Examples.
  58.  This antipathic procedure is not defective merely because it
      is directed against a single symptom of the disease  only,
      but also because in persisting ailments, after it produces a
      short apparent amelioration, real aggravation ensues.
         Note.—Testimonies of authors to the truth of this.
 59.  Injurious  effects of some antipathic modes of treatment.
  60.  Increasing the dose at every repetition of a palliative never
      cures a chronic  affection, but does still more harm.
  61.  Whence physicians ought to have inferred the utility of an
      opposite and only good  mode of  treatment, to wit, the  ho-
      moeopathic . 
CONTENTS.
xxiii
§ 62. The reason of the injurious nature of the palliative, and of
      the sole efficacy of the homoeopathic employment of medi-
      cines
  63. Depends upon the  difference between the primary action
      that takes place under the influence of every medicine, and
      the reaction or secondary action subsequently effected by
      the living organism (the vital force).
  64. Explanation of the primary and secondary actions.
  65. Examples of both.
  66. From the smallest homoeopathic doses of medicine employed
      in treatment, the secondary action of the vital force merely
      shows itself in the restoration of the balance of health.
  67. These truths explain the salutary character of the homoeo-
      pathic treatment,  as also the perversity of the antipathic
      (palliative) method.
         Note.—Cases in which the antipathic employment of medicines
        is alone admissible.
  68. How is the  efficacy  of the homoeopathic system proved  by
      these truths?
  69. How is the hurtfulness  of the  antipathic treatment proved
      by these truths?
         Note 1.—Opposite sensations do not neutralize each other in the
        human sensorium; they are not, therefore, like opposite sub-
        stances in chemistry.
         Note 2.—Illustrative example.
  70. Short summary of the homoeopathic system of medicine.
  71. The three points necessary for curing: (1) the investigation
      of the disease;  (2)  the  investigation  of  the  effects of the
      medicines; and (3) their appropriate employment.
  72. General survey of diseases—acute chronic.
  73. Acute diseases that attack single individuals, sporadic, epi-
      demic, acute miasms.
  74. The worst kinds  of chronic  diseases are those produced by
      the unskillfulness  of allopathic physicians.
  75. These are the most incurable.
  76. It is only when the vital force is still sufficiently  powerful,
      that the injury  can then be repaired, often only after a long
      time,  if the original disease be at the same time homceo-
      pathically eradicated.
  77. Diseases inappropriately named chronic.
  78. Chronic diseases proper: they all arise from chronic miasms.
  79. Syphilis and sycosis.
  80, 81.  Psora: it is the mother of all true chronic diseases except
      the syphilitic and sycotic.
         Note.—Names of diseases in the ordinary pathology.
 82. Among  the  more specific remedies discovered  for these
      chronic miasms, especially for psora, the selection of those 
xxiv
CONTENTS.
      for the cure of each individual case of chronic disease is to
      be conducted all the more carefully.
\ 83. Requisites for apprehending the picture of the disease.
  84—99. Instructions  to the physician for investigating and trac-
      ing the picture of the disease.
 100—102. Investigation of the epidemic diseases in particular.
 103. In like manner must  the fundamental cause of (non-syphilitic)
      chronic diseases be investigated and the great  entire pic-
      ture of psora be displayed.
 104. Utility of noting down in writing the picture of the dis-
      ease, for the purpose of curing, and in the progress of the
      treatment.
          Note.—How the old school physicians go about the investigation
        of the morbid state.
 105—114. Preliminaries  to  be attended to in investigating  the
      pure effects of medicines on healthy individuals.   Primary
      action.  Secondary action.
 115. Alternating actions of medicines.
 116, 117. Idiosyncrasies.
 118, 119. The action of every medicine differs from that of  every
      other.
          Note.—There can be no such things as surrogates.
 120. Every medicine, therefore, must be  carefully proved to as-
      certain the peculiarity of its special effects.
 121—140.  Mode  of proceeding when we  make trial of them  on
      other persons.
 141. The experiments of the healthy physician with  medicines
      upon himself are the best.
 142. The investigation of the pure effects  of medicines in diseases
      is difficult.
 143—145.  Only from  such investigations of the pure effects of
      medicines on healthy persons can a real materia medica be
      formed.
 146. The most appropriate therapeutic employment of  medicines
      known in their pure effects.
 147. The medicine most  homceopathically corresponding is the
      most suitable, is the specific remedy.
 148. Explanation of how a homoeopathic cure is probably effected.
 149. The homoeopathic cure of a disease that has occurred quickly
      is quickly effected; that  of chronic diseases, however, de-
      mands proportionally more time.
          Note.—Difference betwixt  pure homoeopathists and the mon-
        grel sect.
 150. Slight ailments.
 151. Important diseases have a number of symptoms.
 152. For those with numerous striking symptoms a homoeopathic
      remedy can be more certainly found. 
CONTENTS.
XXV
\ 153. What kind of symptoms ought one chiefly to attend to in the
      choice of a remedy?
 154. A remedy as homoeopathic as it is possible to be cures with-
      out much disturbance.
  155. Cause of the freedom from disturbance of such cures.
  156. Cause of the slight exceptions to this.
  157—160.  The medicinal disease very similar, but somewhat su-
      perior  in  strength, to  the  original disease, termed  also
      homoeopathic aggravation.
  161. In chronic (psoric) diseases the homoeopathic aggravations
      from (antipsoric) homoeopathic medicines occur during a
      period of several days, from time to time.
  162—171.  Rules for treatment when the supply of known medi-
      cines is too small to allow  a  perfect  homoeopathic remedy
      to be discovered.
  ] 72—184.  Rules for the treatment of diseases with too few symp-
      toms: one-sided diseases.
  185—203  Treatment of diseases with local symptoms; their ex-
      ternal treatment is always injurious.
  204, 205. All chronic affections and  diseases 'properly so called
      (that are not merely  produced and  maintained by a bad
      mode of living)  must be cured  only from within, by the
      homoeopathic medicines appropriate  for the miasm that lies
      at their root.
  206. Preliminary investigation of the miasm that lies at their
      root, of the simple miasm or its complications with a se3ond
      (or even with a third).
  207. Inquiry into the treatments previously employed.
  208, 209. The other preliminary inquiries necessary for the ap-
      prehension of the morbid picture of the chronic disease.
  210—230.  Treatment of the so-called  mental or emotional dis-
      eases.
  231, 232. The intermittent and alternating diseases.
  233, 234. The periodical intermittent diseases.
  235—244.  The intermittent fevers.
  245—251.  Mode of using the remedies.
          Note.—Repetition of the doses.
  252—256.  Signs of commencing improvement.
  257, 258. False predilection for favorite remedies and unjustifi-
      able aversion to other medicines.
  259—261.  Regimen in chronic diseases.
         Note.—Injurious things in the habits of life.
  262, 263. Diet in acute diseases.
  264—206.  Selection of the  most energetic, most  genuine  med-
      icines.
         Note.—Change affected in some substances in their preparation
        for food. 
XXVI
CONTENTS.
I 267. Preparation of the most powerful and must durable forms
      of medicines from plants that can be  obtained fresh.
  268. Dry vegetable substances.
          Note.—Preparation of powders so that they shall keep.
  269-271. The mode of preparing crude medicinal substances pe-
      culiar to homoeopathy, so as to develop their curative pow-
      ers to the utmost.
  272—274. Only one single, simple medicine should be given to the
      patient at one time.
  275—287. Strength of  the  doses for homoeopathic use—how it
      may be increased or diminished.  Their dynamization.
  288—292. What parts of the body are more or less susceptible
      to the influence of the medicines?
          Note.—Advantages of the olfaction of highly potentized medi-
        cines over every other method of taking them.
  293, 294. Animal  magnetism  (mesmerism).  Its  positive  and
      negative employment. 
INTRODUCTION."*'
 Review of the therapeutics, allopathy W and palliative treatment
     that have hitherto  been practiced in the old  school  of
     medicine.
   As long as men have existed they have been liable, individu-
 ally or collectively, to diseases from physical or moral causes.
 In a rude state of nature but few remedial agents were required,
 as the simple mode of living admitted of but few diseases; with
 the civilization of mankind in the state, on  the contrary,  the
 occasions of diseases and the necessity for medical aid increased
 in  equal proportion.   But ever since  that time  (soon  after
 Hippocrates,  therefore,  for 2500  years) men  have occupied
 themselves with the treatment of the ever increasing multipli-
 city of diseases,  who, led astray  by their vanity,  sought by
 reasoning and guessing to excogitate the mode of furnishing
 this aid.    Innumerable and dissimilar  ideas respecting the  na-
 ture of diseases and their remedies  sprang from so many dis-
 similar brains, and the theoretical views these gave rise to they
 called  systems, each of which was at variance  with the rest and
 self-contradictory.  Each of these  subtile  expositions at first
 threw the readers into stupefied amazement at the incomprehen-
 sible wisdom contained in it, and attracted  to the system-
 monger a number of followers,  who re-echoed his unnatural
 sophistry, to none of  whom, however,  was it  of the slightest
 use in enabling them to cure better, until a new system, often
diametrically opposed to the first,  thrust that aside, and in its
turn gained a short-lived renown.   None of  them,  however,
was in  consonance with nature and experience; they were mere
theoretical  webs, woven by cunning intellects  out of pretended
                                                  1 
2
INTRODUCTION.
consequences, which could not be made  use of in practice, in
the treatment at the sick-bed, on account of their excessive
subtilty  and repugnance to nature, and only served for empty
disputations.
   Simultaneously, but quite independent of all these theories,
there sprung up a mode of treatment with mixtures of unknown
medicinal substances  for  forms of disease arbitrarily  set  up.
and directed toward some material  object  completely  at vari-
ance with nature and experience, hence, as may be supposed,
with  a bad result—such  is  old medicine,  allopathy as it is
termed. i°)
   Without disparaging the  services which many  physicians
have rendered to the sciences auxiliary to  medicine, to natural
philosophy and  chemistry, to natural history  in  its  various
branches, and to that of man  in particular, to anthropology,
physiology and anatomy,  &c.,  I shall occupy myself here with
the practical part of medicine only, with the healing art itself,
in order  to show  how it is that diseases have hitherto  been so
imperfectly treated.   Far beneath my notice is that mechanical
routine of treating precious  human  life  according to the pre-
scription manuals,  the  continual  publication of which shows,
alas!  how frequently they are still used.   I pass it by unnoticed,
as a despicable practice of the  lowest class of ordinary practi-
tioners.  I speak merely of the medioal art as hitherto practiced,
which, pluming itself on its antiquity, imagines itself to  possess
a scientific character.
   The partisans of the old school  of  medicine  flattered them-
selves that  they  could  justly  claim for it alone the title   of
"rational medicine," because they alone sought for and strove
to remove the cause  of disease, and followed  the  method em-
ployed by nature  in diseases.
   Tolle causam!  they cried incessantly.   But they went no
further than  this empty exclamation.  They only fancied that
they could discover the  cause of disease; they did not discover
it, however, as it is not perceptible and not discoverable.   For as
far the greatest number of diseases are of  dynamic (spiritual)
origin and dynamic (spiritual) nature, their cause is therefore
not perceptible to the senses; so they exerted themselves to im-
agine one, and from a survey of the parts of  the normal,  in- 
INTRODUCTION.
3
 animate human body (anatomy),  compared  with  the visible

 changes of  the same  internal parts in persons who had died of

 diseases (pathological anatomy), as also from what they  could

 deduce from a  comparison of the phenomena and functions

 in healthy  life  (physiology) with their endless alterations in

 the innumerable morbid states (pathology, semeiotics), to draw

 conclusions relative to the invisible process whereby the changes

 which take  place in the inward being of man  in  diseases  are

 effected—a dim  picture  of the imagination,  which  theoretical

 medicine regarded as its prima causa morbi j1 and  thus it was

 at one and the  same  time the proximate cause of the disease,
 and the internal essence of  the  disease, the disease itself—al-

 though, as sound human reason  teaches us,  the cause of  a

 thing or of an event,  can never  be at the same time the  thing

 or the event itself.   How could they then, without deceiving

 themselves, consider  this imperceptible internal essence as the

 object to be treated, and prescribe for it medicines  whose  cura-

 tive  powers were  likewise  generally  unknown to  them, and

 even give several such  unknown medicines  mixed together in
 what  are termed prescriptions?

   But this sublime problem, the discovery, namely, a priori,

 of an  internal  invisible cause  of disease,  resolved itself, at

 least  with the more astute physicians of  the old school, into a

  1 It would have been much more consonant with sound human reason and
 with the nature of things, had they, in order to be able to cure a disease,
 regarded the originating cause as the causa morbi, and endeavored to dis-
 cover that, and thus been  enabled successfully to employ the mode of treat-
 ment which had shown itself useful in maladies having the same exciting
 cause,  in those also of a similar origin, as, for example, the same mercury is
 efficacious in an ulcer of the  glans after impure coitus, as in all previous
 venereal chancres—if, I say, they  had discovered the exciting cause of all
 other (non-venereal) chronic diseases to be an infection at one period or an-
 other with the itch miasm (psora), and had found for all these a common
 method of treatment, regard  being had for the peculiarities of each indi-
 vidual  case, whereby all and each of these chronic diseases might have been
 cured, then might they with justice have boasted that in the treatment of
 chronic diseases they had in view the only available and useful cauxa mor-
 borum chronicorum (non vencreorum), and with this as a basis they might have
 treated such diseases with  the best results.  But during these many centuries
 they were unable to cure the millions of chronic diseases, because they knew
 not their origin in the psoric miasm (which was first discovered and after-
 wards provided with a suitable plan of treatment by homoeopathy), and yet
 they vaunted that they alone kept in view the prima causa of these diseases
 in their treatment, and that they alone treated rationally,  although they
had not the slightest conception of the only useful knowledge of their psoric
origin and consequently they bungled the treatment of all chronic diseases! 
4                       INTRODUCTION.
search, under the guidance of the symptoms it is true, for what
might be supposed to be the probable general character of  the
case of disease before them -,1 whether it was spasm, or debility,
or paralysis, or fever, or  inflammation,  or induration, or  ob-
struction of this or  that part, or excess of blood (plethora),
deficiency or excess of oxygen, carbon, hydrogen or  nitrogen
in the juices,  exaltation or depression of the functions of  the
arterial,  venous  or capillary system,  change  in  the relative
proportion of the factors of sensibility, irritability or reproduc-
tion?—conjectures that have been dignified by the followers of
the old school with the title of causal indication, and considered
to be the only possible rationality in medicine;  but which were
assumptions,  too fallacious and hypothetical to prove of any
practical utility—incapable, even had they been well grounded,
of indicating the most appropriate remedy for a case of disease;
flattering,  indeed,  to the  vanity of the  learned theorist,  but
usually  leading astray when used  as guides to  practice, and
wherein  there was  evidenced more  of  ostentation  than of  an
earnest search for the curative indication.
   And how often has it  happened that, for example, spasm or
paralysis seemed to be in  one part of the  organism, while in
another part inflammation  was apparently present!
   Or, on the other hand, whence  are the certain  remedies for
each  of  these pretended  general  characters  to  be  derived?
Those that  would certainly be of  benefit could be none  other
than  the specific medicines, that  is,  those whose  action is
homogeneous2 to the  morbid  irritation; whose employment,
however, is denounced  and forbidden3  by the old  school as
highly injurious, because observation has shown that in conse-
quence of  the receptivity for homogeneous  irritation  being so

  1 Every physician who treats disease according to such general characters,
however he may affect to claim  the name of homoeopathist. is and ever will
remain in  fact a generalising allopath, for without the  most minute indi-
vidualisation, homoeopathy is not conceivable.(a)
  2 Now termed homoeopathic.
  3 "Where experience showed  the curative power  of homceopathically
acting remedies, whose mode of action could not be explained, the difficulty
was avoided by calling them specific, and further investigation was stifled by
this actually unmeaning  word. The homogeneous excitant remedies, the
specific (homoeopathic) medicines, however, had long previously been pro-
hibited as  of very injurious influence."—Rau, On the Value of the Homoeo-
pathic Method of Treatment, Heidelberg, 1834, pp. 101,102. 
INTRODUCTION.
5
 highly increased in diseases, such medicines in the usual large
 doses are dangerous to life.  The old school never dreamt of
 smaller, and of extremely small doses.  Accordingly no at-
 tempt was made to cure, in the direct (the most natural) way,
 by means of  homogeneous, specific medicines; nor could it be
 done, as the effects of most of medicines were, and continued to
 remain, unknown,  and even had they  been known  it would
 have been impossible to hit on the right medicine with such
 generalising views as were entertained.
   However, perceiving that it was more consistent with reason
 to seek for another path, a straight one if possible, rather than
 to take circuitous courses,  the  old school of medicine believed
 it might cure diseases in a direct manner,'«) by the removal of
 the (imaginary) material cause of the disease—for  to physicians
 of  the ordinary  school,  while investigating  and  forming  a
 judgment upon a disease, and not less  while  seeking for  the
 curative indication, it was  next to impossible  to  divest them-
 selves of these materialistic ideas, and to regard  the nature of
 the spiritual-corporeal organism as such a highly potentialised
 entity,  that its sensational and functional vital changes, which
 are called  diseases, must  be produced and effected chiefly, if
 not solely, by dynamic (spirituals ) influences, and could  not
 be effected in any other way.
   The old school regarded all those matters which were altered
 by the disease,  those  abnormal  matters  that occurred in con-
 gestions,  as  well  as those  that were  excreted, as disease-
 producers, or at least on account of their supposed reacting
 power,  as  disease-maintainers,  and this latter notion prevails
 to this  day.
   Hence they dreamed of effecting causal cures  by endeavor-
 ing to remove these imaginary and presumed  material  causes
 of the disease.   Hence their assiduous evacuation of the bile
 by vomiting in bilious fevers j1 their emetics in  cases  of  so-
 called stomach  derangements;2 their diligent purging away of
  1 The estimable Hofrath Dr. Rau (loc. cit., p. 170). at a time when not per-
 fectly conversant with homoeopathy, but firmly convinced of the dynamic
cause of these fevers, cured them without employing any evacuating remedy,
by means of one or two small doses of homoeopathic remedies, two very re-
markable cases of which he relates in his book.
  2 In a case of sudden derangement of the stomach, with constant disgust-
ing eructations with the taste of the vitiated food, generally accompanied 
6
INTRODUCTION.
the mucus, the lumbrici and the ascarides  in children  who are
pale-faced and who  suffer  from ravenous  appetite, bellyache,

by depression of spirits, cold hands and feet, &c, the ordinary physician has
hitherto been in the habit of attacking only the degenerated contents of the
stomach; a powerful emetic should clean it out completely. This object was
generally attained by tartar emetic, with or without ipecacuanha.  Does the
patient, however, immediately after this become well, brisk and cheerful?
Oh no! Such a derangement of the stomach is usually of dynamic origin,
caused by mental disturbance (grief, fright, vexation), a chill, over-exertion
of the mind or body immediately after eating, often after even a moderate
meal.   Those two remedies are not suitable for removing  this dynamic de-
rangement, and just as little is the revolutionary  vomiting they produce.
Moreover, tartar emetic and ipecacuanha, from their other peculiar patho-
genetic powers, prove of further injury to the patient's health, and derange
the biliary secretions; so that if the patient be not very robust, he must feel
ill for several days from the effects of this pretended causal treatment, not-
withstanding all  this violent expulsion of the whole contents of the stomach.
If the patient, however, in place of taking such violent and always(a) hurt-
ful evacuant drugs, smell only  a single time at a globule  the size of a mus-
tard seed, moistened  with highly diluted Pulsatilla juice, whereby the de-
rangement of his health in general and of his stomach in particular will
certainly be removed, in two hours he is quite well; and  if the eructation
recur once more,  it consists of tasteless and inodorous air; the contents of
the stomach cease to be vitiated, and at the next meal he  has regained his
full usual appetite; he is quite well and lively.  This is tpue causal medica-
tion; the former is only an imaginary one and has an injurious effect on
the patient.
  Even a stomach overloaded with indigestible food never requires a medi-
cinal emetic. In such a case nature is competent to rid herself of the excess
in the best way through the oesophagus, by means of nausea, sickness and
spontaneous vomiting, assisted, it may be, by mechanical irritation of the
palate and fauces, and by this means the accessory medicinal effects of the
emetic drugs are  avoided; a small quantity of  coffee expedites the passage
downwards of what remains in the stomach.
  But if, after excessive overloading of the stomach, the irritability of the
stomach is not sufficient to promote spontaneous vomiting, or is  lost  alto-
gether, so that the tendency thereto is extinguished, while there  are at the
same time great pains in the epigastrium, in  such a paralyzed state of the
stomach, an emetic medicine would only  have the effect of producing a
dangerous or fatal inflammation of the intestines; whereas a small quantity
of strong infusion of coffee, frequently administered, would dynamically
exalt the sunken irritability  of the stomach, and put it in a condition to
expel its contents, bo they ever so great, either upwards or downwards.  So
here also the pretended causal treatment is out of place.
  Even the acrid gastric acid, to eructations of which patients with chronic
diseases are not  infrequently subject, may  be today violently evacuated
by means of an emetic, with great suffering, and yet all in vain, for tomor-
row orsome days later it is replaced by similar acrid  gastric acid, and then
usually in larger quantities;  whereas it goes away by itself  when its dyna-
mic cause is removed by a very small dose of a high dilution of sulphuric acid,
or still better, if it is of frequent recurrence, by the employment of minutest
doses of antipsoric remedies corresponding in similarity to the rest of the
symptoms  also.  And of a similar character are many of  the pretended
causal cures of the old-school physicians, whose main effort it is, by means of
tedious operations, troublesome to themselves and injurious to their pa-
tients,  to clear away  the  material product of  the  dynamic  derangement-
whereas if they perceived the dynamic source of the affection, and annihU 
INTRODUCTION.
7
 and enlarged abdomen;1  their venesections in cases of  haemor-
 rhage;2   and more   especially  all  their  varieties  of  blood-
 lettings,3 their  main remedy  in  inflammations,  which  they

 now, following  the  example  of  a  well-known  bloodthirsty
 Parisian physician (as a  flock of sheep follow the bell-wether
 even into the butcher's slaughter-house),  imagine  to encounter
 in almost every  morbidly  affected part of the  body,  and  feel

 lated it and its products homoeopathically, they would  thereby effect  a
 rational cure.
   1 Conditions dependent solely on a psoric taint, and easily curable by mild
 (dynamic) antipsoric remedies without emetics or purgatives.
   - Notwithstanding that almost all morbid  haemorrhages depend on  a
 dynamic derangement of the  vital force (state of health), yet the old-school
 physicians consider their cause to be excess of blood, and  cannot refrain
 from bleeding in order to draw off  the supposed superabundance of this
 vital fluid;  the palpable evil consequences of which procedure,  however.
 such as prostration of the strength, and the tendency, or actual transition.
 to the typhoid state they ascribe to  the malignancy of the disease, which
 they are then often unable to overcome—in fine, they imagine, even when the
 patient does not recover, that their treatment has been in conformity with
 their axiom, cawam tolle, and that, according to their mode of speaking,
 they have done everything in their power for the patient, let the  result be
 what it may.
   3 Although there probably never was a drop of blood too much in the living
 human body, yet the old-school practitioners consider an imaginary excess
 of blood as the main material cause of all haemorrhages and inflammations.
 which they must remove and drain off by venesections, cupping and leeches.
 This they hold to be a rational mode of treatment, causal medication. In
 general inflammatory fevers,  in acute pleurisy, they even regard the coagu-
 lable lymph in the blood—the buffy coat, as  it is termed—as the materia
 peceans, which they endeavor  to get rid of, if possible, by repeated venesec-
 tions, notwithstanding that this coat often becomes  more consistent and
 thicker at every repetition of the bloodletting. They thus often bleed the pa-
 tient nearly to death, when the inflammatory fever will  not subside, in
 order to remove this buffy coat, or the imaginary plethora, without suspect-
 ing that the inflammatory blood is only the product  of the acute fever, of
 the morbid, immaterial (dynamic) inflammatory  irritation, and  that the
 latter is the sole cause of the great disturbance in the  vascular system, and
 may be removed by the smallest dose of a homogeneous (homoeopathic) medi-
 cine, as, for instance, by a small globule of thedecillion-fold potentization of
 aconite juice, with abstinence  from vegetable acids, so that the most violent
 plturitic fever, with all its alarming concomitants, is changed into health
 and cured, without the least abstraction of blood and without any avtiphl gistic
 remedy, in a few—at the most in twenty-four—hours  (a small quantity of blood
 drawn from a vein by way of experiment then shows no traces of buffy coat);
 whereas another patient  similarly affected,  and treated  on the rational
 principles of the o'd school, if, after repeated bleedings, with great difficulty
 and unspeakable sufferings he escape for the nonce with life, he often has
 still many months to drag through before he can support  his emaciated
 body on his legs, if in the mean time (as often happens from such maltreat-
 ment) he be not carried off by typhoid fever, leucophlegmasia or pulmonary
 phthisis.
  Anyone who has felt the tranquil pulse of a man an hour before the occur-
rence of the rigor that always  precedes an attack of acute pleurisy, will not
be able to restrain his amazement if told two hours later, after the hot stage 
8
INTRODUCTION.
themselves bound to remove by the application of often a fatal
number of leeches. (°)  They believe that by so doing they obey
the  true causal indications,  and treat  disease  in a  rational
manner.   The adherents  of the old  school, moreover, believe
that by putting a ligature on polypi,  by cutting out,  or artifi-
cially exciting suppuration  by means of local irritants  in, indo-
lent  glandular swellings,  by  enucleating  encysted  tumors
(steatoma and meliceria) by their operations for aneurism  and
lachrymal and anal fistula,  by removing with the knife scirrhus
tumors  of the breast,  by  amputating a  limb  affected  with

necrosis, &c., they cure  the patient radically,  and that their
treatment is  directed against the  cause of the disease;   and
they also think, when they employ  their  repellent remedies,

dry  up old running ulcers in the legs  with  astringent applica-
tions of oxide of  lead, copper  or zinc (aided  always by  the

simultaneous  administration of  purgatives,  which merely  de-
bilitate, but have no effect on the fundamental dyscrasia), cau-
has commenced, that the enormous plethora present urgently requires re-
peated venesections, and will naturally inquire by what magic power could
the pounds of blood that must now be drawn off have been conjured into
the blood-vessels of this man within these two hours, which but two hours
previously he  had felt beating in such a  tranquil manner?  Not a single
drachm more of blood can now be circulating in t,hose vessels than existed
when he was in good health, nor yet two hours ago!
  Accordingly the allopathic physician with  his venesections draws from
the patient laboring under acute fever no oppressive superabundance of
blood, as that cannot possibly be present; he only robs him of what is indis-
pensable to life and recovery, the normal quantity of blood and consequently
of strength—a great loss which no physician's power can replace!—and yet
he vainly imagines that he has conducted the treatment  in conformity to
his (misunderstood) axiom, caumm tolle; whereas it is impossible that the
cau*a morbi in this case can be an excess of blood, which is not present; but
the sole true causa morbi was a morbid, dynamical, inflammatory irritation
of the circulating system, as is proved by the rapid  and permanent cure of
this and every similar caseof general inflammatory fever by one or two in-
conceivably minute doses of aconite juice, which removes. such an irritation
homoeopathically.
  The old school errs equally in the treatment of local inflammation with
the topical bloodlettings, more  especially with the quantities of leeches
which are now applied according to the maniacal principles of Broussais.
The palliative amelioration that at first ensues from the  treatment is far
from being crowned by a rapid and perfect cure; on the contrary, the weak
and ailing state of tho parts thus treated (frequently also of the whole body),
which always remains, sufficiently shows the error that is  committed in at-
tributing the local inflammation to a local plethora, and  how sad are  the
consequences of such abstractions of blood; whereas this  purely dynamic
apparently local, inflammatory irritation, can be rapidly and permanently
removed by an equally small dose of aconite, cr, according to circumstances,
of belladonna, and the whole disease annihilated and  cured, without such
unjustifiable shedding of blood. 
INTRODUCTION.                      9
 terize chancres, destroy condylomata locally, drive off itch from
 the skin with ointment of sulphur, oxide of lead, mercury or
 zinc, suppress ophthalmise with solutions of lead or zinc, and
 drive away tearing pains from the limbs by means of opodeldoc,
 hartshorn liniment or  fumigations  with cinnabar or amber; in
 eveiy case they think they  have removed the  affection, con-
 quered  the disease, and pursued a rational treatment directed
 towards the  cause.   But what is  the result?  The  metastatic
 affections that sooner or later, but inevitably appear, caused
 by this mode of treatment (but which  they pretend are entirely
 new diseases),  ichich are always worse than the original malady,
 sufficiently prove their error, and might and should open their
 eyes to the  deeper-seated,  immaterial nature of the disease,
 and its  dynamic (spiritual) origin, which  can only be removed
 by dynamic means.
   A favorite  idea of the ordinary school of medicine,  until re-
 cent (would that I could not say the most recent!) times, was
 that of  morbific matters (and acridities) in diseases, excessively
 subtile  though they might be thought  to be, which must be ex-
 pelled  from   the  blood-vessels and lymphatics,  through the
 exhalents,  skin, urinary apparatus  or  salivary glands, through
 the tracheal and bronchial glands in the form of expectoration,
 from  the stomach and bowels by vomiting and purging, in
 order that  the body might  be freed from the  material cause
 that produced the disease,  and a  radical causal  treatment^)
 be thus carried out. (fl)
   By cutting holes in  the diseased  body,  which were converted
 into chronic  ulcers kept  up for years by the introduction of
 foreign substances (issues, setons), they sought to draw off the
 materia peccans from the (always  only dynamically) diseased
 body, just as  one lets  a dirty fluid run out of a barrel through
 the tap-hole.    By means only of perpetual fly-blisters and the
 application of  mezereum, they thought to draw away the bad
 humors and  tc cleanse  the  diseased  body  from all  morbific
 matters—but they only weakened it, so as generally to render
 it  incurable, by all these senseless unnatural processes. (°)
   I admit that it was more convenient for the weakness of hu-
 manity to assume that, in the diseases they were called on to
cure, there existed  some morbific material of which the mind 
10
INTRODUCTION.
might  form a  conception (more particularly  as the  patients
readily lent themselves to such a notion;,  because in that case
the practitioner had nothing further to care about than to pro-
cure a good supply of  remedies for purifying the blood  and
humors, exciting the diuresis  and diaphoresis, promoting ex-
pectoration, and scouring out the stomach and bowels.   Hence,
in all the works on Materia Medica, from Dioscorides clown to
the latest books on this subject, there is  almost nothing said
about the special peculiar action of  individual medicines; but,
besides an  account of their supposed utility in various nosologi-
cal names  of  diseases, it is merely stated whether they are
diuretic, diaphoretic, expectorant  or emmenagogue, and more
particularly whether they produce  evacuation of  the stomach
and bowels upwards or downwards;  because all the aspirations
and efforts of  the practitioner  have ever been chiefly directed
to cause  the expulsion of  a material morbific matter, and of
sundry (fictitious) acridities, which  it was imagined were the
cause of diseases.
   These  were, however,  all idle dreams, unfounded  assump-
tions  and  hypotheses, cunningly devised  for  the convenience
of therapeutics, as it was expected the easiest way of perform-
ing a cure  would be to remove the material morbific matters
(si modo essent!).
   But the  essential nature of diseases and their  cure will not
adapt themselves to such fantasies, nor to the convenience of
medical men;  to humor  such  stupid baseless hypotheses dis-
eases will not  cease to  be (spiritual) dynamic  derangements of
our spirit-like vital principle in sensations and functions,  that
is to say, immaterial derangements of our state of health.
   The causes of our  maladies cannot be material,  since the
least foreign material substance,1  however mild it may appear
to us, if introduced.into our blood-vessels, is promptly ejected
by the vital force, as though it were a poison; or  when  this
does not happen, death ensues.  If even the minutest splinter
penetrates  a sensitive part of our organism, the vital principle
  1 Life was endangered by injecting a little pure water into a vein.  (Vide
Mullen, quoted by Birch in the History of the Royal Society.)
  Atmospheric air injected into the blood-vessels caused death,  i Vide J. H.
Voigt, Magazin f'tir den muesten Zustand der Naturkuvde, i, iii, p. 25.)
  Even the mildest fluids introduced into the veins endangered life.  (Vide
Autenrieth. Physi>logie, ii, § 784.) 
INTRODUCTION.
11
 everywhere present in our body never rests until  it is removed
 by pain, fever, suppuration  or gangrene.  And  can it be sup-
 posed that in a  case of cutaneous  disease of  twenty  years'
 standing, for instance, this indefatigably active vital principle
 will quietly endure the presence of  such an injurious, foreign,
 material exanthematous substance,  such as a herpetic, scroful-
 ous, a gouty acridity, &c.,  in the fluids  of the body?   Did
 any  nosologist ever  see  with corporeal eyes such a morbific
 matter, to warrant him in speaking so confidently about it, and
 in founding a system of  medical treatment upon it?  Has any
 one ever succeeded in displaying to view the matter of gout or
 the poison of scrofula?
   Even when the  application  of  a material substance  to the
 skin,  or to a wound, has propagated diseases by infection, who
 can prove (what is so often maintained  in works on pathology)
 that some  material portion of this substance has  penetrated
 into  our fluids  or  been  absorbed?1  The  most  careful  and
 prompt washing of the genitals does not  protect the system
 from  infection with  the  venereal chancrous disease.   The
 slightest breath of  air emanating  from  the  body of  a person
 affected with smallpox will suffice to produce this horrible dis-
 ea3e  in a healthy child.
   What ponderable quantity of material substance could have
 been absorbed  into  the fluids,  in order  to  develop,  in the first
 of these instances, a tedious dyscrasia  (syphilis), which  when
 uncured is only extinguished with the remotest period of life,
 with death; in the last, a disease  (smallpox)  accompanied by
 almost general suppuration,2 and often rapidly fatal?  In these
  1 A girl in Glasgow, eight years of age. having been bit by a mad dog, the
 surgeon immediately cut the piece clean out, and yet thirty-six days afterwards
 she was seized with hdyrophobia, which killed hei in two days. (Med. Com-
 ment, of Edinb.. Dec. 2, vol. ii, 1793.)
  8 In order to account for the large quantity of putrid excrementitious mat-
 ter and foetid discharge often met with in diseases, and to be able to represent
 them as the material substance that excites and keeps up disease—although,
 when infection occurs, nothing perceptible in the shape of miasm, nothing
 material, could have penetrated into the body—recourse was had  to the
 hypothesis, that the matterof infection, beiteverso minute, acts in t'ae body
 like a ferment, bringing the fluids into a like state  of corruption, and thus
 changing them into a similar morbific ferment which constantly increases
 with the disease and keeps it up. But by what all-potent and all-wise puri-
 fying draughts will you purge and  cleanse the human fluids from this ever
 reproductive ferment, from this mass of imaginary morbific matter, and that
so perfectly, that there shall not remain a particle of such morbific ferment, 
12
INTRODUCTION.
and all similar cases is it  possible  to  entertain  the idea of  a
material morbific  matter being introduced  into the blood?   A
letter written in the  sick-room at a  great  distance has  often
communicated the same contagious disease to the person who
read it.   In this instance, can the notion of a material morbific
matter  having penetrated  into the fluids  be admitted?   But
what need is there of all such proofs?  How often has it hap-
pened  that an irritating word has brought on  a  dangerous
bilious  fever;  a  superstitious prediction of  death has caused
the fatal catastrophe at the very time announced; the abrupt
communication of sad or excessively joyful news has occasioned
sudden death?  In these cases, where is the material morbific
principle that entered in substance  into the body, there to pro-
duce and  keep up the disease, and  without  the  material expul-
sion and ejection of which a radical cure were impossible?
  The champions of  this clumsy doctrine of morbific matters
ought to be ashamed that  they have  so inconsiderately  over-
looked and failed to appreciate the spiritual nature of life, and
the spiritual  dynamic  power of  the  exciting  causes of dis-
eases, (a) and that they have thereby degraded themselves into
mere scavenger-doctors, who, in their efforts to expel from  the
diseased body morbific matters that never  existed, in place of
curing,  destroy life.
  Are,  then, the foul,  often disgusting excretions which  occur
in diseases the actual matter  that produces  and keeps  them
up?1   Are they not  rather ahcays excretory jiroducts of  the
disease itself, that is, of the life which is only dynamically de-
ranged and disordered?
  With such false and materialistic views concerning the origin
and essential  nature of diseases,  it  was  certainly not  to  be
wondered at that  in all ages the main  endeavor of  the  most

which, according to this hypothesis, must ever again, as at first, transform
and corrupt the fluids to new morbific matter? Were that so it would evi-
dently be impossible to cure these diseases in your way!—Sec how all hypo-
theses, be they ever so ingeniously framed, lead to the most palpable absurd-
ities when they are not founded on truth!—The most deeply rooted syphilis
may be cured, after the removal of the psora  with which it is often compli-
cated, by one or two small doses of the decillioufold diluted  and potcntized
solution of mercury, whereby the general syphilitic taint of the fluids is for
ever (dynamically) annihilated and removed.                  i
  1 Were this the case, the most inveterate coryza should be certainly and
rapidly cured by merely blowing and wiping tho nose carefully. 
INTRODUCTION.
13
 obscure, as  well  as  of the most distinguished practitioners,
 and even of  the inventors of  the sublimest medical  systems,
 was always only to separate and expel an imaginary morbific
 matter, and the indication most frequently laid down  was to
 break up and put in  motion this morbific matter,  to  effect its
 expulsion by salivation, expectoration, diaphoresis and diuresis;
 to purify the blood from (acridities  and  impurities)  morbific
 matters, which never existed, by  means of the  intelligence of
 sundry obedient decoctions of  roots  and  plants; to  draw off
 mechanically the  imaginary matter of disease  by  setons, by
 issues,  by portions of the skin kept open  and  discharging by
 means of perpetual blisters or mezereum bark, but chiefly to
 expel  and purge  away the  materia peccans, or the injurious
 matters as they were termed, through  the intestines, by means
 of laxative and purgative medicines, which, in order to  give
 them a more profound  meaning and a more prepossessing ap-
 pearance, were fondly denominated dissolvents and mild aperi-
 ents—all so many arrangements  for the expulsion of  inimical
 morbific matters, which never could be, and never were instru-
 mental  in the production and  maintenance of the diseases of
 the human organism, animated as it is by  a spiritual principle
 —of diseases which  never were  anything  else  than  spiritual
 dynamic derangements of  the life altered in its  sensations and
 functions. (°0
   Let it be granted now, what cannot be doubted, that no dis-
 eases—if they do not result from the introduction of perfectly
 indigestible or otherwise injurious substances into the stomach,
 or into other  orifices or cavities of the  body, or from foreign
 bodies penetrating the skin,  &c.—that no disease, in a word,
 is caused by any material substance, but that every one is only
 and always a peculiar, virtual,  dynamic derangement of  the
 health;  how injudicious, in that  case, must not a method of
 treatment directed towards  the  expulsion1 of that imaginary
  1 There is a semblance of necessity in the expulsion by purgatives of worms.
 in so-called vermicular diseases. But even this semblance is false. A few
 lumbrici may be found in some children; in many there exists ascarides.  But
 the presence of these is always dependent on a general taint of the constitu-
 tion (the psoric), joined to an unhealthy mode of living.  Let the latter be
 improved, and the former cured homoeopathically, which is most easily
 effected at this age, and none of the worms remain, and children cured in
this manner are never troubled with them more; whereas after mere purga-
tives, even when combined with cina seeds, they soon reappear in quantities. 
14
INTRODUCTION.
material substance  appear  to every rational  man,  since no
good, but only monstrous  harm,  can  result from its employ-
ment in the principal diseases  of  mankind,  namely,  those of  a

chronic character!
   In short, the degenerated substances and impurities that ap-
pear in diseases are, undeniably, nothing more  than  products
of  the disease of  the  abnormally  deranged organism,  which
are expelled by the  latter,  often violently enough—often much

too violently—without requiring the aid of  the evacuating art,
and fresh products are  always developed as long  as  it labors
under that disease.   These matters the true physician regards

as actual symptoms of  the disease, and they aid him  to dis-
cover the nature of  the disease, and to form an accurate  por-

  "But the  tapeworm," methinks I  hear some one exclaim, '"every effort
should be made to expel that monster, which was created for the  torment of
mankind."
  Yes, sometimes it is expelled; but at the cost of what after-sufferings, and
with what danger to life! I  should not like to have on my conscience the
deaths of so many hundreds of human beings as have fallen sacrifices to the
horribly violent purgatives directed against the tapeworm, or the many years
of indisposition of those who have escaped being purged to death.  And how
often does it happen that after all this health-and-life-destroying purgative
treatment, frequently continued for several years, the animal is not expelled,
or if so, that it is again produced!
  What if there is not the slightest necessity for all these violent, cruel and
dangerous efforts to expel and kill the worm?
  The various species of tapeworm are only found along with the psoric taint,
and always disappear when that is cured.  But even before the cure is ac-
complished, they live—the patient enjoying tolerable health the  while—not
exactly in the intestines, but in the residue of the food, the excrement of the
bowels, as in their proper element, quite quietly, and without causing the
least disturbance, and find in the excrement what suffices for their nourish-
ment; they then do not  touch the walls of the intestine, and are perfectly
harmless. But if the patient happen  to be affected with an acute disease of
any kind, then the contents of the bowels become intolerable to the animal;
it twists about, comes in contact with, and irritates the sensitive walls of the
intestines, causing a peculiar kind of spasmodic colic, which increases mate-
rially the sufferings of the patient. (So also the foetus of the womb becomes
restless, turns about and kicks, only  when the mother is ill; but when she is
well, it swims quietly in  its proper fluid without causing her any suffering).
  It irf worthy of remark, that the morbid symptoms of patients suffering
from tapeworm are generally of such a kind, that they are rapidly relieved
(homoeopathically) by the smallest dose of tincture of male-fern root; so that
the ill-health of the patient, which causes this parasitic animal to be'restless,
is thereby for the time removed; the tapeworm then feels at ease, and lives on
quietly in the excrement of the bowels, without particularly distressing the
patient or his intestines, until the antipsoric treatment is so far advanced
that the worm, after the eradication  of the psora, finds the contents of the
bowels no longer suitable for its support, and therefore spontaneously dis-
appears  for ever from the now cured patient, without the least purgative
medicine. (a) 
INTRODUCTION.
15
trait of it, so as to enable him  to cure it with a similar medi-
cinal morbific agent. (°)
   But the more modern  adherents of the  old school do not
wish it to be supposed,  that in their treatment they aim at the
expulsion of material morbific  substances.   They  allege  that
their multifarious evacuant processes are a mode of treatment
by derivation,  wherein  they follow  the example of nature
which, in her efforts to assist the diseased  organismr resolves
fever by perspiration and diuresis, pleurisy by epistaxis, sweat
and mucous expectoration—other diseases by vomiting, diar-
rhoea and bleeding from the anus, articular pains by  suppura-
ting ulcers on the legs,  cynanche tonsillaris  by salivation, &c.,
or removes them  by metastases and  abscesses which she de-
velops in parts at a distance from the seat of  the disease.
   Hence they thought the best thing to  do  was to imitate na-
ture, by also going to work  in the  treatment of most diseases
in a circuitous manner  like the  diseased vital force when left
to itself, and thus in an indirect manner,1 by means of stronger
heterogeneous irritants  applied  to organs remote from the seat
of disease, and totally dissimilar to the  affected tissues, they
produced evacuations,  and generally kept them up, in order to
draw, as it were, the disease thither.
   This derivation, as it is called, was and  continues  to be one
of the principal modes of treatment of the old school of medi-
cine.
   In this imitation of  the self-aiding operation of nature,  as
some call it, they endeavored to excite, by force,  new  symp-
toms in the tissues that are least diseased and best  able to bear
the medicinal disease,  which  should draw away2 the primary
disease under the semblance of  crises and  under  the form  of
excretions, in order to admit of a gradual lysis by the curative
powers of nature.3
  1 In place of extinguishing the disease rapidly, without exhaustion of the
strength and without going about  the bush, with homogeneous, dynamic
medicinal agents acting directly on the diseased points of the organism, as
homoeopathy does.
  a. Just as if anything immaterial could be drawn away! So that here too
was the notion of a substance and a morbific matter, excessively subtile
though it might be supposed to be! (a)
  8 It is only the slighter acute diseases that tend, when the natural period
of their course has expired, to terminate quietly in resolution,  as it is called.
with or without the employment of not very aggressive allopathic remedies; 
16
INTRODUCTION.
  This they accomplished by means of diaphoretic and diuretic
remedies, blood-lettings,  setons   and  issues, but chiefly by
irritant drugs  to cause evacuation of  the alimentary canal,
sometimes upwards by means of emetics, sometimes  (and this
was  the  favorite  plan)  downwards by means of  purgatives,
which were termed aperient and dissolvent1 remedies.
  To assist this  derivative  method they employed the allied
treatment by  counter-irritants; woolen garments to  the  bare
skin, foot-baths,  nauseants,  inflicting on  the  stomach  and
bowels the pangs of hunger (the hunger treatment),  substances
to cause  pain, inflammation,  and  suppuration in near or dis-
tant parts, as  the application  of horseradish, mustard plasters,
cantharides  blisters,  mezereum,  setons,  issues,  tartar-emetic
ointment, moxa,  actual cautery, acupuncture, &c. ; here also
following the  example of  crude unassisted nature, which en-
deavors  to free herself from the dynamic disease (in the case
of a chronic disease, unavailingly) by exciting pain in distant
parts of  the body, by metastases  and abscesses, by eruptions
and  suppurating ulcers.
  It was evidently no rational principle, but merely imitation,
with the  view  of  making  practice  easy, that  seduced the old
school into  those unhelpful and injurious  indirect modes  of
treatment, the derivative as well as the counter-irritant;  that
led them to this inefficacious,  debilitating and hurtful practice
of apparently  ameliorating diseases for a  short time,  or re-
moving them in  such a manner  that another and a worse dis-
ease was roused up to occupy  the place of  the  first.  Such  a
destructive plan cannot certainly be termed curing.
  They merely followed the example of crude instinctive na-
ture in her efforts, which  are barely2  successful even in  the
the vital force, having regained its  powers, then gradually substitutes the
normal condition for the derangement of the health that has now ceased to
exist. But in severe acute and in chronic diseases which constitute by far the
greater portion of all human ailments, crude nature and the old school are
equally powerless; in these, neither the vital force, with its self-aiding fac-
ulty, nor allopathy in imitation of it, can effect a lysis, but at the most a mere
temporary truce,  during which the enemy fortifies himself, in order, sooner
or later, to recommence the attack with still greater violence.
  1 An expression which likewise betrays that they imagined and presup-
posed a morbific substance, which had to be dissolved and expelled.
  2 In the ordinary school of medicine, the efforts made by nature for the re-
lief of the organism in diseases where no medicine was given, were regarded
as models of treatment worthy of imitation. But this was a great erro°r. The 
INTRODUCTION.
17
 slighter cases of acute disease;  they  merely imitated  the un-
 reasoning life-preserving power when  left  to itself in diseases,

 which,  entirely dependent as it is upon the organic laws of the
 body, is only capable of acting in conformity with these laws,
 and is not guided by reason  and reflection—they  copied na-

 pitiable and highly imperfect efforts of the vital force to relieve itself in acute
 diseases is a spectacle that should excite our compassion, and command the
 aid of all the powers of our rational mind, to terminate the self-inflicted tor-
 ture by a real cure. If nature is unable to cure homoeopathically a disease
 already existing in the organism, by the production of another fresh malady
 similar to it (§§ 43—46), which very rarely lies in her power (§ 50), and if to the
 organism alone is left the task of overcoming, by  its own forces and without
 external aid, a disease newly contracted (in cases of chronic miasms its power
 of resistance is quite inefficacious), we then witness naught but painful, often
 dangerous, efforts of nature to save the individual at whatever cost, which
 often terminate in extinction of the  earthly existence, in death.
  Little as we mortals know of the operations that take place in the interior
 economy in health—which must be hidden from us as certainly  as they are
 patent to the eye of the  all-seeing Creator and Preserver of his creatures —
 just as little can we perceive the operations that go on in the interior in dis-
 turbed conditions of life, in diseases.  The internal operations i:i diseases are
 manifested  only by the visible changes, the sufferings and the symptoms,
 whereby alone our life betrays the inward disturbance; so that in no given
 case can we ascertain which of the morbid  symptoms  are  caused by the
 primary action of the morbific agent, which by the reaction of the vital force
 for its own relief.  Both are inextricably mixed up together before our eyes,
 and  only present to us an outwardly  reflected picture of the entire internal
 malady, for the fruitless efforts of unassisted vitality to terminate the suffer-
 ings are themselves sufferings of the whole organism. Hence, even in those
 evacuations termed crises, which nature generally produces at the termina-
 tion of diseases which run a rapid course, there is frequently more of suffer-
 ing than of efficacious relief.
  What the vital force does  in these so-called crises, and how it does it, re-
 mains a mystery to us, like  all  the  internal operations of the organic vital
 economy. One thing, however, is certain: that in all these efforts more or
 less of the affecied parts are sacrificed and dedroyed in order to  save  the rest.
 These self-aiding operations of the vital force for  the removal  of an acute
 disease, performed only in  obedience to the laws  of organic life and not
 guided by the reflection  of an intellect, are mostly but a species of allopathy;
 in order to relieve the primarily affected organ by a crisis, an increased, often
 violent, activity is excited in the excretory organs, to draw away the disease
 from the former to the latter; there ensue  vomitings,  purgings, diuresis,
 diaphoresis, abcesses, &c. in order, by this irritation of distant parts, to effect
 a sort of derivation from the primarily diseased parts, and the dynamically
 affected nervous power seems to unload itself in the material product.
  It is only by the destruction and sacrifice of a portion of the organism itself
 that unaided nature can save the patient in acute diseases, and, if death do
 not ensue, restore, though only slowly and imperfectly,the harmony of life-
 health.
  The great weakness of the  parts which had been exposed to the disease,
 and even of the whole body, the emaciation, &c, remaining after spontane-
 ous cures, are convincing proofs of this.
  In  short, the whole operation of the self-aiding power of the organism when
attacked by diseases displays to the observer nothing but suffering—nothing
that he could or ought  to imitate if he wishes  to cure disease in a truly
 artistic manner.
                                                               2 
18
INTRODUCTION.
ture, which cannot, like an intelligent surgeon, bring together
the gaping lips of a wound and by their  union effect  a cure;
which knows not how to straighten and adjust the broken ends
of a bone lying far apart and exuding much  (often an excess
of) new osseous matter;  which cannot  put a  ligature on  a
wounded artery, but in its energy causes the patient to bleed
to death;  which does not understand how to replace a  dislo-
cated shoulder, but by the swelling it occasions round about it
soon presents an obstacle to  reduction; which, in order  to re-
move a foreign body from the cornea,  destroys  the whole eye
by suppuration;  which,  with all its efforts,  can only liberate  a
strangulated hernia by gangrene of the bowel  and death; and
which, by  the metaschematisms  it produces in  dynamic dis-
eases, often renders them much worse than  they were origin-
ally.   But  more, this irrational  vital force receives  into our
body, without hesitation, the  greatest  plagues of  our terrestrial
existence,  the spark that kindles  the countless diseases  be-
neath which tortured mankind has groaned for  hundreds and
thousands of years, the chronic miasms—psora, s}7philis, syco-
sis—not one of which can  it diminish in  the slightest degree,
far less expel single-handed  from the  organism; on  the con-
trary, it allows them  to rankle therein, until, often after along
life of misery, death at last closes the eyes of the sufferer.
   In such an important affair as that  of healing,  which  de-
mands  so much  intelligence, reflection  and judgment, how
could  the old school,  which arrogates to  itself the  title of
rational, choose as  its best instructor, as its guide to be blindly
.followed,  the unintelligent vital force, inconsiderately copy its
indirect and  revolutionary operations  in diseases, imagining
these to be the non plus'xdtra, the best conceivable, when that
greatest gift of God, reflective reason and unfettered judgment,
was given  us to enable us infinitely to surpass it in salutary
help to suffering humanity?
   When the old  school  practitioners,  thoughtlessly imitating
the crude, senseless, automatic vital energy, with their counter-
irritant and derivative methods of treatment—by far their most
usual plans—attack innocent parts and organs  of the  body
either inflicting on  them excruciating pains,  or, as is most fre-
quently done, compelling them to perform evacuations, where- 
INTRODUCTION.                     19
by strength and fluids are wasted, their  object is to direct the
morbid vital  action in the  primarily affected  parts away to
those artificially attacked, and thus  to effect the cure  of the
natural disease indirectly, by the production of a disease,  much
greater in intensity and of quite a different kind,  in the healthy
parts of the  body,  consequently  by  a  circuitous way, at the
cost of much loss of strength,  and usually of great sufferings
to the patient.1
   The disease,  if it be acute, and consequently naturally of
but short duration,  may certainly disappear, even during  these
heterogeneous attacks on distant and dissimilar parts—but it
is not cured.   There is nothing that can  merit the honorable
name  of cure in this revolutionary  treatment,  which  has no
direct, immediate, pathological relation to the tissues primarily
affected.   Often, indeed, without  these  serious  attacks on the
rest of the organism, would the acute disease have  ceased of
itself, sooner most likely, with fewer subsequent sufferings and
less sacrifice of  strength.   But neither the mode of operation
of the crude natural forces, nor the allopathic copy of that, can
for a  moment  be compared to  the  dynamic  (homoeopathic)
treatment,  which sustains the strength, while  it extinguishes
the disease in a direct and rapid manner.
   In far the greatest number of  cases of  disease, however—I
mean those of a chronic nature—these perturbing, debilitating,
indirect modes of treatment of the old school are scarcely ever
of the slightest use.   They suspend, for a few days only,  some
troublesome symptom or  other, which, however, returns  when
the system  has become accustomed to  the  distant irritation,
and the disease recurs worse than  before, because  by  the an-
  1 Daily experience shows the sad effects of this manoeuvre in chronic dis-
eases. Anything but a cure is (ffected. Who would ever call that a victory if,
in place of attacking the enemy in front in a hand-to-hand fight, and by his
destruction terminating at once his hostile assaults, we should, in a cowardly
manner and behind his back, lay an embargo on everything, cut off his sup-
plies, burn down everything for a great way round him? By so doing we
would at length deprive him of all courage to resist, but our object is not
gained, the enemy is far from being destroyed,—he is still there, and when he
can again procure provisions and supplies, he once more rears his head, more
exasperated than before—the enemy, I repeat, is far from being destroyed,
but the poor innocent country is so completely ruined that it will be long be-
fore it can recover itself.  In like manner acts allopathy in chronic diseases,
when, by its indirect attacks on innocent parts at a distance from the  seat of
the disease, instead of effecting a cure, it destroys the organism.  Such is the
result of its hurtful operations! 
20
INTRODUCTION.
tagonistic pains1 and the injudicious evacuations, the vital powers
have been depressed.
  Whilst most  physicians  of the old  school,  imitating in a
general manner the efforts of crude, unaided nature for its own
relief,  carried out in their practice these derivations of  merely
hypothetical utility, just as they judged expedient (guided by
some imaginary indication); others, aiming at a higher object,
undertook designedly to promote the efforts of the vital force to aid
itself by evacuations and antagonistic  metastases, as seen in dis-
eases, and by way of lending it a helping hand, to increase still
more these derivations  and evacuations;  and  they believed
that by this hurtful procedure they  were  acting duce natura,
and might justly claim the title  of ministri natura-.
  As the evacuations effected by the  natural  powers  of the
patient in chronic diseases are not infrequently the precursors
of  alleviations—though only of  a  temporary  character—of
troublesome symptoms,  violent  pains, paralyses, spasms, &c.,
so the old school imagined these derivations to be the true way
of  curing diseases,  and  endeavored  to promote, maintain and
even increase  such evacuations.  But they did not perceive
that all these evacuations and  excretions  (pseudo-crises)  pro-
duced by nature when left to herself  were, in chronic diseases,
only palliative, transient alleviations, which,  far from con-
tributing to a real cure,  on the contrary, rather aggravated the
original, internal dyscrasia, by the waste of strength and juices
they occasioned.  No one ever  saw  a chronic patient  recover
his health permanently  by  such efforts  of  crude  nature, nor
any chronic disease cured by such evacuations effected by the
organism.2   On the contrary, in such cases  the original  dys-
crasia is always perceptibly aggravated,  after  alleviations,
whose duration always becomes shorter and shorter; the bad
attacks recur more  frequently  and  more severely in spite of
the continuation of  the  evacuations.   In  like manner, on the
  1 What good results have ever ensued from those foetid artificial ulcers, so
much in vogue, called issues? If even during the first week or two, whilst
they still cause pain, they  appear somewhat to check by  antagonism a
chronic disease, yet by and by, when the body has become accustomed to the
pain, they have no other effect than that of weakening the patient and <nvin°'
still greater scope to the chronic a ffection. Or does anyone imagine, in this
nineteenth century, that they serve as  an outlet for the escape of the materia
peccansf It almost appears as if this were the case!
  2  Equally inefficacious are those produced artificially. 
INTRODUCTION.
21
 occurrence of symptoms excited by an internal  chronic affec-
 tion that threaten to  destroy life, when nature, left to its own
 resources, cannot help herself in any other way than by the
 production of external local sjTmptoms, in order to avert the
 danger from parts indispensable to life and direct it to tissues
 of  less vital importance (metastasis), these operations of the
 energetic but unintelligent, unreasoning and improvident vital
 force conduce to anything  but genuine relief or recovery; they
 only silence in a palliative manner,  for a short time,  the dan-
 gerous internal affection, at the cost of a large portion of the
 humors and  of  the strength,  without diminishing the original
 disease by a hair's breadth; they can, at the most, only retard
 the fatal termination which  is  inevitable  without  true hom-
 oeopathic treatment.
   The allopathy of the old school not only greatly  over-rated
 these efforts of the crude automatic power of nature, but com-
 pletely misjudged them, falsely  considered them to  be truly
 curative, and endeavored to increase and promote them, vainly
 imagining that thereby the}r might perhaps succeed in annihi-
 lating and  radically  curing  the whole disease.   When,  in
 chronic diseases, the  vital  force  seemed to  silence this or that
 troublesome symptom of the internal affection by the produc-
 tion, for example, of some humid cutaneous eruption,  then the
 servant of the crude power of nature (minister naturae) applied
 to the discharging surface  a cantharides plaster or an exutory
 (mezereum), in order,  duce natura, to draw still more moisture
 from the skin, and thus to promote and to assist nature's object—
 the cure  (by the removal of the morbific matter from the body ?);
 but when the effect of the  remedy was too violent, the eczema
 already of long standing, and the system too irritable, he in-
 creased the external  affection to a  great  degree without the
 slightest advantage to tne original disease, and aggravated the
 pains,  which deprived the  patient of sleep  and depressed his
 strength  (and sometimes even developed a malignant febrile
erysipelas);  or if the effect upon the local affection (still recent.
perhaps)  was of  a milder character,  he thereby repelled from
its seat, by a species  of ill-applied external homoeopathy, the
local symptoms which had  been established by nature on the
skin for the  relief of  the  internal disease,  thus  renewing the 
22
INTRODUCTION.
more dangerous internal  malady, and by this  repulsion of the
local symptom compelling the vital force to effect a transfer-
ence of a worse  form of morbid action to other and more im-
portant parts; the patient became affected with dangerous oph-
thalmia, or deafness, or  spasms of the stomach, or epileptic
convulsions, or attacks of asthma  or apoplexy, or mental de-
rangement, &c., in place of the repelled local disease.1
  When the  diseased natural  force propelled blood into the
veins of the rectum or anus (blind  haemorrhoids), the minister
naturee, under the same delusive idea of  assisting  the vital
force in its curative efforts,  applied  leeches,  often in  large
numbers, in order to give an outlet to  the blood there—with
but brief, often  scarcely noteworthy, relief, but thereby weak-
ening the body  and occasioning  still  greater congestions  in
those  parts, without the slightest  diminution of the original
disease.
  In almost all cases in  which the diseased vital force endeav-
ored to subdue  the violence of a  dangerous internal malady
by evacuating blood by means of vomiting, coughing, &c., the
old school physician, duce natura, made haste to assist  these
supposed salutary efforts of  nature, and performed  a copious
venesection, which was invariably productive of injurious con-
sequences and palpable weakening of the body.
  In cases of frequently  occurring chronic nausea, he produced,
with the view of furthering the intentions of nature, copious
evacuations of the stomach, by means  of  powerful emetics—
never with a  good result, often with bad, not infrequently dan-
gerous and even fatal consequences.
  The  vital  force, in order to relieve the internal malady,
sometimes  produces indolent  enlargements  of  the external
glands, and he thinks to forward the intentions of nature,  in
his assumed  character of her servant,  when, by the use of all
sorts of heating embrocations and  plasters, he causes them to
inflame, so that, when the abscess is ripe, he may incise it and
let out the bad  morbific matter (?).   Experience has  shown,
hundreds of times, that lasting  evil almost invariably results
from such a plan.
  1 Natural effects of the repulsion of these local symptoms—effects that are
often regarded by the allopathic physician as fresh diseases of quite a differ-
ent kind. 
INTRODUCTION.
23
   And having often noticed slight amelioration of the severe
symptoms of chronic diseases  to result from spontaneous night
sweats or frequent liquid stools, he imagines himself  bound to
obey these hints of nature (duce natura), and to promote them,
by instituting and maintaining a complete course  of  sweating
treatment or by the  employment of  so-called gentle  laxatives
for years,  in  order  to promote  and increase these  efforts of
nature (of the vital force of the unintelligent organism), which
he thinks tend to the  cure of  the whole  chronic affection, and
thus to free the patient more  speedily and certainly from his
disease (the matter of his disease?).
   But he thereby always produces quite the contrary result:
aggravation of the original disease.
   In conformity with this  preconceived but  unfounded  idea,
the old school physician goes on thus promoting1 the  efforts of
the diseased vital force and increasing  those  derivations and
evacuations in the patient which never lead to the  desired end,
but  are always disastrous,  without  being aware  that all  the
local affections, evacuations, and seemingly derivative efforts,
set up and continued by the unintelligent vital force  when left
to its own resources,  for  the relief of  the original chronic dis-
ease, are actually the disease itself,  the phenomena of  the
whole disease, for the totality of which,  properly speaking, the
only efficacious remedy, and the  one,  moreover, that will act
  1 In direct opposition to this treatment, the old school not infrequently in-
dulged themselves in the very reverse of this:  thus, when the efforts of the
vital force for the relief of the internal disease by evacuations and the pro-
duction of local symptoms on the exterior of the body became troublesome,
they capriciously suppressed them by their repereutients and repellents; they
subdued chronic pains, sleeplessness and diarrhoea of long standing by doses
of opium  pushed to a dangerous extent; vomitings by effervescent saline
draughts; foetid perspiration  of the feet by cold footbaths and astringent
applications; eruptions on the skin by preparations of lead  and zinc; they
checked uterine haemorrhage by injections of vinegar; colliquative perspira-
tion by alum;  nocturnal seminal emissions by  the free use of camphor; fre-
quent attacks of flushes of heat in the body and face by nitre, vegetable acids
and sulphuric acid; bleeding of the nose by plugging the nostrils  with dossils
of lint soaked in alcohol or astringent fluids; they dried up discharging ulcers
on the legs, established by the vital power for the relief of great internal suf-
fering, with the oxides of lead and zinc, &c, with  what sad results experience
has shown in thousands of cases.
  With tongue and with pen the old school physician brags that he is a rational
practitioner, and that he investigates the cause of the disease so as always to
make radical cures; but behold, his  treatment is directed, in these cases,
against a single symptom only, and always  with injurious consequences to
bis patient.(a) 
24
INTRODUCTION.
 in the most direct manner, is a homoeopathic  medicine,  chosen
 on account of its similarity of action.
   As everything that crude nature  does to relieve  itself in
 diseases, in those of an acute, but especially those of a chronic
 kind, is extremely imperfect and even  actual  disease,  it may
 easily be conceived that the promotion  by artificial means of
 this imperfection  and disease  must do still more  harm;  at
 least, it cannot improve the efforts of nature for its own relief,
 even in acute diseases, because medical art is  not in a condition
 to follow the  hidden paths by which the vital  force effects its
 crises, but attempts to  produce them from  without,  by  violent
 means, which are  still less beneficial than what the instinctive
 vital force left  to its  own  resources does, but on  the other
 hand are more perturbing and debilitating.   For even  the in-
 complete  amelioration  resulting from the  natural derivations
 and  crises cannot be obtained in a similar manner by allopathy;
 with all its endeavors it cannot procure anything like even that
 pitiful relief the vital force left to itself  is able to afford.
   It has been attempted  to produce, by means  of  scarifying
 instruments,  a bleeding at the  nose, in imitation of that some-
 times occurring  naturally, in order to mitigate, for example,
 the  attacks of a chronic headache.   By this  means a large
 quantity of blood could be made to flow from the nostrils and
 weaken the patient, but the  relief  afforded was either  nil, or
 much less than the instinctive vital force would  procure at an-
 other time, when,  of  its own accord,  it would cause  but a few
 drops to flow.
  A so-called critical perspiration or diarrhoea, produced by
 the ever active vital force after a sudden indisposition, excited
 by anger,  fright, a sprain or a chill,  will be  much more  suc-
cessful, at least for  the time,  in relieving the acute disease,
than all the sudorific or purgative drugs in  the pharmacopoeia,
which only make the  patient worse, as daily experience shows.
  But the vital force, which of itself can only act according to
the physical constitution of our organism, and is not guided by
reason, knowledge and  reflection, was not given to man to be
regarded as the best possible curative agent  to restore those
lamentable deviations from health to the normal condition, and
still  less that physicians should slavishly imitate  its  imperfect 
INTRODUCTION.                     25
 morbid efforts (to free itself from disease), and that with oper-
 ations incontestably more inappropriate  and  severe  than its
 own,  and thereby conveniently spare themselves  the expendi-
 ture  of  reasoning, reflection and  judgment requisite for  the
 discovery and for the practice of  the noblest of human  arts—
 the true healing art;—while they allege their bad copy  of  the
 spontaneous efforts of  doubtful  utility  made  by  the   crude
 natural force for its relief, to be the  healing  art, the  rational
 healing art!
   What sensible man would imitate the efforts of the organism
 for its own  preservation?   These  efforts are in reality the dis-
 ease itself,  and the  morbidly  affected vital force is the pro-
 ducer of  the visible disease!   It  must, therefore, necessarily
 follow that  all artificial imitation, and likewise the suppression
 of these efforts,  must either increase the  disease  or render it
 dangerous by their  suppression, and  both of these allopathy
 does; these are its pernicious operations which it alleges to be
 the healing  art,  the rational healing art!(«)
   No! that  exquisite power innate in the human being, designed
 to direct  in the most perfect manner  the  operations  of  life
 while it is in health,  equally present in  all parts of the  organ-
 ism, in the  fibres of sensibility as well  as in those of irrita-
 bility, the unwearying spring of all  the normal  natural func-
 tions of the body, was not created for the purpose of affording
 itself aid in diseases, not for the purpose  of exercising a heal-
 ing art worthy of imitation.  No! the true  healing art is that re-
 flective work, the attribute  of the higher powers of human intel-
 lect, of unfettered judgment and of reason selecting  and deter-
 mining on principle in order to effect an alteration in the instinct-
 ive, irrational and unintelligent,  but  energetic automatic vital
 force, when  it has been diverted by disease into abnormal action,
 and by means of a similar affection developed by a homoeopathi-
 cally chosen  remedy, to excite in it a medicinal disease somewhat
 greater in degree, so  that the natural morbid  affection  can no
 longer act upon the vital force, which thus, freed from the natural
 disease,  has  now  only the similar, somewhat stronger, medicinal
 morbid affection  to contend with, against which it now directs its
 whole energy and which it soon overpowers, whereby  the vital
force is liberated and enabled to return  to  the normal standard 
26                    INTRODUCTION.
 of health and to its proper function,11 the maintenance of the life
 and health of the organism," without having suffered, during this
 change,  any painful  or debilitating  attacks.    Homoeopathy
 teaches us how to effect this.
   Under the methods of treatment of the old school I have
 just detailed, no small number of patients certainty got rid of
 their diseases,  but not of  those of  a chronic (non-venereal)
 character; only such as were acute and unattended with danger;
 and even these they  were orily freed from by such circuitous
 and tedious ways, and often so incompletely, that the results
 of the treatment could never be termed  cures effected by a
 gentle art.   Acute diseases of a not very dangerous kind were,
 by venesections or suppression of one of the chief symptoms
 through  the instrumentality of  an  enantiopathic palliative
 remedy (contraria contrariis), kept under,  or by means  of
 counter-irritant and  derivative  (antagonistic  and  revulsive)
 remedies, applied to other than the diseased  spots, suspended,
 until the natural time for the duration of the short malady had
 expired.   These  methods were, consequently, indirect, and at-
 tended with loss of strength and  humors, so much  so that in
 patients so treated the greatest and  most important measures
 for the complete removal of the disease and for the restoration
 of the lost strength and humors remained  to be performed by
 Nature herself—by the life-preserving power which, besides the
 removal of the  natural acute disease, had  also to  combat  the
 effects of improper treatment, and thus it was able,  in cases
 unattended by danger, gradually  to restore the normal relation
 of the functions by  means  of its own energy, but often in a
 tedious, imperfect and painful manner.
   It remains a very doubtful question whether the natural pro-
 cess of recovery in acute diseases is  really, at all shortened or
 facilitated by this interference of the old school, as the latter
cannot act otherwise than the vital force, namely, indirectly
but its derivative and counter-irritant treatment is much more
injurious and much more debilitating.
   The old school has yet another method of treatment, which
is termed the stimulating and strengthening system1 (by excitantia

   It is, properly speaking, enantiopathic, and I shall again refer to it in the
text of the Organon (§ 59). 
                       INTRODUCTION.                     ^'

nervina,  tonica,  confortantia, roborantia).   It is astonishing
how it can boast of this method.
  Has it ever succeeded in removing the physical weakness so
often engendered and kept up or increased by a chronic disease
with its prescriptions of etheric  Rhine-wine or fiery Tokay?
The strength gradually sank under this treatment, and all the
lower, the greater  the quantity of wine  the patient was per-
suaded to drink, because the  source of the   weakness, the
chronic  disease,  was  not  cured by  it,  because artificial
stimulation is followed by relaxation in the reaction of the vital
force.
  Or did its cinchona bark, or its amara, so misunderstood, so
multifarious in their modes of action, and productive of  quite
different kinds of injury,  give strength in these frequently oc-
curring cases? Did not these vegetable substances,  said to be
tonic and  strengthening  under all circumstances, as also the
preparations of iron, often add to the old disease new  sufferings,
by  virtue of their peculiar pathogenetic effects,  without reliev-
ing the weakness proceeding from an unknown disease  of long
standing?
  Has any one ever succeeded in  diminishing in the very least
the duration of the incipient paralysis of an arm or a leg, so
often arising  from a chronic dyscrasia,  by means  of the so-
called unguenta  nervina, or  any  other spirituous or balsamic
embrocations, without  curing the  dyscrasia itself.  Or have
electric or galvanic shocks ever been attended  with any  other
result in such cases, than a  gradually increasing, and finally
absolute,  paralysis, and extinction of all muscular and nervous
irritability in the affected limbs?1
  Did not the renowned excitantia and aphrodisiaca,  ambergris,
lacerta scincus, cantharides tincture,  truffles, cardamoms, cin-
namon and vanilla invariably bring about complete impotence
when used for the purpose of restoring the gradually declining
sexual power (which always depended on an unobserved chronic
miasm)?
 1 Those affected with hardness of hearing were relieved by moderate shocks
from the voltaic pile of the apothecary of Jever only for a few hours—these
moderate shocks soon lost their power.  In order to produce the same result
he had to make them stronger; until these stronger shocks had  no effect; the
very strongest would then at first excite the patients' hearing for a short time,
but  at length left them quite deaf. 
28
INTRODUCTION.
   How can credit be taken for the production of a stimulation
and invigoration of but a few hours duration, when the result
that must follow and which is permanent—according  to  the
laws of all palliative action—is a directly opposite state,  the
rendering of the disease incurable?
   The little good that the excitantia and roborantia did  for re-
covery from acute diseases (treated according to the old method)
was a thousand times outweighed by  their ill effects in chronic
maladies.
   When physicians of the old school  do not know what to do
in a chronic disease, they treat  it blindly with  their so-called
alterative  remedies (alterantia);  among which the horrible mer-
curialia (calomel, corrosive  sublimate and mercurial ointment)
occupy the foremost  place—which they  allow  to act in such
large quantities and for so long  a time on the diseased body (in
non-venereal diseases!)  that  at last the  health  is  by their de-
structive effects completely  undermined.   They  thus certainly
produce great alterations, but invariably such as are not bene-
ficial,  and they always utterly ruin the health by their improper
administration of this excessively injurious metal.
   When they  prescribe, in  large doses,  cinchona bark (which,
as a homoeopathic febrifuge, is only specific in true marsh ague,
uncomplicated with psora),  for all epidemic intermittent fevers,
which are often distributed  over large tracts of country, the old
school practitioners palpably manifest their stupidity, for these
diseases assume a different  character almost every year and
hence demand for their cure, almost always, a different homoeo-
pathic  remedy, by means of one or a few very  small doses of
which  they may always be radically cured in a  few   days.
Now,  because these epidemic fevers have periodical attacks
(tyjnis) and the adherents of the old school  see  nothing  in all
intermittent fevers  but their typus  [periodicity],  and  neither
know nor  care to  know any  other febrifuge  but cinchona, these
routine practitioners  imagine, if they can but suppress  the
typus of the epidemic intermittent fever with enormous  doses
of cinchona and  its costly  alkaloid,  quinine (an  event  which
the unintelligent,  but, in this instance,  more sensible vital force
endeavors to prevent often for months),  that they have  cured
this epidemic ague.  But  the deluded  patient, after such a 
INTRODUCTION.
29
suppression of the periodicity  (typus) of his fever, invariably
becomes worse than he was during the fever itself: with sallow
complexion,  dyspnoea, constriction in the hypochondria,  disor-
dered  bowels, unhealthy  appetite,   broken sleep,  feeble  and
desponding,  often with great swelling of the legs, of the abdo-
men and even of the face and hands, he  creeps  out of the
hospital, dismissed as cured, and long  years  of  homoeopathic
treatment are not infrequently required, merely to rescue from
death, let alone to cure and restore to health, such a profoundly
injured (cured?), artificially cachectic patient.
   The old school is  happy when it can convert the dull stupor
that occurs in typhus  fevers, by means of  valerian,  which in
this case acts antipathically, into a kind of  liveliness of a few
hours' duration;  but as this does not continue, and to force a
repetition of the animation ever increasing  doses of  valerian
are requisite, it is not  long before  the largest doses  cease to
have the desired effect.  But as this palliative is only stimulant
in its primary action, in its after effects the  vital  force is para-
lyzed, and such a patient is certain of a speedy death from this
rational treatment of the  old school; none  can e3cape.   And
yet the adherents of this routine art could not  perceive that
by these proceedings they  most certainly killed their  patients;
they ascribed the death to the malignancy of the  disease.
   A palliative of  a  still more  horrible character for chronic
patients is the digitalis purpurea, with which the old school
practitioners imagine they do such excellent service,  when, by
means of it,  they compel the quick,  irritated  pulse in chronic
diseases (purely symptomatic !) to become slower.  True it  is
that  this dreadful remedy, which is in such cases employed
enantiopathically, strikingly diminishes the frequency of the
quick, irritated pulse,  and greatly reduces  the number of the
arterial pulsations, for a few hours, after  the first dose;  but
the pulse  soon becomes more rapid than  before.   In order
again to diminish in some  degree its  frequency the  dose  is in-
creased, and it has the effect, but for  a  still shorter period,
until even these and still larger palliative doses cease  to reduce
the pulse, which at length,  in the secondary action of  the fox-
glove which can no longer  be restrained, becomes much more
rapid than it was before the use of this drug,—it then becomes 
30
INTRODUCTION.
uncountable; sleep,  appetite and strength are lost—death is
imminent; not one of the patients so treated escapes alive, unless
to be a prey to incurable insanity!1^)
   Such was the treatment  pursued by the allopathist.   The
patients, therefore, were obliged to yield to the sad necessity,
because they could obtain no better aid from other allopathists,
who had  gained  their  knowledge  from  the same  deceitful
books.
   As the  fundamental cause of chronic (non-venereal) diseases,
together with the remedies for  them,  remained  unknown  tc
these practitioners, who vainly boasted of their causal medica-
tion of their diagnosis  being directed to the investigation of
the genesis of diseases;2 how could they hope  to  cure the im-
mense numbers of chronic diseases by their indirect treatments,
which were but hurtful imitations  of the unintelligent vital
force for its own relief,  that never were intended to be models
for practice?
   The presumed character of the affection they regarded as the
cause of the disease, and hence they  directed their pretended
causal  treatment  against  spasm, inflammation  (plethora),
fever,  general  and partial debility, mucus, putridity,  obstruc-
tions,  &c., which they thought to remove by means  of their
antispasmodic, antiphlogistic, tonic, stimulant, antiseptic, dis-
solvent, resolvent,  derivative, evacuant, antagonistic remedies
(of which they only possessed a superficial knowledge).
   But from such general indications  really serviceable medi-
cines could not be discovered, most assuredly not in the materia
medica of the old school,  which, as I have  elsewhere  shown,3
is founded mainly on  conjecture and false deductions ab usu in
morbist mixed up with falsehood and  fraud.
   With equal  rashness  they attacked those still more hypo-
  1 And yet Hufeland, the chief of this old school (v. Homoopathie, p. 22),  ex-
tols with much satisfaction the  employment of digitalis in such cases, in
these words:  "None will deny" (experience invariably does so!) "that too
great rapidity of the circulation can be removed (?)by digitalis."  Permanent-
ly removed? and by a heroic enantiopathic remedy? Poor Hufeland!
  2 Which Hufeland in his pamphlet, Die Homoopathie, p. 20, makes a futile
attempt to appropriate for his old pseudo-art.  For since, as is well known.
previous to the appearance of my book (Chronic Diseases), the 2500-years-old
allopathy knew nothing about the source of most chronic  diseases (psora)
must it not have attributed a false source (genesis) to such maladies? (a)
  3 See essay in the first volume of the Materia Medica Pura (English edit.)
"Sources of the Common Materia  Medica." 
INTRODUCTION.
31
 thetical so-called indications—deficiency or excess of oxygen,
 nitrogen,  carbon, or hydrogen in  the fluids, exaltation  or
 diminution of the irritability, sensibility and reproduction, de-
 rangements of  the  arterial, venous and  capillary  systems,
 asthenia, &c., without knowing  a  single remedy for effecting
 objects so visionary.  All this was pure ostentation.   It was a
 mode of treatment that did no good to the patients.
   But all semblance of appropriate treatment of diseases was
 completely lost by a practice, introduced in the earliest times.
 and even made into a rule:  I mean the mixture in a prescription
 of various medicinal substances, whose real action was,  almost
 without an  exception,  unknown, and which,  without any one
 exception, invariably differed so much among each other.  One
 medicine (the sphere of whose medicinal effects was  unknown)
 was placed foremost, as the principal remedy (basis), and was
 designed to subdue what the physician deemed the chief char-
 acter of the disease; to this was added some other drug (equally
 unknown as regards the sphere of  its medicinal action) for the
 removal  of  some accessory symptom,  or  to strengthen  the
 action of the  first (adjuvans);  and besides these, yet another
 (likewise unknown as to the sphere of its medicinal powers), a
 pretended corrective remedy (corrigens);  these  were  all mixed
 together (boiled, infused)—and along with them, some medicinal
 syrup, or distilled medicinal water, also with different proper-
 ties, would be included in the formula, and it was supposed that
 each of the ingredients of this  mixture would perform, in the
 diseased body, the part alloted to it by the prescriber's imagin-
 ation,  without suffering itself to be disturbed or led  astray by
 the other things mixed up along with  it;  which, however, could
 not in reason  be expected.   One ingredient suspended wholly
 or partially the action of another,  or  communicated  to  it and
 to the others a mode of action and operation not anticipated
 nor conjecturable, so that it was impossible the  expected  effect
 could be obtained; there frequently occurred  a new morbid de-
 rangement,  which, from the incomprehensible changes imparted
 to substances by their admixture, was not and could not have
 been foreseen, which escaped observation amid the tumultuous
symptoms of the  disease, and which became permanent from a
lengthened employment of the prescription—accordingly an 
32                      INTRODUCTION.


artificial  disease was  added to and complicated  the  original
disease, causing  an aggravation of  the latter—or if the  pre-
scription were not often repeated,  but superseded  by one or
more new prescriptions,  composed of other ingredients, given
in rapid succession, then  the very least that could happen was
a further depression of the strength, for the substances adminis-

tered in that way neither had, nor could have had,  any direct
pathological relation to the  original malady, but only attacked,
in a useless and injurious manner, parts that  were least impli-

cated in the disease.
   The mixture of several medicines, even if the effects of each
single medicine on the human body  were  accurately  known
(—the  prescription  writer,  however,  often  knows not  the
thousandth part of their  effects—), the association, in one pre-
scription, of several such ingredients,  I  repeat, many of which
are themselves of  a very compound nature,  and the peculiar
action of any one of which is as good  as unknown, although in
reality  it always differs  greatly from that of the others, and
the  administration of  this  incomprehensible  mixture  to  the

patient in large and frequently repeated doses, in order there-
with to obtain some purposed, certain, curative effect, is a piece
of folly repugnant to every reflecting and unprejudiced person.1

  1 The absurdity of medical mixtures was  perceived even by adherents of
the old  school of  medicine,  although they still continued to follow this
slovenly plan in their own practice, contrary to their own convictions.  Thus
Marcus Herz  (in Haf eland's Journal, ii, p. 33) reveals the pricks of his con-
science in the following words: "When we wish to remove the inflammatory
state, we do not employ either nitre or sal-ammoniac or vegetable acids alone,
but we usually mix several, and often but too many, so-called antiphlogistics
together, or give them in the same case in close succession.  If we have to
combat putridity, we are not content to look for the attainment of our ob-
ject from the administration of large doses of one of the known antiseptic
medicines, such as cinchona bark, mineral  acids, arnica, serpentaria, &c,
alone; we prefer associating several of them together, and count upon their
community of action; or  from  our uncertainty as to whose  action is the
most suitable for the case in question, we throw together a number of differ-
ent substances, and almost leave it to chance to effect the end we have in
view, by means of one of them.  Thus we seldom excite perspiration, purify
the blood#(?), overcome obstructions (?), promote  expectoration, or even
evacuate the prirnas via?, by a single remedy; our prescriptions for these ob-
jects are always composite, almost never simple and pure, consequently neither
are our observations in reference to the actions of each individual substanee con-
tained in them.  To be sure, we learnedly institute  certain grades of rank
 among the remedies in our formulas; on the one to which we particularly
 commission the action, we confer the title  of base (basis), the others we call
 helpers, supporters (adjuvantia), correctives (corrigentia), &c. But this classi-
 fication is evidently almost entirely arbitrary.  The helpers and supporters 
INTRODUCTION.
33
    The result naturally belies every expectation that  had been
  formed.   There certainly ensue chai—s and results,  but none
  of an appropriate character, none b(   icial—all injurious, de-
  structive !
    I should like to see any one who \   Id call the pur-blind in-
  roads of such prescriptions on the d    sed human body a cure!
    It is only by guiding what still remains of the vital principle
  in the patient to the proper performance of its functions, by means
  of a suitable medicine, that a cure can be expected, but not by
  enervating the body to death, secundum  artem;  and yet the old
  school knows not  what else to do with patients  suffering from
  chronic diseases, than to attack the sufferers with  drugs that
  do nothing but torture  them, waste their strength and fluids,
  and shorten their lives! Can it be  said  to save whilst it de-
  stroys? Does it deserve any other name than that of a mis-
  chievious [non-healing]  art? It acts, lege artis, in  the  most in-
  appropriate manner, and it does (it would seem almost purpose-
  ly) dXXola, that  is  to say, the very  opposite  of   what  it
  should do.   Can  it be  commended? Can it be  any longer
  tolerated?
   In recent times  the old  school  practitioners have quite sur-
 passed themselves in their cruelty  towards their sick fellow-
 creatures, and in the  unsuitableness  of their operations,  as
 every unprejudiced observer must admit, and as even physicians
 of their own school have been forced, by the pricks of their con-
 science (like Kruger Hansen), to confess before the world.
   It was high time  for the wise and benevolent Creator and
 Preserver of mankind to put a stop to these  abominations,  to
 command a cessation of these tortures, and to reveal a healing
 have just as much part in the whole action as the chief ingredient, although,
 from want of a standard of measurement, we are  unable  to  determine the
 degree of their participation in the result.  In  like manner the influence of
 the correctives on the powers of the other ingredients cannot be quite indiffer-
 ent; they must increase or  diminish them, or  give them quite another di-
 rection; and hence we must always regard the salutary (?) change which wo
 effect, by means of such a prescription, as the  result of all  its ingredients
 collectively, and we can never obtain from its action a pure experience of the in-
 dividual efficacy of any single ingredient of which it is composed In fact, our
 hnowledge of what is essential to be known respecting all our remedies, as also re-
 specting the perhaps hundred-fold relationships among each other into which they
 enter when combined, is far too little to be relied upon to enable us to tell with cer-
 tainty the degree and entent of the action of a substance, seemingly ever so unim-
portant,  when introduced into the  human  body in combination with other
substances.'' 
34
INTRODUCTION.
art the very opposite of  all this, which should not  waste the
vital juices and powers by emetics,  perennial scourings out of
the bowels, warm  baths,  diaphoretics or salivation;  nor  shed
the life's blood,  nor torment and weaken with painful  appli-
ances; nor, in place of curing patients, suffering from diseases,
render them incurable by the addition of new, chronic medicinal
maladies by means of the prolonged use of wrong, powerful
medicines of unknown properties;  nor yoke  the  horse behind
the cart,  by giving  strong  palliatives,  according to the old
favorite axiom, contraria contrariis curentur; nor, in short, in
place of lending the patient  aid, to guide  him in the way to
death, as  is done by the merciless routine practitioner;—but
which, on the contrary, should spare the patient's strength as
much  as  possible, and  should,  rapidly  and mildly, effect an
unalloyed and permanent cure, and restore to health by means
of smallest doses of few simple  medicines carefully selected
according to their proved effects, by the only therapeutic law
conformable to nature: similia similibus curentur.  It was high
time that  He should permit the discovery of homoeopathy. (a»
   By observation, reflection and experience, I discovered that,
contrary to the old allopathic method, the true, the proper, the
best mode of treatment is contained in the maxim:(°)  To cure
mildly, rapidlyt  certainly,  and  permanently, choose,  in  every
case  of disease, a medicine which can itself produce an affection
similar (o/j.olov 7ra#os) to that sought to be cured!
   Hitherto no one has ever taught this  homoeopathic mode of
cure, no one has 'carried it out in practice.   But  if the truth is
only to be found in this method, as I  can prove it to be, we
might expect that,  even though it remained  unperceived  for
thousands of years, distinct traces of it would yet  be discov-
ered in every age.l
   And such is the fact.   In  all ages,  the  patients  who have
been really, rapidly, permanently and obviously cured by medi-
cines, and who did not merely recover by some fortuitous cir-
cumstance,  or by fhe acute disease  having run  its allotted
course, or by the powers of the  system having, in the course
  i For the truth is co-eternal with the all-wise, benevolent Deity.  It may
long escape the observation of man. until the time foreordained by  Provi-
dence arrives, when its rays shall irresistibly break through the clouds of
prejudice and usher in the dawn of a day which shall shine with a bright
and inextinguishable light for the weal of the human race. 
INTRODUCTION.
35
of time, gradually attained the preponderance, under allopathic
and antagonistic treatment-f or being cured in a direct manner
differs vastly from  recovering  in  an  indirect manner—such
patients have been cured solely  (although without the knowl-
edge of the physician) by means of a (homoeopathic)  medicine
which possessed the power of producing a similar morbid state.
   Even in real cures by means of mixtures of medicines—
which were excessively rare—it  will be found that the remedy
whose action  predominated  was  always of  a  homoeopathic
character.
   But this is observed much more strikingly in cases where
physicians sometimes effected  a rapid cure with one simple
medicinal substance,  contrary  to  the  usual custom, that ad-
mitted of none but mixtures of medicines in the form  of a
prescription.   There we see, to our  astonishment,  that  this
always occurred by means of a medicine that is  itself capable
of producing an affection similar  to  the  case of disease, al-
though the physicians  themselves knew not what they  were
doing, and acted in forgetfulness of the contrary doctrines of
their own school.  They prescribed a medicine the very reverse
of that which they  should  have  employed according to  the
traditional therapeutics, and it was only in  consequence of so
doing that the patients were rapidly cured. UO
   If we  deduct the   cases   in  which  the   specific  rem-
edy  for   a   disease   of  never  varying  character   has
been made  known   to  physicians of  the  ordinary school
 (not by   their  own  investigation,  but)  by   the  empirical
practice  of  the  common  people,  wherewith  they  are   ena-
bled to  effect a  direct cure, as for instance, of the venereal
chancrous disease with mercury;  of the morbid state resulting
from contusions with arnica;  of   marsh ague  with cinchona
bark; of recent cases of itch with  flowers of sulphur, &c.—if
we deduct these, we  find, that  without almost any exception,
all the other treatment of the old  school physician, in chronic
diseases,  consists in debilitating,  teasing and tormenting the
already afflicted patient, to the aggravation of his disease and
to his destruction, with a great display of dignified gravity on
the  part of the doctor  and  at  a ruinous expense to  the pa-
tient, (o) 
36
INTRODUCTION.
   Blind  experience sometimes  led them  to a  homoeopathic
mode of treatment,1 and yet they did not perceive  the law of
nature in obedience to which cures so  effected did and must

ensue.
   Hence it is  highly important,  for the weal  of mankind, to
ascertain what really took place in these extremely rare but sin-

gularly  salutary  treatments.   The answer we  obtain to  this
question is of the utmost  significance.   They were never  per-

formed in any other manner than  by means of  medicines of
homoeopathic power, that  is to say, capable of producing a

disease similar to the  morbid  state  sought to  be cured; the
cures were effected rapidly and permanently by medicines, the

  i Thus they imagined they could drive out through the skin the sudatory
matter which they believed to stagnate there after a chill, if they gave the
patient to drink, during the cold stage of the catarrhal fever, an infusion of
elder flowers, which is capable of removing such a fever and curing the
patient by its peculiar similarity of  action (homoeopathically), and this it
does most promptly and effectually, without causing perspiration, if but a
small quantity of this infusion, and nothing else, betaken.  To hard, acute
swellings, in which the excessive violence of the inflammation pre vents their
suppuration and causes intolerable pains, they apply very warm poultices,
frequently renewed, and behold! the inflammation  and the pains diminish
rapidly, while the abscess is rapidly  formed, as  is known by the yellowish
Shining elevation and the perceptible softening.  In this case they imagine
that the hardness has been softened by the moisture of the poultice, whereas
it is chiefly by the greater heat of the poultice that the excess of inflamma-
tion has been homoeopathically subdued, and the rapid suppuration been
enabled to take place.—Why do they employ with benefit in many ophthal-
mia? St. Yve's salve, the chief ingredients of which is red oxide of mercury,
which can produce inflammation of the eyes, if anything can? Is it hard to
see that they here act homoeopathically?—Or why should a little parsley
juice produce such evident  relief in  those cases (by no means rare), where
there are anxious, often ineffectual, efforts to urinate, in little children, and
in ordinary gonorrhoea, which is well known by  the very painful, frequent
and almost ineffectual attempts to make water, if the fresh juice of this
plant had not the power of causing,  in healthy persons, a painful, almost
fruitless, urging to urinate, consequently cures homoeopathically?  WTith
the pimpernel root, which causes great secretion of mucus in the bronchia
and fauces, they successfully combated the so-called mucous angina—and
quelled some kinds of metrorrhagia  with the leaves of savine.  which can
itself cause metrorrhagia, without perceiving the homoeopathic curative
law. In cases of constipation from incarcerated hernia and in ileus many
medical men found the constipating  opium, in small doses, to be the most
excellent and certain remedy without having the most  distant idea of the
homoeopathic therapeutic law exemplified in this case.  They cured non-
venereal ulcers of the fauces with small doses of mercury, which is homoeo-
pathic to such states—stopped some diarrhoeas with small doses of the pur-
gative rhubarb—cured hydrophobia with belladonna, that causes a similar
affection, and removed, as if  by magic, the dangerous comatose state in
acute fevers with a small dose of the heating,  stupefying opium; and yet
they abuse homoeopathy, and persecute it with a fury that can only arise
from the stings of an evil conscience in a heart incapable of improvement. 
INTRODUCTION.
37
medical prescribers of which made use of them as it were  by
accident, and even  in opposition  to  the doctrines  of all pre-
vious systems and therapeutics (often without rightly knowing
what they were doing and why they did it), and  thus,  against

their will, they practically confirmed the necessity of the only
therapeutic law consonant to  nature, that of  homoeopathy—a

therapeutic  law, which,  despite the  many facts and innumer-
able hints that pointed to it, no physicians of past epochs have
exerted themselves to discover, blinded as they all  have been

by medical prejudices.
   For even the domestic practice  of the non-medical classes of
the community endowed  with sound  observant  faculties has

many times proved this  mode of  treatment to be  the  surest,

the most radical and the least fallacious in  practice.
   In recent cases of  frost-bitten  limbs frozen sauer kraut is

applied or frictions of snow are used.1

  i It is on such examples of domestic practice that Mr. M. Lux founds his
so-called mode of cure by identicals and idem, which he calls Isopathy, which
some eccentric-minded persons have already adopted as the non plus idtra
of a therapeutic method, without knowing how they could carry it out.
  But if we examine these instances attentively we find that  they do not
bear out these views.
  The purely physical powers differ in  the nature of  their  action on the
living organism from those of a dynamic medicinal kind.
  Heat or cold of the air that surrounds us, or of the water, or of our food
and drink, occasion (as heat and cold) of  themselves no absolute injury to a
healthy body; heat and cold are in their alternations essential to the main-
tenance of healthy life, consequently they are  not of themselves  medicine.
Heat and cold, therefore, act as curative agents in affections of  the body,
not by virtue of their essential nature (not,  therefore, as cold and heat per
se, not as things hurtful in themselves, as are the drugs, rhubarb, china, &c,
even in the smallest doses), but only by virtue of their greater or smaller
quantity, that is, according to their degrees of temperature, just as  (to take
an example from purely physical powers) a great weight of lead will bruise
my hand painfully, not by virtue of its essential nature as lead, for a  thin
plate of lead would not bruise me. but in consequence of  its quantity and
massive weight.
  If. then, cold or heat be serviceable in  bodily ailments like frost-bites or
burns, they are so solely on account of their degree of temperature, just as
they only inflict injury on the healthy  body by their extreme degrees of
temperature.
  Thus we find in these examples of successful domestic practice, that it is
not the prolonged application of the degree  of  cold in  which the limb was
frozen that restores it i«.pathically (it would thereby be rendered quite life-
less and dead), but a degree of cold that  only approximates to that  (fi moeo-
pathy), and which  gradually  rises to a comfortable temperature, as frozen
sauer kraut laid upon the frost-bitten hand in  the temperature of the room
soon melts, gradually growing warmer from 32° or 33° (Pahr.)to the tempera-
ture of the room, supposing that to be only 55°, and thus the limb is recovered
by physical homoeopathy. In like manner, a hand scalded  with boiling 
38
INTRODUCTION.
   The experienced cook holds  his hand,  which he has scalded,
at a certain distance from the fire, and does  not heed  the in-
crease of pain that takes place at first, as  he knows  from  ex-
perience that he can thereby in a very short time,  often in  a
few minutes, convert the burnt part into  healthy painless skin.1
   Other  intelligent non-medical  persons,  as,  for  example,

the manufacturers of lacquered ware,  apply  to  a part scalded
with the hot varnish a substance  that  causes a similar burning


water would not be cured isopathically by the application of boiling water,
but only by a somewhat lower temperature, as, for example, by holding it in
a vessel containing a fluid heated to 160°, which becomes every minute  less
hot, and finally descends to the temperature of  the  room, whereupon the
scalded part is restored by homoeopathy.  Water in the act of freezing cannot
draw out the frost isopathically from potatoes and apples, but this is effected
by water only near the freezing-point.
  So, to give another example from  physical action, the injury resulting
from a blow on the forehead with a hard substance (a painful lump)  is soon
diminished in pain and swelling by pressing on the  spot for a  considerable
time with the ball of the thumb, strongly at first, and then  gradually  less
forcibly, homoeopathically, but not by an equally  hard blow with an equally
hard body, which would increase the evil isopathically.
  The examples of cures by  isopathy given in the book alluded to—muscular
contractions in human beings and spinal paralysis in a dog, which had been
caused by a chill, being rapidly cured by  cold bathing—these  events are
falsely explained by isopathy. What are called sufferings from a chill are
only nominally connected with cold, and often arise, in the bodies of those
predisposed to them, even from a draught of wind which was not at all cold.
Moreover, the manifold effects of a cold bath on the living  organism, in
health and in disease, cannot be reduced to such  a simple formula as to
warrant the construction of a system of such pretensions! That serpents'
bites, as is there stated, are most certainly cured by portions of the serpents,
must remain a mere fable of a former age, until such an improbable asser-
tion is authenticated by indubitable observations and experience, which it
certainly never will be.  That, in fine, the saliva  of a mad dog given to a
patient laboring under hydrophobia (in Russia), is said to have  cured  him
—that "is said" would not seduce any conscientious physician to imitate such
a hazardous experiment, or to construct a so-called isopathic  system, so
dangerous and so highly improbable in its extended application, as has been
done (not by the modest author of the  pamphlet entitled The Isopathy of
Contagions, Leipzic: Kollmann), but by its eccentric supporters, especially
Dr. Gross  (v. Allg. horn. Ztg.,  ii, p. T2), who vaunts this isopathy (cequalia
anualibus) as the  only proper therapeutic  rule,  and sees nothing in the
similia similibus but an indifferent  substitute for  it; ungratefully enough,
as he is entirely  indebted  to the similia similibus for all his  fame  and
fortune, (a)
  1 So also Fernelius (Therap., lib. vi, cap. 20) considers that the best  remedy
for a burnt part is to bring  it near the  fire, whereby  the pain is removed.
John  Hunter (On the Blood, Inflammation, &c, p.  218) mentions the Teat
injury that results from treating burns with cold water, and gives a decided
preference to approaching them to the fire, guided in this, not by the tra-
ditional medical doctrines \vhich(contraria contra Us) prescribe coolin^ things
for inflammation, but by experience, which teaches that the application of
a similar heat (similia similibus) is the most salutary. 
INTRODUCTION.
39
sensation, such  as strong  heated spirits of wine,1  or  oil  of
turpentine,2 and by that means cure themselves in the course

of a few hours,  whereas cooling salves, as they  are well aware,

  ' Sydenham (Opera, p. 271 [edit. Syd. Soc, p. 601]) says that  spirits of ivine.
repeatedly applied, is preferable to all other remedies in burns.  Benjamin
Bell, too (System of Surgery, 3rd edit., 1789), acknowledges that experience
shows that homoeopathic remedies only are efficacious.  He  says:  "One of
the best applications to everv  burn of this kind is strong brandy or any
other ardent spirit; it seems to induce a momentary  additional pain (see
below,  § 157), but this soon subsides, and is succeeded by an agreeable sooth-
ing sensation.  It  proves most effectual when the parts can be kept im-
mersed in it; but where this cannot be done, they should be kept constantly
moist with pieces of old linen soaked in spirits."  To this I may add that
warm, and indeed  very warm, alcohol is much  more rapidly and much more
certainly efficacious, for it is much more homoeopathic than when not lieated. And
all experience confirms this in a most astonishing manner.
  - Edward Kentish, having to  treat the workers in coal pits, who were so
often dreadfully burnt by the explosion of fire-damp,  applied heated oil of
turpentine or alcohol, as the best remedy in the most extensive and severest
burns  (Second Essay on Burns, London, 1798).  No treatment can  be more
homoeopathic than this, nor is any more efficacious.
  The  estimable and experienced Heister  (Institut. Chirurg., Tom. i,  p.  33)
confirms this from  his own observation and extols the application of turpen-
tine oil, of alcohol  and of very hot poultices for this end, as hot as ever they
can be borne.
  But the amazing superiority of the application to burns of these remedies,
which possess the power of exciting burning  sensation and heat (and are
consequently homoeopathic), over palliative refrigerant remedies, is most
incontestably shown by pure experimentation, in which the two opposite
methods of treatment are employed for the sake of comparison, in burns of
equal intensity in  the same body.
  Thus Benjamin Bell (Kiihn'sPhys. Med.Journ.,  Leipzic, 1801, Jun., p. 428),
in the case of a lady who had scalded both arms,  caused  one to be covered
with oil of turpentine, and made her plunge the  other into cold water.  In half
an hour the first arm was well, but the other continued to be  painful for six
hours longer; when it was  withdrawn one instant from  the water she ex-
perienced much greater pain in it, and it required a much longer time than  the
first for its cure
  John Anderson (Kentish, op. cit., p. 43) treated in a similar  manner a lady
who had scalded herself with boiling grease. "The face which was very red
and scalded and excessively painful was, a few minutes after the accident,
covered with oil of  turpentine; her arm she had, of her own accord, plunged
into cold water, with which she desired to treat it for some hours.  In the
course of seven hours her fact looked much better,andtho pain was relieved.
She had frequently renewed the cold water for the arm, but whenever she
withdrew it she complained of much pain, and, in truth, the inflammation
in it had increased.   The following morning I found that she had had during
the night great pain in the arm; the inflammation had extended above the
elbow; several large blisters had risen, and thick eschars had formed on the
arm and hand; a warm poultice was then applied.  The face was completely
free from pain, but emollient applications had to be used for the arm for a
fortnight longer, before it was cured."
  Who can fail to perceive in this instance the infinite superiority  of the (homoeo-
pathic) treatment by means of remedies of similar action, over the wretched treat-
ment by opposites (contraria contrariis)  of the  antiquated  ordinary  school of
medicine! 
40
INTRODUCTION.
would not effect a  cure in as many months, and cold  water1
would make matters worse.
  The old experienced reaper, although he may not be  in the
habit of drinking brandy,  will not touch cold water (contraria
contrariis) when he has worked himself  into a violent feverish
state in the heat of the sun—he knows the danger of  such a
proceeding—but he takes a small quantity of a heating  liquor,
a mouthful of  brandy; experience, the teacher of truth, has
convinced him of the  great superiority and efficacy  of  this
homoeopathic procedure,  whereby  his heat and fatigue are
speedily removed. 2(a>
  There  have occasionally been physicians  who vaguely  sur-
mised that  medicines  cure  analogous morbid  states  by the
power they possess of producing analogous morbid symptoms.3
   Thus  the  author  of  the  book:   irepl  toVcdi/ tov  ko.t' av-
0pa>7rov„4 which  is  among the writings attributed to Hippoc-
rates, has the following remarkable words:  Sid. to. o(j.ouj. vouo-os
ylverai, Kol Sid. to. o/xoia Trpoo-<f>ep6fJ.€va  c'k voaevvTwv vyutlvovTai,—
81a. to ifieeiv  c/xeros Travcrai.^
   Later physicians have also felt and expressed the truth  of
the  homoeopathic  method   of  cure.    Thus, for  instance,
Boulduc5 perceived that the purgative property  of rhubarb was
the cause of its power  to allay diarrhoea.
   Detharding6(a)  guessed  that  the infusion of  senna leaves
relieved colic in  adults by virtue  of  its  analogous action  in
causing colic in healthy persons.

  1 John Hunter (loc. cit.) is not singular in asserting the great injury done
by treating burns with cold water.  W. Fabricius of Hilden, also  (De Com-
 bustionihus libellus, Basil, 1007, cap. 5, p. 11), alleges that cold applications in
burns are highly injurious and productive of the most serious consequences;
inflammation, ^suppuration and  sometimes  mortification are caused by
 them.
  2 Zimmerman (Ueber die Erfahrung. ii, p. 318) informs us that the inhabi-
 tants of hot countries act in the same manner, with the best results, a,nd
 that, after being very much heated, they swallow a small quantity of some
 spirituous liquor.
  3 I do not bring forward the  following passages from authors who had a
 presentiment of homoeopathy as proofs in support of  this doctrine, which is
 firmly established by its own intrinsic merits, but in order to avoid the im-
 putation of having suppressed these foreshadowings with the view of claim-
 ing for myself the priority of the idea.
   * Basil. Froben., 15:58. p. 72.
   5 Memoires de V Academie Royale, 1710.
   6 Eph Xat. Cur , cent, x, obs. 70. 
INTRODUCTION.
41
    Bertholon1 confesses that in  diseases electricity diminishes
 and removes pain very similar to that which itself produces.
    Thoury2 testifies that positive electricity possesses the power
 of quickening the pulse, but when that is already  morbidly
 accelerated it diminishes its frequency.
    Von Stoerk3 makes the  following  suggestion:    "If  stra-
 monium  disorders the mind and produces mania in healthy
 persons,  ought we not to try if in cases of insanity it cannot
 restore reason by producing a revolution in the ideas?"
    But a  Danish army physician, of the name of Stahl,4 has
 expressed his conviction on this point in the most unequivocal
 terms.   "The rule generally acted on in medicine,"  says he,
 "to treat by means of oppositely acting  remedies  (contraria
 contrariis) is quile false and the reverse of  what ought to be;
 I am, on  the contrary, convinced that diseases  will yield to,
 and be cured by, remedies  that  produce  a  similar  affection
 (similia similibus),—burns  by exposure to the fire, frost-bitten
 limbs by  the  application of  snow and the coldest water, in-
 flammation and bruises by  distilled spirits;  and in like manner
 I have treated a tendency to acidity of the  stomach  by a  very
 small  dose of sulphuric acid with  the most successful  result,
 in cases  where  a number of absorbent  remedies  had  been
 fruitlessly employed."
   How near was the great truth  sometimes  of being  appre-
 hended!  But it was dismissed with a mere passing thought,
 and thus  the  indispensable  change of the  antiquated medical
 treatment of  disease,  of  the  improper therapeutic  system
 hitherto in vogue, into a real, true,  and certain healing  art,
 remained  to be accomplished in our own times.
  1 Medicin. Electrisitat., ii, pp. 15 and 282.
  2 Memoire lu a V Academie de Caen.
  * Libell. de Stram., p. 8.
  4 In Jo. Hammelii, Commentatio  de Arthritide tarn tartarea, quam scorbutica,
sew podagra  etscorbuto, Budingae, 1738, viii, pp. 40—42. 
ORGANON  OF  MEDICINE.
                             § l.«0

  The physician's  high and only mission is to restore the sick

to health,  to cure, as it is termed.J


                               §2.

  The highest  ideal of a cure is rapid,  gentle and  permanent

restoration of  the  health, or removal and  annihilation of  the

disease in  its whole extent, in the shortest, most reliable,  and
most harmless  way, on easily comprehensible principles. (°)



                               § 3.

   If the  physician clearly perceives what is  to be  cured  in
diseases, that  is to say,  in every individual case of  disease
(knowledge of disease, indication),  if  he  clearly  perceives what

  1 His mission is not, however, to construct so-called systems, by inter-
weaving empty speculations and hypotheses concerning the internal essen-
tial nature of the vital processes and the mode in which diseases originate
in the invisible interior of the organism (whereon so many physicians have
hitherto ambitiously wasted their talents and their time);  nor is it to at-
tempt to give countless explanations regarding the phenomena in diseases
and their proximate cause (which must ever remain concealed),  wrapped
in unintelligible words and an inflated abstract mode of expression, which
 should sound very learned in order to astonish the ignorant—whilst sick
 humanity sighs in vain  for aid.  Of such learned reveries (to which  the
 name of theoretic medicine is given, and for which special  professorships are
 instituted) we have had quite enough, and it is  now high time that all who
 call themselves physicians should at length cease to deceive suffering man-
 kind with mere talk, and begin now, instead, for once to act, that is, really
 to help and to cure. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
43
is  curative  in medicines, that  is  to say,  in  each individual
medicine, (knowledge of medicinal powers), and  if he  knows
how to adapt, according to clearly defined  principles, what is
curative in medicines to what he has discovered to be undoubt-
edly morbid in the patient, so that  recovery  must ensue—to
adapt  it, as well  in  respect to the suitability of  the medicine
most appropriate according to its mode of action to  the case
before him (choice of the remedy, the medicine indicated),  as also
in respect to the exact mode of preparation and quantity of it
required (proper dose), and the proper period for repeating the
dose;—if, finally, he knows the  obstacles to recovery in each
case and is aware how to remove them, so that the restoration
may be permanent:  then he understands how to treat judiciously
and rationally, and he is a true  practitioner of the healing
art.W
                            S 4.
   He  is  likewise a preserver of health if he knows the things
that derange  health and cause  disease,  and how to remove
them from persons in health. («)
                            I 5.
   Useful to the  physician in  assisting him  to  cure are  the
particulars of  the most probable  exciting  cause  of the acute
disease, as also the most significant points in the whole  history
of  the chronic disease, to enable  him to discover its  funda-
mental cause,  which is generally due to a chronic miasm.  In
these investigations, the ascertainable physicial constitution of
the patient (especially when the disease is chronic), his moral
and intellectual character, his occupation,  mode of living and
habits, his social and domestic relations, his age,  sexual func-
tion, &c., are to be taken into consideration. (a>

                            I 6.
   The unprejudiced observer—well  aware of the futility of
transcendental speculations which can receive no  confirmation
from experience—be his  powers of penetration ever so great,
takes note of  nothing in every  individual  disease, except the
changes  in  the  health  of the body and of the mind  (morbid
phenomena,  accidents, symptoms)  which  can  be  perceived ex-
ternally by means of the senses;  that is to  say, he notices only 
44
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
the deviations from the former  healthy state of the now dis-
eased  individual,  which  are  felt  by the  patient  himself,
remarked by those around him and observed by the physician.
All these perceptible  signs represent  the disease in its whole
extent, that  is, together they form the true and only conceiv-

able portrait of the disease.x °)

                               I 7.

   Now,  as in  a disease, from  which  no  manifest  exciting  or

maintaining  cause (causa occasionalis) has to be removed,2 we
can  perceive  nothing  but  the  morbid  symptoms, it  must
(regard being had  to the possibility of a  miasm, and attention

paid  to  the  accessory circumstances, I  5)  be  the  symptoms
alone  by which the disease demands and points to the remedy
suited to relieve it—and,  moreover,  the  totality of these its
symptoms, of this  outwardly reflected picture of  the  internal

  i I know not,  therefore, how it was possible for physicians at the sick-bed
to allow themselves to suppose that, without most carefully attending to
the symptoms and being guided  by them in the treatment, they ought to
seek and could discover, only in the hidden  and unknown interior, what
there was to be cured in the disease, arrogantly and ludicrously pretending
that they could, without paying much  attention to the symptoms, discover
the alteration that had occurred in the invisible interior, and set it to rights
with (unknown!) medicines, and that such a procedure as this could alone
be called radical and rational treatment.
  Is not. then, that which is cognizable by the senses in diseases through the
phenomena it displays, the disease itself in the eyes of the physician, since
he never can see the spiritual being that produces the disease, the vital
force? nor is it necessary that he should see  it, but only that he should as-
certain its morbid actions, in order that he may thereby be enabled to cure
the disease.  What else will the old school search for in the hidden interior
of the organism, as a prima causa nv>rhi. whilst they reject as  an object of
cure and  contemptuously despise the sensible and manifest representation
of the disease,  the symptoms, that so plainly address themselves to us?
What else do they wish to cure in diseases, but these?*
  2 It is not necessary to say that every intelligent physician would first
remove this where it exists; the indisposition thereupon generally ceases
spontaneously.  He will remove from the room strong-smelling  flowers.
which have a tendency to  cause syncope and hysterical sufferings; extract
from  the cornea the foreign body that excites inflammation of the eye;
loosen the over-tight bandage on a wounded limb that threatens to cause
mortification, and apply a  more suitable one, lay bare and put a ligature on
the wounded artery that produces fainting; endeavor to promote the ex-
pulsion by vomiting of belladonna berries. &c. that may have been swal-
  * "The physician whose researches are directed towards the hidden rela-
tions in the interior of the organism, may daily err; but the homceopathist
who grasps with requisite carefulness the whole group of symptoms, pos-
sesses a sure guide;  and if he succeed in removing the  whole group of
symptoms, he has likewise most assuredly destroyed the  internal, hidden
cause of the disease."  (Rau, op. cit., p. 103). 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
t5
essence of the disease, that  is, of  the  affection  of  the vital
force,^  must be the principal, or the  sole means, whereby

the  disease can make known what  remedy  it requires—the
only thing that can  determine the choice  of the most  appro-
priate  remedy—and  thus,  in a word,  the  totality1  of  the
symptoms must be the principal, indeed  the only thing  the

physician has to  take note of  in every case of  disease and to
remove by means of his art,  in order that it shall  be cured  and

transformed into health.(fl)

                                I 8.

   It is not conceivable, nor  can it be  proved by any experience
in the world,  that, after removal of all the  symptoms  of  the
disease and of  the entire  collection of  the  perceptible pheno-
mena,  there  should  or  could remain  anything  else  besides
health, or that  the  morbid  alteration  in the  interior could

remain uneradicated.2

lowed; extract foreign substances that may have got into the orifices of the
body (the  nose,  gullet, ears, urethra, rectum, vagina);  crush the vesical
calculus; open the imperforate anus of the new-born infant. &c.
  1 In all times, the old school physicians, not knowing how else to give re-
lief, have sought to combat and if possible to suppress by medicines,  here
and there, a single symptom from among a number in diseases—a one-sided
procedure, which, under the name of symptomatic treatment, has justly excited
universal  contempt, because by it, not only  was  nothing gained, but much
harm was  inflicted. A single one of the symptoms  present is no more the
disease itself than a single foot is the man himself.  This procedure was so
much the  more reprehensible, that such a single symptom was only treated
by an antagonistic remedy (therefore only in an enantiopathic and pallia-
tive manner), whereby, after a slight alleviation, it was  subsequently only
rendered all the worse.
  2 (a) When a patient has been cured of his disease by a true physician, in
such a manner  that no trace of  the disease, no morbid symptom, remains,
and all the signs of health have permanently returned, how can anyone,
without offering an insult to common sense, affirm that in such an individual
the whole bodily disease still remains in the  interior?  And yet the chief of
the old school.  Hufeland, asserts this in the following  words:  "Homoeo-
pathy can remove the symptoms, but the disease remains."  (Vide Homoo-
pathie, p. 27,1.19). This he maintains partly  from mortification at the prog-
ress made by homoeopathy to the benefit of mankind, partly because he still
holds thoroughly material  notions respecting  disease, which he is still
unable to regard as a state of being of  the organism wherein it is dynami-
cally altered by the morbidly deranged vital force, as an altered state of
health, but he views the disease  as a something material, which, after the
cure is completed, may still remain lurking in some corner in the interior of
the body, in order, some day during the most vigorous health, to burst forth
 at its pleasure with its material presence! So dreadful is still the blindness
of the old  pathology! No wonder that it could only produce a system of
therapeutics which is solely occupied with scouring out the poor patient. 
16
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
                            § 9. («)
   In the healthy condition of man, the spiritual  vital  force
 (autocracy), the  dynamis  that animates  the  material  body
 (organism), rules with unbounded sway,  and retains all the
 parts  of the organism in admirable, harmonious, vital opera-
 tion, as regards  both sensations  and  functions, so that our
 indwelling, reason-gifted mind can freely employ this living,
 healthy instrument for the higher purposes of our existence.
                             § 10.
   The material organism, without the  vital  force, is capable
 of no sensation, no function, no self-preservation;1  it derives
 all sensation and performs all the functions of life solely by
 means of the immaterial  being (the vital force) which animates
 the material organism in health and in disease.

                            8 11.
   When a person falls ill, it  is only this spiritual, self-acting
 (automatic) vital force,  everywhere present  in  his organism,
 that is primarily deranged by the dynamic influence upon it of
 a  morbific agent inimical to  life; it is only the vital force,
 deranged to such an  abnormal   state,  that can furnish the
 organism with  its disagreeable sensations, and incline it to the
 irregular  processes which  we call  disease;  for, as  a power
 invisible  in itself, and only  cognizable by its  effects on the
 organism, its morbid derangement only makes itself known by
 the manifestation of disease in the sensations and functions of
 those  parts of  the organism exposed  to  the  senses of the
 observer and physician, that is, by morbid symptoms, and in
 no other way can it make itself known.

                            § 12.
   It is the morbidly affected  vital force alone  that  produces
 diseases,2 so that the morbid phenomena  perceptible to our
 1 It is dead, and now only subject to the power of the external physical
 world; it decays; and is again  resolved into its chemical constituents.
 2 How the vital  force causes the organism to display morbid phenomena,
that is. how it produces disease, it would be of no practical utility to the
physician to  know, and therefore it will forever remain concealed from
him;  only what it is necessary for him to know of the disease and what is
fully sufficient for enabling him to cure it, has the Lord of life revealed to
his senses. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
47
senses express at the same time all the internal change, that
is  to say,  the  whole  morbid derangement  of the  internal
dynamis; in  a word, they reveal  the  whole disease; conse-
quently, also, the disappearance under  treatment  of all  the
morbid phenomena and of all the morbid alterations that differ
from the healthy vital  operations,  certainly effects  and neces-
sarily implies the restoration of the integrity of the vital force
and, therefore,  the recovered health of  the whole organism.
                           I 13.
  Therefore disease (that does not  come within the province of
manual  surgery) considered, as it  is  by the allopathists, as a
thing separate from the living whole, from the organism and
its animating vital force, and  hidden in the interior,  be it of
ever so subtile a character, is an absurdity,  that could only be
imagined by minds of  a materialistic stamp, and  has  for
thousands of years given to the prevailing system of medicine
all  those pernicious impulses that have made it a truly mis-
chievous [non-healing] art.
                           I 14.
  There  is, in  the  interior of man,  nothing morbid that  is
curable  and  no  invisible  morbid  alteration  that  is curable
which does not make itself known to the accurately observing
physician by means of morbid signs and symptoms—an ar-
rangement  in  perfect conformity with the infinite goodness of
the all-wise Preserver of human life.
                           I 15.
   The affection of the morbidly deranged, spirit-like  dynamis
(vital force) that animates our body  in the invisible  interior,
and the  totality of the outwardly cognizable symptoms pro-
duced  by  it  in the organism and representing the  existing
malady,  constitute a whole; they are one and the same.  The
organism is indeed  the material instrument of the life, but  it
is not conceivable without the animation imparted to it by the
instinctively perceiving and regulating vital force  (just as the
vital force is  not conceivable without the organism), conse-
quently  the  two  together constitute a  unity, although  in
thought our mind separates this unity into two distinct con-
ceptions for the sake of facilitating the comprehension of it. 
48
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
                             § 16.
  Our vital force, as a spirit-like dynamis, cannot be attacked
and  affected by injurious influences  on the healthy organism
caused  by the external  inimical forces that  disturb the har-
monious play of life, otherwise than in a spirit-like  (dynamic)
way,  and in  like  manner,  all  such  morbid  derangements
(diseases) cannot be removed from it by  the  physician in any
other way than by the spirit-like (dynamic, virtual)  alterative
powers of the serviceable medicines acting upon our  spirit-like
vital force, which perceives  them through the medium of the
sentient faculty of the  nerves  everywhere present  in  the or-
ganism, so that it is only by their dynamic action on the vital
force that remedies are able to re-establish and do actually re-
establish health and  vital harmony, after the changes in the
health of the patient cognizable by  our senses (the  totality of
the  symptoms)  have revealed the  disease  to  the  carefully
observing and investigating physician as fully as was requisite
in order to enable him to cure it.
                             § 17.
   Now, as in the cure effected by the removal of the whole of
the  perceptible signs  and symptoms  of the disease the internal
alteration of the vital force to which the disease is due—con-
sequently the  whole of the  disease—is at the  same  time
removed,1 it follows that the physician  has only to remove the
whole of the symptoms  in order, at the same time, to abrogate
and  annihilate the internal change,  that  is to say,  the morbid
 derangement of  the  vital force—consequently  the  totality of
 the disease, the disease  itself.2  But when the disease is an-
  1 A warning dream,  a  superstitious fancy, or  a solemn prediction that
 death would occur at a certain day or at a certain hour, has not unfrequent-
 ly produced all the signs of commencing and increasing disease, of approach-
 ing death and death itself at the hour announced, which could not happen
 without the simultaneous production of the inward change (corresponding
 to the state observed externally); and hence in  such cases all the morbid
 signs indicative of approaching death have frequently been dissipated by an
 identical cause, by some cunning deception or persuasion to a belief in the
 contrary, and health suddenly restored, which  could not have  happened
 without the removal, by means of this moral remedy, of the internal and
 external morbid change that threatened death.
   2 It is only thus that God, the Preserver of mankind, could reveal His
 wisdom and goodness in reference to the cure of the diseases  to which man
 is liable here  below, by showing to the physician what he had to remove in
 diseases in order to annihilate them and thus re-establish health.  But what 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
49
 nihilated the health is restored,  and this is the highest, the
 sole aim  of the physician who knows the true  object  of his
 mission, which consists not in learned-sounding  prating, but in
 giving aid to the sick. (fl)
                             I 18.
   From this indubitable truth, that,  besides the totality of the
 symptoms,  nothing can by any means be discovered in diseases
 wherewith  they could  express their need of aid, it follows
 undeniably that the sum of all the symptoms in each individual
 case of disease must  be the  sole  indication,  the sole guide to
 direct us in the choice of a remedy.

                             I 19.
   Now,  as  diseases are nothing   more than  alterations  in the
 state of health of  the healthy individual which express them-
 selves by morbid signs, and  the cure is also only possible  by a
 change to the healthy condition of  the state  of  health  of the
 diseased  individual, it  is very evident  that medicines  could
 never  cure diseases if  they  did  not possess  the power  of
 altering man's state of health which depends on sensations and
 functions;  indeed, that  their curative power must be  owing
 solely to  this power they  possess of altering man's state  of
 health.
                           I  20. («)
   This spirit-like  power to  alter man's state of  health  (and
 hence to cure diseases) which lies hidden in the inner nature
 of medicines can never be discovered by us by a mere effort of
 reason;  it is only  by experience of the phenomena it displays
 when acting on the state of health of man that we can become
 clearly cognizant of it.
                             I 21.
   Now, as  it  is  undeniable  that the  curative principle  in
 medicines is not in itself perceptible, and as in pure experi-
 ments with medicines  conducted  by the  most  accurate ob-
 servers, nothing can  be observed that  can  constitute  them
 would we think of His  wisdom and goodness if He had shrouded in mysteri-
 ous obscurity that which was to be cured in diseases (as is  asserted by the
 dominant  school of medicine, which affects to possess a Supernatural in-
 sight into the inner nature of things), and shut it up in the hidden interior,
 and thus rendered it impossible for man to know the malady accurately,
consequently impossible for him to cure it?
                                                     4 
50
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
medicines or  remedies except  that  power of  causing distinct
alterations  in  the state  of health  of  the human body,  and
parti6ularly in that of the healthy individual, and of  exciting
in him various definite morbid  symptoms;  so it follows  that
when medicines  act as  remedies,  they  can only bring their
curative property into play  by means of this their  power of
altering man's state of health by the production of  peculiar
symptoms;  and  that,  therefore,  we have only  to rely  on the
morbid phenomena which the medicines produce in the healthy
body as the sole possible revelation of their indwelling curative
power,  in order  to  learn what disease-producing power, and
at the same time what disease-curing power, each individual
medicine possesses.
                             I  22.
   But as nothing is to be observed in diseases that must be
removed  in order  to  change  them into  health  besides  the
totality of  their signs and symptoms, and  likewise medicines
can  show nothing curative besides  their tendency to  produce
morbid symptoms in healthy persons(a< and to remove them in
diseased persons; it follows, on  the one  hand, that medicines
only become remedies and capable of annihilating  diseases,
because the medicinal  substance, by exciting  certain  effects
and symptoms, that is to say,  by producing a certain artificial
morbid state, removes and abrogates the  symptoms already
present, to-wit, the natural morbid state  we wish to cure.   On
the other hand,  it follows that,  for the  totality of  the symp-
toms of the disease to  be cured, a medicine must  be  sought
which (according as experience shall prove whether the morbid
symptoms  are  most  readily, certainly,  and  permanently re-
moved and changed into health by similar or opposite medicinal
symptoms1) has  a tendency to  produce similar or  opposite
symptoms.
  i The other possible mode of employing medicines  for diseases besides
these two (the allopathic method), in which medicines are given, whose symp-
toms have no direct pathological relation to the morbid state, consequently
are neither similar nor opposite, but quite heterogeneous to the symptoms
of the disease, is, as I have shown above, in the  Introduction (Review of the
therapeutics, allopathy and palliative  treatment that have hitherto been prac-
ticed in the old school of medicine), merely  an imperfect and injurious imitation of
the extremely imperfect efforts of the unintelligent, merely instinctive vital force
which, when made ill by noxious agents, strives to save itself at whatever sacrifice
by the production and continuance of morbid irritation in the organism—an 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.                  51
                              I 23.

   All  pure  experience,  however,  and all  accurate  research
 convince us that persistent symptoms of  disease are far from
 being removed and annihilated by opposite symptoms of medi-
 cines (as in the antipathic, enantiopathic or palliative method),
 that, on the  contrary, after  transient, apparent alleviation,
 they  break  forth  again,  only  with  increased  intensity, and
 become manifestly aggravated (see §§ 58—62 and 69).

                              § 24.

   There remains,  therefore,  no  other  mode  of  employing
 medicines in diseases that promises  to be of service  besides
 the homoeopathic,  by means of which we seek, for the totality
 of  the symptoms of  the case of  disease, a medicine  which

 among all  medicines  (whose  pathogenetic effects are  known
 from having been tested  in healthy individuals)  has the power
 and tendency to produce an artificial morbid  state most similar
 to that of the case of disease in question.

                            I 25. W

   Now, however,   in  all  careful trials, pure experience,1 the
 sole and infallible  oracle  of  the  healing art, teaches us  that

 imitation, consequently, of the crude vital force which was  implanted in our
 organism in order to preserve our life in health, in the most beautiful har-
 mony; but when deranged by disease, was so constituted as to admit of
 being again changed to health (homoeopathically) by the intelligent physi-
 cian, but not to cure itself, for which the little power it possesses is so far
 from being a pattern  to be copied, that all the changes and symptoms it
 produces in the (morbidly deranged) organism are just the disease itself.
 But  this injudicious  system of therapeutics of the old school  of medicine
 can no more be passed by unnoticed than can history omit to record the
 thousands of years of oppression to which mankind has been subjected
 under the irrational, despotic Governments.
  1 I  do not mean that sort of experience of which the ordinary practitioners
 of the old school boast, after they have for years worked away with a lot of
 complex prescriptions on a number of diseases which they never carefully
 investigated, but which, faithful to the tenets of their school, they consid-
 ered  as already described in works of systematic pathology, and dreamed
 that  they could detect in them some imaginary morbific matter, or ascribed
 to them some other hypothetical internal abnormality. They  always saw-
 something in them, but knew not what it was they saw, and they got results,
 from the complex forces acting on an unknown object, that no human being
 but only a God could  have unravelled—results from which nothing can be
 learned, no experience gained.  Fifty years' experience of this sort is like
fifty years of looking into a kaleidoscope filled with unknown colored ob-
jects, and perpetually turning round;  thousands of ever-changing figures
and no accounting for them! 
52                  ORGANON  OP MEDICINE.


actually  that medicine which, in its action  on  the healthy
human body, has demonstrated its  power of  producing  the
greatest number of  symptoms similar to those  observable  in
the case  of  disease  under  treatment, does also,  in  doses  of
suitable potency and attenuation, rapidly, radically and  per-
manently remove the totality of the symptoms of  this morbid
state,  that is to say (U 6—16), the whole disease present, and
change it into health;  and  that all medicines cure, without
exception, those  diseases whose  symptoms  most nearly re-

semble their own,  and leave none of  them uncured.

                            §  26. ^)

  This depends  on the following  homoeopathic  law of nature

which  was   sometimes,  indeed,  vaguely  surmised   but  not
hitherto fully recognized,  and  to which is due every  real  cure

that has ever taken place.
  A weaker dynamic affection is permanently  extinguished in
the living organism by a stronger one,  if the  latter (whilst differ-
ing in kind) is very similar to the former in its manifestations.1

                            I  27. (^

  The curative power  of  medicines, therefore,  depends  on
their symptoms, similar  to the disease  but superior to it in

  1 Thus are cured both physical affections and moral maladies.(a) How is
it that in the early dawn the brilliant Jupiter vanishes from the gaze of the
beholder?  By a stronger very similar power acting on his optic nerve, the
brightness of  approaching day!—In situations  replete  with foetid odors,
wherewith is it usual to sooth effectually  the offended olfactory nerves?
With snuff, that affects the sense of smell in a similar but stronger manner!
No music, no sugared cake, which act on the nerves of other senses, can cure
this olfactory disgust.  How does the soldier cunningly stifle the piteous
cries of him who runs the gauntlet from the ears of the compassionate by-
standers?  By the shrill notes of the fife commingled with the roll of the
noisy drum!  And the distant roar of the enemy's cannon that  inspires his
army with fear? By the loud boom of the  big drum! For neither the one
nor the other would the distribution of a brilliant  piece of uniform nor a
reprimand to the regiment suffice.—In like manner, mourning  and sorrow
will be effaced from the mind by the account of another and still greater
cause for sorrow happening to another, even though it be a mere fiction.
The injurious consequences of too great joy will be removed by drinking
coffee, which produces an excessively joyous state of mind. Nations like
the Germans, who have for centuries been gradually sinking deeper and
deeper in soulless apathy and degrading serfdom, must first be trodden still
deeper in the dust by the Western Conqueror, until their situation became
intolerable; their mean opinion of themselves was thereby overstrained and
removed; they again became alive to their dignity as men, and then, for the
first time, they raised their heads as Germans. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
53
strength (U  12—26), so that  each individual  case of disease
is most surely, radically, rapidly and  permanently annihilated
and  removed only by a medicine capable of producing (in the
human system) in the most similar and complete manner the
totality of its symptoms, which at the same time are stronger
than the disease.
                             I 28.
  As  this natural law of cure manifests itself in every pure
experiment  and every true observation in  the world,  the fact
is consequently established; it matters  little what may be the
scientific explanation of how it takes  place;   and  I  do not
attach much  importance to the attempts made  to explain it.
But the following view seems to  commend itself as the most
probable one, as  it  is founded  on premises derived  from ex-
perienced. (°)
                            \ 29. («)
   As every disease (not strictly  belonging to the domain of sur-
gery)  depends only on a peculiar morbid  derangement of our
vital force in sensations and functions,  when a homoeopathic cure
of the vital  force  deranged by natural  disease is accomplished
by  the administration of a  medicinal  agent selected on  account
of an accurate similarity  of  symptoms, a  somewhat  stronger,
similar, artificial morbid affection is  brought  into contact with
and, as  it were,  pushed into  the  place of the  weaker, similar,
natural  morbid irritation, against  which the  instinctive  vital
force,  now  merely  (though  in  a  stronger  degree) medicinally
diseased,  is  then  compelled to  direct  an  increased  amount  of
energy, but,  on account of  the shorter  duration of the action1 of
 1 The short duration of the action of the artificial morbific forces, which
we term medicines, makes it possible that, although they are stronger than
the natural diseases, they can yet be much more easily overcome by the
vital force than can the weaker natural diseases, which, solely in  conse-
quence of the  longer, generally lifelong, duration  of their action  (psora,
syphilis, sycosis), can never be vanquished and extinguished by it  alone,
until the physician affects the vital force in a stronger manner by an agent
that  produces  a disease yery similar, but stronger, to-wit, a homoeopathic
medicine, which, when taken (or smelt), is. as it were, forced upon the unin-
telligent, instinctive vital force, and substituted in the place of the former
natural  morbid  affection, by which  means  the vital  force then remains
merely  medicinally ill. but only for a short time, because the action of the
medicine (the  time in which the medicinal disease excited by  it runs its
course)  does not last long. The cures of diseases of many years' duration
(8 4fi). by the occurrence of smallpox and measles (both of which run a course
of only a few weeks), are processes of a similar character.(a) 
54
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
the medicinal agent that  now morbidly affects it, the vital force
soon overcomes this, and as it  was in the first instance relieved
from the natural morbid affection, so it is now at last freed from
the substituted artificial (medicinal)  one, and hence is enabled
again to  carry on healthily the vital operations of the organ.
ism. (a)    This highly probable explanation of the process rests
on the following axioms.
                            3 30.
   The human body appears  to admit  of  being much  more
powerfully affected in  its health by medicines (partly because
we have the regulation of the dose in our own  power) than by
natural  morbid  stimuli—for  natural  diseases are cured and
overcome by suitable medicines.

                            I 31.
   The  inimical  forces,  partly  psychical, partly  physical,  to
which our terrestrial  existence  is exposed,  which are  termed
morbific noxious agents,  do not possess  the  power of morbidly
deranging the  health  of  man  unconditionally;1  but  we  are
made ill by  them only when our organism  is sufficiently dis-
posed and susceptible  to the attack of the morbific cause  that
may  be present,  and to be altered in its health, deranged and
made to undergo  abnormal   sensations and functions—hence
they do not produce disease in every one nor at all times.

                             I 32.
   But  it is quite otherwise with the artificial morbific agents
which we term medicines.   Every real  medicine,  namely, acts
at all  times,  under all circumstances,  on every living human
being, and  produces in  him  its peculiar symptoms (distinctly
perceptible, if the  dose be large enough), so that  evidently
every living human organism  is liable to be affected,  and, as it
were, inoculated  with  the medicinal disease at all times,  and
  i When I call disease a derangement of man's state of health. I am far from
wishing thereby to give a hyperphysical explanation of the internal nature
of diseases generally, or of any case of disease in particular. It is only in-
tended by this expression  to intimate, what it can be proved diseases are
not and cannot be, that they are not mechanical or chemical alterations of
the material substance of the body, and not dependent on a material mor-
bific substance, but that they are merely spiritual dynamic derangements
of the life. 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
55
 absolutely  (unconditionally),  which, as  before  said,  is  by no
 means the case with the natural disease.

                             I 33.
   In accordance with this fact, it is undeniably shown  by all
 experience1  that  the living  human organism  is  much  more
 disposed and  has a greater  liability to be acted  on, and to
 have its health deranged by medicinal  powers, than by mor-
 bific noxious agents and infectious miasms, or, in other words,
 that the morbific noxious agents possess a power of morbidly
 deranging man's health that is subordinate and conditional, often
 very conditional, whilst medicinal agents have an absolute un-
 conditional power, greatly superior to the former.

                             I 34.
   The greater strength  of the artificial  diseases producible by
 medicines is, however,  not the  sole cause  of  their power to
 cure natural diseases.   In order  that they may effect a cure,
 it is before all  things requisite that they should be capable of
 producing in the human body an artificial disease as similar as
 possible  to the  disease to be cured, in order,  by means of this
 similarity,  conjoined with  its  somewhat greater strength, to
 substitute themselves  for the  natural   morbid  affection, and
 thereby  deprive the latter of all influence upon  the  vital force.
 This  is  so true,  that  no previously  existing  disease can be
 cured, even by Nature  herself, by  the accession of   a new
 dissimilar disease, be it ever so strong, and  just as  little can
 it be cured  by medical  treatment with drugs which are in-
 capable  of producing a  similar morbid condition in  the healthy
 body.
                             I 35.
   In order to illustrate  this, we shall consider in three different
  1 A striking fact in corroboration of this is, that whilst previously to the
 year lr>01, when the smooth scarlatina of Sydenham still occasionally pre-
 vailed epidemically among children, it attacked  without  exception all
 children who had  escaped it in a former epidemic; in a similar epidemic
 which I witnessed in Konigslutter, on the contrary,  all the children who
 took in time a very small dose of belladonna remained unaffected by this
 highly infectious infantile disease.  If medicines can protect from a disease
 that is raging around, they must possess a vastly superior power of affecting
our vital force. 
56
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
cases, as well  what  happens in nature  when  two dissimilar
natural diseases meet together in one person, as also the result
of the ordinary medical  treatment of  diseases  with unsuit-
able allopathic  drugs,  which are incapable of  producing an
artificial  morbid condition similar to the disease  to be cured,
whereby  it will  appear that even Nature herself is unable to
remove a dissimilar disease already present by one  that is un-
homceopathic, even though  it be stronger, and just as little is
the unhomceopathic employment of even  the strongest medi-
cines ever capable of  curing any disease whatsoever.

                            \ 36.
  I. If  the  two dissimilar diseases  meeting together in the
human being be of equal strength, or still more if  the older
one be the stronger, the new disease will be repelled  by the old
one from the body and not allowed  to affect it.   A patient
suffering from a severe chronic disease will not  be infected by
a moderate   autumnal  dysentery or other epidemic  disease.
The plague of the Levant, according to Larry,l  does not break
out where scurvy is  prevalent,  and  persons suffering  from
eczema are not infected by it.    Rachitis, Jenner alleges,  pre-
vents vaccination  from taking effect.   Those  suffering  from
pulmonary consumption  are  not  liable  to  be  attacked by
epidemic fevers of a  not  very  violent character, according  to
Von Hildenbrand.
                            \ 37.
  So, also, under  ordinary  medical  treatment, an old chronic
disease remains uncured and unaltered if it is treated accord-
ing to the common  allopathic  method,  that is to say,  with
medicines that are  incapable of producing in healthy  individuals
a state of health similar to the disease, even though the treat-
ment should  last for years and is not of too violent character.
This is daily  witnessed in practice, it is therefore unnecessary
to give any illustrative examples.

                          I 38.^)
  II.  Or the new  dissimilar disease  is the stronger.   In  this
  i "Memoires et Observations," in the Description de V JSgypte,  torn. i. 
                    ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.                 57

  case  the  disease under which the patient originally labored,
  being the weaker, will  be kept back and  suspended  by the
  accession of the stronger one, until the latter shall have run its
  course or been cured, and  then the old one reappears uncured.
  Two children affected  with a kind  of epilepsy remained free
  from epileptic attacks after infection with ringworm (tinea);
  but as soon as the eruption on the head was gone  the epilepsy
  returned  just as before, as Tulpiusx  observed.  The  itch, as
  Schopf2 saw, disappeared on the occurrence of  the scurvy, but
  after the cure of the  latter  it again  broke out.  So also the
  pulmonary  phthisis remained stationary when the patient was
  attacked  by  a violent typhus, but went on again after the
  latter had run its course.3  If  mania occur  in a consumptive
  patient, the  phthisis with all  its symptoms is removed  by the
  former;  but if that go off, the phthisis returns immediately
  and proves fatal.4  When measles and smallpox are prevalent
  at the same  time, and  both attack the same child, the measles
  that had already broken out is generally checked by the small-
  pox that came somewhat later; nor does the measles resume its
  course until after the cure of  the smallpox;  but it not infre-
  quently happens that the inoculated  smallpox is suspended for
  four days by the  supervention of the  measles, as observed by
  Manget,5 after  the  desquamation of which the smallpox com-
 pletes its course.   Even when the inoculation of the smallpox
 had taken effect for six days, and the  measles then broke out,
 the inflammation  of the inoculation remained  stationary and
 the smallpox did  not ensue until the measles  had completed
 its regular course of seven days.0  In  an epidemic of measles,
 that disease attacked  many individuals on the  fourth or fifth
 day after  the inoculation of  smallpox and prevented the de-
 velopment of  the smallpox until it  had completed  its  own
 course,  whereupon  the  smallpox  appeared and  proceeded

  1 Obs., lib. i, obs. 8.
  2 In Hufeland's Journal, xv, 2.
  3 Chevalier, in Hufeland's Neuesten Annalen dtr franzbsischen Heilhunde, ii,
p. 192.
  4 Mania phthisi superveniens earn cum omnibus suis phaenomenis auffert,
verum mox redit phthisis et occidit, abeunte mania. Reil, Mcmorab., fasc.
iii, v, p.  171.
  6 In the Edinb. Mtd. Comment., pt. i, 1.
  6 John Hunter, On the Venereal Disease, p. 5. 
58
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
regularly to its termination.1  The true, smooth, erysipelatous-
looking scarlatina of Sydenham,2 with sore throat, was checked
on the fourth day  by the eruption of cow-pox, which ran its
regular course, and not till it  was ended did  the scarlatina
again establish  itself;  but on another occasion, as both dis-
eases seem to be of equal strength, the cow-pox was suspended
on the  eighth  day by  the supervention  of  the true,  smooth
scarlatina of  Sydenham, and the  red areola of  the  former
disappeared  until the scarlatina  was gone, whereon the cow-
pox  immediately resumed  its  course, and  went on  to  its
regular termination.3  The measles suspended the cow-pox; on
the eighth  day, when  the cow-pox  had nearly attained  its
climax, the  measles  broke  out;  the  cow-pox  now remained
stationary, and  did not resume and complete its course until
the desquamation of  the measles  had  taken place, so  that on
the sixteenth day  it presented  the appearance  it otherwise
would have shown on the tenth day, as Kortum observed.4
   Even after the measles had broken out  the cow-pox inocula-
tion took  effect,  but  did not run its course until  the measles
had disappeared, as Kortum likewise witnessed.5
   I  myself  saw the mumps (angina parotidea) immediately
disappear when the cow-pox inoculation had  taken effect and
had  nearly attained its  height;  it was not until the complete
termination of the  cow-pox and  the  disappearance of its red
areola that this febrile tumefaction of the  parotid and sub-
maxillary  glands, that is  caused by a peculiar miasm, reap-
peared and ran its regular course of seven days.
   And  thus  it  is with all dissimilar diseases; the stronger sus-
pends  the weaker (when they do not complicate one  another
which is seldom the  case  with  acute diseases),  but they never
cure one another.
   Now the adherents of the ordinary school  of medicine saw

  1 Rainey, in the Edinb. Med. Comment., iii, p. 480.
  2 Very accurately described by Withering  and Plenciz, but differing
greatly from the purpura (or Roodvonk), which  is often erroneously de-
nominated scarlet fever.  It is only of late years that the two, which were
originally very different diseases, have come to resemble each other in their
symptoms.
  3 Jenner, in Medicinische Annalen, August, 1800, p. 747.
  4 In Hufeland's Journal der praktischen Arzeneikunde, xx,  3, p. 50.
  5 Loc. cit. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
59
                           I 39. (a)
 all this for so mamy centuries;   they saw that Nature  herself
 cannot cure any disease by the  accession of another, be it ever
 so strong, if  the new disease  be dissimilar to that already
 present in the body.   What shall we think of them, that they
 nevertheless went on treating chronic diseases with allopathic
 remedies, namely, with medicines and prescriptions capable of
 producing God Jraows what morbid  state—almost  invariably,
 however, one dissimilar to the disease to be cured?   And even
 though physicians did not  hitherto observe nature attentively,
 the miserable results of their  treatment should have  taught
 them  that they were  pursuing  an  inappropriate, a  false path.
' Did  they  not  perceive  when  they   employed,  as  was  their
 custom, an aggressive allopathic treatment  in  a chronic dis-
 ease,  that thereby  they  only  created  an  artificial  disease
 dissimilar to the original  one,  which, as  long as it was kept
 up, merely held in  abeyance, merely suppressed, merely sus-
 pended the  original  disease, which latter,  however,  always
 returned, and must return, as soon as the diminished strength
 of the patient  no longer  admitted  of  a continuance  of  the
 allopathic  attacks on the  life?  Thus the  itch  exanthema
 certainly disappears  very  soon  from the skin under the em-
 ployment of violent purgatives,  frequently repeated; but when
 the patient can no  longer stand the  factitious  (dissimilar)
 disease of  the  bowels, and can  take  no more  purgatives, then
 either  the cutaneous eruption  breaks  out  as  before,  or the
 internal psora displays itself in some bad symptom, and the
 patient, in addition  to his  undiminished original disease, has
 to  endure  the  misery  of a painful  ruined digestion and im-
 paired strength  to boot.  So, also, when the ordinary physicians
 keep  up artificial ulcerations of the skin and  issues  on the
 exterior of the  body, with the  view of thereby eradicating  a
 chronic disease, they can never attain their object by so doing,
 they can never cure them by  that means, as  such artificial
 cutaneous ulcers are quite alien and  allopathic to the internal
 affection; but inasmuch as the  irritation produced by several
 issues is at least sometimes a stronger (dissimilar) disease than
the indwelling malady, the  latter is thereby sometimes silenced
and suspended  for a week  or two.    But it is only  suspended, 
60
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
and that for a very short time,  whilst  the patient's powers are
gradually worn out.   Epilepsy, suppressed  for many years by
means of  issues, invariably  recurred,  and in an aggravated
form, when they  were allowed  to  heal up, as  Pechlin1 and
others  testify.    But  purgatives  for itch,  and issues  for
epilepsy,  cannot  be  more  heterogeneous,  more  dissimilar
deranging agents—cannot be more allopathic, more exhausting
modes of  treatment—than  are the customary   prescriptions,
composed of unknown ingredients, used in ordinary practice for
the other  nameless, innumerable  forms  of disease.   These
likewise do nothing but  debilitate, and only suppress or sus-
pend  the malady  for a short time without  being able to cure
it, and  when used for  a  long time always add  a new morbid
state  to the old disease.
                            8 40.

   III.  Or  the new  disease,  after having  long  acted  on the
organism, at length joins the old one  that  is dissimilar to it,
and forms with  it a complex disease,  so  that  each  of them
occupies a  particular locality  in  the  organism, namely, the
organs  peculiarly adapted for it,  and, as  it were, only the
place specially belonging to  it,  whilst it leaves the rest to the
other disease that is dissimilar to it.  Thus a syphilitic patient
may become psoric,  and vice versa.   As two diseases dissimilar
to each  other, they cannot rtmove, cannot cure one another.  At
first  the venereal symptoms are kept in  abeyance and sus-
pended when the psoric  eruption begins  to appear;  in course
of time, however (as the syphilis is at least as  strong  as the
psora),  the two  join  together,2  that  is,  each involves those
parts of the organism onl}r which are most  adapted for  it,  and
the patient is thereby rendered more diseased and  more diffi
cult to cure.
   When two dissimilar acute  infectious diseases meet,  as, for
example, smallpox and measles,  the one usually suspends the
  1 Obs.phys. med., lib. ii. obs. 30.
  2 From careful experiments and cures of complex disease^of this kind, I
am now firmly convinced that no real amalgamation of the two takes place,
but that in such cases the one exists in the organism beside the other only,
each in the parts that are adapted for it, and their cure will be completely
effected by a judicious alternation of the  best mercurial preparation, with
the remedies specific for the psora, each given in the most suitable dose and
form. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.                 61
other, as has  been before observed;  yet  there  have also been
severe epidemics of this  kind, where, in rare cases, two dis-
similar acute diseases occurred simultaneously  in one and  the
same body, and for a short time combined, as it  were, with
each  other.   During an  epidemic,  in  which  smallpox  and
measles were prevalent- at the same time, among three hundred
cases (in which  these diseases avoided  or suspended one  an-
other, and  the measles attacked  patients  twenty  days after
the smallpox  broke-out,  the smallpox,  however, from  seven-
teen to eighteen days after the appearance of the measles,  so
that the first disease had  previously  completed  its regular
course) there was yet one  single case  in which P. Russell1 met
with both these  similiar diseases  in  one person at the same
time.   Rainey2  witnessed  the  simultaneous  occurrence  of
smallpox and  measles in two girls.   J.  Maurice,3 in his whole
practice, only observed two such  cases.   Similar cases  are to
be found in Ettmuller's4  works,  and in the writings of a few
others.
  Zencker5  saw cow-pox run  its regular  course  along with
measles and along with purpura.
  The cow-pox  went on its  course undisturbed  during a
mercurial treatment for syphilis,  as Jenner saw.

                           \ 41.
  Much more frequent than the  natural  diseases  associating
with and complicating one another  in the same body are  the
morbid  complications resulting from the  art of the ordinary
practitioner, which the  inappropriate medical  treatment  (the
allopathic method) is apt to  produce by the  long-continued
employment  of  unsuitable  drugs.   To  the  natural disease,
which it is  proposed to  cure, there are  then  added, by  the
constant repetition of the  unsuitable medicinal agent, the new,
often very tedious, morbid conditions which might be  antici-
pated from the peculiar powers of the drug; these gradually
coalesce with  and complicate the chronic  malady which is
 1 Vide Transactions of a Society for the Improvement of Med. and Chir.
Knowledge, ii.
 2 In the Edinb. Med Comment, iii, p. 480.
 3 In Med. and Phys. Journ.. 1805.
 4 Opera, ii, p. L, cap. 10.
 s In Hufeland's Journal, xvi'i. 
62
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
dissimilar to them (which they were unable to cure by similarity
of action, that is, homoeopathically), adding to the old disease
a new, dissimilar,  artificial  malady  of  a chronic nature, and
thus give the  patient a double  in place  of a single disease,
that is  to say, render him much worse and  more difficult to
cure, often  quite  uncurable.   Many  of the  cases for  which
advice is asked  in  medical journals, as  also the records of
other cases in medical writings, attest the truth of this.   Of a
similar character are the frequent cases in  which the venereal
chancrous  disease,  complicated especially with psora or with
the dyscrasia of condylomatous gonorrhoea,  is not  cured by
long-continued or  frequently  repeated  treatment with  large
doses of  unsuitable  mercurial preparations,  but  assumes its
place in  the organism beside  the chronic mercurial affectionJ
that has been in the meantime gradually developed,  and thus
along with  it often forms a hideous monster of  complicated
disease (under the  general name of masked venereal disease),
which then, when not quite incurable, can only be transformed
into health with the greatest difficulty.

                            I 42.
   Nature herself permits, as  has been  stated, in some cases,
the simultaneous occurrence of two (indeed, of three)  natural
diseases in one and the same  body.   This  complication, how-
ever,  it must be remarked,  happens only in  the  case of two
dissimilar diseases, which according to  the  eternal  laws of
nature do not  remove, do  not annihilate and  cannot cure one
another, but,  as  it seems, both (or all  three) remain, as  it
were, separate in the organism,  and each takes  possession of
the parts and  systems  peculiarly appropriate to it, which, on
account of the want of  resemblance of these maladies to each
other,  can  very well happen without  disparagement  to  the
unity of life.
                           I 43.  ^)
   Totally  different, however,  is the result when two similar
diseases meet together in  the organism,  that is  to say, when
  1 For mercury, besides the morbid symptoms which by virtue of similarity
can cure the venereal disease homoeopathically, has among its effects many
others unlike these of syphilis, which, if it be employed  in large doses,
cause new maladies and commit great ravages iu the body, especially when
complicated with psora, as is so frequently the case. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
63
to the disease already present, a stronger similar one is added.
In such cases we see how a cure can be effected by the opera-
tions of nature, and we  get a lesson as to how man ought to
cure.
                           § 44.
  Two diseases similar to each other can neither (as is  asserted
of dissimilar diseases in  I) repel one another,  nor (as has been
shown  of  dissimilar diseases  in II) suspend  one  another, so
that the old one shall return after the new one has run  its
course; and just  as little can  two similar diseases (as has
been demonstrated in III respecting dissimilar affections) exist
beside each other  in the same organism, or together form a
double  complex disease.
                           I 45.
  No!  two diseases, differing, it  is true,  in  kind,1  but very
similar  in  their phenomena  and effects and in the sufferings
and symptoms they severally produce, invariably  annihilate
one another whenever they meet together in the organism; the
stronger disease, namely, annihilates the weaker, and  that for
this simple reason, because the stronger morbific power  when
it invades the  system,  by reason of its similarity of action in-
volves  precisely  the same parts of the  organism  that were
previously  affected by the weaker  morbid irritation, which,
consequently,  can no longer act on  these  parts, but  is extin-
guished;2  or  (in other  words) because, whenever the  vital
force,  deranged  by  the primary  disease, is more  strongly
attacked by   the  new,  very  similar, but stronger  dynamic
morbific power, it therefore now remains affected by the latter
alone, whereby the original, similar but weaker disease must,
as a mere  dynamic power without material substratum,  cease
to exercise any further  morbid influence  on  the  vital  force,
consequently it must cease to  exist.

                           I 46.
  Many examples might  be adduced of diseases which, in the
course  of nature, have been  homoeopathically cured  by other
  1 Vide supra, § 26. note.
  2 Just as the image of a lamp's flame is rapidly overpowered and effaced
from our retina by the stronger sunbeam impinging on the eye. 
64
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
diseases presenting similar  symptoms,  were it not  necessary,
as our object is to speak about something determinate and  in-
dubitable, to confine our attention solely to those (few) diseases
which are invariably the same, arise from a fixed miasm, and
hence merit a distinct name.
  Among these the smallpox, so dreaded  on account of the
great number of its  serious symptoms, occupies a prominent
position, and it has removed and cured a number of maladies
with similar symptoms.
  How  frequently does smallpox produce  violent ophthalmia,
sometimes even causing blindness!  And see! by its inocula-
tion, Dezoteux1 cured  a chronic ophthalmia permanently, and
Leroy2 another.
  An amaurosis  of two years' duration, consequent on sup-
pressed scald-head, was perfectly  cured by  it,  according to
Klein.3
  How  often  does smallpox cause  deafness and  dyspnoea!
And both  these chronic diseases it removed on reaching  its
acme, as J. Fr. Closs4  observed.
  Swelling of  the testicle, even of  a  very severe character, is
a frequent symptom of smallpox, and  on this account it was
enabled, as Klein5 observed, to cure, by virtue of similarity, a
large hard swelling of the left testicle, consequent on a bruise.
And another observer6  saw  a similar  swelling of the testicle
cured by it.
  Among the troublesome symptoms of smallpox is a dysen-
teric state of the bowels;  and  it subdued, as Fr. Wendt7 ob-
served, a case of  dysentery,  as a similar morbific agent.
  Smallpox coming on after vaccination, as well on account of
its greater strength as its great similarity, at once removes
entirely the cow-pox homoeopathically,  and does not permit it
to come  to maturity;   but,  on the other hand,  the cow-pox
when near maturity does, on account  of its great similarity,
homoeopathically  diminish very much the supervening small-
  i Traits de Vinoculation, p. 189.
  - Heilkundefiir Mutter, p. 384.
  3 Interpres clinicus, p. 293.
  4 Neue Heilart der Kinderpocken, Ulm, 1769, p. 68; and Specim. obs No 1^
  s Op. cit.
  G Xov. Act. Nat. cur., vol. i, obs. 22.
  7 Xachricht von dem Kranktninstitul zu Erlangen, 1783. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
65
pox and make  it much  milder, as Muhry1 and many others
testify.
  The inoculated cow-pox, whose lymph, besides the protective
matter, contains the contagion of a general cutaneous eruption
of another nature,  consisting  of usually small, dry  (rarely
large,  pustular)  pimples, resting on  a small red areola, fre-
quently  conjoined with round red cutaneous  spots  and  often
accompanied  by the most violent itching, which rash appears
in not  a few  children several days  before, more  frequently,
however, after the red areola of the cow-pox, and goes off in
a few days, leaving  behind small,  red, hard spots on the skin;
—the  inoculated cow-pox, I  say,  after  it has taken,  cures
perfectly and permanently, in a homoeopathic manner, by the
similarity of  this accessory miasm, analogous cutaneous erup-
tions of children, often of  very long  standing  and of a very
troublesome character, as a number of observers assert.2
  The  cow-pox,  a  peculiar  symptom of which is to  cause
tumefaction of the arm,3 cured,  after  it  broke out, a sicollen
half-paralyzed arm.4
  The fever accompanying cow-pox, which  occurs at the time
of the production  of the red  areola, cured  homoeopathically
intermittent fever in two individuals, as the younger Hardege5
reports,  confirming  what J.  Hunter6  had  already observed,
that two fevers (similar  diseases) cannot  co-exist in the same
body.7
  1 Willan. Ueber die Kuhpockenimpfung, aus dem Engl., mit Zuscitzen von G. P.
Milhry, Gottingen, 1S08.
  2 Especially Clavier,  Hurel  and Desormeaux, in the Bulletin des sciences
me'dicales, publie par les membres du comite central  de la Soc. de Mtdecine du
Departement de VEure, 1808; also in the Journal de medecine continue, vol. xv, p.
206.
  8 Balhorn, in Hufeland's Journal, 10, ii.
  4 Stevenson, in Duncan's Annals of Medicine, lustr. 2, vol. i, pt. 2, No. 9.
  5 In Hufeland's Journal, xxiii.
  6 On the Venereal Disease, p. 4.
  7 The examples adduced in this place, in the former editions of the Or-
ganon except the last, of chronic maladies cured by the itch,(a) can, accord-
ing to the discoveries and explanations I have given in the first part of my
book on Chronic Diseases,he looked upon as only in a certain degree homoeo-
pathic cures.  The great maladies which thereby disappeared (suffocative
asthma of many years' standing and pulmonary phthisis) were themselves
originally of psoric origin, widely spread, life-threatening symptoms of an
ancient psora that had been fully developed in the interior of the system,
which was again transformed into the simple form of the primitive itch dis-
ease by the cutaneous eruption resulting from the new infection (as always
                                                       5 
66                 ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.

  The measles  bears a strong resemblance in the character of
its fever and cough to the whooping-cough,  and hence it was
that  Bosquillon1  noticed, in  an epidemic where  both  these
affections prevailed, that many children who then took measles
remained free  from whooping-cough  during that epidemic.
They would all have been protected  from,  and rendered  in.
capable of being infected  by, the whooping-cough  in that and
all  subsequent  epidemics, by the measles,  if the whooping-
cough were  not a disease that has only a partial similarity to
the measles, that is to say, if it had also a cutaneous eruption
similar to what the  latter possesses.   As it is, however,  the
measles can but preserve a large number from whooping-cough
homoeopathically,  and that only in  the epidemic prevailing at
the time.
  If, however, the measles come in contact with a disease re-
sembling  it in its  chief symptom, the  eruption, it can indis-
putably remove, and effect a  homoeopathic cure of the latter.
Thus a chronic herpetic eruption was entirely and permanently
(homoeopathically) cured2 by the breaking out of the measles,
as Kortum3  observed.   An  excessively burning miliary r$sh
on  the  face, neck  and arms, that had  lasted six years, and
was aggravated by every change of  weather,  on the invasion
of measles assumed the form of a swelling of the surface of
the skin;  after  the measles  had run  its course  the exanthem
was cured, and returned no more.4

                          § 47.(o)
  Nothing could  teach the physician  in a plainer and  more
convincing  manner than  the above,  what kind of  artificial
morbific agent  (medicine)  he ought to choose in  order  to cure
in a sure, rapid and  permanent manner, conformably with  the
process that takes place in nature.

happens in such cases), whereby the old malady and the dangerous  symp-
toms were made to disappear.  Such  a transformation into the primitive
form is therefore only to be considered as a homoeopathic healer of these
extensive symptoms of highly developed ancient psora, in so far as the new
infection puts the patient in a much more favorable condition to  be cured
of th3 whole psora by anti-psoric medicines.
  1 Cullen's Elements of Practical Medicine, pt. 2, i, 3, ch. vii.
  2 Or at least that symptom was removed.
  3 In Hufeland's Journal, xx, 3, p. 50.
  4 Rau, Ueber d. Werth des horn. Heilv., Heidelb., 1824. p. 85. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
67
                            I 48.
  Neither in the course of nature, as we see from all the above
examples, nor by the physician's art, can an existing affection
or  malady  in any one instance be  removed  by a dissimilar
morbific agent, be it ever so strong,  but solely by one that is
similar in  symptoms and  is someichat stronger, according to
eternal, irrevocable  laws of nature,  which have  not  hitherto
been recognized.
                            I 49.
  We should  have been able to meet with many more real
natural homoeopathic cures  of  this kind if, on the one  hand,
the attention of observers had been more directed to them, and,
on the other hand, if nature had not  been so deficient  in help-
ful  homoeopathic diseases.
                            I 50.
  Mighty Nature  herself has,  as we  see, at her command, as
instruments for effecting homoeopathic cures, little besides the
miasmatic  diseases oZ constant  character,  (the itch,) measles
and smallpox,1 morbific agents which,2 as remedies, are either
more dangerous  to life and  more to  be dreaded than the dis-
ease they are  to cure,  or of  such a kind (like  the itch) that,
after  they have  effected the  cure,  they  themselves require
curing, in order to be eradicated in their  turn—both  circum-
stances that make their employment, as  homoeopathic remedies,
difficult, uncertain and dangerous.  And how few diseases are
there to which man is subject that find  their similar remedy in
smallpox,  measles or  itch!   Hence, in the course of nature,
very few maladies can be cured by these uncertain and hazard-
ous homoeopathic remedies,  and the cure by their instrumen-
tality is also attended with danger and much difficulty, for this
reason that the doses of  these morbific  powers cannot  be
diminished  according  to circumstances, as doses of  medicine
can; butth' oatientafflicted with an analogous malady of long
standing m.    a subjected to the entire dangerous and tedious
disease, to  the    "e  disease of smallpox, measles (or itch),

 1 And the exanthematous contagious principle present in the cow-pox
lymph.
 2 Namely, smallpox and measles. 
68
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
which in its turn has to be cured.  And yet, as is seen,  we
can point to some striking homoeopathic cures effected  by this
lucky concurrence, all  so many incontrovertible proofs of the
great, the sole therapeutic law of nature that obtains in them:
Cure by symptom similarity!

                           I 51.
  This therapeutic law is rendered obvious to all  intelligent
minds by these instances, and they are amply sufficient for this
end.  But, on  the other hand, see what advantages man has
over crude  Nature  in her happy-go-lucky  operations.   How
many thousands more of homoeopathic morbific agents  has not
man  at  his  disposal  for the  relief of  his suffering  fellow-
creatures  in  the  medicinal substances  universally distributed
throughout creation!   In them he has producers of disease of
all possible varieties of action, for  all the innumerable,  for all
conceivable  and inconceivable natural diseases, to which they
can render homoeopathic aid—morbific  agents  (medicinal sub-
stances), whose power, when their remedial  employment  is
completed,  being overcome by  the  vital  force,  disappears
spontaneously without requiring  a second  course  of treatment
for its extirpation, like  the itch—artificial morbific  agents,
which the physician can attenuate,  subdivide and potentize
almost  to an infinite  extent, and  the  dose of which he can
diminish to  such a degree that they shall remain  only  slightly
stronger than the similar natural disease they  are employed to
cure; so that, in this incomparable method of  cure, there is no
necessity  for any violent attack upon  the  organism  for  the
eradication of even an inveterate disease of  old standing;  the
cure by this  method takes place by only a gentle, impercepti-
ble and yet  often rapid transition from the tormenting natural
disease to the desired state of permanent health.

                            I  52.
   Surely no  intelligent physician, after these examples  as clear
as  daylight, can still go on  in the old  ordinary system of
medicine, attacking the body, as  has  hitherto been done, in
its least diseased parts with (allopathic) medicines that have
no direct pathological (homoeopathic) relation  to the disease to 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.                 69
be cured,  with purgatives, counter-irritants,  derivatives, &c. ,J
and  thus  at a sacrifice  of the patient's  strength, inducing a
morbid state quite heterogeneous and dissimilar to the original
one,  to the ruin of his constitution,  by large  doses of mixtures
of medicines  generally of unknown qualities, the employment
of which can  have no other  result,  as is  demonstrated by the
eternal laws of  nature in the above and all other cases  in the
world in which a dissimilar  disease is  added to the  other in
the human  organism, for a cure is  never  thereby effected in
diseases,  but  an aggravation  is the invariable consequence,'—
therefore it  can have no other result than  that either  (because,
according to  the process of nature described in I,  the older
disease  in the body repels  the dissimilar one wherewith the
patient is assailed)  the natural disease remains as it was, under
mild allopathic treatment, be it  ever so long  continued, the
patient being  thereby weakened; or (because, according to the
process of nature  described  in II, the  new and stronger  dis-
ease merely obscures and suspends for a short time the original
weaker dissimilar one), by the violent attack on the body with
strong allopathic drugs,  the  original disease seems to yield for
a time, to return in at least all its former strength; or (because,
according to  the process of nature described  in III, two dis-
similar diseases, when both  are of  a chronic character and of
equal strength, take up a position  beside one another in the
organism  and complicate each other) in  those cases  in which
the physician employs for a  long time morbific agents opposite
and  dissimilar to  the natural  chronic  disease  and allopathic
medicines in  large doses, such allopathic treatment, without
ever being able to remove and to cure the original (dissimilar)
chronic disease, only develops new artificial diseases  beside it;
and, as daily experience shows, only renders the patient much
worse and more incurable than before. (fl)

                          I 53. (o)
  True, mild  cures  take place, as  we see, only in a homoeo-
pathic  way—a  way  which,  as we have also  shown  above
(\\ 7—25) in  a different  manner, by experience and deductions,
  1 Vide supra in the Introduction:  A Review of  the  Therapeutics, &c. and
my book, Die Alloopathie, ein Wort der Warnung fur  Kranke jeder Art, Leipzig,
bei Baumgartner [translated in Hahnem mn's Lesser Writings'], 
70
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
is  also  the  true and the only  one whereby  diseases may be
most surely,  rapidly and permanently extinguished by art; for
this mode of cure is founded on  an  eternal, infallible  law of
nature.
                          I 54»
  This, the  homoeopathic  way, must, moreover,  as observed
above  ill 43—49) be  the only proper one, because,  of the
three possible modes of employing medicines in diseases,  it is
the only direct  way to a  mild, sure, permanent cure without
doing injury in  another direction,  and without weakening the
patient.   The pure homoeopathic mode  of  cure is the  only
proper  way,  the only  direct way, the only  way  possible  to
human  skill,  as certainly  as only one straight  line  can be
drawn betwixt two given points.

                            § 55.
  The  second mode of employing medicines in diseases, the
allopathic or heteropathic, which, without  any  pathological
relation to what is actually diseased  in the body, attacks the
parts most exempt  from the disease, in order to draw away
the disease through  them and thus to expel it, as is imagined,
has hitherto been the most  general method.  I have treated
of it above in the Introduction,1  and shall not  dwell  longer
on it.
                            I 56.
  The third  and only remaining method8 of employing medi-
cines in diseases, which, besides the other two just alluded to,
is the only other possible one,  is the antipathic (enantiopathic)
or palliative method,  wherewith the physician could hitherto
appear to be most  useful, and hoped most  certainly to gain
his patient's confidence  by deluding him  with  momentary
amelioration.  But  I  shall now proceed  to show how ineffica-

 1 Review of the Therapeutics. &c.
 2 A fourth mode of employing medicines in diseases has been attempted to
be created  by means of  Ixopathy. as it is  called—that is to say, a method of
curing a given disease by  the same contagious principle that produces  it.
But even granting this could be done,  which would certainly be a most
valuable discovery, yet, after all. seeing  that the virus is given to the pa-
tient highly potentized, and thereby, consequently, to a certain degree  in
an altered condition, the  cure is effected only by opposing a similUmum
to a simillimum.(a) 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
71
 cious and how injurious this third and sole remaining way was,
 in diseases of a not very rapid  course. («)   It is certainly the
 only one of the modes of treatment adopted  by the allopaths
 that had any manifest relation to a portion of the sufferings
 caused by the natural disease;  but what kind of relation?  Of
 a truth the very one (the exact contrary of the right one) that
 ought most to be avoided if we would not delude and make a
 mockery of the patient affected with a chronic disease.

                           I 57.
   In order  to carry into  practice this antipathic method, the
 ordinary physician gives, for a single troublesome symptom
 from among the many other  symptoms of the disease which
 he  passes  by unheeded,  a  medicine concerning which it is
 known  that it  produces  the  exact  opposite  of the morbid
 symptom sought to be subdued, from which, agreeably to the
 fifteen-centuries-old traditional rule of the antiquated medical
 school (contraria contrariis) he can expect the speediest (palli-
 ative) relief.  He  gives large doses of opium for pains of all
 sorts, because this  drug  soon  benumbs the sensibility, and
 administers the same remedy for diarrhoeas, because it speedily
 puts a stop to the peristaltic motion of the  intestinal canal and
 makes it insensible; and also for sleeplessness, because opium
 rapidly produces a stupefied, comatose sleep;  he gives purga-
 tives when the patient has suffered long from constipation and
 costiveness; he causes the burnt hand to be plunged into cold
 water,  which, from its low degree of temperature,  seems in-
 stantaneously to remove the burning pain,  as if by magic;  he
 puts the  patient who complains of chilliness and deficiency of
 vital heat into warm baths, which warm  him immediately; he
 makes  him who is suffering from prolonged debility drink
 wine, whereby he is instantly enlivened and refreshed;  and in
 like  manner he  employs  other opposite (antipathic) remedial
 means, but he has very few besides those just mentioned, as it
 is only of very few substances  that some  peculiar  (primary)
action is known to the ordinary medical school.

                           8  58.
  If, in estimating the value of this mode of employing medi- 
72
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
 cines, we should even pass over the  circumstance  that it is an
 extremely faulty symptomatic treatment (v. note to I 7), wherein
 the practitioner  devotes  his  attention in a  merely  one-sided
 manner to a single symptom, consequently to only a small part
 of the whole, whereby  relief for the  totality of  the disease,
 which  is what  the patient  desires,  cannot  evidently be ex-
 pected,—we  must, on the other hand, demand  of experience
 if, in one  single case where such  antipathic employment of
 medicine was made use of in a chronic or  persisting  affection,
 after  the transient amelioration there did not  ensue an  in-
 creased  aggravation  of the symptom which  was  subdued at
 first  in  a  palliative  manner, an aggravation, indeed, of the
 whole disease?  And every attentive observer will  agree  that,
 after such short antipathic amelioration, aggravation follows
 in every case without exception, although the ordinary physician
 is in the habit of giving his patient another explanation of this
 subsequent aggravation, and ascribes it to malignancy of the
 original  disease,  now for the  first  time showing  itself, or to
 the occurrence of quite a new disease.l

                             I 59.
   Important  symptoms of persistent diseases have never yet
 been treated  with such  palliative, antagonistic remedies, with-
 out  the opposite state,  a relapse—indeed, a palpable  aggrava-
 tion of the malady—occurring a few hours afterwards.   For a
 persistent tendency to sleepiness during  the day the physician
 prescribed coffee, whose primary action is to enliven; and when
 it had  exhausted its action the  day-somnolence increased;—

  1 Little as physicians have hitherto been in the habit of observing accu-
 rately, the aggravation that so certainly follows such palliative treatment
could not altogether escape their notice.  A striking example  of this is to be
 found in J. H. Schulze's Diss, qua corporis  humani  momentanearum altera-
tionum spccimina qucedam expenduntur. Halae, 1741, § 28. Willis bears testimony
to something similar (Pharm. rat., §7, cap.  i, p. 298:  "Opiata dolores atro-
cissircos  plerumque  sedant  atque indolentiam — procurant,   eamque—
aliquamdiu et pro stato  quodam tempore  continuant, quo  spatio elapso
dolores mox recrudescunt et brevi  ad solitam ferociam augentur." And
also at page 295:  "Exactis opii viribus illico redeunt tormina, nee atrocita-
tem suam remittunt. nisi  dum ab eodem pharmaco rursus incantuntur."
In like manner J. Hunter (On the Venereal Disease, p. 13) says that wine and
cordials given to the weak increase the action without giving real strength
and the powers of the body are afterwards sunk proportionally as they have
been raised, by which nothing can be gained, but a great deal  may be lost. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
73
 for frequent waking at night he gave  in the evening,  without
 heeding the other symptoms of  the disease, opium, which by
 virtue of its primary action produced the same night (stupefied,
 dull) sleep, but the subsequent nights were still more sleepless
 than before;—to  chronic  diarrhoeas he opposed,  without re-
 garding the other morbid signs, the same opium, whose primary
 action is to constipate  the bowels, and after a transient stop-
 page of the diarrhoea  it subsequently  became all  the worse;—
 violent and frequently  recurring pains of  all  kinds he could
 suppress with  opium for but a short time;  they  then  always
 returned in greater, often intolerable  severity, or some much
 worse affection came in their stead.   For nocturnal cough of
 long  standing  the ordinary physician  knew no better than to
 adminisler opium, whose primary action is to suppress every
 irritation;  the cough would  then perhaps cease the first night,
 but during  the subsequent nights it would be still  more severe,
 and if it were  again and again suppressed by this palliative in
 increased doses, fever  and nocturnal  perspiration were added
 to  the disease;—weakness of  the  bladder, with  consequent
 retention of urine, was sought  to  be  conquered  by the anti-
 pathic power of cantharides  to stimulate the urinary passages,
 whereby evacuation of  the urine was certainly  at first effected,
 but thereafter the  bladder  becomes less capable of  stimulation
 and less able to contract,  and paralysis of  the bladder  is im-
 minent;—with  large  doses of purgative drugs and laxative
 salts, which excite the  bowels to frequent  evacuation, it  was
 sought to remove a  chronic  tendency  to constipation,  but in
 the secondary action the bowels became still more confined;—
 the ordinary physician seeks  to remove chronic debility by the
 administration  of wine, which, however, stimulates only in its
 primary action, and  hence the forces sink all  the lower  in the
 secondary action;—by  bitter substances and  heating  condi-
 ments he tries to strengthen and warm  the chronically weak
 and cold stomach, but  in  the secondary action of  these palli-
 atives, which are stimulating in  their primary action only, the
 stomach becomes yet more inactive;—long-standing deficiency
of vital  heat and  chilly disposition ought  surely  to yield to
prescriptions of warm  baths, but still more  weak,  cold,  and
chilly do the patients subsequently become;—severely burnt 
74
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
parts feel  instantaneous alleviation from  the application  of
cold water, but the burning  pain afterwards increases  to  an
increditable degree, and the inflammation spreads and rises to
a still greater height;1—by means of the sternutatory remedies
that provoke  a secretion of  mucus, coryza with  stoppage of
the nose of long standing is sought  to be removed, but it
escapes observation that the disease is aggravated all the more
by these antagonistic remedies (in their secondary action), and
the nose becomes still more stopped;—by electricity and gal-
vanism,  which   in  their  primary action  greatly  stimulate
muscular action,  chronically weak  and  almost paralytic  limbs
were soon  excited to more  active  movements, but  the conse-
quence  (the secondary action)  was complete deadening of all
muscular irritability and complete  paralysis;—by venesections
it was attempted  to remove chronic determination of  blood  to
the head, but they were always followed by greater congestion;
—ordinary  medical  practitioners  know  nothing better with
which to treat the paralytic  torpor  of the  corporeal and mental
organs,  conjoined  with unconsciousness, which  prevails  in
many kinds of typhus, than with  large doses of valerian, be-
cause this  is  one of  the most powerful  medicinal  agents  for
causing animation and increasing the motor faculty; in their
ignorance,  however, they knew not that  this  action  is only a
primary action, and that the organism,  after that is passed,
most  certainly  falls  back,  in the  secondary  (antagonistic)
action,  into still greater stupor and immobility, that is to say,
into paralysis of the mental  and corporeal organs (and death);
they did not  see, that the  very diseases they supplied most
plentifully  with valerian, which is  in such cases an oppositely
acting,  antipathic remedy, most infallibly terminated fatally
The old school physician rejoices2 that he is  able to reduce for
several  hours the velocity of the small rapid pulse in cachectic
patients with  the very  first dose of uncombined purple fox-
glove (which in its primary action makes  the pulse  slower); its
rapidity, however, soon returns; repeated, and now increased
doses effect an ever smaller  diminution of its rapidity, and  at
length none at all—indeed—in the secondary action  the  pulse

 1 Vide Introduction, p. 43.
 2 Vide Hufeland, in his pamphlet. Die Homoopathie. p. 20.(CT) 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
75
becomes uncountable;  sleep, appetite and strength depart, and
a speedy death is invariably the result, or else insanity ensues.
How often, in one  word, the disease is aggravated, or  some-
thing even worse is effected by the secondary  action of such
antagonistic (antipathic) remedies, the old school with its false
theories does not perceive,  but experience teaches it  in a ter-
rible manner.
                            I  60.
   If these ill effects are produced,, as may  very naturally be
expected  from the  antipathic employment  of  medicines, the
ordinary physician imagines he can get over the difficulty by
giving,  at each  renewed  aggravation, a stronger dose of the
remedy, whereby an equally transient suppression is  effected;
and as  there  then  is a still greater necessity for giving ever-
increasing quantities of the palliative, there ensues either an-
other more serious disease  or  frequently even  danger to life
and death itself, but never  a cure of a disease of considerable
or of long standing.
                            I  61.
   Had  physicians been capable of reflecting  on the sad  results
of the antagonistic employment of medicines, they had long since
discovered the grand truth,  THAT THE TRUE  RADICAL  HEALING
ART MUST BE FOUND IN THE EXACT OPPOSITE  OF  SUCH AN ANTI-
PATHIC  TREATMENT OF THE  SYMPTOMS OF DISEASE; they WOuld
have become convinced, that as a medicinal action antagonistic
to the  symptoms of the disease (an antipathically employed
medicine) is followed  by only  transient relief,  and after that
is passed, by invariable aggravation, the  converse  of that
procedure, the homoopathie  employment  of medicines according
to similarity of  symptoms,  must effect a permanent and per-
fect cure, if at the same time the opposite of their large doses,
the most  minute doses, are exhibited.   But neither the ob-
vious aggravation that ensued from their antipathic treatment,
nor the  fact that no physician ever effected  a permanent cure
of diseases of considerable or of long standing unless  some
homoeopathic medicinal agent was accidentally a chief ingred-
ient in  his prescription, nor yet the circumstances that all the
rapid and perfect cures that nature ever performed (I 46), were 
76
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
always affected by  the  supervention  upon the old  disease of
one of a similar  character,  ever  taught them, during such a
long series  of  centuries,  this truth, the knowledge of  which
can alone conduce to the benefit of the sick.

                            I 62.
  But on what this pernicious  result of  the  palliative, anti-
pathic treatment and the efficacy of the reverse, the  homoeo-
pathic treatment, depend, is explained by the following facts,
deduced from manifold observations, which no one before me
perceived,  though  they are so  very palpable  and  so very
evident,  and are of such infinite importance to  the healing art.

                            I 63.
  Every agent that acts upon the  vitality, every medicine,
deranges  more or  less  the vital  force,  and causes a certain
alteration in the health  of the  individual  for  a  longer or a
shorter period.   This is termed primary action.   Although a
product  of  the medicinal  and vital powers conjointly, it is
principally due to  the former power.   To its  action  our vital
force endeavors  to oppose  its own energy.   This  resistent
action is a property, is indeed an automatic action of  our life-
preserving power, which goes by the name of secondary action
or counteraction.
                            I 64.
  During the primary action of  the artificial  morbific  agents
(medicines) on our  healthy body, our vital force seems to con-
duct itself merely in a passive (receptive) manner, and appears,
so to say, compelled to permit the impressions of the artificial
power acting from  without to take  place in it and thereby alter
its state of health; it  then, however, appears to  rouse itself
again, as it were, and to develop (A) the exact opposite condi-
tion of  health (counteraction, secondary  action) to this effect
(primary action)  produced upon it, if there be such an  opposite,
and that in as great a degree as was the effect  (primary action)
of the artificial morbific or medicinal agent on it,  and propor-
tionate to its own  energy;—or (b)  if there be not  in nature a
state exactly the opposite of the primary action, it appears to
endeavor to indifferentiate  itself, that is,  to make its superior 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
77
power available  in  the extinction of the change wrought in  it
from without  (by the medicine), in the place of which it sub-
stitutes its normal state (secondary  action, curative action).

                            I 65.
   Examples of (a)  are familiar to all.   A hand bathed  in hot
water is at first much warmer than  the other hand that has not
been so  treated (primary  action);  but when it is withdrawn
from the hot water and again thoroughly dried, it becomes  in
a short  time cold,  and  at  length much  colder than  the other
(secondary action).   A  person  heated by violent  exercise
(primary action)  is afterwards affected  with chilliness  and
shivering (secondary action).   To one  who  was  yesterday
heated by  drinking much  wine (primary action), today every
breath of air feels  too  cold (counteraction of the organism,
secondary action).    An arm that has been  kept  long in very
cold water  is  at first much paler and colder (primary action)
than the other;  but removed from  the cold water  and dried,  it
subsequently becomes not  only warmer than the other, but
even  hot, red and  inflamed (secondary action,  reaction of the
vital  force).   Excessive  vivacity  follows  the use  of strong
coffee (primary  action),  but sluggishness  and drowsiness re-
main for a  long time afterwards (reaction, secondary action),
if  this be not always again removed  for a short  time by im-
bibing fresh supplies of coffee (palliative).    After the profound
stupefied sleep caused by opium (primary action), the following
night will be all the more sleepless (reaction, secondary action).
After the constipation  produced by opium (primary action),
diarrhoea ensues (secondary action); and after purgation with
medicines that irritate the bowels, constipation of several days'
duration ensues (secondary action).   And in  like  manner  it
always happens, after the primary action of a medicine that
produces  in  large  doses  a great change  in the  health of a
healthy person,  that its  exact opposite, when,  as  has been
observed, there  is  actually such a thing,  is produced in the
secondary action by our vital force.
                            I m.
  An obvious antagonistic secondary action,  however, is,  as
may readily be conceived, not to be noticed from the  action 
78
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
of quite  minute homoeopathic doses  of the  deranging agents

on  the healthy body.   A small  dose  of every one of  them

certainly produces  a primary action that is perceptible to a

sufficiently attentive observer;  but the living organism employs

against it only so much reaction (secondary action) as is neces-

sary for the restoration of the normal condition.

                               I 67.

  These  incontrovertible truths,  which  spontaneously  offer

themselves to our notice in nature and experience, explain to

us the beneficial  action that takes place under homoeopathic

treatment; whilst,  on  the other  hand, they demonstrate  the

perversity of  the antipathic and  palliative  treatment  of dis-

eases with antagonistically acting medicines.1

                               I 68.

  In homceopathic cures  they show us  that  from  the  uncom-

  1 Only in the most urgent  cases, where  danger to life and imminent death
allow no time for the action of a homoeopathic remedy—not hours, some-
times not even quarter-hours, and scarcely minutes—in sudden accidents
occurring to previously healthy individuals—for example, in asphyxia and
suspended animation from  lightning, from suffocation, freezing, drowning,
&c—it is admissible and judicious, at all events as a preliminary measure,
to stimulate the irritability and sensibility (the physical life) with a  pallia-
tive, as, for instance, with gentle electrical shocks, with clysters of  strong
coffee, with a stimulating odor, gradual application of heat, &c. When this
stimulation is effected, the play of the vital organs again  goes  on in its
former healthy manner, for there is here no disease* to be removed, but
merely an obstruction and suppression of the healthy vital force. To this
category belong various antidotes to sudden poisonings: alkalies for min-
eral acids, hepar sulphuris for metallic poisons, coffee and camphor (and
ipecacuanha) for poisoning by opium, &c.
  It does not follow that a homoeopathic  medicine has been ill selected for a
case of disease because some of the medicinal symptoms are only antipathic
to some of the less important and minor symptoms of the disease; if only
the others, the stronger, well-marked (characteristic), and peculiar symp-
toms of the disease are covered  and matched by the same  medicine with
similarity of symptoms—that is to say, overpowered, destroyed and extin-
guished;  the few opposite symptoms also disappear of themselves after the
expiry of the term of action of the medicament, without retarding the cure
in the least.
 * And yet the  new sect that mixes the two systems appeals (thoueh in
vain) to this observation, in order that they may have au excuse for en-
countering everywhere such exceptions to thegeueral rule in diseases anc
to  justify  their convenient employment of allopathic palliatives, and oi
other injurious allopathic trash besides, solely for the sake of sparing them-
selves the trouble of seeking for the suitable homoeopathic remedy for each
case of disease—I might almost say for the sake of sparing themselves the
trouble of being homoeopathic physicians, and yet wishing to anDear as
such.  But their performances are on a par with the system thev  nnr<snR-
they are nothing to boast of.                                 J  ^Ulouo- 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
79
 monly small doses of medicines (11 275—287) required in this
 method of treatment, which are just sufficient, by the similarity
 of their  symptoms, to  overpower  and remove  the  similar
 natural disease, there certainly remains, after the destruction
 of the  latter, at first a certain  amount of  medicinal  disease
 alone  in  the  organism, but, on  account of  the  extraordinary
 minuteness of the dose,  it is so transient, so  slight, and dis-
 appears so rapidly of  its own accord, that the vital force has
 no need to employ, against this small artificial derangement of
 its health, any more considerable reaction than will suffice to
 elevate its  present state of  health up to the healthy point—
 that  is, than will  suffice to  effect complete  recovery, for
 which, after the extinction of the  previous morbid derange-
 ment, but little effort is required (I 64, b).

                            I  69.
   In the  antipathic (palliative)  mode of treatment, however,
 precisely the reverse of this takes place.   The medicinal symp-
 tom which the physician opposes to  the disease symptom (for
 example,  the  insensibility and stupefaction  caused by opium
 in  its primary action to acute  pain)  is certainly not alien, not
 allopathic to  the  latter;  there is  a manifest relation of the
 medicinal symptom to the  disease  symptom, but it  is the
 reverse of  what should be; it is here intended that the  annihi-
 lation of the disease symptom  shall be effected by an opposite
 medicinal symptom, which is impossible.  No doubt the anti
 pathically chosen medicine touches precisely the same diseased
 point in the organism as the homoeopathic medicine chosen on
 account of the similar affection  it produces; but the  former
 covers the opposite symptom of the disease only as an opposite,
 and makes it unobservable for a short  time only, so that in
 the first period of the action of the antagonistic palliative the
 vital force perceives nothing disagreeable from  either  of the
 two (neither from the disease symptom nor from the medicinal
 symptom), as  they seem both  to  have mutually removed and
 dynamically neutralized one  another as  it were (for example,
 the stupefying power of opium does this to the pain).   In the
first minutes the vital force feels quite well,  and perceives
neither the  stupefaction  of  the  opium  nor  the  pain  of the 
80
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
disease.   But as the  antagonistic medicinal symptom cannot
(as in the homoeopathic  treatment)  occupy the  place of  the
morbid derangement  present  in the organism as  a similar,
stronger   (artificial)  disease,  and  cannot,  therefore, like  a
homoeopathic medicine,  affect  the vital force  with  a similar
artificial  disease, so as to be able to  step into the place of  the
original  natural morbid  derangement, the  palliative medicine
must,  as  a thing totally differing from, and the  opposite of  the
disease derangement, leave the  latter uneradicated;  it renders
it, as  before said, by a semblance of dynamic  neutralization,1
at first unfelt by the vital force, but, like every medicinal dis-
ease, it   is  soon spontaneously  extinguished,  and  not  only
leaves the disease behind, just as it was, but compels the vital
force (as  it  must, like all palliatives, be given  in  large  doses
in order  to effect the apparent removal) to  produce an opposite
condition (U 63, 64) to this palliative medicine, the reverse of
the  medicinal action,  consequently  the  analogue of  the still
present,   undestroyed, natural  morbid derangement,  which  is
necessarily  strengthened  and increased2 by this  addition  (re-
action against the palliative) produced by the vital force.    The
disease symptom (this single part of the disease) consequently
becomes worse after  the term of the action of the palliative  has
expired;  worse in proportion to the magnitude of the dose  of the
palliative.   Accordingly  (to keep to  the  same example)  the

  1 In the living human being no permanent neutralization of contrary or
antagonistic sensations can take place, as happens with substances of op-
posite qualities in  the chemical laboratory, where, for instance, sulphuric
acid and potash unite to form a perfectly different substance, a neutral salt)
which is now no longer either acid or alkali, and is not decomposed even  by
heat. Such amalgamations and thorough combinations  to form something
permanently neutral and indifferent do not. as has been said, ever take
place with  respect to dynamic  impressions of an antagonistic nature in our
sensific apparatus. Only a semblance of neutralization and mutual removal
occurs in such cases at first, but the antagonistic sensations do not perma-
nently remove one another.  The tears of the mourner will be dried for but
a short time by a laughable play; the jokes are. however, soon forgotten,
and his tears then flow still more abundantly than before.
  2 Plain as this proposition is, it has been misunderstood, and in opposition
to it some have asserted "that the palliative in its secondary action, which
would then be similar to the disease present, must be capable of curing just
as well as a homoeopathic medicine does by its primary  action."  But  they
did not reflect that the secondary action is not a product of the medicine,
but  invariably of  the antagonistically acting vital force of  the organism;
that therefore this secondary action resulting from the vital force on the
employment of a palliative is a state similar to the symptoms of the disease 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
81
 larger the dose of  opium given to allay the  pain, so much the
 more does the pain increase beyond its  original intensity as
 soon as the opium  has exhausted its action.1

                             I 70.
   From what has been already adduced we cannot fail to draw
 the following inferences:
        That everything of a really morbid character and which
          ought to  be cured  that the physician can discover in
          diseases,  consist solely  of the sufferings of the  pa-
          tient, and the  sensible alterations in his health, in a
          word, solely  of the  totality of the  symptoms,  by
          means of  which the  disease  demands the  medicine
          requisite  for its relief;  whilst, on  the other hand,
          every internal  cause attributed to it,  every occult
          quality  or imaginary material morbific principle, is
          nothing but an idle dream;
        That this derangement of the state of health, which we
          term disease, can  only be converted into  health  by
          another revolution  effected in the state of health  by
          means of  medicines,  whose sole curative power,  con-
          sequently, can  only consist in altering man's state of
          health—that is to say,  in  a peculiar excitation  of
          morbid symptoms,  and is learned with most distinct-
          ness and purity by testing them on  the healthy body;
        That, according to all experience, a natural disease can
          never be cured by  medicines  that possess  the power
          of producing in the healthy individual  an  alien mor-
          bid state (dissimilar morbid symptoms) differing from
          that of the disease to be cured (never, therefore, by
          an allopathic mode of treatment),  and that even  in
          nature no  cure  ever takes  place in which an inherent
          disease is  removed, annihilated and cured  by the ad-
which the palliative left uneradicated. and which the reaction of the vital
force against the palliative consequently increased still more.
  1 As when in a dark dungeon, where the" prisoner could with difficulty rec-
ognize objects close to  him, alcohol is suddenly lighted, everything is in-
stantly illuminated in a most consolatory manner to the unhappy wretch;
but when it is extinguished, the  brighter the flame  was previously,  the
blacker is the night which now envelops him, and renders everything about
him much more difficult to be seen than before.
                                                   6 
82
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
        dition of another disease dissimilar to it, be the new
        one ever so strong;
      That, moreover, all experience proves that, by means
        of medicines which have a tendency  to produce in
        the healthy individual an artificial morbid symptom,
        antagonistic to the single  symptom of  disease sought
        to be cured, the cure of a long-standing affection will
        never be effected, but merely a very transient allevi-
        ation, always followed by its aggravation; and that,
        in a word, this antipathic and merely palliative treat-
        ment in long-standing diseases of  a serious character
        is absolutely inefficacious;
      That, however, the third  and only other possible mode
        of  treatment (the  homoeopathic), in which  there  is
        employed for the totality  of  the  symptoms of a
        natural disease a medicine capable of producing the
        most similar symptoms possible in the healthy  in-
        dividual, given in suitable dose,  is the only efficacious
        remedial method whereby diseases, which are purely
        dynamic deranging irritations of the vital force, are
        overpowered,  and  being thus  easily,  perfectly,  and
        permanently extinguished, must necessarily cease to
        exist—and  for this mode of procedure we have the
        example of unfettered Nature herself, when to an old
        disease there is added  a new one  similar to the first,
        whereby the old one is rapidly  and for ever annihi-
         lated and cured.
                           I 71.
  As it is now no longer a matter of doubt that the diseases
of mankind consist merely of groups of certain  symptoms, and
may be annihilated and transformed into health by medicinal
substances, but only by such as are capable of  artificially pro-
ducing similar morbid symptoms (and such  is the process in all
genuine cures),  hence the operation of  curing is comprised in
the three following  points:
       1.   How is the physician to ascertain what is necessary
         to be known in order to cure the disease?
       II.   How is he to gain a knowledge of the instruments 
GRGANON OF MEDICINE.
83
          adapted for the  cure of the  natural disease,  the
          pathogenetic powers of the medicines?
       III.   What is the most suitable method of employing
          these  artificial  morbific  agents (medicines)  for  the
          cure of natural diseases?

                          I 72. f«)
   With respect to the first point, the following will serve as a
 general preliminary view.   The diseases to which man is liable
 are either rapid  morbid  processes of the abnormally deranged
 vital  force,  which  have a  tendency to finish their course more
 or less quickly,  but always  in a  moderate time—these  are
 termed acute diseases;—or they are diseases of such a character
 that,  with small, often imperceptible beginnings, dynamically
 derange the living organism,  each  in its  own peculiar manner,
 and  cause it gradually to deviate from the  healthy condition,
 in such a way that the automatic life energy, called vital force,
 whose office is to preserve the  health, only opposes to them at
 the commencement and during their progress imperfect,  un-
 suitable, useless resistance, but is unable of itself to extinguish
 them, but must  helplessly suffer  (them  to spread and)  itself
 to be ever more  and more  abnormally  deranged,  until  at
 length the  organism  is destroyed; these are  termed chronic
 diseases.  They are caused by infection with a chronic miasm.

                            I 73.
   As regards acute diseases, they are either of such a kind as
 attack human beings  individually, the exciting cause being in-
 jurious influences to  which they were  particularly exposed.
 Excesses in  food, or an insufficient supply of it, severe physical
 impressions, chills, over-heatings,  dissipation, strains, &c., or
 psychical irritations, mental emotions, and the like, are excit-
 ing causes of such acute febrile affections; in reality, however,
 they are  generally only a transient explosion of  latent psora,
 which  spontaneously returns to its dormant state if  the acute
 diseases  were not of  too  violent  a character and were soon
quelled.   Or they are of such a kind as  attack several persons
at the same time, here and there (sporadically),  by means of
meteoric or telluric influences  and injurious agents, the sus- 
84
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
ceptibility for  being moibidly affected  by which  is  possessed
by only a few  persons at one time.  Allied  to these are those
diseases in which many persons are attacked with very similar
sufferings  from the same cause (epidemically); these diseases
generally  become infectious (contagious)  when they prevail
among thickly congregated masses of human beings.   Thence
arise  fevers,1 in  each instance of a peculiar nature, and, be-
cause the cases of disease have an identical origin, they set up
in all those  they affect an  identical  morbid process,  which
when left to itself terminates in a moderate  period of time in
death or  recovery.    The calamities of  war, inundations  and
famine are not infrequently their exciting causes and producers
—sometimes they are peculiar acute miasms which recur in the
same manner (hence known  by some traditional  name), which
either attack  persons but once  in a lifetime, as the smallpox,
measles,  whooping-cough,  the  ancient  smooth,  bright  red
scarlet fever2 of Sydenham,  the mumps, &c., or such as recur
frequently in pretty much  the same manner, the plague of the
Levant, the  yellow fever of  the sea-coast, the  Asiatic cholera,
&c.
                           I 74. («)

  Among chronic diseases we must still, alas!  reckon those so
commonly met with,  artificially produced  in allopathic  treat
ment by the prolonged use of violent heroic medicines in large
and  increasing doses, by the abuse of  calomel, corrosive sub-
limate,  mercurial ointment,  nitrate of silver, iodine and its
ointments, opium, valerian,  cinchona bark and  quinine,  fox-

  1 The homoeopathic physician, who  does not entertain the foregone con-
clusions devised by the ordinary school (who have fixed upon a few names of
such fevers, besides which mighty nature dare not produce any others, so as
to admit of their treating these diseases according to some fixed method),
does  not acknowledge the names gaol fever,  bilious fever, typhus  fever,
putrid fever, nervous fever or mucous fever, but treats them each according
to their several peculiarities.
  2 Subsequently to the year 1801 a kind of purpura miliaris (roodvonk).  which
came from the West, was by physicians confounded with the scarlet  fever,
notwithstanding that they exhibited totally different symptoms, that the
latter found its prophylactic and curative remedy in belladonna, the former
in aconite, and that  the former was generally  merely sporadic, while the
latter was invariably epidemic.  Of late years  it seems as if the two occas-
ionally joined to form an eruptive fever of a peculiar kind, for which neither
the one nor yet the other remedy, alone, will be found to be exactly homoeo-
pathic. 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
85
 glove,  prussic  acid,  sulphur  and  sulphuric  acid,  perennial
 purgatives, venesections,  leeches, issues, setons, &c.,  whereby
 the vital force is sometimes weakened to an unmerciful extent,
 sometimes, if it  do  not succumb, gradually  abnormally  de-
 ranged (by each substance in a peculiar manner) in such a way
 that, in order  to maintain life against these inimical and  de-
 structive attacks, it must produce a revolution in the organism,
 and either deprive some part of its irritability or sensibility, or
 exalt  these to  an excessive degree,  cause dilatation or con-
 traction, relaxation or induration or even  total destruction of
 certain  parts, and develop faulty organic alterations here and
 there in the interior or the exterior,x  (cripple the body inter-
 nally  or externally)  in order  to preserve  the organism  from
 complete destruction  of life by the  ever-renewed,  hostile as-
 saults of such destructive forces.

                             I  75.
   These inroads on human health  effected by the allopathic
 non-healing art (more particularly in recent  times) are of all
 chronic  diseases the most deplorable,  the most  incurable; and
 I  regret to add that  it is apparently  impossible to discover or
 to hit  upon any remedies for their cure when they have reached
 any considerable height.
                             I  76.
   Only for natural  diseases has the  beneficent Deity granted
 us, in  Homoeopathy,  the means of affording relief;  but those
 devastations and  maimings of the human  organism exteriorly
 and interior!}', effected by years, frequently, of the unsparing
 exercise of a  false art, with its  hurtful  drugs and treatment,
 must be remedied by the vital force itself (appropriate aid being
 given  for  the eradication of  any  chronic miasm  that may
 happen to  be lurking  in the background), if it have not already
 been too much  weakened by such mischievous acts, and can
 1 If the patient at length succumbs, the practicer of such a treatment is in
the habit of pointing out to the sorrowing relatives, at the post mortem ex-
amination, these internal organic  disfigurements,  which are due to his
pseudo-art, but  which he  artfully maintains to be the original incurable
disease (see my book, Die Alloopathie, cin Wort der Warnung an Kranke jeder
Art. Leipzig, bei Baumgartner [translated in Leaser Writings]).  Those de-
ceitful records, the illustrated works on pathological anatomy, exhibit the
products of such lamentable bungling. 
86
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
devote several years to this huge operation undisturbed.   A
human healing art, for the restoration to the normal  state of
those innumerable abnormal conditions so often produced  by
the allopathic non-healing art, there is not and cannot  be.

                           I 77.
  Those  diseases  are appropriately  named  chronic, which
persons incur who expose themselves continually to avoidable
noxious influences, who are in the habit of indulging in in-
jurious liquors or aliments, are addicted to dissipation of many
kinds which  undermine  the health,  who undergo prolonged
abstinence  from things that are necessary for the support  of
life, who reside in unhealthy localities,  especially marshy dis-
tricts, who are housed in cellars or other confined dwellings,
who are deprived of  exercise or of open air, who ruin their
health by over-exertion of  body or mind, who  live  in a con-
stant state of worry, &c.   These  states of ill-health, which
persons bring upon themselves,  disappear spontaneously, pro-
vided no chronic miasm lurks in the body, under an improved
mode of living, and they cannot be called chronic diseases.

                           I 78.
  The true natural chronic diseases are those that arise from a
chronic miasm, which when  left to themselves and  unchecked
by  the employment  of those remedies  that  are specific  for
them, always  go on  increasing  and growing  worse,  notwith-
standing the  best mental and corporeal  regimen, and  torment
the patient to the end of his life with ever  aggravated suffer-
ings.  These are the  most  numerous and greatest scourges of
the human race; for the most robust  constitution,  the best
regulated mode of  living and the most vigorous energy of  the
vital force are insufficient for their eradication.

                           I 79.
  Hitherto syphilis alone has  been to some extent  known as
such a chronic miasmatic disease, which  when uncured ceases
only with the termination of life.   Sycosis (the condylomatous
disease), equally ineradicable by the vital force without proper
medicinal treatment, was not recognized as a chronic miasmatic 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
87
disease of a peculiar character,  which it nevertheless undoubt-

edly is, and physicians imagined  they had cured it when they
had  destroyed  the growths upon  the skin, but  the persisting
dyscrasia occasioned by it escaped their observation.


                              I 80.

  Incalculably greater  and more  important  than  the  two
chronic miasms just named,  however, is the chronic miasm of
psora, which, whilst those  two reveal  their  specific internal

dyscrasia, the  one by the  venereal  chancre, the other  by the
cauliflower-like growths, does also, after the completion of the
internal infection of  the whole organism, announce by a pe-
culiar cutaneous eruption, sometimes consisting only of a few
vesicles accompanied by intolerable voluptuous tickling itching

(and a peculiar odor), the monstrous internal chronic miasm—
the psora, the only real fundamental cause and producer of all
the other numerous,  I may say innumerable, forms of disease,x
which, under the  names of  nervous debility, hysteria,  hypo-
chondriasis, mania,  melancholia, imbecility, madness, epilepsy
and convulsions of  all sorts, softening of the bones (rachitis),

scoliosis  and  cyphosis,  caries,  cancer,  fungus haematoides,


  1 I spent  twelve years in investigating the source of this incredibly large
number of  chronic affections, in ascertaining and  collecting certain proofs
of this great truth, which had remained unknown to all former or contem-
porary observers, and in discovering at  the same time  the principal (anti-
psoric) remedies, which collectively are  nearly a match for this thousand-
headed monster of disease in all its different developments and forms.  I
have published my observations on this subject in the book entitled The
Chronic Diseases (4 vols., Dresden, Arnold.  |2nd edit., Diisseldorf, Schaub.])..
Before I had obtained this knowledge I could only teach how to treat the
whole number of chronic diseases as isolated,  individual maladies, with
those medicinal substances whose pure effects had been tested on healthy
persons up to that period, so that every case of chronic disease was treated
by my disciples according to the group of symptoms it  presented, just like
an idiopathic disease, and it was often so far cured that sick mankind re-
joiced  at the extensive remedial treasures already amassed by the new
healing art.  How much greater cause  is there now for rejoicing that the
desired goal has been so much more nearly attained, inasmuch as the re-
cently discovered and far more specific homoeopathic remedies for chronic-
affections arising from psora (properly termed antipsoric remedies) and the
special instructions for their preparation and employment have been pub-
lished; and from among them the true physician can now select for his
curative agents those whose  medicinal symptoms correspond in the most
similar (homoeopathic) manner to the chronic disease he has to cure;  and
thus, by the  employment of (antipsoric) medicines more suitable for this;
miasm, he is enabled  to render more essential service and almost invariably
to effect perfect cures. 
88
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
neoplasms, gout,  haemorrhoids,  jaundice, cyanosis,  dropsy,
amenorrhoea,   haemorrhage  from the  stomach,  nose,  lungs,
bladder and womb, of asthma and  ulceration of  the  lungs, of
impotence  and  barrenness,  of  megrim,  deafness,  cataract,
amaurosis,  urinary calculus,  paralysis, defects  of the senses
and pains of  thousands  of  kinds, &c, figure  in systematic
works on pathology as peculiar,  independent diseases.

                             I 81.
  The fact that this extremely ancient  infecting agent has
gradually passed, in some hundreds of  generations,  through
many millions of human  organisms and has  thus attained an
incredible development, renders it in some  measure conceivable
how it can now display such innumerable morbid forms in the
great family of  mankind, particularly when we consider what
a number of  circumstances1 contribute  to the  production of
these great varieties of chronic diseases (secondary symptoms
of psora), besides the indescribable diversity of men in respect
of  their  congenital  corporeal constitutions,  so that it is no
wonder if such a variety of injurious agencies,  acting  from
within and from without and sometimes continually, on such a
variety of organisms permeated  with the psoric miasm, should
produce  an innumerable  variety of defects, injuries,  derange-
ments and sufferings, which  have hitherto been treated of in
the old pathological works,2 under a number of  special names,
as diseases of  an independent character.
 1 Some of these  causes that exercise a modifying influence on the transfor-
mation of psora into chronic diseases manifestly depend sometimes on the
climate and the peculiar physical character of the place of abode, sometimes
on the very great varieties in  the, physical and mental training of youth,
both of which may have been neglected, delayed or carried to excess, or on
their abuse in the business or conditions of life, in the matter of  diet and
regimen, passions, manners, habits and customs of various kinds.
 - How many improper, ambiguous names do not these works contain, un-
der each of which are included excessively different morbid conditions,
which often resemble each other  in  one single symptom only, as ague,
jaundice, dropsy, consumption, leuco^rhaza. hemorrhoids, rheumatism, apoplexy,
convulsions, hysteria, hypochondriasis mdancholia, mania,  quinsy, palsy. &c,
which are represented as diseases of a  fixed and unvarying character, and
are  treated, on account  of their name, according to a determinate  plan!
How can the bestowal of such a name justify an identical medical treat-
ment? And if the treatment is not always to be the same, why make use of
an identical name which postulates an identity of treatment? "Nihil sane in
artem medicam pestiferum magis unquarn irrepsit malum, quam geueralia
quaidam nomina morbis  imponere iiiique aptare velle generalem quandam 
ORGANON  OF  MEDICINE.
89
                                I 82.

   Although,  by the discovery of that  great  source of  chronic

diseases,  as also by the discovery of the specific homoeopathic
remedies  for  the  psora,  medicine  has  advanced  some steps

nearer to a knowledge of the  nature  of the majority of  dis-
eases it  has  to cure, yet,  for settling the indication  in  each

medicinam," says Huxham, a man as clear-sighted as he was estimable on
account of  his conscientiousness (Op.phys. med., torn. i.).  And in like man-
ner Fritze laments (Annalen, i, p. 80) "that essentially  different diseases are
designated by the same name."  Even those epidemic diseases, which un-
doubtedly may be propagated in every separate epidemic by a peculiar con-
tagious principle which remains unknown to us, are designated, in the old
school of medicine, by particular names, just as if they were well-known
fixed  diseases that invariably recurred under the same form, as hospital
fever,  gaol fever, camp fever, putrid fever, bilious fever, nervous lever, mucous
fever,  although each epidemic of such roving fevers exhibits  itself at every
occurrence as another, a new disease, such as it has never before appeared in
exactly the same form, differing very much, in every instance, in its course,
as well as in many of its most striking symptoms and  its whole appearance.
Each  is so far dissimilar to all previous epidemics, whatever names they
may bear, that it would be a dereliction of all  logical  accuracy in our ideas
of things were we to give  to these maladies, that differ so much among
themselves, one of those names we meet  with in pathological writings, and
treat  them all medicinally in conformity with this  misused name. The
candid Sydenham alone perceived this, when he (Obs. med., cap. ii, De morb.
epid.) insists upon the necessity of not considering any epidemic disease as
having occurred  before and treating it in the same way as another, since all
that occur successively, be they ever so numerous, differ from one another:
"Nihil quicquam (opinor,) animum universal qua patet medicinee  pomceria
perlustrantem, tanta admiratione percellet, quam discolor illaet  sui plane
dissimilis morborum Epidemicorum facies; non tarn qua varias ejusdem
anni tempestates, quam qua discrepantes diversorum ab invicem annorum
constitutiones referunt, ab iisque dependent.  Quas tamaperta praedictorum
morborum  diversitas  turn propriis ac sibi peculiaribus symptomatis. turn
etiam medendi ratione, quam hi ab illis disparem  prorsus sibi vendicant,
satis illucescit.   Ex quibusconstat morbus hosce, ut ut externa quadantenus
specie, et symptomatis aliquot utrisque pariter supervenientibus, convenire
paulo incautioribus videantur, re tamen ipsa  (si bene adverteris  animum,)
alienae admodum esse indolis, et distare ut asra lupinis."(a)
  From all this it is clear that these useless and misused names of diseases
ought to have no influence on the practice of the true  physician, who knows
that he has to judge of and to cure diseases, not according to the similarity
of the name of a single one of  their symptoms,  but according to the totality
of the signs of the individual  state of each particular patient, whose affec-
tion it is his duty carefully to investigate, but never to give  a hypothetical
guess at it.
  If. however, it is deemed  necessary sometimes  to make use of names of
diseases, in order, when talking about a patient to ordinary persons, to ren-
der ourselves intelligible in  few words, we ought only to employ them as col-
lective names, and tell them, e. g. the  patient has a kind of St. Vitus' dance.
a kind of dropsy, a kind of typhus, a kind of ague; but (iu order to do away
once for all with the mistaken notions these names  give rise to) we should
never say he has the St.  Vitus' dance^ the typhus, the dropsy, the ague, as
there  are certainly no diseases of these and similar names of fixed, unvary-
ing character. 
90
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
case of  chronic (psoric) disease he is called on  to  cure, the
duty of a careful  apprehension of its ascertainable symptoms
and  characteristics is as indispensable for  the  homoeopathic
physician as  it was  before  that discovery, as no  real cure of
this or of other diseases can take place without  a strict par-
ticular treatment (individualization) of each  case of disease—
only that in this  investigation some difference is to be made
when the affection is an acute and rapidly developed disease,
and when it is a chronic one; seeing that, in  acute disease, the
chief symptoms strike us  and become evident to the senses
more quickly, and  hence much less time is requisite for tracing
the picture of  the disease  and much  fewer  questions are re-
quired to be asked,1 as almost everything is  self-evident, than
in a chronic disease which  has  been gradually  progressing for
several  years, in which the symptoms are much  more difficult
to be ascertained.
                           § 83. (a)

   This  individualizing examination of a case of disease, for
which  I shall  only  give  in this place general directions, of
which the practitioner will bear in mind only what is applicable
for each  individual case, demands of the physician nothing
but  freedom  from  prejudice  and sound senses, attention in
observing and fidelity in tracing the picture of the disease.

                            8 84.

   The patient details the history of his sufferings; those about
him  tell what  they have  heard him complain of, how he has
behaved and what they have  noticed in him; the physician
sees, hears, and remarks by his other senses what there is of
an altered or unusual  character about him.   He writes down
accurately all that the patient and his friends have  told him
in the very expressions used by them.   Keeping silence him-
self  he allows  them to say all  they have to say, and refrains
from interrupting them2 unless they  wander off  to other mat-

  i Hence the following directions for investigating the symptoms are only
partially applicable for acute diseases.
  2 Every interruption breaks the train of thought of  the narrators, and all
they would have said at first does not again occur to  them  in precisely the
same manner after that. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
91
ters.   The physician advises them at the  beginning of the
examination to speak slowly, in order  that he may take down
in writing the important parts of what the speakers say.

                            I 85.
   He begins a fresh line  with  every  new circumstance men-
tioned by  the patient  or  his friends, so that  the symptoms
shall  be all  ranged separately one  below the other.    He can
thus add to any one, that may at first  have been related in too
vague a manner,  but subsequently more explicitly detailed.

                            I 86.
   When the  narrators have  finished what they would say of
their own accord, the physician then reverts to each particular
symptom and elicits more precise information respecting  it in
the following manner:  he reads over the symptoms as  they
were related  to him one by  one, and  about  each of them he
inquires for further  particulars: e. g. at what period did  this
symptom occur?   Was  it  previous to  taking the  medicine he
had hitherto been using?  Whilst  taking the  medicine?   Or
only some days after leaving off the medicine?  What kind of
pain,  what sensation exactly, was it that occurred on  this spot?
Where was the precise spot?  Did  the pain occur in fits and
by itself, at various times?  Or was it continued, without in-
termission?  How long did it last?   At what time of the day
or night, and in what position of the body  was  it  worst, or
ceased entirely?  What  was the exact nature of this or that
event or circumstance mentioned—discribed in plain  words?

                            I 87.
   And  thus  the physician obtains  more precise information
respecting each particular detail, but without ever framing his
questions so as to suggest the answer to the patient,1 so that
he shall only have to answer yes or  no; else he  will  be misled
to answer in the affirmative or negative something untrue, half
true, or not strictly correct, either  from indolence or in order
  i For instance, the physician should not ask, Was not this or that circum-
stance present?  He should  never be guilty of making  such suggestions,
which tend to seduce the patient into giving a false answer  and a false ac-
count of his symptoms. 
92
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
to please  his interrogator, from which  a false picture of  the
disease and an unsuitable mode of treatment must result.


                              I 88.

  If  in these voluntary  details  nothing has  been mentioned
respecting several parts or functions of the body or his mental
state, the  physician asks  what more can be  told in regard to
these parts and these functions,  or the state of his disposition
or mind;1  but in doing this  he only makes use of  general  ex-
pressions,  in  order that his informants may be  obliged to enter

into special details concerning them.


                              I 89.

  When the  patient (for  it  is on him we have chiefly to rely
for  a description  of  his sensations, except  in the  case  of
feigned diseases) has by these details, given of his own accord
and in answer to inquiries, furnished the requisite information
and  traced   a  tolerably  perfect picture  of  the  disease,  the
physician  is  at liberty and  obliged (if he  feels  he  has  not
yet gained all the information he needs) to ask more precise,
more special  questions.2

  1 For example, what is the character  of his stools?  How does he pass his
water?  How is  it with his day  and night sleep? What is the state of his dis-
position, his humor, his memory?  How about the thirst?  What sort of taste
has he in his mouth? What kinds of food and drink are most relished? What
are most repugnant to him? Has each  its full natural taste, or some other
unnatural taste? How does he feel after eating or drinking? Has he any-
thing to tell about the head, the limbs, or the abdomen?
  2 For example, how often are his bowels moved?. What is the exact char-
acter of the stools?  Did the whitish evacuation consist of mucus or faeces?
Had he or had he not pains during the  evacuation? What was their exact
character, and  where were they seated? What did the patient vomit? Is
the bad taste in the mouth putrid, or bitter, or sour, or what? before or after
eating, or during the repast? At what period of the day was it worst? What
is the taste of what is eructated?  Does the urine only become turbid on
standing, or is it turbid when first discharged?  What is its color when first
emitted?  Of what color is the sediment?  How does he behave during sleep?
Does he whine,  moan, talk or  cry out in his sleep?   Does he start during
sleep?  Does he snore during inspiration, or during expiration?  Does he lie
only on his back, or on which  side?  Does he cover himself well up, or can
he not bear the clothes on him? Does  he easily awake, or does he sleep too
soundly? How  does he feel immediately after waking from sleep?  How
often does this  or that symptom occur? what is the cause that produces it
each time it occurs? does it come on whilst sitting, lying, standing, or when
in motion? only when fasting,  or in the morning, or only in the evening, or
only after meal, or when does  it usually appear? When did  the rigor come
on? was it merely a chilly sensation, or was he actually cold at the same 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
93
                              I 90.

  When the physician has finished writing down these particu-

lars, he then makes a note of what he himself observes in the
patient,1 and ascertains  how much of that was peculiar to the

patient in his healthy state.


                              I 91.

  The symptoms and feelings of the patient during a previous

course of medicine do not furnish  the pure picture of the dis-

ease;  but,  on  the other hand,  those symptoms and ailments
which he suffered  from  before the use of the medicines, or after
they had been discontinued for several days, give the true funda-

mental idea of the  original form of  the disease, and  these

especially the physician must take note of.  When the disease
is of  a chronic  character,  and the  patient  has  been  taking
medicine up to the  time he is seen, the  physician may  with

advantage  leave  him some  days quite without medicine, or in
the meantime administer something of an unmedicinal  nature
and defer to a  subsequent period the more precise scrutiny of
the morbid  symptoms,  in order to be  able to grasp  in their


time? if so. in what parts? or while feeling chilly, was he actually warm to
the touch? was it  merely a sensation of cold, without shivering?  was he hot,
without redness of the face?  what parts of him were hot to the touch? or did
he complain of heat  without being hot to the touch? How long did the
chilliness last? how long the hot stage? When did the  hirst come on—dur-
ing the cold stage? during the heat? or previous to it? or subsequently to it?
How great was the thirst, and what was the beverage desired?  When did
the sweat come on—at the beginning or the end of the  heat? or how many
hours after the heat? when asleep or when awake?  How great  was the
sweat? was it warm or cold?  on what parts? how did it smell? What does he
complain of before or during the cold stage? what during the hot stage?
what after it? what during or after the sweating stage? &c.
  i For example, how the patient behaved during the visit—whether he was
morose, quarrelsome, hasty, lachrymose, anxious, despairing or sad, or hope-
ful, calm, &c. Whether he was in a drowsy state or in any way dull of com-
prehension;  whether he spoke hoarsely, or in a low tone, or incoherently,
or how otherwise did  he talk? what was the color of his face and eyes, and of
his skin generally? what degree of liveliness and power was there in his ex-
pression and  eyes? what was the  state of his tongue, his breathing, the smell
from his mouth, and his hearing? were his pupils dilated or contracted? how
rapidly and to what extent did they alter in the dark and in the light? what
was the character of the pulse?  what the condition of the abdomen? how
moist or hot.  how cold or dry to the touch, was the skin of this or that part,
or generally? whether he lay with head  thrown back, with mouth half or
wholly open,  with the arms placed above the head, on  his back, or in what
other position? what effort did he make to raise himself? and anything else
in him that may strike the physician as being remarkable. 
94
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
purity the  permanent uncontaminated symptoms of  the  old
affection and to form a faithful picture of the disease.

                             8 92.
   But if it be a disease of a rapid course, and if its serious
character admit of no delay,  the physician must content him-
self with  observing  the  morbid condition, altered though it
may be  by medicines, if he cannot ascertain what  symptoms
were  present before  the  employment of  the  medicines,—in
order that  he may  at least form  a just apprehension of  the
complete picture of  the disease in  its actual condition, that is
to say, of  the conjoint malady formed  by the medicinal and
original diseases, which from  the use of inappropriate drugs is
generally more serious and  dangerous than was the  original
disease,  and hence demands prompt and efficient aid; and by
thus tracing out the  complete picture of  the disease he will be
enabled  to  combat it with a suitable homoeopathic remedy, so
that the  patient shall not fall a sacrifice  to the injurious drugs
he has swallowed.
                             I 93.
   If  the disease have been brought on a short  time or, in the
case of a chronic affection, a  considerable time  previously, by
some obvious  cause,  then the patient—or  his friends when
.questioned  privately—will mention it  either spontaneously or
when carefully interrogated.1

                             8" 94.
   While inquiring into the state of chronic diseases,  the  par-
ticular circumstances of the patient with regard  to his  ordinary
occupations, his usual mode of living and diet, his domestic

  1 Any causes of a disgraceful character, which the patient or his friends
do not like to confess, at least not voluntarily, the physician must endeavor
to elicit by skilfully framing his questions, or by private information.  To
these belong poisoning or attempted suicide, onanism, indulgence inordin-
ary or unnatural debauchery, excesses in wine, cordials, punch  and other
ardent beverages, or coffee,—over-indulgence, in eating generally, or in some
particular food of a hurtful character,—infection with venereal disease or
itch, unfortunate love,  jealousy, domestic infelicity, worry, grief on ac-
count of some family misfortune, ill-usage, balked revenge, injured pride.
embarrassment of a pecuniary nature, superstitious fear,—hunger.—or an
imperfection in the private parts, a  rupture, a prolapsus, and so forth. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
95
 situation, and so forth, must be well considered and scrutinized,
 to ascertain what there is in them that may tend to produce or
 to maintain disease, in order that by their removal the recovery
 may be promoted.1
                             8 95.

   In chronic diseases the investigation of the signs of disease
 above  mentioned, and of all others, must be pursued  as care-
 fully and circumstantially as possible,  and the most minute
 peculiarities  must be  attended to,  partly because in these
 diseases they are  the most characteristic and  least  resemble
 those of acute  diseases, and  if  a  cure is to be effected  they
 cannot be  too  accurately noted; partly  because the  patients
 become so used to their long sufferings that they pay little or
 no heed to the lesser accessory  symptoms, which are  often
 very pregnant with meaning (characteristics)—often very useful
 in determining the  choice of the  remedy—and  regard them
 almost as a necessary part of their condition, almost as health,
 the  real feeling  of  which  they have well-nigh  forgotten
 in their sometimes fifteen or  twenty years of suffering,  and
 they can scarcely bring themselves  to believe that  these acces-
 sory symptoms, these  greater or  lesser deviations  from  the
 healthy  state, can have  any connection with  their  principal
 malady.
                            ■ 8 96.

   Besides this,  patients  themselves  differ  so  much in their
 dispositions, that some, especially the  so-called hypochondriacs
 and other persons of great sensitiveness and impatient of suf-
 fering,  portray their  symptoms  in too  vivid  colors and, in

  1 In chronic diseases of females it is specially necessary to pay attention
 to pregnancy, sterility, sexual desire, accouchements, miscarriages, suck-
ling, and the state of the menstrual discharge.  With respect to the last-
 named more particularly, we should not neglect to ascertain if it recurs at
too short intervals, or is delayed beyond the proper time, how many days it
lasts, whether its flow is  continuous  or interrupted, what is its general
quantity, how dark is  its color, whether there is leucorrhoea (whites) before
its appearances or after its termination, but especially by what bodily and
mental ailments, what sensations and pains, it is preceded, accompanied or
followed; if there is leucorrhoea. what is its nature, what sensations attend
its flow, in what quantity it is, and what are the conditions and occasions
under which it occurs? 
96
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
order  to induce  the  physician to give  them  relief, describe
their ailments in exaggerated expressions.1

                             I  97.
   Other individuals of  an opposite character, however, partly
from indolence, partly from false modesty, partly from a kind
of mildness of  disposition or weakness of mind, refrain from
mentioning a  number  of their  symptoms, describe  them  in
vague  terms, or allege some of them to be of no consequence.

                             8  98.
   Now, as certainly as  we should listen particularly  to the
patient's  description  of  his  sufferings  and  sensations,  and
attach credence especially to  his own expressions wherewith he
endeavors to make us understand his ailments—because in the
mouths of his friends and attendants they are usually altered
and  erroneously stated,—so certainly, on  the  other  hand,  in
all diseases,  but especially in  the chronic ones, the investiga-
tion  of the true, complete picture and its peculiarities demand
especial circumspection,  tact,  knowledge of human  nature,
caution in conducting the inquiry  and patience in an eminent
degree.
                             8  99.
   On the whole, the investigation of  acute diseases, or of such
as have existed but a short  time,  is  much the easiest for the
physician, because all the phenomena and deviations from the
health that has been but recently lost  are still  fresh in the
memory of the patient and  his  friends, still  continue to be
novel  and striking.  The physician certainly requires to know
everything in such cases also;  but he has much less to inquire
into; they are for  the most part spontaneously detailed to him.
  1 A pure fabrication of symptoms and sufferings will never be met with in
hypochondriacs, even in the most  impatient of them—a comparison of the
sufferings they complain of at yarious times when the physician gives them
nothing at all, or something quite unmedicinal, proves this plainly;—but we
must deduct something from their exaggeration, at all events ascribe the
strong character of their expressions to their excessive sensibility, in which
case this very exaggeration of their expressions  when talking of their ail-
ments becomes of  itself an important symptom  in the list of features of
which the portrait of  the disease is  composed.  The case is different with
insane persons and rascally feigners of disease. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
97
                           8 100.

   In investigating the  totality  of  the  symptoms of epidemic
 and  sporadic diseases  it  is quite immaterial whether or no
 something similar has ever appeared in the world before under
 the same or any other name.  The novelty or peculiarity of a
 disease of  that kind makes no difference either in the mode of
 examining or of  treating it, as the physician must  any way
 regard  the pure picture of every  prevailing disease  as  if  it
 were something new and unknown, and  investigate it  thor-
 oughly for itself, if he desire to practice  medicine in a  real
 and radical manner, never substituting conjecture  for actual
 observation, never  taking for granted that the case of disease
 before  him is already wholly or partially  known,  but always
 carefully examining it in all its  phases;  and this mode of  pro-
 cedure  is  all  the  more requisite  in  such  cases, as a careful
 examination  will  show that every  prevailing  disease  is in
 many respects a phenomenon of a unique character,  differing
 vastly from  all previous  epidemics, to which certain names
 have been falsely  applied—with the exception  of  those  epi-
 demics  resulting  from a contagious  principle that always
 remain  the same, such as  smallpox, measles, &c.

                           8  101.
   It  may easily happen that in the  first case of an epidemic
 disease that presents itself to  the physician's notice he does
 not at once obtain a knowledge of its complete picture, as  it is
 only  by a close observation of  several cases of  every  such
 collective disease   that he can  become conversant with  the
 totality of  its  signs and symptoms.   The carefully observing
 physician can,  however, from the examination of even the  first
 and second patients, often arrive so nearly at a  knowledge of
 the true state as to have  in his mind a characteristic portrait
 of it, and even to succeed  in finding a suitable,  homoeopathic-
 ally adapted remedy for it.
                           8  102.

  In  the course of  writing  down the  symptoms of  several
cases of this kind  the  sketch of the disease picture becomes
                                                   7 
98
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
ever more and more complete, not more spun out and verbose,
but more significant (more characteristic), and including more
of the peculiarities of this collective disease;  on  the one hand,
the general symptom (e. g. loss of appetite, sleeplessness, &c.)
become precisely defined  as to their peculiarities; and on the
other, the more  marked and  special  symptoms  which  are
peculiar to but  few diseases and of rarer occurrence, at least
in the  same combination,  become  prominent and constitute
what is characteristic of this  malady.1  All those affected
with the disease prevailing at a given time have  certainly con-
tracted it from one and the same source and hence are suffering
from the same disease;  but the whole extent of such an epi-
demic disease and the totality of its symptoms (the knowledge
whereof, which  is essential for enabling us to choose the most
suitable homoeopathic remedy for this  array of symptoms, is
obtained by a complete  survey of the  morbid picture) cannot
be  iearned from one single patient, but  is only to be  perfectly
deduced (abstracted) and ascertained from the   sufferings  of
several patients of different constitutions.

                          8 103. W
  In the same manner as has here been taught  relative to the
epidemic diseases, which  are  generally of an acute character,
the  miasmatic  chronic  maladies,  which, as I   have shown,
always remain the same in their essential nature,  especially
the  psora, must be investigated as the whole sphere of their
symptoms, in a much more minute manner than  has ever been
done before,  for in them also one patient only exhibits a por-
tion of their symptoms,  a second, a  third, and  so on, present
some other symptoms, which also are but a  (dissevered, as it
were) portion of the totality of the symptoms which constitute
the entire extent  of this malady, so  that the whole array of
the symptoms belonging  to such a miasmatic, chronic disease,
and especially to  the psora, can only be ascertained from the
observation of very many single patients affected with such a

  i The physician who has already, in  the first cases, been able  to choose a
remedy  approximating to the homoeopathic specific,  will, from the subse-
quent cases, be enabled either to verify the suitableness of the medicine
chosen, or to discover a more appropriate, the most appropriate homoeo-
pathic remedy. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
99
 chronic disease, and without  a complete  survey and collective

 picture of these symptoms the medicines capable of curing the
 whole malady homoeopathically (to-wit, the antipsorics) cannot
 be discovered; and these medicines are, at  the same time, the
 true  remedies of  the  several patients  suffering  from  such
 chronic affections.

                             8  104.

   When the totality of the symptoms that  specially mark and
 distinguish  the case of disease or, in other words, when the
 picture of the disease, whatever be its kind, is once accurately
 sketched,1 the most difficult part of the  task  is accomplished.
 The physician has  then the picture of the disease, especially if
 it be a chronic  one, always before  him  to guide him in his
 treatment;  he can  investigate it in all its  parts  and can pick
 out the characteristic symptoms, in order to oppose to these,
 that  is to  say,  to the  whole malady itself,  a  very  similar
 artificial morbific force, in the shape of  a homoeopathically
 chosen medicinal  substance, selected  from  the lists of symp-
 toms of all the medicines whose  pure effects have been as-
 certained.   And  when, during the treatment,  he  wishes  to

 ascertain what has been the effect of the medicine,  and what


  1 The old school physician gave himself very little trouble in this matter
 in his mode of treatment. He would not listen to any minute detail of all
 the circumstances of his case by the patient;  indeed, he frequently cut him
 short in his relation of his sufferings, in order that he might not be delayed
 in the rapid writing of his prescription, composed of a variety of ingredients
 unknown to him in their true effects.  No allopathic physician, as has been
 said, sought to learn all the minute circumstances of the patient's case, and
 still less did he make a note in writing of thm.  On seeing the patient again
 several days afterwards, he recollected nothing concerning 'the few details
 he had  heard at the first visit (having in the meantime seen so many other
 patients laboring under different affections); he had allowed everything to
 go in at one ear and out at  the other. At subsequent visits he only asked a
 few general questions, went through the ceremony of feeling the pulse  at
 the wrist, looked at the tongue, and at the same moment wrote another pre-
 scription, on equally irrational principles, or ordered the first one to be con-
tinued (in considerable quantities several times a day), and, with a graceful
bow, he hurried off to the fiftieth or sixtieth patient  he had  to visit, in this
 thoughtless way, in the course of that forenoon.  The profession  which  of
 all others requires actually the most reflection, a conscientious, careful ex-
 amination of the state of each individual  patient and a special treatment
 founded thereon, was  conducted in this manner by persons who called
themselves physicians, rational practitioners.  The result, as might naturally
be expected, was almost invariably bad; and yet patients had to go to them
 for advice, partly because there were none better to be had, partly for fash-
 ion's sake. 
100
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
change has taken  place in the patient's state, at  this fresh ex-
amination of the patient he only needs to strike out of the list
of the symptoms noted down at  the first visit those that have
become ameliorated, to mark what still  remains, and  add any
new symptoms that may have supervened.

                           8 105.
   The second point of the business of a true physician relates
to acquiring a knowledge of the instruments intended for the cure
of the natural diseases, investigating the pathogenetic power of
the medicines, in order, when called on  to cure,  to  be able to
select from among them one, from the list of whose symptoms
an artificial disease may be constructed, as similar as  possible
to the  totality of the principal symptoms of the natural disease
sought to be cured.
                           8 106.
  The whole pathogenetic effects of the several medicines must
be known; that is to say, all the morbid symptoms and alter-
ations  in the  health, that each of them is specially capable of
developing in the  healthy individual must first  have been ob-
served as far as possible, before  we can hope to be able to find
among them, and to select, suitable homoeopathic remedies for
most of the natural diseases.

                           8 107.
  If, in  order  to  ascertain this, medicines  be  given to sick
persons only, even though they be administered singly and
alone, then little or nothing precise is seen of  their pure effects,
as those peculiar alterations of the health to  be expected from
the medicines are mixed up with the symptoms of the disease,
and can seldom be distinctly  observed.

                          8 108.
  There  is, therefore,  no other possible way  in  which the
peculiar effects  of  medicines  on  the health of individuals can
be accurately ascertained—there is no  sure,  no more natural
way of accomplishing  this object, than to administer  the sev-
eral  medicines  experimentally, in moderate  doses,  to healthy 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
101
persons, in  order  to ascertain  what changes, symptoms and
signs of their  influence each  individually  produces  on  the

health of the body and of the mind; that  is to say, what dis-
ease elements they are able and tend to produce,1 since,  as has

been  demonstrated  (11  24—27),  all the  curative powers  of
medicines lies in this power  they possess of changing the state

of man's health, and is  revealed by observation of the  latter.

                               8 109.

   I  was the first  that opened up this path, which  I have pur-
sued with a perseverance that could  only arise and be kept  up

by a perfect conviction of the  great truth, fraught with such
blessings to humanity,  that  it  is only  by the homoeopathic
employment of  medicines2   that  the  certain cure of  human
maladies is possible.3

  1 Not one single physician, as far as I know, during the previous two thou-
sand five hundred years, thought of this so natural, so absolutely uecessary
and  only genuine  mode of testing medicines for their pure and peculiar
effects in deranging the health of man. in order to learn what morbid state
each medicine is capable of curing, except the great and immortal Albrecht
von  Haller. He alone, besides myself, saw the necessity of this (aide  the
Preface to the Pharmieopcein  Helvet. Basil, 1771, fob, p. 12):  Nempe primum
in corpore sano medela tentanda est. Nine peregrina ulla miscela; odoreque et
sapore ejus exploratis, exigua illius dosis  ingerenda et ad omnes, quae inde
contingunt, affectiones. quis  pulsus, qui calor. qua? respiratio, quasnam ex-
cretiones. attendendum.  Inde ad ductum phaenomenorum. in sano obviorum,
transeas ad experimenta in corpore aegroto." &c. But no one. not  a single
physician, attended to or followed  up this invaluable hint.
  2 It is impossible  that there can be  another true, best method of curing
dynamic diseases  (i. e. all diseases not strictly surgical) besides homoeo-
pathy, just as it is  impossible to draw more than one straight line  betwixt
two  given points.  He who imagines that there are other modes of curing
diseases besides it could not have appreciated homoeopathy fundamentally
nor practiced it with sufficient care, nor  could he ever have seen  or read
cases of properly performed homoeopathic cures;  nor, on the other hand,
could he have discerned the baselessness of all allopathic modes of treating
diseases and their bad or even dreadful effects, if, with such lax indifference,
he places the only true healing  art on an equality with those  hurtful
methods of treatment, or alleges the latter to be auxiliaries to homoeopathy
which it could not  do without! My true,  conscientious followers, the pure
homoeopathists, with their  successful,  almost never-failing  treatment,
might teach these persons i eitcr.(a)
  3 The first fruits of these labrr.-, as perfect as they could be at that time, I
recorded in the Fragmenta de riribus  medicamentorum positivis. sive in  sano
corpore humano observatis, pts. i. ii, Lipsiao, 8, 1805, ap. J. A. Barth; the more
mature fruits in the Reine Arzntimittellehre, I  Th., dritte Ausg.; II  Th.,
dritte Ausg., 1833 ; III Th., zweite  Ausg., 1825; IV Th., zw. Ausg., 1825; V Th..
zw. Ausg., 1826; VI  Th., zw. Ausg., 1827 [English translation, Materia Medica
Pura, vols, i and ii]; and in the second, third and fourth parts of Die chron-
ischen Krankheiten, 1828,1830, Dresden bei Arnold [2nd edit., with a fifth part.
Dusseldorf bei Schaub, 1835,1839]. 
102
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
                           8 110.
  I saw,  moreover, that the morbid lesions  which previous
authors had observed to result from medicinal substances when
taken into the stomach of healthy persons, either in large dosea
given by mistake or in order to produce  death in themselves
or others, or under other circumstances, accorded very much
with my own observations when experimenting with the same
substances on myself and  other  healthy individuals.   These
authors give details of what occurred as histories of poisoning
and as proofs of the pernicious effects of these powerful sub-
stances, chiefly in order  to warn others from their use;  partly
also for the sake of exalting their own skill, when, under the
use of the remedies they employed to combat  these dangerous
accidents,  health gradually returned;  but partly also, when
the persons so effected died under their treatment, in order to
seek their own justification in the dangerous character of these
substances, which  they  then termed poisons.   None of these
observers  ever  dreamed that  the  symptoms  they recorded
merely as proofs of  the noxious and poisonous  character of
these substances were sure revelations of the  power of these
drugs to extinguish curatively similar symptoms occurring in
natural diseases,  that  these their  pathogenetic phenomena
were  intimations of  their homoeopathic curative  action,  and
that the only possible way to ascertain  their medicinal powers
is to observe those  changes of health medicines are capable of
producing in the healthy  organism; for  the pure, peculiar
powers of medicines available for  the cure of disease are to be
learned neither by any ingenious a priori speculations,  nor by
the  smell, taste or  appearance  of  the  drugs,  nor by their
chemical  analysis,  nor yet  by the employment of Several of
them  at one  time  in a  mixture  (prescription) in diseases;  it
was never suspected  that these histories of medicinal diseases
would one day  furnish  the first rudiments of the true, pure
materia medica, which  from the  earliest times until now has
consisted solely of  false conjectures and  fictions of the im-
agination—that is to say, did not exist at all.1

  1 See what I have said on this subject in the "Examination of the Sources
of the Ordinary Materia Medica." prefixed to the third part of my Reine
Arzneimittellehre [translated in the Mai ria Medica Pura, vol. ii]. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
103
                           8 111.
   The agreement of my observations on the pure effects of
medicines with these older ones—although they were recorded
without reference to any therapeutic object,—and the very
concordance of these accounts with others of the same kind by
different authors, must easily convince us that medicinal sub-
stances act in the morbid changes they produce in the healthy
human body  according  to fixed, eternal laws of nature, and
by virtue of  these are enabled to  produce  certain, reliable
disease symptoms, each according to its own peculiar character.

                          8 112. («)
   In those older descriptions of the often dangerous effects of
medicines ingested in excessively large doses we notice certain
states  that were produced,  not at  the commencement, but
towards the termination of these sad events, and which were
of  an  exactly opposite  nature to.those that first appeared.
These  symptoms, the very reverse of the primary action (I 63)
or  proper action of the medicines on the vital force, are the
reaction of the vital force of the organism, its secondary action
(11 62—67), of which, however, there is seldom or hardly ever
the  least trace  from  experiments  with moderate doses  on
healthy bodies,  and from small doses none whatever.   In the
homoeopathic  curative  operation  the living organism  reacts
from these only so much as is requisite to raise  the  health
again to the normal healthy state (8 67).

                           I 113.
   The only exceptions to this are the narcotic medicines.   As
they, in  their primary action, take away sometimes the sensi-
bility  and  sensation, sometimes the  irritability, it  frequently
happens  that  in their secondary action,  even from moderate
experimental doses on healthy bodies, an increased sensibility
(and a greater irritability) is observable.

                           8 114.
   With the exception of  these narcotic substances, in experi-
ments  with moderate doses of medicine of healthy bodies, we
observe only their primary action, i. e. those symptoms where- 
104               ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
with the medicine deranges the health of the human being and
develops in him a morbid  state of longer or shorter duration.

                           8 115.
  Among  these symptoms, there occur in the  case  of some
medicines not a few which  are partially, or under certain con-
ditions, directly opposite to other symptoms  that  have  pre-
viously or  subsequently appeared, but which are not therefore
to be regarded as actual secondary action or the mere reaction
of the vital  force, but which only  represent  the alternating
state of  the various paroxysms  of  the primary  action; they
are termed alternating actions.

                           I 116.
  Some  symptoms are produced by the medicines  more fre-
quently—that  is  to say,   in many  individuals,  others more
rarely or in few persons, some only in very few healthy bodies.

                          8 117. («)
  To the latter category belong the so-called idiosyncrasies, by
which are  meant peculiar  corporeal constitutions  which,  al-
though otherwise  healthy,  possess a disposition  to be brought
into a more or less morbid  state  by certain  things which seem
to produce no impression  and  no change  in  many other in-
dividuals.1   But this inability to make an impression on every
one is only apparent.  For as two things are required for  the
production of these as  well as all other morbid alterations in
the health  of man—to-wit,  the inherent power  of the influenc-
ing  substance,  and the capability  of the vital force  that
animates the organism  to be influenced  by it—the obvious de-
rangements of health in the so-called idiosyncrasies cannot  be
laid to the account of these peculiar  constitutions alone,  but
they must  be also ascribed  to these things that produce them,
in which must lie the  power of  making the same impressions
on all human bodies,  yet  in such a manner that but a small
number  of healthy constitutions have a  tendency to  allow
  i Some few persons are apt to faint from the smell of roses, and to fall into
many other  morbid, and sometimes dangerous states from partaking of
mussels, crabs or the roe of the barbel, from touching  the leaves of some
kinds of sumach, &c. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
105
 themselves to  be brought into such an  obvious  morbid con-
 dition by them.   That these  agents  do actually  make this
 impression on  every healthy body is shown  by this, that when
 employed  as  remedies they   render  effectual  homoeopathic
 service1 to all sick persons for morbid  symptoms  similar  to
 those they seem to  be only capable of producing in so-called
 idiosyncratic individuals.
                              8 118.

   Every  medicine  exhibits peculiar   actions  on the human
 frame, which are not produced  in exactly the same manner  by
 any other medicinal substance of a different kind.2

                              8 119.
   As certainly as every species of plant  differs in its external
 form, mode of life and growth,  in  its taste  and smell from
 every other species  and genus  of plant, as  certainly  as every
 mineral and salt differs from all others, in its external as well
 as its internal  physical and chemical, properties (which alone
 should have sufficed  to prevent any confounding of one with
 another),  so certainly do  they all differ and  diverge among
 themselves in  their pathogenetic—consequently also in their
 therapeutic—effects.3   Each of these substances  produces al-
 terations in the health of human beings in a  peculiar, different,

  1 Thus the Princess Maria Porphyrogenita restored her brother, the Em-
 peror Alexius, who suffered from faintings,  by sprinkling him with rose
 water (to tZ>v pd6W <TTo.Ka.ytna) in the presence of his aunt Eudoxia (Hist. byz.
 Alexias, lib. xv, p. 503, ed. Posserl; and Horstius (Oper., iii, p. 59) saw great
 benefit from rose vinegar in cases of syncope.(")
  2 This fact was  also  perceived by the estimable A. v. Haller, who says
 (Preface to his Hist, stirp. helv.): "Latet immensa virium diversitas in iis
 ipsis plantis, quarum facies externas dudum novimus, animas quasi et quod-
 cunque caelestius habent, 'nondum perspeximus."
  3 Anyone who has a thorough knowledge of, and can appreciate the re-
 markable difference of effects on the health of man of every single substance
 from those of every other, will readily perceive that among them there can
 be. in a medicinal point of view, no equivalent remedies whatever,  no
surrogates. Only  those who do not know the pure, positive effects  of the
 different medicines can be so foolish as to try to persuade us that one can
serve in the stead of the other, and can in the same disease prove just as
serviceable  as the other.  Thus do ignorant children confound the most
essentially different things, because they scarcely know their external ap-
pearances, far less their real value, their true importance and their very
dissimilar inherent properties. 
106
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
yet determinate  manner, so as  to  preclude  the possibility of

confounding one with the other. ^

                             8 120.

   Therefore medicines,  on which depend man's life and death,

disease  and  health, must be  thoroughly and  most  carefully
distinguished from one  another, and for this purpose  tested by
careful, pure experiments on the healthy body for the purpose
of ascertaining their powers  and real effects,  in order to obtain

an accurate knowledge of them, and to enable us to avoid any
mistake in  their employment  in  diseases, for it is only  by
correct selection  of  them that the greatest of  all earthly bless-

ings, the health  of  the  body and of the mind, can be  rapidly

and permanently restored.

                             I 121.

   In proving medicines to ascertain their effects on the  healthy

body, it must  be borne in  mind that the strong, heroic sub-
stances, as  they are termed, are liable even in small doses to
produce changes in  the health even of  robust persons.   Those
of milder power must  be given for these experiments in more

  1 If this be pure truth, as it undoubtedly is, then no physician who would
not be regarded as devoid of reason, and who would not act contrary to the
dictates of his conscience, the sole arbiter of real worth, can employ in the
treatment of  diseases any medicinal substance but one with whose real
significance he is thoroughly and perfectly conversant, i. e. whose positive
action on the health of  healthy individuals he  has so accurately tested that
he knows for  certain that it is capable of producing a yery similar morbid
state, more similar than any other medicine with which he is perfectly ac-
quainted, to that presented  by the case of disease he intends to cure by
means of it;  for, as has been shown  above, neither man, nor mighty Nature
herself, can effect a perfect, rapid and permanent cure otherwise than with
a homoeopathic remedy.  Henceforth no true  physician can abstain from
making such experiments, in order to obtain this most necessary and only
knowledge of the medicines that are essential to cure, this knowledge which
has hitherto been neglected by the physicians in all  ages.  In all former
ages—posterity will scarcely believe it—physicians have hitherto contented
themselves with blindly prescribing for diseases medicines whose value was
unknown, and which had never been te*hd. relative to their highly important,
very various, pure, dynamic action  on the health of man;  and, moreover,
they mingled several of these unknown medicines that differed so vastly.
among each other in one formula, and left it  to chance to determine what
effect should thereby be produced on the patient. This is just as if a mad-
man should force his way into the workshop of an artisan, seize upon hand-
fuls of very different tools, with the use of all of which he is quite unacquainted, in
order, as he imagines, to work at the objects of art he sees around him.  I
need hardly  remark that these  would be destroyed, I may  say utterly
ruined, by his senseless operations. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
107
considerable quantities; in order to  observe  the action of  the
very weakest, however, the subjects  of experiment should be
persons free from disease, and  who  are delicate, irritable and
sensitive.
                          8 122.
  In these experiments—on which depends the exactitude of
the whole medical art, and the weal of all future generations
of  mankind—no other medicines  should  be employed except
such as are perfectly well known,  and of whose purity, genu-
ineness and energy we are thoroughly assured.

                          8 123.
  Each of these medicines must be taken in a perfectly simple,
unadulterated form;  the  indigenous plants  in  the  form of
freshly expressed juice, mixed  with a  little alcohol to prevent
it spoiling; exotic vegetable substances, however, in  the form
of powder, or tincture prepared with alcohol when they were
in the fresh state, and afterwards mingled with a certain pro-
portion of water; salts and gums, however, should be dissolved
in water  just before  being taken.  If the plant can only be
procured in its dry state, and if its powers are naturally weak,
in that case there may be used for the experiment an infusion
of it, made by cutting the  herb into small pieces and pouring
boiling water on it, so as  to extract its medicinal parts;  im-
mediately after its preparation it must be  swallowed whilst
still warm, as all expressed vegetable juices and all aqueous
infusions  of herbs, without the addition of spirit,  pass rapidly
into fermentation and decomposition, whereby all  their medic-
inal properties are lost.
                          8 124.
  For  these experiments every medicinal substance must be
employed quite alone and  perfectly  pure, without the admix-
ture of any  foreign  substance, and without  taking  anything
else of a  medicinal nature the same day, nor yet  on the sub-
sequent days, nor during all the  time we wish  to observe the
effects of  the medicine, (a)
                           I 125.
  During all the time the experiment lasts  the diet must be 
108
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
strictly regulated;  it should be as much as possible destitute
of spices, of a  purely nutritious and simple  character, green
vegetables,1 roots,  and all salads and herb soups (which, even
when most carefully  prepared, possess some disturbing medi-
cinal qualities) should  be  avoided.   The drinks are  to be
those usually partaken of, as little stimulating as possible.2

                           8 126.
  The person who is proving  the medicine must during the
whole time of the experiment avoid all over-exertion of mind
and  body, all  sorts of dissipation and disturbing passions; he
should  have no urgent  business to detract his attention;  he
must devote himself to careful self-observation and  not be
disturbed whilst so engaged;  his body must be in what is for
him  a good state of health,  and ha must possess a sufficient
amount of intelligence to be able  to express and describe his
sensations in accurate terms. W

                          8 127. W
  The medicines must be tested on both males and females, in
order also to reveal the alterations of the health they produce
in the sexual sphere.
                          8 128. <«)
  The most recent observations have  shown  that medicinal
substances, when taken in their crude state by the experimenter
for the  purpose of testing their peculiar effects, do not  exhibit
nearly the full amount of the powers that lie  hidden in them
which they do when they are taken for the same object  in high
dilutions  potentized  by  proper trituration  and succession, by
which simple operations the powers which  in their crude state
lay hidden and. as  it were, dormant, are developed and roused
into  activity to  an  incredible extent.   In this  manner we  now
find  it  best to investigate the medicinal powers even of such
substances as  are  deemed weak, and the  plan we adopt is to

  1 Young green peas, green French beans and in all cases carrots are allow-
able,  as the least medicinal vegetables.
  2 The subject of experiment must either be not in the habit of taking pure
wine, brandy, coffee or tea, or he must have totally abstained for a consid-
erable time previously from the use of these injurious beverages, some of
which are stimulating, others medicinal. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
109
give to  the  experimenter, on an empty  stomach, daily from
four to six very small globules of  the  thirtieth potentized
dilution of such a substance, moistened with a little water, and
let him continue this for several days.

                          8 129.
  If the effects  that result from such a dose are but slight, a
few more  globules may be taken daily, until they become more
distinct and stronger and  the alterations of  the  health more
conspicuous; for all persons are not affected  by a medicine in
an equally great degree; on the contrary, there is a vast variety
in this  respect,  so that sometimes an apparently weak indi-
vidual may be scarcely  at all affected by moderate doses of
a medicine known to be of a powerful character, whilst he  is
strongly enough acted on  by some others of  a much  weaker
kind.  And, on the other hand, there are very robust persons
who experience very considerable morbid symptoms from an
apparently mild  medicine, and  only  slighter  symptoms from
stronger drugs.   Now, as this cannot be known beforehand, it
is advisable to commence  in every instance with a small dose
of the drug and, where suitable and requisite, to increase the
dose more and more from day to day. <«)

                           I 130.
  If, at the very commencement, the first dose  administered
shall have been  sufficiently  strong, this advantage  is gained,
that  the  experimenter learns the order of succession  of  the
symptoms and can note down accurately  the  period at which
each occurs, which is very useful in leading to a  knowledge of
the genius of  the medicine, for  then the order of  the primary
actions, as also  that of the alternating actions, is observed in
the most  unambiguous manner.   A very moderate  dose even,
often suffices for the experiment, provided  only the experi-
menter is endowed with  sufficiently delicate sensitiveness, and
is very attentive to his sensations.   The duration of the action
of  a drug can only be ascertained by a comparison  of  several
experiments.
                           8 131.
   If however, in order  to ascertain anything at all, the same 
110                ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
medicine must be given to the same person to test for several
successive days in ever-increasing doses, we thereby learn, no
doubt, the  various  morbid states this medicine is capable of
producing in a  general  manner, but we do not ascertain their
order of  succession; and  the subsequent dose often removes,
curatively,  some one or other of the symptoms caused by the
previous  dose, or develops in its stead an opposite state;  such
symptoms should be enclosed in brackets, to mark their am-
biguity, until subsequent purer experiments show whether they
are the reaction of the organism and secondary action or an
alternating action of this medicine.

                          8 132.
  But when the object  is, without  reference  to  the sequential
order of  the phenomena and the duration of  the action of  the
drug, only  to ascertain the symptoms  themselves, especially
those of a weak medicinal substance, in that case the preferable
course to pursue is to give  it for several successive days, in-
creasing  the  dose  every day. <a>  In this manner  the action of
an unknown  medicine,  even  of the  mildest nature,  will be
revealed, especially if tested on sensitive persons.

                          8 133.
   On experiencing  any particular sensation from the medicine,
it is useful, indeed necessary, in order to determine the exact
character of  the symptom, to assume various positions while
it lasts,  and  to observe whether, by moving the part affected,
by walking in the room or the open air,  by standing, sitting or
lying, the  symptom is  increased, diminished or removed,  and
whether  it returns on again assuming the position in which it
was  first observed,—whether  it is altered by eating or drink-
ing,  or by any other  condition, or  by  speaking, coughing,
sneezing or any other  action of the body,  and at the  same
time to note  at what time of the day or night it  usually occurs
in the most marked manner, whereby what is peculiar to and
characteristic of each symptom will become apparent.

                           8 134.
   All external influences, and more   especially medicines 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
Ill
possess the property of producing in the health of the living
organism a particular kind of alteration peculiar to themselves;
but all the symptoms peculiar to a medicine do not appear in
one person, nor all at once, nor  in the  same experiment, but
some  occur in one person  chiefly  at one time, others again
during a second or third trial; in another person  some other
symptoms  appear, but in such a manner that probably some
of the phenomena are observed in the fourth, eighth or tenth
person which  had already  appeared in  the second, sixth  or
ninth person,  and so forth; moreover,  they may not recur at
the same hour.
                           8 135.
  The whole of the elements of  disease  a medicine  is capable
of producing can only be brought to anything like complete-
ness by  numerous observations  on  suitable persons of both
sexes and of various constitutions.   We can only be assured
that a medicine has been thoroughly proved in regard to the
morbid states  it can produce—that is to say, in regard to  its
pure powers of altering  the health of man—when subsequent
experimenters can notice little of a  novel character from  its
action, and  almost always  only  the  same symptoms as  had
been already observed by others.

                           8 136.
  (Although, as has  been  said, a medicine,  on being proved
on healthy subjects, cannot develop in one  person all the  al-
terations of health it is capable of causing, but  can only  do
this when given to many different individuals, varying in their
corporeal and  mental constitution, yet the tendency to excite
all these symptoms in every human being exists in it [8 117],
according to an eternal and  immutable law of nature, by virtue
of which  all its effects, even  those  that are  but rarely  de-
veloped in the healthy person, are  brought into  operation in
the case of every individual if  administered to him when he is
in a morbid state presenting similar symptoms; it then, even
in the smallest dose,  being  homoeopathically selected, silently
produces in the patient an artificial state closely resembling
the natural disease, which rapidly and permanently [homoeop-
athically] frees and cures him of his original malady.) 
112
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
                          8 137.
  The more  moderate, within certain limits, the doses of  the
medicine used  for  such  experiments are—provided  we  en-
deavor to facilitate the observation by the selection of a person
who is a lover of truth, temperate  in all  respects, of delicate
feelings, and who can direct  the most minute attention to his
sensations—so much the more distinctly are the primary effects
developed,  and  only these, which  are  most worth  knowing,
occur without any admixture of secondary effects or reactions
of the vital  force.   When, however, excessively large doses
are used there occur at the same time not  only a number of
secondary effects among the symptoms, but the primary effects
also come on in such hurried confusion and  with  such im-
petuosity that nothing can be  accurately observed;  let alone
the danger attending them, which no one who  has any  regard
for his fellow-creatures,  and who  looks on the meanest of
mankind as his  brother, will deem an indifferent matter.

                          I  138.
  All the sufferings, accidents  and changes of the health of
the experimenter during the action of a medicine (provided the
above conditions  [88 124—127] essential to a good and pure
experiment are  complied  with) are  solely derived  from  this
medicine, and must be regarded and registered as  belonging
peculiarly to this medicine,  as symptoms of  this medicine,
even  though  the experimenter  had  observed, a considerable
time previously, the spontaneous occurrence of similar phenom-
ena in himself.   The  reappearance  of these  during the trial
of the medicine only shows that this individual is, by virtue of
his  peculiar constitution, particularly disposed to have such
symptoms excited in him.   In  this case they are the  effect of
the medicine; the symptoms  do not  arise spontaneously while
the medicine that has been  taken  is exercising an influence
over the health of the whole system, but are produced  by the
medicine.
                          I  139.
  When the physician does not  make the trial of the medicine
on himself, but  gives it to another person, the latter must note
down distinctly the sensations, sufferings, accidents and changes 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
113
 of health he experiences  at the time of their occurrence, men-
 tioning the  time after the ingestion of the drug when each
 symptom arose and,  if it lasts long, the period of its duration.
 The physician  looks  over the report  in  the presence of  the
 experimenter immediately after the  experiment  is concluded,
 or if  the  trial lasts  several days  he does  this every  day, in
 order, whilst everything is still fresh in his memory, to question
 him about  the exact nature of   every one of these circum-
 stances, and to write down the more precise details so elicited,
 or to  make such alterations as the experimenter may suggest.1

                             8  140.
   If  the person cannot write, the  physician must  be informed
 by  him every day of  what  has occurred  to him, and  how it
 took place.   What is noted down as authentic  information on
 this point, however, must be chiefly the voluntary narration of
 the person who makes the experiment, nothing conjectural and
 as little as possible derived from  answers to leading questions
 should be admitted;  everything must be ascertained with the
 same  caution as I have counselled above (88 84—99) for the
 investigation of the phenomena and for tracing the  picture of
 natural diseases.
                             8  141.
   But the best provings of the pure effects of simple medicines
 in altering the  human health,  and  of the artificial diseases and
 symptoms they are capable  of developing  in the healthy  in-
 dividual,   are  those  which  the   healthy,   unprejudiced and
 sensitive  physician institutes on himself with all  the caution
 and care here enjoined.  He knows with the greatest certainty
 the things he has experienced in his own person.2

  1 He who makes  known  to the medical  world the results of such experi-
 ments becomes thereby responsible for the trustworthiness of the person
 experimented on and his statements, and  justly so, as the weal of suffering
 humanity is here at stake.
  2 Those trials made by the physician on himself have for  him other and
 inestimable advantages.  In the first place, the great truth that the medi-
 cinal virtue of all drugs, whereon depends their curative power, lies in the
 changes of health he has himself  undergone from the medicines he has
 proved, and the morbid states he has himself experienced from them, be-
comes for him an incontrovertible fact.  Again, by such noteworthy obser-
 vations on himself he will be brought to understand his own sensations,  his
 mode of thinking  and his disposition (the foundation of all true wisdom:
yv«0i aeavTov), and he will be also trained to be, what every physician ought 
114                 ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
                              8 142.

   But  how some symptoms1 of the simple medicine employed

for  a  curative  purpose  can  be  distinguished  amongst  the
symptoms of  the original malady, even  in diseases,  especially

in those of  a chronic character that usually remain unaltered,

iR a  subject appertaining to  the  higher  art of judgment, and

must be left exclusively to masters in observation.


                              I 143.

   If we have thus tested on the  healthy individual a consider-
able number of simple medicines and carefully and  faithfully

registered  all  the disease  elements and  symptoms they  are
capable of  developing as  artificial disease-producers, then only
have we  a  true  materia  medica—a collection of real, pure,

reliable2 modes of action of  simple  medicinal  substances,  a


to be, a good  observer.  All our observations on others are not nearly so in-
teresting as those made on ourselves. The observer of others must always
dread lest the experimenter did not feel exactly what he said, or lest he did
not describe his sensations with the most appropriate expressions.   He must
always remain in doubt whether he has not been deceived, at least to some
extent.  These obstacles to the knowledge of the truth, which can never be
thoroughly surmounted in our investigations of the artificial morbid symp-
toms that occur in others from the ingestion of medicines, cease entirely
when we make the trials on ourselves.  He who makes these trials on him-
self knows for certain what he has felt, and each trial is a new  inducement
for him to investigate the powers of other medicines.  He thus becomes more
and more practiced  in the art  of observing, of such importance to the phy-
sician, by continuing to observe himself, the one on whom he can most  rely
and who will never deceive him; and this he will  do all the more zealously
as these experiments on himself promise to give him a reliable knowledge of
the true value and significance of the instruments of cure that are still to a
great degree unknown to our art.  Let it not be imagined that such slight
indispositions caused by taking medicines for the purpose of proving them
can be in the main injurious to the health. Experience shows, on the con-
trary, that the organism of theprover becomes, by these frequent attacks on
his health, all the more expert in repelling all external influences inimical to
his frame and all artificial and natural morbific  noxious agents, and be-
comes more hardened to resist everything of an injurious character, by
means of these moderate'experiments  on his own person with medicines.
His health becomes more unalterable; he becomes more robust, as all "ex-
perience shows.(")
  1 Symptoms which, during the  whole course of the disease,  might  have
been observed only  a long time previously, or never before, consequently
new ones, belonging to the medicine.
  ■^ Latterly it has been the habit to entrust the proving of medicines to un-
known persons at a distance, who were paid for their work, and the infor-
mation so obtained  was printed.  But by so doing, the work which is of all
others the most important, which is to form the basisof the only true heal-
ing art, and which demands the greatest moral certainty and trustworthi- 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.                115
volume of the book of  nature, wherein is recorded a consider-
able array of the peculiar changes of the health and symptoms
ascertained to belong to each of the  powerful  medicines, as
they were revealed to the attention of the observer, in which
the  likeness  of  the (homoeopathic) disease elements of many
natural diseases to be' hereafter  cured by them  are  present,
which, in a word, contain artificial morbid states, that furnish
for the similar natural morbid states  the only true, homoeop-
athic,  that  is  to say specific,  therapeutic  instruments for
effecting their certain and permanent cure.

                            I 144.
   From such a materia medica everything that is conjectural,
all that  is mere assertion or  imaginary should be strictly ex-
cluded;  everything  should  be the pure language  of nature
carefully and honestly interrogated.

                            8 145.
   Of a truth, it is only by a very considerable store of medi-
cines accurately known in respect of these their pure modes of
action in  altering the health of man, that we can be placed in
a  position  to  discover a  homoeopathic  remedy, a  suitable
artificial  (curative) morbific analogue for each of the infinitely
numerous morbid  states  in  nature,  for every malady in the
world.1   In  the meantime, even now—thanks to the truthful
character of the symptoms, <a) and to the abundance of disease
elements which every one of the powerful  medicinal substances
has already shown in its action on the healthy body—but few
diseases  remain, for which a  tolerably suitable homoeopathic
remedy may not be met with  among those now proved as to
their  pure action,2 which, without much  disturbance, restores
ness. seems to me, I regret to say, to become doubtful  and uncertain  in its
results, and to lose all value.(a)
 1  At first  I was the only person who made the proving of the pure powers
of medicines the most important of his occupations.  Since then I have been
assisted in this by some young men, who instituted experiments on them-
selves, and whose observations 1 have critically revised. But what shall we
not be able to effect in the way of curing in the whole extent of the infinite-
ly large domain of disease, when numbers of  accurate and trustworthy ob-
servers shall have rendered their services in enriching this, the only true
materia medica, by careful experiments on themselves! The healing art will
then come near the mathematical sciences in certainty.
 2 See the second note to §109. 
116
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
health  in  a gentle, sure  and  permanent  manner—infinitely
more surely and safely than can be effected by all the general
and special therapeutics of the old allopathic medical art with
its  unknown  composite remedies, which do but alter and ag-
gravate but  cannot cure chronic diseases, and rather retard
than promote recovery from acute diseases. (fl)

                         8 146. (a)
   The third point of the business of a true physician relates to
the  judicious employment of  the artificial  morbific agents
(medicines) that  have been  proved on  healthy  individuals to
ascertain their  pure action, in order to effect  the  homoeopathic
cure of natural diseases.
                           8 147.
  Whichever of these medicines  that have been investigated as
to their power of altering man's health we find to contain in
the symptoms observed from its use the greatest  similarity to
the totality of the symptoms of  a given natural  disease, this
medicine will and  must be the most suitable, the  most certain
homoeopathic remedy for the disease; in it is found the specific
remedy of this case of disease.

                          8 148.
  A medicine selected  in this  manner, which has the power
and the tendency to  produce  symptoms  the most similar
possible to the  disease to be cured,  consequently a similar
artificial disease,  given in  a  suitable dose, affects, in its
dynamic action on the morbidly deranged vital force of the
individual, those very parts  and points in the organism now
suffering from the natural disease, and produces  in  them its
own artificial disease,  which,  on  account of its great similarity
and preponderating  strength,   occupies  precisely   the  seat
hitherto occupied by the natural  morbid derangement, so that
the instinctive, automatic vital force is from that time forward
no  longer  affected by  the natural disease but solely by the
stronger, similar  medicinal  disease;  which  in  its  turn, on
account of the small  dose of  the remedy,  being, like  every
moderate medicinal disease, overcome by the  increased energy 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
117
 of the vital force, soon spontaneously disappears, leaving the

 body free from all disease, that is to say, healthy and  perma-
 nently cured.
                              I 149.

   When  the  suitable  homoeopathic  remedy  has  been  thus
 selectedx and  rightly employed,  the acute  disease we wish to
 cure, even  though it be of a grave character and attended  by
 many sufferings, subsides insensibly, in a few  hours if it be of
 recent date, in a few days if it be of somewhat longer standing,
 along with all traces of  indisposition, and nothing or  almost

 nothing more of  the artificial medicinal disease  is  perceived;
 there occurs, by  rapid, imperceptible transitions, nothing but
 restored  health, recovery.   Diseases of  long standing  (and
 especially such  as are of  a complicated character) require for

 their cure  a proportionately longer time.   More especially do

  1 But this laborious, sometimes very laborious, search  for and selection of
 the homoeopathic remedy most suitable in every respect to each morbid
 state, is an operation which, notwithstanding all the admirable books for
 facilitating it, still demands the study of the original sources themselves,
 and at the same time a great amount of circumspection and serious deliber-
 ation, which have their best reward in the consciousness of having faithfully
 discharged our duty. How could this laborious, care-demanding  task, by
 which alone the best way of curing diseases is rendered possible, please the
 gentlemen of the new mongrel sect, who assume the  honorable name of
 homoeopathists, and even seem to employ medicines in form and appearance
 homoeopathic, but  determined upon by them anyhow (quidquid in buccam
 venit), and who, when the unsuitable remedy does not immediately give re-
 lief, in place of laying the blame on their unpardonable ignorance and laxity
 in performing the most important and serious of all human affairs, ascribe
 it to homoeopathy, which they accuse of great imperfection (if  the truth be
 told, its imperfection consists in this, that the most suitable homoeopathic
 remedy for each morbid condition does not spontaneously fly into their
 mouth like roasted pigeons, without any trouble on their own part).  They
 know, however, from frequent practice, how to make up for the inefficiency
 of the scarcely half homoeopathic remedy by the employment of allopathic
 means, that come much  more handy to them, among which one or more
 dozen of leeches applied to the affected part, or little harmless venesections
 to the extent of eight ounces, and  so forth, play an important part; and
 should the patient, in spite of all this, recover, they extol th*eir venesections,
 leeches, &c, alleging that, had it not been for these, the patient would not
 have been pulled through, and they give us to understand, in  no doubtful
 language, that these operations, derived without much exercise of genius
 from the pernicious routine of the old school, in reality contributed the best
share towards the cure.   But if the patient die under the treatment, as not
unfrequently  happens, they seek to console the friends by saying that  "they
themselves were witnesses that everything conceivable, had been done for
the lamented  deceased."  Who would do this frivolous and pernicious tribe
the honor to call them, after the name of the very laborious but salutary
 art, homoeopathic physicians?  May  the just recompense await them, that,
when taken ill, they may be treated in the same manner l(a) 
118
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
the chronic medicinal  dyscrasias so often produced  by allo-
pathic bungling, along  with the natural disease left uncured by
it, require a much longer time for their recovery;  often, indeed,
are they incurable, in consequence of the shameful  robbery of
the patient's strength and juices, the principal feat performed
by allopathy in its so-called methods of treatment.

                           8 150.
   If a patient complain of one or more trivial symptoms, that
have been only observed a short  time previously, the physician
should not regard this as a fully developed disease  that re-
quires serious medical  aid.  A slight alteration in the diet and
regimen will  usually suffice to dispel such an indisposition.

                           8 151.
   But if the  patient complain of a few violent  sufferings, the
physician will usually find, on investigation,  several  other
symptoms  besides, although  of a slighter  character, which
furnish a complete picture of the disease.

                           8 152.
   The worse  the acute  disease is, of so much the more numer-
ous and striking symptoms is it generally composed,  but with
so much the  more certainty may a suitable remedy for it be
found, if there be a sufficient number of medicines known with
respect to their positive action, to choose from. Among the lists
of symptoms of many  medicines it  will not be difficult to find
one from whose separate disease elements an antitype of cura-
tive artificial  disease, very like the totality of the symptoms of
the natural disease, may be constructed, and such a  medicine
is the desired remedy.
                           8  153.
   In this search for a  homoeopathic specific remedy, that is to
say, in this  comparison  of the collective symptoms of  the
natural disease with the lists of symptoms of known medicines,
in order  to find among these an artificial morbific agent cor-
responding by similarity  to the disease to be cured, the more
striking,  singular, uncommon, and pecxdiar (characteristic) signs 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.                119
and symptoms1 of the case of disease are chiefly and  almost
solely to be kept in view;  for it  is more particularly these that
very similar ones in the list of symptoms of the selected medicine
must correspond to, in order to constitute it the most suitable
for effecting the cure.   The more general and undefined symp-
toms:  loss  of  appetite,  headache, debility, restless  sleep,
discomfort, and so forth,  demand but  little attention when of
that  vague and indefinite character, if  they cannot  be more
accurately described, as symptoms  of  such  a general  nature
are  observed in almost every disease and  from almost every
drug.
                            I 154.
   If the antitype constructed from the list of symptoms of the
most  suitable  medicine  contain  those peculiar,  uncommon,
singular and distinguishing (characteristic) symptoms, which
are to be met with in the disease to be cured in the greatest
number and  in the greatest similarity, this medicine  is  the
most appropriate  homoeopathic specific remedy for this morbid
state; the disease, if it be not one of very  long standing, will
generally be removed and extinguished by  the first dose of  it,
without any considerable disturbance.

                            8 155.
   I  say without any considerable  disturbance.  For in the em-
ployment of this  most appropriate  homoeopathic remedy it is
only  the  symptoms of the medicine that correspond  to  the
symptoms of the disease that are called into play, the  former
occupying the place of the latter (weaker) in the  organism, and
thereby annihilating  them by  overpowering them;  but  the
other symptoms of the homoeopathic medicine, which are often
very  numerous,  being  in no way  applicable to  the case  of
disease in question, are not called  into  play at  all.  The  pa-

 1 Dr. von Bonninghausen, who has already distinguished himself by his
labors in connection with the new system of medicine, has lately increased
our obligation to him by the publication of his important little book setting
forth the characteristic symptoms, more particularly of the antipsoric med-
icines, entitled Uebersicht der Hauptwirkungs-Sphare der antips.  Arz.,
Miinster, bei Coppenrath, 1833,  and the appendix thereto (containing the
antisyphilitic and antisycotic medicines) at the end of the second edition of
his Systematisch-alphabetisches  Repertorium der antipsorischen Arzneien, bei
Coppenrath in Miinster. 
120                ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.

tient, growing hourly better, feels almost nothing of them at
all, because the excessively minute dose requisite for homoeop-
athic use  is much too weak  to  produce the other symptoms
of the medicine that are not homoeopathic to the case, in those
parts of the body that are free from disease, and consequently
can allow only the homoeopathic symptoms  to act on the parts
of the organism that are already most irritated and excited by
the similar symptoms of the disease, thus changing the morbid
affection of the vital force into a similar but stronger medicinal
disease, whereby the original malady is extinguished.

                         I 156. (a)
   There  is, however, almost  no homoeopathic  medicine, be it
ever so suitably chosen, that, especially if it should be given
in an insufficiently  minute  dose, will  not produce, in  very
irritable  and sensitive patients, at least one  trifling, unusual
disturbance, some slight new symptom whilst its action lasts;
for it is next to  impossible that medicine and disease should
cover one another  symptomatically  as exactly as  two triangles
with equal sides and equal angles.   But this (in ordinary cir-
cumstances) unimportant  difference will  be easily done away
with by the potential activity (energy) of  the  living organism,
and is not perceptible by patients not excessively delicate; the
restoration goes forward, notwithstanding, to the goal of per-
fect recovery, if it be not prevented by the action of hetero-
geneous  medicinal  influences upon the patient,  by errors of
regimen or by excitement of the passions.

                         8 157. («)
   But though it is certain that a  homoeopathically selected
remedy does, by reason of its appropriateness and the minute-
ness of  the  dose, gently  remove  and  annihilate the  acute
disease  analogous  to it,  without  manifesting  its other, un-
homceopathic symptoms, that is to say,  without the production
of new, serious disturbances, yet it usually, immediately after
ingestion—for the first hour, or for a few hours—causes  a
kind of slight aggravation (where the dose has been somewhat
too large, however, for a considerable number of  hours), which
has so much resemblance  to the original disease  that it seems 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
121
to the patient to be an aggravation of his own disease.   But
it is,  in reality,  nothing  more  than  an  extremely  similar
medicinal disease,  somewhat exceeding in strength the original
affection.
                            8 158.
   This slight homoeopathic aggravation during the first hours—
a very good prognostic that the acute disease will  most  prob-
ably yield to the first dose—is quite as it  ought to be, as the
medicinal disease must naturally  be somewhat stronger  than
the malady to be cured if it is to overpower and extinguish the
latter, just as a natural  disease  can remove and annihilate an-
other one similar to it only when it is stronger than the  latter
(U 43—48).
                             I 159.
   The  smaller the dose of  the homoeopathic  remedy is,  so
much  the slighter and shorter is this apparent increase of the
disease during the first hours.

                             8 160.
   But as the dose of a homoeopathic remedy can scarcely ever
be  made so  small that it  shall not be able to relieve, over-
power,  indeed completely  cure  and  annihilate  the  uncom-
plicated natural disease of  not long standing that is analogous
to it (8 249, note), we can  understand why a dose of an ap-
propriate  homoeopathic  medicine,  not  the   very  smallest
possible, does always, during the first hour after its ingestion,
produce a perceptible homoeopathic aggravation of this kind.1
  1 This exaltation of the medicinal symptoms over those disease symptoms
analogous to them, which looks like an aggravation, has been observed by
other physicians also, when by accident they employed a  homoeopathic
remedy.  When a patient suffering from itch complains of an increase of the
eruption after sulphur, his physician, who knows not the cause of this, con-
soles him with the assurance that the itch must first come out properly
before it can be cured; he knows not, however, that this is a sulphur eruption,
that assumes the appearance of an increase of the itch.
  "The facial eruption which the viola tricolor cured was aggravated by it
at the commencement of its action," Leroy tells us (Hiilk. fur Mutter, p. 406),
but ho knew not that the apparent aggravation was owing to the somewhat
too largo dose of the remedy, which in this instance was to a certain extent
homoeopathic. Lysons says (Med. Transact., vol. ii, London, 1772), "The bark
of the elm cures most certainly those skin diseases which it increases at the
beginning of its action.''  Had he not given the bark in the monstrous doses
usual in the allopathic system, but in the quite small doses requisite when
the medicine shows similarity of symptoms, that is to say, when it is used 
122                ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
                          8 161. («)
   When I here limit the so-called homoeopathic aggravation,
or rather the primary action of the homoeopathic medicine that
seems to increase  somewhat the symptoms of the original dis-
ease,  to  the first or few first hours, this is certainly  true with
respect to diseases of  a more acute character and of  recent
origin;1  but where medicines of long action  have to combat a
malady  of  considerable or of  very long standing, where one
dose,  consequently, must continue  to  act for  many  days, we
then occasionally  see, during the first six, eight or ten days,
the occurrence of  some such primary actions of  the medicine,
some  such apparent increase of the symptoms of the original
disease (lasting for one or several  hours), whilst in the inter-
vening hours  amelioration of the whole malady is perceptible.
After  the  lapse of these  few  days  the amelioration resulting
from  such primary action of the medicine proceeds almost un-
interruptedly for several days longer.

                           8 162.
   It  sometimes happens, owing to the moderate  number  of
medicines yet  known with respect to their true, pure action, that
but a portion of the symptoms of the disease under treatment^
are to be met  with in the list of  symptoms of the most  appro-
priate medicine, consequently this imperfect medicinal morbific
agent must be employed for lack of a more perfect one.

                           8 163.
   In this case we  cannot indeed expect from  this medicine a
complete, untroubled cure; for during its use some symptoms
appear which were not previously  observable  in the disease,
accessory symptoms of the not perfectly  appropriate remedy.
This does by no means prevent a considerable part of the dis-
ease (the symptoms of  the disease that resemble those  of the
homoeopathically, he would have effected a cure without, or almost without,
seeing this apparent increase of the disease (homoeopathic aggravation).
 1 If the action of those medicines to which the longest duration of action
is proper, quickly expires in acute diseases—most quickly in those that are
most acute—it is proportionately long lasting in chronic diseases (of psoric
origin),  and hence it  happens that the antipsoric medicines often do not
show any such homoeopathic aggravation in the first  hours, whilst  they do
so later and during various hours for the first eight or ten days. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICIGE.
123
 medicine) from  being  eradicated by  this  medicine, thereby
 establishing a fair commencement of  the cure, but still  this
 does not take place without those accessory symptoms, which
 are, however, always moderate when the dose of the medicine
 is sufficiently minute.
                            8 164.
   The small number of  homoeopathic symptoms present in the
 best selected medicine  is no obstacle to the cure in cases
 where these few medicinal symptoms are chiefly of an uncommon
 kind and such  as  are peculiarly distinctive  (characteristic) of
 the  disease;  the  cure takes place under such circumstances
 without any particular disturbance.

                            8 165.
   If, however, among the symptoms of  the remedy selected,
 there be none that accurately resemble  the distinctive (charac-
 teristic),  peculiar, uncommon symptoms of the case of disease,
 and if the remedy correspond to the disease only  in the general,
 vaguely described,  indefinite states (nausea, debility, headache,
 and so forth), and if there be among the  known  medicines
 none more  homoeopathically appropriate, in  that  case  the
 physician cannot promise himself any immediate favorable re-
 sult from the employment of this unhomoeopathic medicine.

                           8 166.
   Such a case is, however, very  rare,  owing to the increased
 number of medicines whose  pure effects  are now known, and
 the  bad effects  resulting  from it, when  they  do occur,  are
 diminished whenever a subsequent medicine,  of  more accurate
 resemblance, can be selected.

                           8 167.
  Thus  if there  occur, during the  use of  this  imperfectly
homoeopathic remedy first employed, accessory symptoms of
some moment, then, in the case  of  acute  diseases, we  do not
allow this first dose to exhaust its action, nor leave the patient
to the full duration of the action of the remedy, but we inves-
tigate afresh the morbid  state in its now altered  condition, and 
124               ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
add the remainder of the original symptoms  to  those newly
developed in tracing a new picture of the disease.

                          I 168.
  We shall then be able much more readily to discover, among
the known medicines, an analogue to the morbid  state before
us, a single  dose of  which, if it do  not entirely destroy the
disease, will advance it considerably on the way  to be cured.
And  thus we go on, if  even this medicine be not quite  suffi-
cient to effect the restoration of health, examining again and
again the morbid state Jthat still remains, and selecting  a
homoeopathic medicine as suitable as possible for it, until our
object, namely putting  the patient  in the possession of perfect
health, is accomplished.
                          8 169.
  If, on the first examination of a disease and the first selec-
tion of  a medicine, we should  find  that  the  totality of the
symptoms of the disease would not  be effectually covered by
the disease elements of a single medicine—owing to the in-
sufficient number of known medicines,—but that two medicines
contend for the preference in point of  appropriateness, one of
which  is  more  homoeopathically suitable for  one part, the
other for another part of the symptoms of the disease,  it is not
advisable, after the employment of the more  suitable of the
two medicines, to administer the other without fresh examina-
tion, for the medicine that seemed to be the next best would
not, under the change of circumstances that has  in the mean-
time taken place, be suitable for  the  rest of  the  symptoms
that  then remain; in which case, consequently, a more appro-
priate homoeopathic remedy must by selected  in  place of the
second medicine for the set of symptoms as they appear on a
new inspection.
                         I 170. («)
  Hence in this as in every case where  a change of the morbid
state has occurred, the remaining set of symptoms now present
must  be inquired into,  and (without paying any attention to
the medicine which at first appeared to be the  next in point of
suitableness) anothor homoeopathic medicine, as appropriate as 
                   ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.               125

 possible to the new state now before us, must be selected.  If
 it should so happen, as is not often the case, that the medicine
 which at first appeared to be the next  best seems still to be
 well  adapted for the morbid state that remains, so much the
 more will it merit our confidence, and deserve to be employed
 in preference to another.
                          8 171. (a)
   In non-venereal chronic diseases, those,  therefore, that arise
 from psora, we often require, in order to effect  a cure,  to give
 several antipsoric remedies in succession, every successive one
 being homoeopathically chosen in consonance with the group of
 symptoms remaining  after  the expiry of the action of the
 previous  remedy  (which may have  been employed  in a single
 dose or in several successive doses).

                           8  172.
   A similar difficulty in the way of the cure occurs from the
 symptoms of the disease being  too few—a circumstance that de-
 serves our careful attention, for by its removal  almost all the
 difficulties that can lie in the way of  this  most perfect of all
 possible  modes of treatment (except that  its  apparatus  of
 known homoeopathic medicines is still incomplete) are removed.

                           8 173.
  The only diseases that seem to have but few symptoms, and
 on that account to be less  amenable  to cure, are those which
 may be termed one-sided,  because they display only one or two
 principal  symptoms which  obscure  almost  all  the  others.
 They belong chiefly to the class of chronic  diseases.

                           8 174.
  Their principal symptom  may  be either an  internal com-
plaint (e. g. a headache of many years' duration, a diarrhoea of
long  standing, an  ancient  cardialgia, &c), or  it may be an
affection more of an external  kind.  Diseases of  the  latter
character  are  generally distinguished by the name of local
maladies.
                           8  175.
  In one-sided diseases of the first kind it is often to be at- 
12G
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
tributed to the medical observer's want of  discernment that he
does not fully discover  the symptoms actually present which
would enable him to complete the sketch of the portrait of the
disease.
                           8 176.
  There  are, however, still a  few  diseases,  which, after the
most careful initial examination (88 84—98), present but one
or two severe, violent symptoms, while all the  others are but
indistinctly perceptible.
                           I 177.
  In order to meet  most successfully such a case as this,
which  is of very rare occurrence, we are  in the first  place to
select,  guided by these few  symptoms, the medicine which in
our judgment is the most homoeopathically indicated.

                           8 178.
  It will,  no  doubt, sometimes  happen  that  this medicine,
selected  in strict observance of  the homoeopathic law, fur-
nishes  the similar artificial disease suited for the annihilation
of the  malady present; and this is much more likely to happen
when these few morbid symptoms are very striking,  decided,
uncommon and  peculiarly distinctive (characteristic).

                           8 179.
  More frequently, however, the medicine  first chosen  in such
a case  will be only partially, that is to say,  not exactly suitable,
as there was no considerable number of symptoms to guide to
an accurate selection.
                           8 180.
  In this case the medicine,  which has been chosen as well as
was possible, but which, for the reason above  stated, is only
imperfectly homoeopathic, will, in  its action upon the disease
that is  only partially  analogous  to  it—just as  in  the  case
mentioned above (I 162,  et seq.), where the limited number of
homoeopathic remedies renders the selection imperfect—pro-
duce accessory  symptoms, and several phenomena from its
own array of  symptoms are mixed up with the  patient's state
of  health, which are.  however, at the same time, symptoms of the 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.               127
 disease itself, although they may have been hitherto never or very
 rarely perceived ;  some symptoms which the patient had never
 previously experienced appear, or others he had only felt in-
 distinctly become more pronounced.

                            8 181.
   Let it not be  objected that the accessory phenomena and
 new symptoms of this disease that now appear should be laid
 to the account of the medicament just employed.  They owe
 their origin to it1 certainly, but they are always only symptoms
 of such a nature as  this disease was itself capable of  pro-
 ducing in this organism, and which were summoned forth and
 induced to make their appearance by the medicine given, owing
 to its power to cause similar symptoms.   In a word,  we have
 to regard the whole collection of symptoms now perceptible as
 belonging to the disease itself, as the actual existing condition,
 and  to direct our  further treatment accordingly.

                            8 182.
   Thus the imperfect selection of the medicament, which was
 in this case almost inevitable owing to the too limited number
 of the  symptoms present, serves to complete the display  of
 the symptoms of  the  disease,  and in this way  facilitates  the
 discovery of a second, more accurately suitable, homoeopathic
 medicine.
                            8 183.

   Whenever, therefore, the dose of the first medicine ceases to
 have a  beneficial  effect  (if the newly developed symptoms  do
 not,  by reason of their gravity, demand more  speedy aid—
 which, however, from the minuteness of the dose of homoeop-
 athic medicine,  and  in  very chronic diseases,  is excessively
 rai e), a new examination of the disease must be  instituted, the
status morbi as it now is must  be noted down,  and  a second
 homoeopathic  remedy selected  in  accordance with it,  which
 shall exactly suit the present state,  and one  which shall be all

 ' When they were not caused by an important error iu regimen, a violent
emotion, or a tumultuous revolution in the organism, such as the occur-
 rence or cessation of the menses, conception, childbirth, and so forth. 
128
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
the more appropriate can  then be  found, as  the  group of
symptoms has become larger and more complete.1

                           8 184.
  In  like manner, after each new dose of medicine  has ex-
hausted its action, the state of the disease that still remains is
to be  noted anew with respect  to its remaining symptoms, and
another homoeopathic remedy sought  for, as suitable as possi-
ble for the group of  symptoms now observed, and so on until
the recovery is complete.
                           8 185.
  Among the one-sided diseases an important place is occupied
by the  so-called local maladies,  by  which  term is signified
those changes and ailments that appear on the external parts
of the body.   Till now the idea prevalent in the schools was
that  these parts were alone  morbidly affected, and  that the
rest of the body did not participate in the disease—a theoret-
ical,  absurd doctrine, which has led  to the  most disastrous
medical treatment.
                           I 186.
  Those so-called local maladies which have been produced
a short  time  previously,  solely by an  external lesion,  still
appear at first  sight  to deserve the  name of local  diseases.
But  then the lesion  must be very trivial, and in that case it
would be of  no great moment.  For in the case of  injuries
accruing to the body from without, if they be  at all  severe,
the whole living organism sympathizes; there occur fever, &c.
The  treatment of such diseases is relegated  to surgery;  but
this  is right only in so far as the affected parts require me-
chanic al aid,  whereby the external obstacles to the cure, which
can only be expected to take place by the agency of the vital
force, may be removed by mechanical means, e. g. by the re-
duction of dislocations, by bandages to bring together the lips
  i In cases where the patient (which, however, happens excessively seldom
in chronic, but not infrequently in acute diseases) feels very ill, although
his symptoms are very indistinct, so that this state may be attributed more
to the benumbed state of the nerves, which does not permit the patient's
pains and sufferings to be distinctly perceived, this torpor of the internal
sensibility is removed by opium, and in its secondary action the symptoms
of the disease become distinctly apparent.(a) 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
129
of  wounds,  by the extraction of foreign bodies  that have
penetrated into the living parts, by making an opening into a
cavity of the body in order to remove an irritating substance
or  to  procure the evacuation of effusions or collections of
fluids, by bringing into apposition the  broken extremities of a
fractured bone and retaining them in exact contact by an ap-
propriate bandage, &c.  But when in such injuries the whole
living organism requires, as it always does, active dynamic aid
to put it in a position to accomplish the work of healing, c. g.
when the  violent fever  resulting from extensive  contusions,
lacerated muscles, tendons and blood-vessels requires to be re-
moved by medicine given internally, or when the external  pain
of  scalded or burnt parts needs to be homoeopathically  sub-
dued,  then  the services of  the  dynamic  physician  and his
helpful homoeopathy come into requisition.

                          8 187. <«)
  But those affections, alterations and ailments appearing on
the external  parts, that  do not arise  from any external injury
or that have only some slight external  wound for their im-
mediate exciting cause, are produced in quite another manner;
their source  lies in some internal malady.   To consider them
as mere local affections, and  at the  same time to treat them
only, or almost only,  as it were surgically, with  topical ap-
plications—as  the old school have  done from the remotest
ages—is as absurd as it  is pernicious in its results.

                           I 188.
  These affections were considered  to be merely  topical and
were therefore called local diseases, as if they were maladies
exclusively limited to those parts, wherein the organism  took
little or no part, or affections  of these particular visible parts,
of which the rest of the  living organism, so to  speak, knew
nothing.1
                           I 189.
  And yet very little reflection will suffice to convince us that
no external malady (not occasioned by some important injury
from without)  can arise, persist or even grow worse without
 i One of the many great and pernicious blunders of the old school.
                                                       10 
130                ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
some internal cause, without the co-operation of the whole or-
ganism, which must consequently  be in a diseased state.   It
could  not make  its appearance  at all without the consent of
the whole of the rest of  the health, and without the participa-
tion of the rest of the  living whole (of the vital  force  that
pervades  all  the other sensitive  and  irritable parts of  the
organism);(«)  indeed, it  is  impossible to conceive its produc-
tion without the instrumentality of the whole (deranged)  life;
so intimately are all parts of  the organism connected together
to form an indivisible whole in sensations and functions.   No
eruption on the  lips, no whitlow can occur without  previous
and simultaneous internal  ill-health.

                           8 190.
   .All  true medical treatment of a disease on the external parts
of the body that has occurred  from little  or no injury from
without must,  therefore, be directed against the whole, must
effect  the annihilation  and cure of  the general  malady by
means of internal remedies, if it is wished  that the treatment
should be judicious, sure,  efficacious  and radical.

                           8 191.
   This is confirmed in the most unambiguous manner  by ex-
perience, which shows in all cases that every powerful internal
medicine  immediately  after  its  ingestion  causes  important
changes in the general health of such a patient,  and particu-
larly in the affected external parts (which the ordinary medical
school regards as quite  isolated), even in a  so-called local
disease of the most external parts of  the body, and  the change
it produces is most salutary, being the restoration to health of
the -entire body,  along with the disappearance of the external
affection (without the  aid  of  any  external  remedy),  provided
tthe  internal remedy directed towards  the whole  state was
suitably chosen in a homoeopathic sense.

                           8 192.

   This is best effected when,  in the investigation of the case
«6f disease, along with the exact character of  the local affection,
all the changes, sufferings and symptoms  observable  in the 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
131
 patient's health, and which may have  been previously noticed
 when no medicines had  been used, are taken in conjunction to
 form a complete picture of the disease, before searching among
 the medicines, whose peculiar pathogenetic effects are known,
 for a remedy corresponding to the totality of  the symptoms,
 so that the selection may be truly homoeopathic.

                            8 193.

   B\r means of this medicine, employed only internally (and,
 if  the disease be but of recent origin, often by the very first
 dose of  it), the general  morbid  state 6*f the body is removed
 along with the local affection, and the  latter is cured  at  the
 same time as the former, proving that the local affection de-
 pended solely on a disease of the rest of the body,  and should
 only be regarded as an  inseparable  part of the whole, as  one
 of the most considerable  and striking symptoms of the whole
 disease.
                           8 194. («)

   It is  not useful, either in acute local  diseases of  recent
 origin or in local affections that have already existed  a long
 time, to rub in or apply externally to  the  spot an external
 remedy, even though it be the  specific and, when used inter-
 nally, salutary by reason of its homceopathicity, even although
 it should be at the same time administered  internally; for  the
 acute topical  affections  (e.  g.  inflammations  of  individual
 parts, erysipelas, &c), which have not been caused by external
 injury of proportionate  violence, but by dynamic or internal
 causes, yield most surely to internal remedies homoeopathically
 adapted to the  perceptible state of the health present  in  the
 exterior and interior,  selected from the general store of proved
 medicines,1 and generally without any other aid; but if these
 diseases do not yield to  them completely, and if there still re-
 main in the affected spot and in the whole state,  notwithstand-
ing  good regimen, a relic of  disease  which  the vital force is
not competent  to restore to the normal  state, then the acute
disease was (as not infrequently happens) a  product of psora
which had hitherto remained  latent in  the  interior, but has

  i As, for instance, aconite, rhus, belladonna, mercury. &c. 
132
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
now burst forth and is on the point of developing  into a pal-
pable chronic disease.
                           8 195.
  In order to effect a radical cure in such cases, which are by
no means rare,  after the acute state  has pretty well subsided,
an appropriate  antipsoric treatment (as is taught  in my work
on  Chronic Diseases) must then be directed against the symp-
toms that still remain and  the morbid state of health to which
the patient was previously subject.    In chronic local maladies
that are not  obviously venereal, the antipsoric internal treat-
ment is,  moreover, alone requisite.

                           8 196.
  It might, indeed, seem^) as  though the cure of  such  dis-
eases would be  hastened  by employing the medicinal substance
which is known to be truly homoeopathic  to the totality of the
symptoms, not  only internally  but  also externally, (a) because
the action of a medicine applied to  the seat of  the local affec-
tion might effect a more rapid change in it.

                           8 197,
  This treatment, however, is quite inadmissible, not only for
the local symptoms arising from the miasm of  psora, but also
and especially for those originating in the miasm of syphilis or
sycosis, for the simultaneous  local application,  along with the
internal employment, of the remedy in diseases tvhose chief symp-
tom is a constant  local  affection, has  this great disadvantage,
that, by  such a topical application,  this chief symptom (local
affection)1 will  usually be annihilated sooner than  the internal
disease, and we  shall  now be deceived by the semblance of a
perfect cure; or at least it will  be difficult, and in some cases
impossible, to  determine,  from the  premature disappearance
of the local  symptom, if the general disease  is destroyed by
the simultaneous employment of the internal medicine.

                          8 198. («)
  The mere topical employment of medicines, that are powerful
for cure when  given  internally, to the  local  symptoms of
 1 Recent itch eruption, chancre, condyloma. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
133
 chronic miasmatic diseases is for  the same reason quite inad-
 missible ; for if the local affection of  the chronic disease be
 only removed  locally and in  a one-sided manner, the internal
 treatment indispensable for  the complete restoration of  the
 health remains in dubious obscurity;  the chief  symptom (the
 local  affection) is  gone, and  there remain only the other, less
 distinguishable symptoms, which  are less constant and less
 persistent than the local  affection, and frequently  not  suffi-
 ciently peculiar and too slightly characteristic to display,  after
 that, a picture of the disease in clear and perfect outlines.

                           8 199.
   If the  remedy perfectly homoeopathic to  the disease had not
 yet been  discovered1 at the  time when the  local symptoms
 were destroyed by a corrosive or desiccative  external remedy
 or by the knife, then the case becomes much more difficult on
 account of the  too indefinite  (uncharacteristic) and inconstant
 appearance of  the remaining symptoms;  for what might have
 contributed most to determine the selection of the most suita-
 ble  remedy, and  its internal  employment until  the  disease
 should have been completely annihilated, namely, the external
 principal  symptom, has  been removed from our observation.

                           8  200.
  Had it  still been  present to  guide  the internal treatment,
 the  homoeopathic  remedy for the whole disease might  have
 been discovered, and had that  been found, the persistence of
 the local  affection during its internal employment would  have
 shown that the cure w#s hot yet completed; but were it cured
on its seat, this would be a convincing proof that the disease
 was completely eradicated, and  the desired recovery  from the
entire disease  was  fully accomplished—an inestimable, indis-
pensable advantage.
                          8 201. («)
  It is evident  that man's vital force, when encumbered with
a chronic  disease which  it is  unable to overcome by its own
powers, adopts the  plan of developing a local malady on  some
 1 As was the case before my time with the remedies for the condylomatous
disease (and the antipsoric medicines). 
134
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
external part, solely for this object, that by making and keep-
ing in a diseased state this part which is not indispensable to
human life, it may thereby silence the internal disease, which
otherwise threatens to destroy the vital organs (and to deprive
the  patient of life), and that it may thereby, so to  speak,
transfer the internal  disease to the  vicarious local  affection
and, as it were, draw  it thither.   The  presence of the local
affection thus silences,  for a time, the internal disease, though
without being able either to  cure it  or  to diminish it materi
ally.1   The local  affection, however, is  never anything else
than a part of the general disease, but a part of it increased
all in  one direction by  the organic vital  force, and trans-
ferred to a less dangerous (external) part  of  the body, in order
to allay the internal ailment.   But (as has been  said) by this
local symptom that silences the internal disease, so far from
anything being gained by the vital force  towards diminishing
or curing  the whole malady, the  internal  disease, on the con-
trary,  continues, in spite of  it,  gradually  to  increase and
Nature is  constrained  to enlarge and  aggravate the  local
symptom  always more  and more,  in  order  that  it may still
suffice as a  substitute for the  increased  internal disease and
may still keep it under.   Old ulcers on the legs  get worse as
long as the internal psora is uncured, the chancre enlarges as
long  as the  internal  syphilis  remains  uncured, just  as  the
general internal disease continues to increase as time goes on.

                            8 202.

   If  the old-school physician should now  destroy the local
symptom by the topical application of external remedies, under
the belief  that he thereby  cures  the whole disease, Nature
makes up for  its loss by rousing the internal  malady and  the
other symptoms that previously existed in a latent state side
by side with the local affection; that  is  to say, she increases
the  internal  disease.   When this  occurs it  is usual  to  say,
though incorrectly,  that the local affection has been driven back

 1 The issues of the old-school practitioners do something similar; as arti-
ficial ulcers on external parts, they silence some internal chronic diseases
but only for a very short time, without being able to cure them; but, on the
other hand, they weaken and destroy the general health much more than is
done by most of the metastases effected by the distinctive vital force.(a) 
ORGANON OF  MEDICIGE.               135
into the system or upon the nerves by the external remedies.

                           8  203.
  Every external treatment of such local symptoms,  the ob-
ject of which is to remove them from the surface of the body,
whilst the internal  miasmatic disease is  left uncured, as, for
instance, driving  off  the skin the psoric  eruption by all  sorts
of ointments, burning away the  chancre  by caustics  and de-
stroying the condylomata on their seat  by  the  knife, the
ligature or the  actual  cautery; this pernicious  external mode
of treatment, hitherto so  universally practiced, has been the
most prolific source of all .the innumerable named or unnamed
chronic  maladies  under which mankind groans;  it is one of the
most criminal procedures the medical world can be guilty of,
and yet it has  hitherto been  the one generally adopted, and
taught from the professorial chairs as the only  one.1^)

                           8 204.
  If we deduct  all chronic affections, ailments and  diseases-
that depend on a persistent unhealthy mode of  living, as also
those  innumerable  medicinal  maladies (v. I 74) caused by the
irrational, persistent, harrassing  and pernicious treatment of
diseases often only of trivial character  by physicians of th&
old school, all  the  remainder, without exception, result  from
the development of   these  three  chronic miasms,  internal
syphilis, internal sycosis,  but chiefly and in infinitely greater
proportion, internal psora, each  of  which was already in pos-
session  of  the whole organism, and  had penetrated it in  all
directions  before the appearance  of the primary,  vicarious
local  symptom of  each of them (in  the case  of  psora the
scabious eruption, -in syphilis the chancre or the bubo, and in
sycosis  the condylomata)  that prevented their  outburst;  and
these  chronic miasmatic  diseases, if deprived  of their  local
symptom, are  inevitably destined by mighty Nature sooner or
later  to become developed and to  burst  forth, and  thereby
propagate all the nameless misery, the increditable number of
  i For any medicines that might  at  the same  time be given  internally-
served but to aggravate the malady, as these remedies possessed no specific
power of  curing the  whole disease, but  assailed the organism, weakened it.
and inflicted on it. in addition, other chronic medicinal diseases. 
136
ORGaNON of  medicine.
chronic diseases  which  have  plagued  mankind  for hundreds
and  thousands of years, none of which would so  frequently
have come  into existence  had physicians  striven  in a rational
manner to  cure radically  and to extinguish  in  the organism
these three  miasms  by the  internal  homoeopathic  medicines
suited for each of them, without employing  topical  remedies
for their external symptoms.

                            8  205.
   The homoeopathic  physician never treats one  of these  pri-
mary  symptoms  of  chronic  miasms,  nor  yet  one  of their
secondary affections  that  result from their  further  develop-
ment,  by local remedies (neither by those external agents that
act dynamically,1 nor yet  by those that act mechanically), but
he cures,  in cases where the one or the other appears, only the
great miasm on which they depend, whereupon it3 primary, as
also  its secondary symptoms disappear spontaneously;  but as
this  was not the mode pursued by the old-school  practitioners
who  preceded  him in the treatment  of the case, the homoeo-
pathic physician generally, alas!  finds that  the primary symp-
toms2  have  already  been  destroyed by  them  by  means of
external  remedies, and  that he  has now  to do more with the
secondary ones,  /'. e. the affections resulting from  the breaking
forth and development of these inherent miasms, but especially

  1 I  cannot therefore advise, for instance, the local extirpation of the so-
called cancer of the lips or face (the product of highly developed psora?) by
means of the arsenical remedy of Frere Cosmo, not only because it is exces-
sively painful and often  fails,  but more for this reason, because, if this
dynamic remedy should indeed succeed in freeing the  affected part of the
body from the malignant ulcer locally, the basic malady is thereby not di-
minished in the slightest,  the preserving vital force is therefore necessitated
to transfer the field of operation of the great internal malady  to some more
important part (as it does in every case of metaschematism), and the conse-
quence is blindness,  deafness,  insanity, suffocative asthma,  dropsy,  apo-
plexy. &c.  But this ambiguous local liberation of the part from the malig-
nant ulcer by the topical  arsenical remedy only succeeds, after all, in those
cases where the ulcer has  not yet attained any great size, and when the vital
force is still very energetic;  but it is just in such a state of things that the
complete 'nternal cure of the whole original disease is also still practicable.
  The result is the same when cancer of the face or breast is removed by the
knife alone and when encysted tumors are enucleated;  something worse
ensues, or at any rate death is hastened.  This has been the case times with-
out number, but the old school still goes blindly on in the same way in every
new case, with the same disastrous results.
  2 Itch eruption, chancre (bubo), condylomata. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
137
  with the chronic diseases evolved from internal  psora, the in-
  ternal  treatment of  which, as far as  a single physician can
  elucidate  it by many years  of reflection, observation and ex-
  perience, I  have endeavored to  point out  in  my  work  on
  Chronic Diseases, to which I must refer the reader.

                              8 206.

    Before commencing the treatment of a chronic disease, it is
  necessary to make the most careful investigation1  as to whether
  the patient has had  a venereal  infection (or an infection with
  condylomatous gonorrhoea) ; for then  the  treatment must be
  directed towards this alone, when only the signs of syphilis  (or
  of the  rarer condylomatous disease)  are  present,  but this dis-
  ease  is  very  seldom  met with alone nowadays,   if such in-
  fection have  previously  occurred,  this  must  also  be borne in
  mind in the treatment of those cases in which psora is present,
  because in  them the  latter is complicated with the former, as
  is always the case when  the  symptoms are not those of  pure
  syphilis; for when the physician thinks  he has a case of old
 venereal disease before him,  he  has always, or almost always,
 to treat a syphilitic affection  accompanied mostly by (compli-
 cated with) psora, for the internal itch  dyscrasia (the psora) is
 far  the most frequent (most certain)  fundamental cause  of
 chronic  diseases, either united (complicated) with  syphilis (or
 with sycosis), if the  latter infections  have avowedly occurred;
 or, as is much more frequently the case, psora is  the sole fun-
 damental cause of all  other chronic maladies, whatever names
 they  may   bear,  which  are,  moreover, so often  bungled, in-
 creased and disfigured to a  monstrous extent by allopathic
 unskilfulness.

  1 In investigations of this nature we must  not allow ourselves to be de-
 ceived by the assertions of the patients or their, friends, who frequently
 assign as the cause of chronic, even of the severest and most inveterate dis-
 ease, either a cold caught (a thorough  wetting, drinking cold water after
 being heated)  many years ago. or a former  fright, a sprain,  a vexation
 (sometimes even a bewitchment), &c.  These causes are much too insignifi-
 cant to develop a chronic disease in a, h-ialthy  body, to keep it up for years,
 and t:> aggravate it year by year, as is the case with all chronic diseases
 from developed psora.  Causes of a much more important character than
 these remembered noxious influences must Heat the root of the initiation
and progress of a serious, obstinate disease of longstanding; the assigned
causes could only rouse into activity the latent chronic miasm. 
138
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
                           8 207.
   When the above information has been gained, it still remains
for the  homoeopathic  physician  to  ascertain what kinds of
allopathic treatment had up to that date been adopted for the
chronic disease, what  perturbing  medicines had  been chiefly
and most frequently employed, also  what  mineral  baths  had
been  used  and what effects these had produced, in order to
understand  in some measure  the  degeneration of the  disease
from  its original state,  and, where possible, to correct in part
these  pernicious artificial  operations, or to enable him to avoid
the employment of medicines that have  already been impro-
perly  used.
                           8  208.
   The age of the patient, his mode of living and diet, his oc-
cupation, his domestic position, his  social relations and  so
forth, must next be taken  into consideration, in order to as-
certain  whether these  things have  tended to increase  his
malady, or in how  far they may favor or hinder  the treatment.
In like manner the state of his disposition and  mind  must be
attended to, to  learn whether that presents any obstacle to the
treatment, or requires  to  be directed, encouraged or modified.
                           8  209.
   After  this is done,  the physician  should endeavor in re-
peated conversations with the patient to trace the  picture of
his disease  as completely as possible, according to  the direc-
tions given above, in order to be able to elucidate the most
striking and peculiar (characteristic) symptoms, in accordance
with which he selects the first antipsoric or other remedy hav-
ing the  greatest symptomatic  resemblance,  for the commence-
ment  of the treatment, and so forth.

                         8 210. (a)
   Of  psoric origin are almost all  those  diseases that  I have
above termed one-sided, which appear to be more difficult to
cure in consequence of  this one-sidedness, all their other mor-
bid symptoms  disappearing,  as   it were,  before the single,
great, prominent symptom.   Of  this character are what are
termed mental  diseases.   They do not,  however, constitute a 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
139
 class of  disease sharply separated  from all others,  since in all
 other so-called  corporeal diseases  the  condition of the dispo-
 sition and mind is always altered;1  and in all cases of disease
 we are called on to cure, the state  of the patient's  disposition
 is to  be  particularly noted,  along with  the  totality of  the
 symptoms,  if we would trace  an accurate picture  of the  dis-
 ease, in order to be able therefrom to treat it homoeopathically
 with success.
                              8 211.
   This holds good to such  an extent, that  the state of the  dis-
 position of the patient often chiefly determines the selection of
 the  homoeopathic  remedy,  as being  a  decidedly characteristic
 symptom which can  least  of  all remain concealed from  the
 accurately observing physician.

                              8 212.
   The Creator of  therapeutic  agents has also  had particular
 regard to this main feature of all diseases, the altered state of
 the disposition  and mind, for  there  is no  powerful medicinal
 substance in the world  which does not  very notably  alter  the
 state of  the disposition and mind in  the healthy individual
 who tests it, and every  medicine does so in a different manner.

                             8 213.
   We shall, therefore, never be  able to cure conformably to
 nature—that  is to say, homoeopathically—if  we do not, in
 every  case of  disease, even in such  as are acute,  observe,
 along with the other symptoms, those relating to the changes
  1 How often, for instance, do we not meet with a mild, soft disposition in
 patients who have  for years been afflicted with the most painful diseases, so
 that the physician feels constrained to esteem and  compassionate the suf-
 ferer! But if he subdue the disease and restore the patient to health—as is
 frequently done in homoeopathic  practice—he is often astonished  and horri-
 fied at the frightful alteration in his disposition.  He often witnesses the
occurrence of ingratitude, cruelty, refined  malice and propensities most dis-
graceful and degrading to  humanity, which were  precisely the qualities
possessed by the patient before he grew ill.
  Those who were patient when well often  become obstinate, violent, hasty,
or even intolerant and capricious, or impatient or desponding when ill;
those formerly chaste  and modest often become lascivious and  shameless.
A clear-headed person not infrequently becomes obtuse of intellect, while
one ordinarily weak-minded becomes more prudent and thoughtful; and a
man slow to make up his mind sometimes acquires great presence of mind
and quickness of resolve. &c. 
140               ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
in the state of the mind and disposition, and if we do not
select, for the patient's  relief, from among  the  medicines a
disease-force which, in addition to the similarity of  its other
symptoms to those of  the disease, is also capable of producing
a similar state of the disposition and mind.1

                           8 214.
  The instructions I have to give relative to the cure of mental
distases may be confined  to a very few remarks, as they are to
be cured in the same  way as all other  diseases, namely, by a
remedy which shows,  by  the symptoms it  causes  in  the body
and  mind  of a  healthy  individual, a power of producing  a
morbid state as similar as possible  to the  case of disease be-
fore  us, and in no other way can they be cured.
                            8 215.
  Almost all the so-called  mental  and emotional diseases are
nothing more than corporeal diseases in which the  symptom
of derangement of the mind and disposition peculiar to each
of them is  increased,  whilst the  corporeal symptoms decline
(more or less rapidly), till it at length  attains the most strik-
ing one-sidedness, almost as though  it were a local disease in
the invisible subtile organ of the mind or disposition.
                            8 216.
  The cases are not rare  in which a so called corporeal disease
that  threatens to be fatal—a suppuration of the lungs, or the
deterioration of  some  other important viscus, or some other
disease of  acute character, e. g. in childbed,  &c.—becomes
transformed  into  insanity, into a kind of  melancholia or  into
mania by a  rapid  increase of  the psychical symptoms  that
were  previously  present, whereupon  the corporeal symptoms
lose all their danger;  these latter  improve almost to perfect
health, or  rather they decrease to  such  a degree  that their
obscured presence can only  be  detected by  the observation of a
physician gifted with perseverance  and penetration.    In this
  1 Thus aconite will seldom or never effect either a rapid or permanent cure
in a patient of a quiet, calm, equable disposition ; and just as little will nux
vomica be serviceable where the disposition is mild  and phlegmatic. Pulsa-
tilla where it is happy, gay and obstinate, or ignatia where it is imperturb-
able and disposed neither to be frightened nor vexed. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
141
 manner  they  become  transformed into a one-sided and, as  it
 were,  a  local disease, in which  the symptom of the mental
 disturbance, which was at first but slight, increases so as to be
 the chief symptom, and in a great measure occupies the place
 of  the other (corporeal) symptoms, whose intensity it subdues
 in a palliative manner, so that, in short, the affections  of the
 grosser corporeal organs become, as it  were,  transferred and
 conducted to the almost spiritual, mental and emotional organs,
 which the anatomist has never yet and  never will reach with
 his scalpel.
                           8 217.

   In these diseases we must be very careful  to make ourselves
 acquainted  with the whole of  the phenomena, both  those be-
 longing  to the  corporeal  symptoms,  and  also,  and  indeed
 particularly, those  appertaining to the accurate apprehension
 of the precise  character of  the chief symptom, of  the peculiar
 and  always predominating state of the mind and  disposition,
 in order  to discover, for  the purpose of extinguishing the en-
 tire disease, among the remedies whose pure  effects are known,
 a  homoeopathic  medicinal pathogenetic force—that is to say,
 a  remedy  which in its list of symptoms displays, with the
 greatest  possible similarity, not  only  the  corporeal morbid
 symptoms  present  in  the case of disease before us, but also
 especially this mental  and emotional state.

                           8 218.
   To this  collection of symptoms belongs  in the first place
 the accurate description of  all  the phenomena of the previous
 so-called corporeal disease, before it degenerated  into  a one-
 sided increase  of the psychical  symptom, and became a disease
 of the mind and disposition.   This may be  learned  from the
 report of the patient's friends.

                           8  219.
  A comparison of these previous symptoms of the corporeal
disease with the traces of them that still remain, though they
have become less perceptible (but which even now sometimes
become prominent,  when  a  lucid interval  and  a  transient 
142
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
alleviation of the psychical disease occurs), will serve to prove
them to be still present, though obscured.

                            8  220.
  By adding to this  the state of the mind and  disposition ac-
curately observed by the patient's friends and by the physician
himself, we have thus constructed the complete picture of the
disease, for which, in order to effect the homoeopathic cure of
the disease, a medicine capable of producing strikingly similar
symptoms, and especially an  analogous  disorder of the mind,
must be sought for among  the antipsoric   remedies,  if  the
psychical disease have already lasted some time.

                          8 221. («)
  If, however, insanity or  mania (caused  by fright, vexation,
the abuse of spirituous liquors, &c.) have suddenly broken out
as an acute  disease  in the patient's  ordinary  calm state, al-
though it almost always arises  from  internal psora, like a flame
bursting forth from it,  yet  when it occurs in this acute manner
it should  not be  immediately treated with antipsorics,  but in
the first  place with remedies indicated for it  out of the other
class of proved medicaments (e. g. aconite, belladonna, stramo-
nium, hyoscyamus, mercury, &c.) in highly potentized, minute
homoeopathic doses, in order to subdue it so far that the psora
shall for the time revert  to  its former latent state, wherein
the patient appears as if quite well.

                            8 222.
  But such a patient, who  has recovered from an acute mental
or emotional disease by  the use of  these non-antipsoric medi
cines, should never be regarded  as cured;  on the contrary,  no
time should  be  lost in attempting to free him completely,1  by
  1 It very rarely happens that a mental or emotional disease of long-stand-
ing ceases spontaneously (for the internal  dyscrasia transfers itself again
to the grosser corporeal organs); such are the few cases met with now and
then, where a former inmate of  a madhouse has been dismissed apparently
recovered.  Hitherto, moreover, all madhouses have continued to be choke-
full,  so that the multitude of other  insane persons who seek for admission
into such institutions could scarcely find room  in them unless some of the
insane in the house died. Not one is tver  really and permanently cured in
them! A convincing  proof, among many others, of the complete nullity of
the non-healing art hitherto practiced, which has been ridiculously honored 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
143
 means of  a prolonged  antipsoric treatment, from  the  chronic
 miasm of the psora, which, it is  true, has now become once
 more latent but  is quite ready to break out anew;  if  this  be
 done,  there  is no fear of another similar attack, if he attend
 faithfully to the diet and regimen prescribed for him.

                             8  223.

   But if  the  antipsoric  treatment be  omitted, then we may
 almost assuredly  expect, from  a much  slighter  cause than
 brought on the first attack of the insanity, the speedy occur-
 rence of  a new and  more lasting and severe fit, during which
 the  psora usually develops itself completely, and  passes  into
 either a periodic or continued mental  derangement, which is
 then more difficult to be cured by antipsorics.

                            I  224.

   If the mental  disease  be not  quite developed, and if it  be
 still somewhat doubtful whether  it  really  arose  from  a  cor-
 poreal affection,  or did  not rather result  from faults of educa-
 tion, bad  practices,  corrupt  morals, neglect of   the  mind,
 superstition  or ignorance; the  mode of deciding this point will
 be, that if it proceed from one or the other of the latter causes
 it will diminish and be improved  by sensible friendly exhorta-
 tions,  consolatory  arguments,  serious  representations  and
 sensible advice;   whereas a real moral  or mental malady,  de-
 pending on bodily disease, would  be speedily aggravated  by
 such a course, the melancholic  would  become still more de-
 jected,  querulous,  inconsolable  and  reserved,  the spiteful
 maniac would  thereby become still more  exasperated, and  the
 chattering fool would become  manifestly  more foolish.1

 by allopathic ostentation with the title of rational medicine.  How often, on
 the other hand, has not the true healing art, genuine, pure homoeopathy,
 been  able to restore such unfortunate beings to the possession of their men-
tal and corporeal health, and give them back again to their delighted friends
 and to the world!(°)
  1 It would seem as though the mind, in these cases, felt with uneasiness
 and grief the truth  of these rational representations and acted upon the
body as if it wished to restore the lost harmony, but that the body, by means
of its disease, reacted upon  the organs of the mind and disposition and put
 them in still greater disorder by a fresh transference of its sufferings on to
them. 
144
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
                           8 225.
  There are, however,  as has just been stated, certainly a few
emotional diseases which  have not merely been developed into
that form out of corporeal  diseases,  but which, in an inverse
manner, the body being but slightly indisposed, originate and
are kept up by emotional causes, such  as continued anxiety,
worry, vexation, wrongs and the frequent occurrence of great
fear and  fright.  This  kind of emotional diseases  in time de-
stroys the corporeal health,  often to a great degree.

                           8 226.
  It is only such emotional diseases as these, which were first
engendered and subsequently kept up by the mind itself,  that,
while they are  yet recent and before they have made very  great
inroads on the  corporeal  state, may, by  means of psychical
remedies, such as a display of  confidence,  friendly exhorta-
tions, sensible advice, and often by a  well-disguised deception,
be rapidly changed into a healthy state of the mind (and with
appropriate  diet and regimen, seemingly into a healthy state
of the body also).
                           8  227.
   But the fundamental cause in these cases also is a  psoric
miasm, which  was only not yet quite near its full development,
and for security's sake, the  seemingly cured  patient should be
subjected to a radical, antipsoric treatment, in order  that he
may not again, as might easily occur, fall into a  similar state
of mental disease.
                          8 228. U»)
   In mental  and emotional diseases resulting from corporeal
maladies, which can only be cured by homoeopathic antipsoric
medicine conjoined with  carefully regulated mode of life, an
appropriate psychical behavior towards the patient on the part
of those about him and of the physician must be  scrupulously
observed, by way of an auxiliary mental regimen.  To furious
mania we must oppose calm intrepidity and cool, firm resolu-
tion—to doleful, querulous lamentation, a mute display  of
commiseration in looks and gestures—to senseless chattering,
a silence not wholly inattentive—to disgusting and abominable 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
145
 conduct and  to  conversation of  a similar  character, total  in-
 attention.   We must merely endeavor to prevent  the destruc-
 tion and injury of surrounding objects, without reproaching the
 patient for his acts,  and everything must be arranged in such a
 way that the necessity for any corporal punishment and  tor-
 tures1  whatever may  be avoided.   This  is  so  much  the more
 easily  effected, because in the administration of the medicine__
 the only circumstance in  which  the  employment  of coercion
 could be justified—in the homoeopathic system the small doses
 of the appropriate  medicine never offend  the taste, and  may
 consequently be  given to the patient without  his knowledge in
 his drink, so that all compulsion is unnecessary.

                             8 229.
   On the other  hand, contradiction,  eager explanations,  rude
 corrections and invectives,  as also weak, timorous yielding, are
 quite out of place  with  such  patients;  they are equally per-
 nicious modes of  treating mental and emotional  maladies.
 But such patients are most of  all exasperated and their com-
 plaint  aggravated  by contumely, fraud, and  deceptions  that
 they can detect.   The physician  and  keeper must  always pre-
 tend to believe them to be possessed  of reason.
   All  kinds of external disturbing influences on their senses
 and disposition should be  if  possible removed:  there are no
 amusements  for  their clouded  spirit,  no salutary distractions,
 no means of instruction, no soothing effects  from conversation,
 books or other things for the soul that pines  or frets  in  the
 chains  of the diseased  body, no  invigoration  for  it, but  the
 cure;  it  is only  when the  bodily health is changed  for  the

  1 It is impossible not to marvel at the hard-heartedness and indiscretion
 of the medical men  in many establishments  for patients of this kind, not
 only in England, but also iu Germany, who, without attempting to discover
 the true and only efficacious mode of curing such  diseases, which is by
 homoeopathic medicinal (antipsoric) means, content themselves with tortur-
 ing these most pitiable of all human beings with the most violent blows and
other painful torments.   By this unconscientious and revolting procedure
they debase themselves beneath the level of the turnkeys in a house of cor-
rection, for the latter inflict such chastisements as the duty devolving on
their office, and on criminals only, whilst the former appeal1, from a humili-
ating consciousness of their uselessness  as physicians, only  to vent their
spite at the apparent incurability of mental diseases in harshness towards
the pitiable, innocent sufferers, for they are too ignorant to be of any us<
and too indolent to adopt a judicious mode of  treatment.
                                                        11 
146               ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
better that  tranquility and comfort again beam  upon their
mind.
                            8  230.
  If  the antipsoric remedies selected for each particular case
of mental  or emotional  disease (there are incredibly numerous
varieties of them) be quite homoeopathically suited for the faith-
fully  traced picture of the morbid state, which, if there be a suffi-
cient  number of this kind of medicines  known in respect of
their  pure  effects, is ascertained by an indefatigable search  for
the most appropriate homoeopathic  remedy all the more easily,
as the emotional and mental state, constituting the principal
symptom of  such a patient, is so unmistakably  perceptible,—
then  the smallest  possible  doses are often sufficient to effect
the most striking improvement in no  very  long time, which
could not be brought about by physicing  the patient  to death
with  the  largest oft-repeated doses of  all  other  unsuitable
(allopathic) medicines.   Indeed,  I  can confidently assert, from
great experience, that the vast superiority of the homoeopathic
system over all  other conceivable methods  of treatment is
nowhere displayed  in a  more  triumphant light than in mental
and emotional  diseases of  long  standing,  which originally
sprang from the corporeal  maladies  or were developed  simul-
taneously  with them.
                          8 231. (a)
  The intermittent diseases  deserve a special consideration, as
well  as  those that recur  at  certain  periods—like  the great
number of intermittent  fevers, and the apparently non-febrile
affections  that recur at intervals like intermittent  fevers—as
also those in which  certain morbid  states  alternate at uncer-
tain intervals with  morbid states of a different kind.
                           8 282. («)
  These latter, alternating  diseases,  are also  very  numerous,1

  1 Two or three states may alternate with ono another.  Thus, for instance,
in the  case of double alternating diseases, certain  pains may occur persist-
ently  in the legs. -.tc. immediately  on  the disappearance of a kind of
ophthalmia,  which latter again appears as soon as the pain in the limbs has
gone off for  the time—convulsions and spasms may alternate immediately
with any other affection of the body or some part of it—in a case of three-
fold alternating states in a common indisposition, periods of apparent in-
crease of health and unusual exaltation of the corporeal and mental powers 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.                 147
 but all belong to the  class of  chronic diseases; they are gen-
 erally a manifestation of developed  psora alone, sometimes,
 but seldom, complicated with  a syphilitic miasm, and there-
 fore in the former case may be cured  by antipsoric medicines;
 in the  latter,  however,  in  alternation with  antisyphilitics as
 taught in my work on the Chronic Diseases.

                              8 233.

   The  typical  intermittent  diseases  are those  where a morbid
 state of unvarying character returns  at a tolerably fixed period,
 whilst the patient  is apparently in good health, and takes its
 departure at an equally  fixed period;  this is observed in those
 apparently  non-febrile morbid states  that come  and go in a
 periodical  manner  (at certain  times),  as well  as in  those of a
 febrile  character, to-wit, the numerous varieties  of  intermit-
 tent fevers.

                            § 234. («)

   Those apparently non-febrile, typical, periodically recurring
 morbid states just alluded to observed in one single patient at
 a time (they do  not usually appear sporadically or epidemically)
 always belong to the chronic diseases,  mostly to those that are
 purely psoric, are  but seldom  complicated with syphilis, and
 are successfully treated  b}~ the same  means;  yet it is some-
 times  necessary to employ as an intermediate  remedy  a small
 dose of a potentized solution of cinchona bark, in order to ex-
 tinguish completely their intermittent  type.

 (extravagaut gaiety, extraordinary activity of the body, excess of comfort-
 able feeling, inordinate appetite, &c.) may occur, after which, and quite un-
 expectedly,  gloomy, melancholy humor, intolerable hypochondriacal de-
 rangement of the disposition, with disorder of several of the vital operations,
 the digestion, sleep. &c. appear, which again, and just as suddenly, give
 place to the habitual moderate ill-health; and  so also several and very vari-
ous alternating states.  When the new state makes its appearance,  there is
often no perceptible trace of the former one. In  other cases only slight
traces of the former alternating state  remain when the new one occurs; few
of the symptoms of the first state remain on the appearance and during the
continuance of the second.  Sometimes the morbid alternating states are
quite of opposite natures, as. for instance, melancholy periodically alternat-
ing with gay insanity or frenzy.(a) 
148
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
                             8 235. (a)

   With regard to the intermittent fevers,1 that prevail sporadi-
cally or epidemically (not those endemically located in marshy

districts), we often find  every paroxysm likewise composed of
two opposite  alternating states (cold, heat—heat, cold),  more
frequently  still of three (cold,  heat, sweat).    Therefore  the

remedy selected  for them  from the general  class  of proved
(common, not antipsoric) medicines  must either  (and remedies
of  this sort are the surest)  be able likewise to produce in  the
healthy body  two (or all three)  similar  alternating  states,  or
else must correspond by similarity of symptoms, in the  most


  1 The pathology hitherto in vogue, which is still in the stage of irrational
infancy, recognizes but one single intermittent fever, which it likewise termed
ague, and admits of no varieties but such as  are constituted by the different
intervals at which the  paroxysms recur, quotidian, tertian, quartan, &c.
But there are much more important differences among them than what are
marked by the periods of their recurrence; there are innumerable varieties
of these fevers, some of which cannot even be denominated ague, as their fits
consist solely of heat;  others, again, are characterized  by cold alone, with
or without subsequent perspiration; yet others which exhibit general cold-
ness of the surface, with a sensation of heat on the patient's part, or whilst
the body feels externally hot, the patient feels cold; others, again, in  which
one paroxysm consists entirely of a rigor or simple chilliness, followed by au
interval of health, while the next consists of heat alone, followed or not by
perspiration; others, again, in which the heat comes first, and the cold stage
not till that is gone;  others, again,  wherein after  a cold and hot  stage
apyrexia ensues, and then perspiration comes on like  a  second  fit. often
many hours subsequently; others, again, in which  no  perspiration  at all
comes on, and yet others in which the whole attack consists of perspiration
alone, without any cold or hot stage, or in which the perspiration is only
present during the heat; and there are innumerable other differences, es-
pecially in regard to the accessory symptoms, such as headache of a peculiar
kind, bad taste  in the mouth, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, want of or  ex-
cessive thirst, peculiar pains in the body or limbs, disturbed sleep, deliria,
alterations  of temper, spasms, &c, before,  during or after the cold  stage.
before, during or after the hot stage, before, during or  after the sweating
stage, and countless other varieties.  All these are manifestly intermittent
fevers of very different kinds, each of which, as might naturally besupposed,
requires a special (homoeopathic) treatment.   It must beconfessed that they
can almost  all be suppressed (as is often done) by enormous doses of bark
and of its pharmaceutical preparation, the sulphate of quinine; that is to say,
their periodical recurrence (their typus) may be extinguished by it, although
often only after increased and frequently repeated doses,  but the patients
who suffered from intermittent fevers for which cinchona bark is not suit-
able, as is the case with all those epidemic intermittent fevers that traverse
whole countries and even mountainous districts, a re not restored to health
by the extinction of the typus; on the contrary,  they now  remain ill  in an-
other manner, and worse, often much worse, than before;  they are affected
by peculiar, chronic bark dyscrasias, and can scarcely be restored  to health
even by a prolonged treatment by the true system of medicine—and yet that
is what is called curing, forsooth! 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.                 149
 homoeopathic manner  possible, to the strongest, best marked,
 and  most peculiar alternating state  (either to the cold stage,
 or to the hot  stage, or  to  the sweating stage,  each with  its
 accessory symptoms, according  as  the one  or the other alter-
 nating state is  the strongest  and  most  peculiar);  but  the
 symptoms of the patient's health during the intervals when he
 is free from fever must be the chief  guide to the most appro-
 priate homoeopathic remedy.1

                            8 236.
   The  most appropriate and efficacious time for administering
 the medicine in these cases  is  immediately or very soon after
 the termination of the paroxysm, as soon as the patient has in
 some degree recovered from its effects; it has  then time to
 effect all the changes in the organism requisite for the restora-
 tion of health,  without any  great disturbance or violent com-
 motion;  whereas  the  action  of a medicine, be  it ever  so
 specifically  appropriate, if  given  immediately  before  the
 paroxysm, coincides with the natural recurrence of the disease
 and causes  such  a reaction in  the organism, such  a violent
 contention, that an attack of that nature  produces at the very
 least a great loss  of strength, if it do  not endanger life.2  But
 if the medicine be given immediately after the termination of
 the fit,  that  is to  say,  at  the period when the apyretic interval
 has commenced and a long time before there are any prepara-
 tions for  the  next  paroxysm,  then  the  vital  force of  the
 organism is  in the best possible condition to allow  itself  to be
 quietly altered by the remedy ,and thus restored to the healthy
 state.
                            8 237.

   But  if  the stage of apyrexia be very short, as  happens in
 some very bad  fevers, or if  it  be disturbed  by some of  the

  1 Dr. von Bonninghausen. who has rendered  more service to our beneficent
system of medicine than any other of my disciples, has best elucidated this
subject, which  demands so much care, and has facilitated Ihe choice of the
efficient remedy for the various epidemics of fever, in his work entitled
 Versuch einer homoopathischen Therapie der Wechselfieber, ls:*:{. Miinster bei
Regensberg.
  2 This is observed in the fatal cases, by no means rare, in which a moderate
dose of opium given during the cold stage quickly deprived the patients of
life. 
 150               ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.

 after sufferings of the previous paroxysm,  the dose of homoeo-
 pathic medicine should  be administered when the perspiration
 begins to abate,  or  the other  subsequent phenomena of the
 expiring paroxysm begin  to diminish.

                           8 238.
   It  is only when the suitable medicine has with a single dose
 destroyed several fits and  manifest health has  ensued,  but
 after some time  indications of a new paroxysm appear, only
 then can and must the same medicine be given again, provided
 always the totality of  the symptoms is still the same.   This
 recurrence of  the same fever after an interval of  health  is,
 however,  only  possible when the noxious influence that first
 excited the intermittent fever still  continues to act upon the
 convalescent, as happens  in marshy districts;  in which case a
 permanent cure is often only possible b\' the removal of this
 exciting cause (as, for  instance, a residence in a mountainous
 country if the case was  one of marsh intermittent fever).

                           8 239.
   As almost every medicine causes  in its pure action a special,
 peculiar fever, and even a kind of  intermittent  fever  with  its
 alternating states, differing  from  all other fevers  that  are
 caused by other   medicines, homoeopathic  remedies  may  be
 found in the extensive domain of medicines for all the numer-
 ous  varieties of  natural intermittent fevers and,  for  a great
 many of  such fevers, even in the  moderate collection of  medi-
 cines already proved on the health)- individual.

                         8 240. («)
   But if the  remedy found  to be the homoeopathic specific for
 a prevalent epidemic of intermittent .fever do not  effect a per-
fect cure in some  one or other patient, if it  be not the influence
of a marshy district that  prevents  the cure, it must always be
the psoric miasm in  the background, in which  case antipsoric
medicines must be employed  until complete relief  is obtained.

                         8 241. («)
   Epidemics  of intermittent fever, in  situations  where none 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
151
are endemic,  are of  the nature of chronic diseases, composed
of single acute paroxysms;  each single epidemy is of a peculiar,
uniform character common to all  the individuals attacked, and
when this character  is found in the totality of the symptoms
common  to all, it  guides us  to the  discovery of the homoeo-
pathic (specific) remedy suitable for  all the  cases,  which is
almost universally serviceable  in those  patients who enjoyed
tolerable health before the occurrence of the epidemy,  that is
to say, who were not chronic sufferers from developed psora.

                           8 242.
   If, however, in such an epidemic intermittent fever the first
paroxysms have been left uncured, or if  the patients* have
been weakened  by improper allopathic treatment; then  the in-
herent psora  that exists, alas! in  so many persons,  although in
a latent  state, becomes developed, takes on the type of inter-
mittent fever, and to all  appearance continues  to play the part
of the epidemic intermittent fever, so that the  medicine, which
would have been useful in  the first paroxysms (rarely an anti-
psoric), is now no longer suitable  and cannot be of any service.
We have now to do  with a psoric intermittent  fever only, and
this will  generally be subdued by minute and  rarely repeated
doses of  sulphur or hepar sulphuris in a high potency.

                          8  243. <<*)
   In those often very  pernicious intermittent fevers which at-
tack  a single person, not  residing  in a marshy  district, we
must also at first, as in  the case of  acute diseases generally,
which they resemble in respect to  their psoric origin, employ
for some days, to render what service it may, a homoeopathic
remedy selected for the special  case from the other class of
proved (not antipsoric) medicines; but if, notwithstanding this
procedure, the recovery is  deferred,  we know  that we have to
do with psora on the point  of its development,  and that in this
case antipsoric medicines alone can effect a radical cure.

                           8 244.
   The intermittent  fevers  endemic in  marshy  districts  and
tracts  of country frequently exposed  to inundations, give a 
152
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
great deal of work to physicians  of the old school, and yet
a  healthy man  may in  his  youth  become habituated  even
to marshy districts and  remain in good health, provided he
preserves a faultless regimen and his system is not lowered by
want, fatigue or pernicious passions.   The  intermittent fevers
endemic there would at the most  only attack him on his first
arrival; but one or two very small  doses of a highly potentized
solution of cinchona  bark would conjointly with the  well-
regulated mode of  living  just alluded  to,  speedily free  him
from the disease.   But  persons  who, while taking sufficient
corporeal exercise and pursuing a healthy system of intellectual
occupations and bodily regimen,  cannot be cured of marsh in-
termittent fever  by one  or  a few  of such small  doses of
cinchona—in  such  persons psora, striving to develop itself,
always  lies at the root of their malady, and their intermittent
fever cannot be cured in the marshy  district without antipsoric
treatment.1  It sometimes happens  that when these  patients
exchange, without delay, the marshy district for one that  is
dry  and mountainous, recovery  apparently ensues, (the fever
leaves them) if they be not yet deeply sunk in disease, that is
to say,  if the psora was not completely developed in them and
can consequently return to its latent  state; but they will never
regain perfect health without antipsoric treatment.

                          8 245. («)
   Having thus seen what attention should, in the homoeopathic
treatment, be paid to the chief varieties of diseases', and to the
peculiar circumstances connected  with them, we now pass on
to what we have to say respecting the remedies and  the mode of
employing  them, together with the  diet and regimen to be observed
during their use.
   Every  perceptibly  progressive  and  strikingly  increasing
amelioration in a  transient (acute) or persistent  (chronic) dis-
ease, is  a condition which, as  long  as  it lasts, completely
precludes every  repetition of  the administration of any medi-

  1 Large, oft-repeated doses of cinchona bark, as also concentrated cin-
chonic remedies, such as the sulphite of quinine, have certainly the power of
freeing such patients from the periodical fits of the  marsh ague; but those
thus deceived into the belief that they are cured remain diseased in another
way without antipsoric aid. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.                153
 cine whatsoever,  because all  the good the medicine taken con-
 tinues to effect is now hastening towards its completion.   Every
 new dose  of any medicine whatsoever, even  of the one last
 administered,  that has hitherto shown  itself  to be  salutary,
 would in this case disturb the work of amelioration.

                           8 246. («)
   On the other hand, the slowly progressive amelioration con-
 sequent on a  very  minute  dose, whose selection has  been
 accurately homoeopathic,  when it has met with no hindrance to
 the  duration of  its  action,  sometimes accomplishes  all  the
 good the remedy in question  is capable from its  nature of per-
 forming in a given case, in periods of forty, fifty or a hundred
 days.   This is, however, but rarely  the case; and besides, it
 must be a matter of  great importance to the physician as well
 as to the patient that,  were it possible, this period should  be
 diminished to one half, one quarter, and even still less, so that
 a much more rapid cure might be obtained.   And this may be
 very happily effected, as recent and oft-repeated observations
 have  shown,  under  three  conditions: firstly, if the medicine
 selected with  the utmost  care  was  perfectly  homoeopathic;
 secondly, if it was given  in the minutest dose, so as to produce
 the  least possible excitation of the vital force, and  yet suffi-
 cient to effect the necessary change in it; and thirdly,  if this
 minutest yet  powerful dose  of  the  best selected medicine  be
 repeated at  suitable  intervals,1  which  experience  shall  have
 pronounced to be the best adapted for accelerating the cure to
 the  utmost extent,  yet  without  the vital  force,  which  it is
 sought to influence to  the production of a similar medicinal
  1 In the former editions of the Organon I have advised that a single dose of
 a well-selected homoeopathic medicine should always be allowed first fully
 to expend its action before a new medicine is given ortho same one repeated
 —a doctrine which was the result of the positive experience that neither by
 a larger dose of the remedy, which  may have been well  chosen (as has been
 again recently proposed, but which  would be very like a retrograde move-
 ment), nor. what  amounts to the same thing, by several small doses of it
 given in quick succession, can  the greatest possible good bo effected in the
 treatment of diseases, more especially of chronic ones; and the reason of
 this is. that by such a procedure the vital force does not quietly adapt itself
 to the transition  from the natural disease to the similar medicinal  disease,
 but is usually so violently  excited and disturbed by a larger dose, or by
 smaller doses of even a homoeopathically chosen remedy given rapidly one
 after the other, that in most cases its reaction will be anything but salutary
and will do more harm than good.  As long as no more efficacious mode of 
154
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
disease, being able to feel  itself excited and roused  to adveise
reactions.

proceeding than that then taught by me was discovered, the  safe philan-
thropic maxim of sinimjuvat, inodo ne noceat, rendered  it imperative for the
homoeopathic practitioner, for whom the weal of his  fellow-creatures was
the highest object, to allow, as  a general rule in diseases, but  a single dose
at a time, and that the very  smallest, of the carefully selected remedy to
act upon the patient and. moreover, to exhaust ils action. The very small-
est. I repeat, for it holds good and will continue to hold good as a homoeo-
pathic therapeutic maxim not to be refuted by any experience  in the world,
that the best dose of the properly selected remedy is always the very small-
est one in one of the high potencies (X). as well for  chronic  as for  acute
diseases—a truth that is  the inestimable property of pure hom<eopathy and
which, as long as allopathy (and the new mongrel sect, whose treatment is a
mixture of allopathic and homoeopathic processes, is not much better) con-
tinues to gnaw  like a cancer  at the life of sick human beings, and to ruin
them  by large and ever larger doses of drugs, will keep pure homoeopathy
separated from  these spurious arts as by an impassable gulf.
  On the other hand, however, practice shows us that though a  single one of
these small doses may suffice  to accomplish almost all that it  was possible
for this medicine to do under the circumstances, in  some, and  especially in
slight cases of disease, particularly in those of  young children and  very
delicate and excitable adults, yet  that  in many, indeed  in most cases, not
only of very chronic diseases that have already  made great progress and
have frequently been aggravated  by a previous employment of inappropri-
ate medicines, but also of serious acute  diseases, one such smallest dose of
medicine in our highly potentized dynamization is evidently insufficient to
effect all the curative action that might be expected from that medicines for
it may unquestionably be requisite to administer several of  them, in order
that the vital force may be pathogenetically altered by them  to such a de-
gree and its salutary reaction stimulated to such a height, as to enable it to
completely extinguish, by its reaction, the whole of that portion of the
original disease.that it lay in the power of the well-selected homoeopathic
remedy to eradicate; the best chosen medicine in such a small dose, given
but once, might certainly be of  some service, but would not be nearly suffi
cient.
  But the careful homoeopathic  physician would not venture soon to repeat
the same dose of the same remedy again and again, as from such a practice
he has frequently experienced no advantage, but most frequently, on close
observation, decided disadvantage.  He generally witnessed aggravation,
from even the smallest dose of the most suitable remedy, which  he had given
one day, when repeated the next day and the next.
  Now. in cases  where he was convinced of  the correctness of his choice of
the homoeopathic medicine, in order to obtain more benefit for the patient
than he was able to get hitherto from prescribing a single small dose, the
idea often naturally struck him to increase  the dose, since, for the reasons
given above, one single dose only should be given;  and. for instance, in phe-e
of giving a single very minute globule moistened with the medicine in the
highest dynamization, to administer six. seven or eight of them at once, and
even a half or a whole drop.   But the result  was almost always less favena-
able than It should have been;  it was  often actually unfavorable, often
even very bad—an injury that, in a  patient so  treated, it is difficult to
repair.
  The difficulty in this case is not solved by giving, instead, lower dynamiza-
tion of the remedy in a large  dose.
  Thus, increasing the strength of  the single doses  of  the homoeopathic
medicine with the view of effecting the degree of pathogenetic excitation of 
ORGANON  OF  MEDICINE.
155
                                 8 247.

     Under  these  conditions,  the  smallest  doses  of  the  best

  selected homoeopathic medicine may be repeated with the best,

  the vital force necessary to produce satisfactory salutary reaction, fails al-
  together, as experience teaches, to accomplish the desired object.  The vital
  force is thereby too violentiy and too suddenly assailed and excited to allow
  it time to exercise a gradual, equable, salutary reaction.-  to adapt itself to
  the modification effected in it;  hence it strives  to repel, as if it were an
  enemy,  the medicine attacking it in excessive force, by means of vomiting,
  diarrhoea, fever, perspiration, and so forth, and thus  in a great measure it
  diverts  and renders nugatory the aim of tiie incautious physician,—little or
  no good towards curing the disease will be thereby  accomplished; on the
  contrary, the patient will be thereby perceptibly  weakened  and, for a long
  time, the administration  of even the smallest  dose of the same remedy must
  not be thought of if we would not wish it to injure the patient.
   But it happens, moreover, that a number of the smallest doses given  for
  the same object in quick succession accumulate in the organism into a kind
  of excessively large dose, with  (a few rare cases excepted) similar bad  re-
  sults; in this case the vital  force, not being able to recover itself betwixt
  every dose, though  it bo but small, becomes  oppressed and  overwhelmed
  and thus, being incapable of reacting in a salutary manner. It is necessitated
  passively to allow involuntarily the continuance of the over-strong medi-
 cinal disease that has thus been forced upon it, just in the same manner as
  we may  every day observe from  the allopathic abuse of large  cumulative
 doses of one and the same medicine, to the lasting injury of the patient.
   Now. therefore, in order, whilst avoiding the erroneous method I have here
 pointed  out, to attain the desired object more certainly than hitherto, and
 to administer the medicine selected in such a manner  that it must exercise
 all  its efficacy without injury to the patient, that it may effect till the good
 it is capableof performing in a given case of disease. I have latterly adopted
 a peculiar method.
  I  perceived that, in order to discover this truo middle  path, we must be
 guided as well by the nature of the different  medicinal substances, as also
 by t he corporeal constitution of  the patient and the magnitude of his dis-
 ease, so that—to give an example from the  use of xu pkur in chronic (psoric)
 diseases—the  smallest dose of it  (tinct. sulph. X°) can seldom be repeated
 with advantage, even in robust patients and in fully developed psora, oftener
 than every seven days,  a period of time which must be  proportionally
 lengthened  when we  have to treat weaker and more excitable patients of
 this kind; in such cases we would do well to give such a dose only  every
 nine, twelve, or fourteen  days, and continue to repeat the medicine until it
 ceases to be of service.  We thus find (to abide  by the Instance of sulphur)
 that in psoric diseases seldom fewer that four,  often, however, six. eight and
 even ten such closes (tinct. sulph. X°) are required to be successively admin-
 istered at these intervals for the complete annihilation of the whole portion
 of the chronic disease that is eradicable by sulphur—provided always there
 had  been no previous allopathic abuse of sulphur in the case.  Thus even a
 (primary) scabious e/uption of  rcc. nt origin, though it may have spread all over
 the body,  mi if he perfectly cured, in  persons who are n< it too weakly. by a dose of
 tinct. sulph   X° givm eviry teven days, in the course of  from ten to twelve
 weeks (accordingly with ten or twelve such globules), so that it will seldom
 be necessary to aid the cure with  a few doses  of carh. veg X° (also given at
the rate of one dose per weelt). witiiont the slightest  external  treatment besides
frequent changes of linen and good regimen.
  When for other serious chronic diseases also  we may consider it requisite,
as far as  we  can calculate, to  give eight, nine or  ten doses of tinct. sulph. (at 
156                 ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
often with  incredible results, at  intervals of  fourteen,  twelve,
ten, eight,  seven days,  and,  where  rapidity is  requisite,  in

X°), it is yet more expedient in such cases, instead of giving them in unin-
terrupted succession, to interpose after every, or every second or third dose,
a dose of another medicine, which in this case is next in point of honicvo-
pathic suitableness to sulphur (usually  hep.  sulph). and to allow this like-
wise to act for eight, nine, twelve or fourteen days before again commencing
a course of three doses of sulphur.
  But it not infrequently happens that the vital force refuses to permit sev-
eral dosas of sulphur, even though they  may ba essential for the cure of the
chronic  malady  and are given at the intervals mentioned above, to  act
quietly on itself; this refusal it reveals  by some, though moderate, sulphur
symptoms, which it allows to appear  in the patient during the treatment.
Iu suchjcases it is sometimes ad visable to administer asmall dose of uuxvom.
X°. allowing It to act for eight or  ten days,  in order to dispose the system
again to allow succeeding doses of the sulphur to act quietly and effectually
upon it.   In those cases for which it is adapted, yri s XJ is preferable.
  But the vital force shows the greatest  resistance to the salutary action
upon itself of the  strongly indicated sulphur, and even exhibits  manifest
aggravation of the chronic disease, though the sulphur be given in the very
smallest dose, though only a globule of the size of a mustard seed moistened
with tinct sulph.  X° be smelt, if the sulphur have formerly  (it may be years
since) been improperly given allopathically  in largo doses.  This is one la-
mentableeircumstanee that renders the host  medical  treatment of chronic
diseases almost  impossible, among the many that the ordinary  bungling
treatment of chronic disaases by the old school would leave us nothing to do
but to deplore, were there not some mode of  getting over the difficulty.
  In such cases we lmva only to let the patient smell a single true strongly
at a globule the sizo of a mustard seed moistened with mercur. me all. X,  and
allow thlsolfaction to act for about nine  davs. in order to make the vital
force again disposed to permit the sulphur  (at least the olfaction  of tinct.
sulph. X°) to exercise a  beneficial inlluence on itself—a discovery for which
we are indebted to Dr. Grlesselich. of  Carlsruhe.
  Of the other antipsoric remedies (except perhaps pho<ph. X) it is necessary
to administer fewer doses at similar Intervals (of  sepia  and sil. at longer in-
tervals, without any intermediate remedy, whore they are.homoeopathically
indicated^, in  order to cure all that is curable  in a given case by the remedy
Indicated. Hep. sulph. calc. X can rarely be taken or smelt at shorter inter-
vals than every fourteen or fifteen days.
  Before making such a repetition of  the  dose the physician must of course
be convinced that his selection is truly homoeopathic.
  In acute diseases, the time for repeating the fitly chosen medicine is regu-
lated by the greater or less rapidity of  the course of the disease wo have to
combat, so that, when necessary, it should  be repeated after twenty-four,
sixteen, twelve, eight, four and even  fewer  hours, if the medicine continue
to prove beneficial without interruption—without producing new symptoms
—but  is not sufficiently rapid in its action  for the excessively quick  and
dangerous course of the acute disease, so  that in  cholera, the  most speedily
fatal disease we know, at thecommencementof the disease, one or two drops
of a mild solution of camphor must bo given every five minutes, in order to
procure speedy and certain relief,  and in  the more developed cholera, doses
of cuprum, veratmm. phosphou-;  ,tc. (X°),  frequently require to be given
every two or-three  hours, and also arsenic,  varha vegetabilis, &c. at similar
short intervals.
  In the treatment of so-called typhus fevers and other continued fevers,
the repetition, in smallest doses, of the medicines that proves itself of  ser-
vice, must be  regulated by the above directions. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
157
 chronic  diseases  resembling cases of  acute  disease,  at still
 shorter  intervals, but  in acute  diseases at very much shorter
 periods—every  twenty-four,  twelve, eight, four hours, in  the

 very acutest, every hour, up to as often as every five minutes,—
 in every case in proportion to the more or less rapid course of
 the disease and  of the action of the medicine employed, as is
 more distinctly explained in the  last note.

                              8 248.

   The dose  of  the  same  medicine  may  be repeated  several
 times according  to circumstances, but  only so long  as until
 either  recovery  ensues, or  the. same  remedy ceases to do good
 and the rest of the disease, presenting a different group of  symp-
 toms,  demands a different homoopathie medicine.

                              8 249.

   Every  medicine prescribed for  a  case of disease  which, in
 the  course of its action,  produces new and  troublesome symp-
 toms not appertaining to the disease to  be cured, is not capa-
 ble of  effecting  real  improvement,1  and  cannot be considered
 as homoeopathically selected; it  must, therefore, either,  if the
 aggravation be  considerable, be first partially neutralized  as

  In pure syphilitic diseases I have generally found a single dose of metallic
 mercury (Xn) sufficient; and yet  not infrequently two or three such doses
 were requisite, given at intervals of six or  eight days, when the  slightest
 complication with psora was perceptible.
  In cases where some particular medicine is urgently indicated, but where
 the patient is very excitable and weak, a more efficient and certain proced-
 ure than giving more substantial, though ever so small  doses of the highly
 potentized medicine, is a single olfaction of a dry globule the size of a must-
 ard seed that has been impregnated with the same medicine; this is effected
 by holding the mouth of the phial that contains it first in one and then (if it
 is wished to give a stronger dose) in the other nostril and making a momen-
 tary inspiration; the action of this medicine, thus administered, lasts just
 as long as that of the medicine that has been taken in substance, hence even
 this olfaction ought not to be repeated at shorter intervals.(a)
  1 As all experience shows that the dose of the specifically suited homoeo-
 pathic medicine can scarcely be prepared too small to effect perceptible
amelioration in the disease for which it is appropriate (§§ 275—279), we should
act injudiciously and hurtfully  were  we. when no improvement, or some,
though it be even slight, aggravation ensues, to repeat  or even to increase
the dose of the same medicine,  as is  done in the old system, under the delu-
sion that it was not efficacious on account of its small quantity (its too small
 close). Every aggravation by the production of new symptoms—when nothing
 untoward has occurred in the mental or physical regimen—invariably proves
 unsuitableness on the part of the medicine  formerly given in the case of disease
before us, but never indicates that the dose has been too weak. 
158
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
soon as possible by an antidote  before giving the next remedy
chosen more accurately according to similarity of action;  or if
the troublesome symptoms be not very violent, the next remedy
must be given immediately, in order to take the place of the
improperly selected one. W
                           8 250.
  When, to the observant practitioner who accurately investi-
gates the state of the disease,  it is  evident, in urgent cases
after the lapse of only six, eight or twelve hours,  that  he has
made a bad selection  in  the  medicine last given,  in that the
patient's state  is growing perceptibly, however slightly, worse
from hour to hour, by the occurrence of new  symptoms and
sufferings,  it is not only allowable for him, but  it is his  duty
to remedy  his mistake, by the selection and administration of
a homoeopathic medicine not merely tolerably suitable, but the
most appropriate possible for the existing state  of the dis-
ease (8 167). («)
                          8 251. («)

  There are  some medicines (e. g. ignatia,  also bryonia and
rhus, and sometimes belladonna) whose power of  altering man's
health consists chiefly  in alternating actions—a kind of pri-
mary-action symptoms that are in part opposed  to each other.
Should  the practitioner find,  on  prescribing one of  these, se-
lected on strict homoeopathic  principles, that no improvement
follows, he will in most cases soon effect his object  by giving
(in acute diseases, even within a few hours) a fresh and equally
small dose of  the same medicine.1

                          8 252. (<*)

  But should  we find, during the employment of  the other
medicines in chronic (psoric) diseases, that the best selected
homoeopathic  (antipsoric) medicine in the suitable (minutest)
dose does not effect an improvement, this is a  sure sign that
the cause  that keeps  up the disease still persists, and that
there is some  circumstance in the mode of life of the patient
  1 As I have more particularly described in the introduction to "Ignatia"
(in the first volume of the Materia Medica Pura). 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
159
 or in the situation in which he  is  placed, that  must  be re-
 moved in order that a permanent cure may ensue.

                             8 253.
   Among the signs that, in all  diseases, especially in such as
 are of an acute nature, inform us of a slight commencement of
 amelioration or  aggravation  that  is  not perceptible to  every
 one,  the  state of mind and the  whole demeanor of the patient
 are the most certain and instructive.  In  the case of ever so
 slight an improvement we observe a greater degree of comfort,
 increased calmness and freedom of the mind, higher spirits—
 a kind of return of the natural  state.   In the case of  ever so
 small a  commencement of aggravation we have, on the con-
 trary,  the  exact opposite of  this:  a  constrained, helpless,
 pitiable state of the disposition, of the mind,  of the whole de-
 meanor,  and of  all gestures, postures and  actions, which may
 be easily perceived on close observation,  but  cannot be  de-
 scribed in words.1
                             8 254.
   The other new or increased symptoms, or, on the contrary,
 the  diminution  of the original  ones  without  any  addition  of
 new ones, will soon dispel all doubts from  the mind of the at-
 tentively observing and investigating practitioner with regard
 to the  aggravation or  amelioration;  though there are among
 patients persons who are either incapable of giving an account
 of this amelioration  or aggravation, or are unwilling to con-
 fess it.
                           8 255. («)

   But  even with such individuals we may convince ourselves
  ' The signs of improvement in the disposition and mind, however, may be
expected only soon after the medicine has been taken when the dose has
been sufficiently minute (i. e. as small as possible); an unnecessarily largor
dose of even  the most suitable homoeopathic medicine acts too violently.
and at first produces too great and too  lasting a disturbance of the mind
and disposition, to allow us soon to perceive the improvement in them.  I
must here observe that this so essential rule is chiefly transgressed by pre-
sumptuous tyros in  homoeopathy, and by physicians who are converted to
homoeopathy from the ranks of the old school.  From old prejudices these
persons abhor the smallest doses of the lowest(a) dilution of medicine in such
cases, and hence they fail to experience the great advantages and blessings
of that mode of proceeding which a thousandfold experience has shown to
be the most salutary; they cannot effect all that homoeopathy is capable of
doing, and hence they have no claim to be considered its adherents. 
160
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
on this point by going  with  them through  all the symptoms
enumerated in our notes of the disease one by one, and finding
that they complain of  no new unusual  symptoms in addition
to these,  and that  none of the old symptoms are worse.  If
this be the case, and if  an improvement in the disposition and
mind  have  already been observed,  the  medicine must have
effected  positive  diminution  of  the disease, or, if sufficient
time have not yet elapsed for this, it  will soon effect it.  Now,
supposing the remedy is perfectly appropriate,  if  the improve-
ment  delay  too long in making  its  appearance, this  depends
either on some error of conduct on the  part  of  the patient, or
on  the homoeopathic aggravation  produced by the medicine
lasting too long (8  157), consequently on the  dose not being
small enough.
                          8  256.
   On the other hand, if the patient mention the occurrence of
some fresh accidents and symptoms of importance—signs that
the medicine  chosen has not been strictly homoeopathic—even
though he should good-naturedly assure us that he feels better,
we must not believe this assurance, but regard his  state as
aggravated, as it will soon be perfectly apparent it is. («0

                          8 257.
   The true(a> physician will take care to avoid making favor-
ite remedies of medicines, the employment of which he has, by
chance,  perhaps found often useful, and which  he  has had
opportunities of using with good effect.  If he do  so, some
remedies of  rarer use,  which would  have been more homoeo-
pathically suitable, consequently  more serviceable, will often
be neglected.
                          8 258.

   The true practitioner, moreover, will not in his practice  with
mistrustful weakness neglect the employment of those remedies
that he may  now and then have employed  with bad effects,
owing to an  erroneous  selection  (from  his  own fault, there-
fore), or  avoid them for other  (false)  reasons,  as that  they
were unhomoeopathic for the case of disease before him; he
must  bear  in mind the  truth, that  of medicinal agents  that 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
161
   one alone  invariably deserves the preference in every case of
   disease which corresponds most accurately by similarity to the
   totality of the characteristic  symptoms,  and  that no  paltry
   prejudices  should interfere with this serious  choice.


                                8 259.

     Considering the  minuteness of the doses necessary and prop-
  er in homoeopathic treatment,  we can  easily understand  that
  during  the treatment  everything  must be removed from  the
  diet and regimen which can have any medicinal action, in order
  that the small dose may  not be overwhelmed and extinguished
  or disturbed by  any foreign medicinal irritant.1


                               8  260.

    Hence the careful investigation  into such obstacles to cure
  is so much  the more necessary  in the case  of patients  affected
  by chronic  diseases, as their  diseases  are  usually aggravated
  by such noxious influences and other disease-causing errors in
  the diet and regimen, which often pass  unnoticed.2

   1 The softest tones of  a distant flute that in the still midnight hours would
 inspire a  tender heart with exalted  feelings and dissolve it in  religious
 ecstasy, are inaudible and powerless amid discordant cries and the nofse of
 day.
   * Coffee;  fine Chinese  and  other herb teas; beer prepared with medicinal
 vegetable substances  unsuitable for the patient's state; so-called  fine
 liquors made with medicinal spices;  all kinds of punch; spiced chocolate-
 odorous waters and perfumes of many kinds; strong-scented flowers in the
 apartment; tooth powders and essences and perfumed  sachets compounded
 of drugs;  highly spiced dishes and sauces;  spiced  cakes and ices-  crude
 medicinal  vegetables for soups; dishes of herbs, roots  and  stalks of  plants
 possessing medicinal qualities; old cheese, and meats that  are in a state of
 decomposition, or that possess  medicinal properties (as the flesh and fat of
 pork, ducks and geese, or veal that is too young and sour viands), ought just
 as certainly to be kept from patients as they should avoid all excesses in
 rooms^oolen rlT °f  SUgar  a"d Sil]U as also spirltaous drinks, heated
 S^rSst fn\7  "GXt th6SkiT1 ^hioh should  be exchanged  in warm
 rp^e^                                         Hfe inclose
 ruling driving  ™.  Trequent ,nflulffonee in mere passive exercise  (such as
 riding driving  or swinging,  prolonged suckling, taking a long siesta in a


 grief or vexation. ^^^S^^^^Tr^^^ d^l
 ™* t^^ fY  ^"^ damP r°°mS- Penurious living. &c. All these thTngs
 mUtSheohstrn?^ """"'If aV°lded or r™ed, in order that the cure may

Jessiyto increase the difficulties of the patient's dietary by forbiddin- the
m"^^ "^ ^^ indiffere^ things, whichVnot to be  "com!
12 
162
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
                           I 261.
  The most appropriate  regimen during  the employment of
medicine in chronic diseases consists in the removal of such
obstacles to recovery, and  in supplying where  necessary the
reverse:  innocent  moral and intellectual recreation,  active
exercise in the open air in almost all  kinds of  weather (daily
walks, slight manual  labor), suitable,  nutritious,  unmedicinal
food and drink, &c.
                            8 262.
  In  acute  diseases, on  the other  hand—except in cases of
mental alienation—the subtile, unerring internal  sense of the
awakened life-preserving faculty determine so clearly and pre-
cisely, that the physician only requires to counsel the friends
and attendants to put no obstacles in the way of  this voice of
nature by refusing  anything the patient urgently desires in the
way of food, or by trying to persuade him to partake of any-
thing injurious.
                            8 263.
  The desire of the patient affected by an acute  disease with
regard to food and drink  is certainly chiefly for things that
give palliative  relief;  they are, however, not strictly speaking
of a medicinal character, and merely  supply a sort of want.
The  slight  hindrances that  the gratification  of this desire,
within moderate bounds, could oppose to the radical removal of
the disease1 will be amply counteracted and overcome  by the
power of the homoeopathically suited medicine and the vital
force set free  by it, as also by the refreshment that follows
from  taking  what  has been  so ardently longed for.   In like
manner,  in acute diseases the temperature of the room and the
heat or coolness of the bed-coverings must also be arranged
entirely in conformity with the patient's  wish.   He must be
kept free from all  over-exertion of mind and exciting emo-
tions. W
                            I 264.
  The true physician must be provided with genuine medicines
  1 This is. however, rare.  Thus, for instance, in pure inflammatory dis-
eases, where aconite is so indispensable, whose action would be destroyed
by partaking of vegetable acids, the desire of the patient is almost always
for pure cold water only. 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
163
 of unimpaired strength,  so that  he may be able  to  reiy upon

 their therapeutic powers; he  must be able,  himself, to judge of
 their genuineness.

                               8 265.

   It should  be a matter of conscience with him to be  thor-
 oughly convinced in every  case that  the  patient  always  takes
 the right medicine.

                              8  266. (a)

   Substances belonging  to  the animal and vegetable  kingdoms
 possess their medicinal qualities most perfectly in  their raw
 state.1
                               I 267.

   We  gain possession of  the powers of indigenous plants and
 of such as may be  had  in  a  fresh state in the most complete
 and certain manner by  mixing  their freshly expressed  juice
 immediately with the  equal   parts of  spirits  of wine  of a
 strength sufficient to burn  in a lamp.   After this has stood a


  1 All crude animal and vegetable substances have a greateror less amount
 of medicinal power, and are capable of altering man's health, each in its own
 peculiar way.  Those plants and animals used by the most enlightened na-
 tions as food have this advantage over all others, that they contain a larger
 amount of nutritious constituents; and they differ from the others iu this.
 that their medicinal powers in their raw state are either not very great in
 themselves, or are diminished by the culinary processes they are subjected
 to in cooking for domestic use,  by the expression of the pernicious juice
 (like the cassava root of South America), by fermentation (of the rye-flour
 in the dough for making bread, sour-crout prepared  without vinegar and
 pickled gherkins), by smoking and by the action of heat (in boiling, stewing,
 toasting, roasting, baking), whereby the medicinal  parts of many of these
 substances are in part destroyed and dissipated.  By the addition of salt
 (pickling) and vinegar  (sauces,  salads) animal and vegetable substances
 certainly lose much  of their injurious medicinal qualities, but other  disad-
 vantages result from these additions.
  But even those plants that possess most medicinal power lose that in part
 or completely by such processes.  By perfect desiccation all the roots of the
 various  kinds of iris, of the horseradish, of the different species of arum and
 of the peonies lose almost all their medicinal virtue. The juice  of the most
 virulent plants often becomes an inert, pitch-like mass, from the heat em-
 ployed in preparing the ordinary extracts  By merely standing a long time,
 theexpressed juice of the most deadly plants becomes quite powerless; even
 at a moderate atmospheric temperature it rapidly takes on  the vinous fer-
 mentation (and thereby loses much of its medicinal power), and immediately
 thereafter the acetous and putrid  fermentation, whereby it is deprived of
 all its peculiar medicinal properties; the fecula that is then deposited, if
 well washed, is quite innocuous, like ordinary starch.  By the transudation
 that takes place when a number of  green plants are laid  one above the
other, the greatest part of their medicinal properties is lost. 
164                  ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
day and a night  in a close stoppered bottle and deposited the
fibrinous and  albuminous matters,  the clear  superincumbent
fluid is then to  be decanted off for medicinal  use.1   All fer-

mentation of the vegetable juice will be at once checked by the
spirits of  wine mixed with  it and rendered, impossible for the

future, and the entire medicinal  power of the  vegetable juice
is thus retained (perfect and uninjured) for ever by keeping the
preparation in well-corked bottles and excluded from the sun's

light.2
                              8  2G8.

   The other exotic plants, barks, seeds and  roots that cannot
be obtained in  the fresh  state  the sensible  practitioner will
aever take in the pulverized form on  trust, but will first con-
vince himself of  their genuineness in  their crude, entire state
before making any medicinal employment of them.3(«)

  1 Buchholz (Ta^chcnh f. Scheidek. u. Ap-th a.d.  J . 1S15. Weimar, Abth. 1,
vi) assures his readers (and his reviewer in the Leipziger Literaturzeitung,
tslli, No. 82, does not contradict him) that for this excellent mode of prepar-
ing medicine we have to thank the campaign in Russia, whence it was (in
1812) imported into Germany.  According to the noble practice of Germans
to bo unjust towards their own countrymen, he conceals the fact that this
discovery and those directions, which he quotes in my very words from the
Brst edition of the Organonof Rational Medicine, § 230 and note, proceed from
me, and that Ifirxt published them to the world two years before the Russian
campaign (the Organon appeared in  1810). Some folks would rather assign
the origin of a discovery to the deserts of Asia than to a German to whom
the honor belongs.  O temporal  O mores!
  Alcohol has certainly been sometimes before this used for mixing with
vegetable juice, e. g. to preserve them some time before making extracts oi
them, but never with the view of administering them in this form.
  2 Although equal parts of alcohol and freshly expressed juice are usually
the most suitable proportion for effecting the deposition of the fibrinous
and albuminous matters, yet for plants that contain much thick mucus (e.
g. Symphytum officinale, Viola tricolor,&c.) or an excess of albumen (e.g.- FAhusa
".ynapium, Solatium nig rum, &c), a double proportion of alcohol is generally
required for this object.  Plants that are very deficient in juice, as oleander,
Buxus, Taxu<, Ledum,  Sabina,  &c, must first be  pounded up alone into a
moist, fine mass, and then stirred up with a double quantity of alcohol, in
order that the juice may combine with it, and being thus extracted by the
alcohol, may be pressed out;  these latter may also when dried bo brought
with milk-sugar to the millionfold trituration, and then be further diluted
and potcntized (v. § 271).
  3 In order to preserve them in the form of powder, a precaution is requisit e
that has hitherto been usually neglected by druggists, and hence powders
even of well-dried animal and vegetable substances could not  be preserved
uninjured even in well-corked bottles.  The entire crude vegetable sub-
stances, though perfectly dry,  yet contain, as an indispensable condition oi'
the cohesion of their texture, a certain quantity of moisture, which does not
indeed prevent the unpulverized drug from remaining in as dry a state as is
requisite to preserve it from corruption, but which is quite too much for the 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
165
                            8 269. («)

   The  homoeopathic system of medicine develops for  its use,

to a hitherto unheard-of degree,  the spirit-like medicinal pow-

ers of  the crude substances by means of a process peculiar to

it and which has  hitherto  never been  tried, whereby only they
all become  penetratingly  efficacious and remedial, even  those
that in the crude state  give no evidence of the slightest medi-
cinal power on the human  body.

                              8  270.-

   Thus two drops of  the fresh  vegetable  juice mingled  with
equal  parts of alcohol  are diluted  with ninety-eight drops of

alcohol and  potentized by means of two succussions, whereby
the first development of power  is  formed, and this process is
repeated through  twenty-nine more phials, each  of which is

filled three quarters full with ninety-nine drops of alcohol, and
each succeeding phial is to be  provided with one drop from the
preceding phial (which has already been shaken  twice) and is
in its turn twice shaken,1  and in the  same manner at  last the

finely pulverized state. The animal or vegetable substance which  in its en-
tire state was  perfectly dry, furnishes  therefore, when finely pulverized, a
somewhat moist powder, which, without rapidly becoming spoilt and mouldy,
can yet not be preserved in corked bottles if not previously freed from this
superfluous moisture. This  is best effected by spreading out the powder in a
flat tin saucer with a raised edge, which  floats in a vessel full of boiling
water (i. >■ a water-bath), and, by means of stirring it  about, drying it to
such a degree that all the small atoms of it (no longer stick together in
lumps, but) like dry. fine sand, are easily separated from each other, and are
readily converted into dust.  In this dry state the fine powders may be kept
for ever uninjured in well-corked and sealed bottles, iu all their original
compjete medicinal  power, without ever being injured by.mites or mould ; and
they are best preserved when the bottles are kept  protected from the day-
_ight(in covered boxes, chests, cases).  If not shut up in air-tight vessels,
and not preserved from the access of the light of thesunand day, all animal
and vegetable substances in time gradually lose their medicinal power more
and more, even in the entire state, but still more in the form of powder.
  1 In order to maintain a fixed and measured standard for developing the
power of liquid medicines, multiplied experience and careful observation
have led mo to adopt two succussions  for each phial, in preference to the
greater number formerly employed (by which the medicines were too highly
potentized). There  are,  however, homoeopathists who carry about with
them on their visits  to patients the homoeopathic  medicines in  the fluid
state, and who yet assort that they do not become more highly potentized
in the course of time, but they thereby show their want of ability to observe
correctly.  I dissolved a grain of soda in half an ounce of water mixed with
alcohol in a phial, which was thereby filled two-thirds  full, and shook this
solution continuously for half an hour, and this fluid was in potency and
energy equal to the thirtieth development of power.(") 
166                 ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
thirtieth development of  power (potentized decillionth dilution
X), which is the one most generally used.

                            8 271.
  All  other substances  adapted for medicinal use—except
sulphur, which has  of  late  years been only employed  in the
form of highly diluted (X)  tincture^) —as pure  or oxydized
and sulphuretted metals  and other minerals, petroleum, phos-
phorus, as also parts and juices of  plants  that can only be
obtained in the dry state, anijnal substances, neutral salts, &c.,
all these are first  to be  potentized  by trituration  for three
hours,  up to the millionfold pulverulent  attenuation, and of
this one grain  is to  be dissolved, and brought to the thirtieth
development of power through twenty-seven attenuating  phials,
in the  same manner as the vegetable juices.1

                            8 272.
  In no case is it requisite to administer more than one single,
simple medicinal substance at one time.2(°0

                            8 273.
  It is not conceivable  how the slightest dubiety could exist
as to  whether it was more consistent with nature and more
rational to prescribe a single, well-known medicine at one time
in a disease,  or a mixture of several differently acting drugs.

                            8 274.
  As  the true physician finds  in  simple medicines, adminis-
tered  singly and uncombined, all that he can  possibly desire
(artificial disease-forces which are able by homoeopathic power
completely  to overpower,  extinguish,  and permanently cure
natural diseases), he will, mindful of the  wise maxim that "it
is wrong to  attempt to employ  complex  means  when  simple

  i As is still more circumstantially described in the prefaces to Arsenic and
Pulsatilla in the Mateiia Medica Pura (a)
  2 Some homoeopathists have made the experiment, in  cases where they
deemed one remedy homoeopathically suitable for one portion of the symp-
toms of a case of disease, and a second for another portion, of administering
both remedies at the same or at almost the same time; but I earnestly de-
precate such a hazardous experiment, which can never be necessary, though
it may sometimes seem to be of use. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
167
 means suffice," never  think of giving as a remedy any  but a
 single, simple medicinal substance;  for these reasons also, be-
 cause  even  though  the  simple  medicines were  thoroughly
 proved with respect to their pure peculiar effects on the unim-
 paired healthy state  of man,  it is  yet  impossible to  foresee
 how  two  and more medicinal  substances might, when  com-
 pounded, hinder and alter  each other's actions on  the human
 body;  and  because, on the other hand,  a simple medicinal
 substance when used in diseases, the  totality of whose symp-
 toms is accurately known, renders efficient aid by itself alone,
 if it  be homoeopathically  selected;  and  supposing the worst
 case to happen, that it was not chosen in strict conformity to
 similarity  of symptoms, and therefore does no  good, it is yet
 so far useful that it promotes our knowledge of therapeutic
 agents, because, by the new symptoms excited by it in such a
 case,  those  symptoms  which  this  medicinal substance  had
 already shcnn in experiments on the healthy human  body are
 confirmed, an advantage that is lost  by the employment of  all
 compound remedies.1

                            8 275.

   The  suitableness of  a medicine for any given  case of dis-
 ease does  not depend on  its accurate homoeopathic  selection
 alone, but likewise on the proper  size, or rather smallness, of
 the dose.   If we give  too strong a dose of a medicine which
 may  have  been even quite  homoeopathically  chosen  for the
 morbid state before us, it must, notwithstanding the inherent
 beneficial character of  its nature, prove  injurious by its  mere
 magnitude, and  by the unnecessary, too  strong  impression
 which, by  virtue of its homoeopathic similarity of action, it
 makes upon  the vital force which  it attacks and, through the
 vital force, upon  those  parts of the organism which  are the
 most  sensitive, and are already most  affected by the natural
 disease.W

  1 When the rational physician has chosen  the perfectly homoeopathic
 medicine for the well-considered case of disease and administered it intern-
ally, he will  leave to irrational allopathic routine the practice of giving
drinks composed of other medicinal substances, of applying compresses of
herbs or fomentations with various plants, of injecting medicated glysters
 and of rubbing in this or the other ointment. 
168                ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
                           8 276.
  For this reason, a medicine, even though  it may be homoeo-
pathically suited to  the case of disease, does  harm  in every
dose that is too  large, the more harm the  larger the dose,  and
by the magnitude of the dose  it does more harm the greater its
homoeopathicity and the  higher the potency1 selected, and  it
does much more injury than any equall}' large dose of a medi-
cine that is unhomoeopathic, and in no  respect adapted (allo-
pathic) to the morbid state; for in the former case the so-called
homoeopathic aggravation (11 157—160)—that is to  say, the
very analogous medicinal  disease produced by the vital force
stirred up  by the excessively  large dose  of medicine, in the
parts of the organism that are most suffering and most irritated
by the original disease—which medicinal disease,  had it been
of appropriate intensity, would have  gently effected a cure—
rises to an injurious  height;2 the patient, to be sure, no longer
suffers from the original  disease, for that has been  homoeo-
pathicall}*  eradicated,  but  he  suffers all  the more from  the
excessive medicinal disease and from useless exhaustion of his
strength.
                           8 277.
  For  the  same reason, and because a medicine,  provided the
dose of it  was sufficiently small, is all  the  more salutary and
almost marvellously efficacious  the more  accurately homoeo-
pathic its selection  has been, a  medicine whose  selection has
been accurately homoeopathic must be  all the more  salutary
the more its dose is reduced to the degree of minuteness appro-
priate for a gentle remedial effect.

                           8 278.
  Here the question arises, what is this most suitable degree
of minuteness for sure and gentle remedial  effect; how small,
in other words, must be the dose of  each individual medicine
homoeopathically selected  for a  case of disease, to effect the

  i The praise bestowed of late years by some  few homoeopathists on the
larger doses is owing to this, either that they chose low dynamizations of
the medicine to be administered, as I myself used to do twenty years ago,
from not knowing any better, or that the medicines selected were not per-
fectly homoeopathic.
  2 See note to S 240. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.                 169
best cure?  To solve this problem, and  to determine for every
particular medicine, what dose of it will suffice  for  homoeo-
pathic  therapeutic  purposes and  yet be so minute that the
gentlest and most  rapid  cure may be  thereby obtained—to
solve  this  problem is,  as  may easily  be conceived, not the
work of theoretical speculation;  not by fine-spun reasoning,
not by specious sophistry can we expect  to obtain the solution
of this problem.   Pure experiment, careful observation, and
accurate  experience can alone determine this;   and it were
absurd to adduce the large doses of unsuitable (allopathic)
medicines of the old system, which do not touch  the diseased
side of  the organism homoeopathically, but only attack the
parts unaffected by the disease, in opposition to what pure ex-
perience pronounces respecting the smallness of  the  doses re-
quired for homoeopathic  cures.

                            8 279.

  This pure experience  shows  universally,  that if  the dis-
ease do not manifestly depend  on a considerable deterioration
of an important viscus (even though it belong to the chronic
and  complicated diseases), and if  during the  treatment all
other alien medicinal influences are kept away from the patient,
the dose of the homoeopathically selected remedy can  never be pre-
pared so  small  that it shall not be  stronger than the natural
disease, and shall not  be able to overpower, extinguish and cure
it, at least  in part, as long as it  is capable of causing some,
though but  a  slight preponderance of its own  symptoms over
those of the disease resembling it (slight homoeopathic aggrava-
tion,  88 157—160) immediately after  its ingestion Sa)


                            8 280.

  This incontrovertible axiom of experience is  the standard of
measurement by which the doses of all honaropathie medicines,
witiiont exception, ore to  be reduced to such an  extent that, after
tlieir  ingestion, they shall excite a. scarcely  abservable homoeo-
pathic aggravatio)t,(a) let the diminutive of the  dose go ever so
far, and appear ever so incredible  to the materialistic  ideas of 
170
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
ordinary physicians;1 their idle declamations must cease before

the verdict of unerring experience.


                              8 281.

   Every patient is, especially  in his diseased points, capable

of being influenced in an  incredible degree by  medicinal agents

corresponding by similarity of  action; and there is no person,
bo  he ever so  robust, and  even though he  be  affected only
with a chronic or so-called local disease, who  will not soon ex-
perience the desired change in the affected part,  if he take the
salutary,  homoeopathically  suited medicine  in the smallest

conceivable dose,  who, in  a word, will  not thereby  be much
more altered in his health than a  healthy infant of but a day
old would be.   How insignificant and ridiculous is mere theoret-
ical scepticism in opposition  to  this unerring, infallible  ex-

perimental proof  K<0

  1 Lit them learn from the mathematicians how true it is that a substance
divided into ever so many parts must still contain in its smallest conceiva-
ble parts always some of this substance, and that the smallest conceivable
parts does not cease to be .some of this substance and cannot possibly become
nothing;—let them, if they are capable of being taught, hear from natural
philosophers that there are enormously powerful things (forces) which are
perfectly destitute of weight, as. for sxample. caloric, light. &c, consequent-
ly infinitely lighter than the medicine contained iu the smallest doses used
in homoeopathy;—let them, if they can, weigh the irritating words that
bring on  a bilious fever, or the mournful intelligence respecting her only
son that  kills the mother;  let them touch, for a quarter of an hour, a mag-
net capable of lifting a hundred pound weight, and learn from the pain it
excites that even imponderable agencies can produce the most violent med-
icinal effects upon man;—and let the weak ones among them allow the pit of
their stomach to be slightly touched by the thumb's point of a strong-willed
mesmefiser for a  few minutes, and the disagreeable sensations they then
suffer will make them repent of attempting to set limits to the boundless
activity of nature; the weak-minded creatures!
  If the allopathist who is trying the homoeopathic system imagine hi' can-
not bring himself  to give such small and profoundly attenuated doses, let
him only askhimself what risk he runs by so doing? If the scepticism which
holds what is ponderable only to be real, and all that is imponderable to be
nothing, be right, nothing  worse could result from a dose that appears  to
him to be nothing, than that no effect would ensue—and consequently this
would be always much more innocuous than what  must result from his too
large doses of allopathic medicine. Why will he consider his inexperience.
coupled with prejudice, more reliable than an experience of many years
corroboratcd by facts? And, moreover, the homoeopathic medicine becomes
potentized at every division and diminution by trituration or succession!— a
development of the inherent powers of medicinal substances which was
never dreamed of before my time, and which is of so powerful a character
that of late years I have been compelled by convincing experience to reduce
the ten successions formerly directed to be given after each attenuation, tc
two. 
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
171
                            8 282.
   The smallest possible dose of homoeopathic medicine, capa-
 ble of producing only the very slightest homoeopathic aggrava-
 tion,  will,  because it has  the power of exciting symptoms
 bearing  the greatest possible resemblance to the original dis-
 ease  (but  yet  stronger  even  in the  minute  dose), attack
 principally and almost  solely the parts  in  the organism that
 are already affected,  highly irritated, and rendered, excessively
 susceptible to such  a similar stimulus, and will alter the vital
 force that rules in them  to a state of  very similar artificial
 disease,  somewhat greater in degree than the natural  one was;
 this artificial disease will substitute itself for the natural (the
 original) disease, so that the living organism now suffers from
 the artificial medicinal disease alone,  which, from its  nature
 and owing to  the minuteness of  the  dose, will  soon  be  ex-
 tinguished by the vital force that is striving to return  to  the
 normal state, and (if the  disease were only an acute one)  the
 body  is left  perfectly free from disease—that is  to say, quite
 well.
                           8 283.
   Now, in order to act really in conformity with nature,  the
 true physician will  prescribe  his well selected homoeopathic
 medicine only in exactly as small  a dose as  will just suffice to
 overpower  and annihilate the disease before him—in a dose of
 such minuteness, that if human fallibility should betray him
 into administering an inappropriate medicine,  the injury  ac-
 cruing from its nature being unsuited  to the disease will  be
 diminished to a mere trifle; moreover the harm done  by  the
 smallest possible dose is so slight,  that it may be immediately
 extinguished and repaired  by the natural  vital  powers, and
 by the speedy  administration of  a remedy more suitably se-
 lected according to similarity of action,  and given also in tlie
 smallest dose.ra)
                           8 284.

   The action of a dose, moreover, does not diminish  in  the
direct ratio of the quantity of material medicine contained in
 the dilutions used  in homoeopathic practice.  Eight drops of
the tincture  of  a medicine to the dose  do not produce four 
172
ORGANON OF  MEDICINE.
times as much  effect on  the human  body  as two drops, but

only about twice the effect that is produced by two drops to
the dose.   In like manner, one drop of  a mixture of a drop of
the  tincture with  ten drops of  some unmedicinal fluid, when

taken, will not  produce ten times more effect than one drop of a
mixture ten times more attenuated, but only about (scarcely)

twice as strong an effect, and so on, in the same ratio—so that
a drop of  the lowest^) dilution  must, and really does, display

still a very considerable action.1

                             8 285.

   The diminution of the dose essential for  homoeopathic use,
will also be promoted by diminishing its volume, so that, if,

instead of a drop of a medicinal dilution, we take but quite a
small part2 of  such a drop for a dose, the object  of diminish-
ing  the effect  still  further will be very effectually attained;
and that  this  will  be  the case may  be readily conceived for
this reason, because  with  the smaller volume of  the dose but
few nerves of  the  living organism can be  touched, whereby
the  power of the medicine is  certainly  also  communicated to

the whole organism,  but it is a weaker power.

                             8 286.

   For  the same reason  the effect of a homoeopathic dose of

  1 Supposing one  drop of a mixture that contains _l_th of a grain of medi-
                                           1 o
cine produces an effect...........=a,
one drop of a more diluted mixture  containing _ 1_ th  of a grain of the
                                          1 oo"
medicine will only produce an effect.......    —a2;
if it contain__1___th of a grain of medicine,  about   ...   .    =a4;
           10,0 0 0
if it contain    1   th  of a grain of medicine, it will produce an effect  =a8;
          100,000,000
and thus it goes on, the  volume of the doses being equal, with every (perhaps
more than) quadratic diminution of the quantity of medicine, the action on
the human body will be diminished each time  to only about one half.  I have
very often seen a drop of the dtcillion-fold dilution of tincture of nux vomica
produce  pretty nearly just half as much effect as a drop of the quiutillion-
fold dilution, under the same circumstances and in the same individual.
  2 For this purpose it is most  convenient to employ fine sugar globules of
the size of poppy seeds,one of which imbibed with the  medicine and put into
the dispensing vehicle constitutes a medicinal dose,  which contains about
the three huiidreth part of a drop, for three hundred such small globules
will be adequately moistened by one  drop of alcohol.  The dose is vastly
diminished by laying one such globule alone upon the tongue and giving
nothing to drink.  If it  be necessary, in the case of a very sensitive patient,
to employ the smallest possible dose and  to bring about the most rapid re-
sult, one single olfaction merely will suffice (see note to § 288). 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
173
 medicine increases, the greater the quantity of liquid in which
 it  is dissolved when administered  to the patient, although  the
 actual amount of  medicine it contains remains the same.   For
 in  this case, when the medicine is taken, it comes  in contact
 with  a much larger surface of sensitive nerves  responsive  to
 the medicinal  action.   Although  theorists may imagine  there
 should be a weakening of the action of  a dose of  medicine by
 its dilution with a large  quantity  of  liquid, experience asserts
 exactly  the opposite,  at all  events when  the medicines  are
 employed homoeopathically.1


                              8 287.

    But in this increase of action  by the mixture of the dose of
 medicine with  a larger quantity of liquid (before  its ingestion),

 the result is vastly  different  whether the mixture of the dose
 of  medicine with a certain quantity of  liquid  is performed

 merely superficially and  imperfectly, or so  uniformly and  in-
 timately2 that the  smallest portion of the diluting fluid receives
 the same quantity of medicine in proportion as all  the rest;  for

  1  It is only the most simple of all stimulants, wine and alcohol, that have
 their heating and intoxicating action diminished by dilution with much
 water.
  2  By the word intimately I mean this: that when, for instance, the drop of a
 medicinal fluid has been shaken up once with one hundred drops of spirits of
 wine; that is to sav, the phial containing both,  held in the hand, has been
 radidly moved from above downward with  a single smart jerk of the arm,
 there certainly ensues a thorough mixture of the whole, but with two. three,
 ten and more such strokes, this mixture becomes much more intimate; that
 is to say. the medicinal power  becomes much more potentized, and the spirit
 of this  medicine, so to speak, becomes much more unfolded, developed, and
 rendered much more penetrating in its action on the nerves. If, then, the
 required object we wish to attain with the low dilutions be the diminution
 of the doses for the purpose of moderating their powers upon the organism,
 we would do well  to give no more than two such  suocussion-jerks to each of
 the twenty, thirty, &c. dilution phials, and thus to develop the medicinal
 power only moderately.  It is also advisable, in attenuating the medicine in
 the state of dry powder by trituration in a porcelain mortar, to keep within
 certain limits, and, for example, to triturate strongly, for one hour only,
one grain of the crude entire medicinal substance, mixed with the first hun-
 dred grains of milk-sugar, and to triturate  the attenuation of one grain of
this mixture with another hundred grains of milk-sugar (to the  l   th at-
                                                        10,000
tenuatiotO likewise only for one hour, and to make the third attenuation (to
   l   ) also by one hour of strong trituration of one grain of the previous
1,000,000
mixture with one hundred grains of milk-sugar, in order to bring the medi-
cine to such an attenuation that its development of power shall remain
moderate.  A more exact description of this process will be found in  the
prefaces to Arsenic and Pulsatilla in the Materia Medica Pura.(a) 
174
ORGANON  OF  MEDICINE.
the  latter becomes much more medicinally  powerful  by  the

diluting  mixture than the former.   From  this  every one will

be able to judge for himself how  to  proceed with the regula-

tion of the homoeopathic medicinal  doses  when he desires  to
diminish  their medicinal  action as much as possible, in order
to make  them suitable for the most sensitive patients.1


                               8 288.

  The  action of medicines in the liquid form2 upon the  living

  1 The higher we carry the attenuation accompanied by dynamization (by
two succussion-strokes) with so much the more rapid and penetrating action
does the preparation seem to affect the vital force and to alter the health,
with but slight diminution of strength even when this operation is carried
very far—in place, asjs usual (and generally sufficient) to XT when it is car-
ried up to XX,  L.   C.  and higher; only that then  the action always  ap-
pears to last a shorter time.(")
  2 It is especially in the form of vapor, by olfaction and inhalation of the
medicinal  aura that is always emanating  from a globule impregnated with
a medicinal fluid in a high development of power, and placed, dry, in a small
phial, that the homoeopathic remedies act most surely and most powerfully-
The homoeopathic physician allows the patient to  hold the open mouth of
the phial first in one nostril, and in the act of inspiration draw the air  out
of it into himself and  then, if it is wished to give a stronger dose, smell in
the same manner with  the other nostril, more or less strongly, according to
the strength it is intended the dose should be; he then corks up the phial
and replaces it iu his pocket case, to prevent any misuse of it, and unless he
wi*h it, he  has no occasion for an apothecary's assistance in his practice.  A "lo-
bule, of  which ten,  twenty or one hundred  weigh one grain, impregnated
with the thirtieth  potentized dilution, and then dried, retains for this pur-
pose all its power undiminished for at least eighteen or twenty years (my ex-
perience extends this length of time), even though the phial be opened a
thousand times during that period, if it be but protected from heat and the
sun's light.  Should both  nostrils be stopped up by coryza or polypus,  the
patient should inhale by the mouth, holding the orifice of the phial  betwixt
his lips.  In little children it may be applied close to their nostrils whilst
they are asleep, with the certainty of producing an effect.  The medicinal
aura thus inhaled comes in contact with the nerves in the walls of the spac-
ious cavities it traverses without obstruction, and thus produces a salutary
influence on the vital force, in the mildest yet most powerful manner and
this is much preferable to every other mode of administering the  medica-
ment in substance by the mouth. All that homoeopathy is capable of curin"
(and what  can it not cure beyond the  domain of mere manual surgical affec-
tions?) among the most severe chronic diseases that have not been quite ruined
by allopathy, as also among acute diseases, will be most safely and certainly
cured by this olfaction. I can scarcely name one in a hundred out of  the
many patients that have sought the advice of myself and my assistant dur-
ing  the past year, whose chronic or acute disease we have not treated with
the most happy results,solely by means of this olfaction; during the latter
half of this year, moreover, I have become convinced (of what I never could
previously have believed)  that by this olfactiou the power of the medicine
is exercised upon the patient in, at least,  the same  degree of strength, and
that more quietly and yet just as long as when the dose of medicine  is taken
by the mouth, and that, consequently, the intervals at which the olfaction 
ORGANON  OF MEDICINE.
175
  human body takes place in such a penetrating manner, spreads
  out from the point of the sensitive fibres provided with nerves
  whereto the medicine is first applied with  such inconceivable
  rapidity and  so universally  through all  parts of  the living
  body,  that  this action of the medicine must be denominated a
  spirit-like (a dynamic, virtual) action.

                             8 289.

    Every part of our body that possesses the sense of touch,  is
  also capable of receiving the influence of  medicines, and of
  propagating their power to all other parts.1

                            8 290.

    Besides  the  stomach,  the tongue  and the  mouth are the
 parts most susceptible to the medicinal  influences;  but the in-
 terior of the nose  is more especially so, and the rectum, the
 genitals, as also all particularly  sensitive  parts of our  body
 are almost equally capable of receiving the medicinal action;
 hence also, parts that are destitute of skin, wounded or ulcer-
 ated spots  permit the powers of  medicines to exercise almost
 as penetrating an action upon the organism  as if the medicine
 had been  taken by the mouth or still better by olfaction and
 inhalation.
                            8 291.

   Even those organs which have lost their peculiar sense,  e. g.
 a tongue and palate that have lost the faculty of tasting, or a
 nose that  has  lost the faculty of smelling, communicate the
 power of the medicine that  acts  first on them  alone not less
 perfectly to  all  the other organs of the body.

                            8 292.

   Even the external surface of the body, covered as it is  with
 skin and epidermis, is not  unsusceptible of the powers of

 should be repeated should not be shorter than in the ingestion of the ma-
 terial dose by the mouth.(a)
  1 A patient even destitute of the sense of smell may expect an equally
perfect action and cure from the medicine by olfaction. 
176
OROANON OF  MEDICINE.
medicine, especially  those  in a  liquid  form,  but  the  most
sensitive parts are also the most susceptible. H«)

                           8 293. (a)
  I find it  necessary to allude here to animal magnetism, as it
is termed, or rather mesmerism  (as  it  should  be called, out of
gratitude to Mesmer, its first founder),  which differs so much
in its nature from all other  therapeutic agents.   This curative
power,  often so stupidly denied, which streams upon a patient
by the contact of a well-intentioned person powerfully exerting
his  will, either acts homoeopathically, by  the  production of
symptoms similar to those of the diseased  state to  be cured;
and  for this purpose a single pass made, without much exer-
tion of the will, with the palms of  the hands  not too slowly
from  the top of the head downwards over the body to the tips
of  the toes,2 is  serviceable  in, for  instance, uterine haemor-
rhages, even in the last stage when death seems approaching;
or it is useful by distributing the vital force uniformly through-
out the organism, when it is in abnormal excess  in one part and
deficient  in other parts, for example,  in rush of blood  to the
head  and sleepless, anxious  restlessness of  weakly  persons,
&c,  by  means of  a  similar, single,  but somewhat  stronger

 i Rubbing-in appears to favor the action of the medicines only In this way,
that the friction makes the skin more sensitive, and the living fibres there-
by more capable of feeling, as it were, the medicinal power and of communi-
cating to the whole organism this health-affecting sensation. The previous
employment of friction to the inside of the thigh makes the mere laying on
of the mercurial ointment afterwards quite as powerfully medicinal as if
the ointment itself  had been rubbed upon that part, a process which is
termed rubbing-in. but it is very doubtful whether the metal itself can pene-
trate insubstance into the interior of the body, or be taken up by the absor-
bent vessels by means of this so-called rubbing-in.(")  Homoeopathy, how-
ever, hardly ever requires for its cures the rubbing-in of any medicine, nor
does it need any mercurial ointment.
 2 The smallest homoeopathic dose.(") which, however, often effects wonders
when used on proper occasions. Imperfect homoeopathists. who think them-
selves monstrously clever, not infrequently deluge their patients in difficult
diseases with doses of different medicines, given rapidly one after the other,
which, although they may have been homoeopathically selected and given
in highly potentized attenuation,  bring the  patients into such an over-
excited state that life and death  are struggling for the mastery, and the
least additional quantity of medicine would infallibly kill them.  In such
cases a mere gentle mesmeric pass and the frequent application, for a short
time, of the hand of a well-intentioned person to the part that is particular-
ly affected, produce the harmonious uniform distribution of the vital force
throughout the organism, and therewith rest, sleep and recovery. 
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
177
 pass; or for the  immediate communication and restoration of
 the vital force to some one weakened part or to the whole  or-
 ganism,—an object, that  cannot  be attained so certainly and
 with  so little  interference with  the other medicinal  treatment
 by any other agent  besides me  merism.   If it is  wished to
 supply a particular part  with  the vital  force,  this  is effected
 by concentrating a very powerful  and well-intentioned will for
 the purpose, and placing the hands or  tips of  the  fingers on
 the chronically weakened parts,  whither an internal chronic
 dyscrasia has transferred  its important local  symptom, as, for
 example, in the case of  old ulcers, amaurosis,  paralysis of
 certain limbs,  &c.1  Many rapid apparent cures performed in
 all ages, by mesmerisers  endowed with  great natural  power
 belong to  this  class.   The effect  of communicated  human
 power upon the whole human organism was most  brilliantly
 shown, in the  resuscitation of persons who had  lain some time
 apparently  dead, by the most powerful,  sympathetic will  of  a
 man in full vigor of vital  force,2 and of  this kind of  resurrec-
 tion history records many undeniable examples.

                             I 294.
   All the above-mentioned methods of  practicing mesmerism
 depend  upon  an  influx of more  or  less vital  force into the
 patient, and hence are  termed  positive  mesmerism.3  An op-
 posite mode of employing mesmerism, however, as it produces

  i Although  by this restoration of the  vital force, which ought to  be re-
peated from time to time, no permanent cure can be effected in cases where-
as has been taught above, a general internal dyscrasia lies at the root of the
old local affection, as it always does, yet this positive strengthening and im-
mediate saturation with the vital force (which no more belongs to the cate-
gory of palliatives than does eating and drinking when hunger and thirst
are present) is no mean auxiliary to the actual treatment of the whole dis-
ease by homoeopathic medicines.
  2 Especially of  one of those persons, of whom  there are not many, who,
along with great kindness of disposition and perfect bodily powers, possesses
but a very moderate desire for sexual intercourse, which it would give him very
little trouble  wholly to suppress, in whom, consequently, all the fine vital
spirits that would otherwise be employed in the preparation of the semen,
are ready to be communicated  to others, by touching them and powerfully
exerting the will.  Some powerful mesmerisers, with whom I had become ac-
quainted, had all this peculiar character.
  3 When I here speak of the decided and certain curative power of positive
mesmerism, I most assuredly do not moan  that abuse of it, where, by re-
peated passes of this kind, continued for half an hour or a whole hour at a
time and, even day after  day, performed on weak,  nervous patients, that 
178
ORGANON OF MEDICINE.
  e  the contrary effect,  deserves to be  termed  negative mes-
merism.  To this  belong the passes which  are  used to rouse
from the somnambulic sleep, as  also all  the manual processes
known  by the names  of soothing  and ventilating.   Tins  ' /*-
charge by  means of  negative mesmerism of  the vital force
accumulated to excess  in individual parts of  the  system ot un-
debilitated persons is most surely and  simply performed  by
making a very rapid motion of the flat extended  hand, held
parallel to, and about an inch distant from the body,  from the
top of the head to  the  tips of the toes.1   The more rapidly
this pass is  made, so  much the more effectually will the dis-
charge  be effected.   Thus, for  instance, in  the  case where a
previously healthy  woman,2 from the sudden suppression of
her catamenia by a violent mental shock, lies to all appearance
dead, the vital force  which  is  probably accumulated in the
precordial region,  will, by such a rapid  negative pass, be dis-
charged and  its equilibrium throughout the whole  organism
restored, so  that the  resuscitation generally follows immedi-
ately.3   In like  manner, a  gentle,  less rapid,  negative pass
diminishes the excessive restlessness and sleeplessness  accom-
panied  with  anxiety  sometimes  produced  in  very  irritable

persons  by a too  powerful positive pass, &c.

moustrous revolution of the whole human system is effected which is termed
somnambulism, wherein the  human being is  ravished from the world of
serse and seems to belong more to the world of spirits—a highly unnatural
and dangerous state, by means of which it has not infrequently been at-
tempted to cure chronic diseases.
  1 It is a well  known rule that a person who is either to be positively or
negatively mesmerised, should not wear silk on any part of the body.
  2 Hence a negative pass, especially if it be very rapid, is extremely injur-
ious to a delicate person affected with a chronic ailment and deficient in
vital force.
  8 A strong country lad, ten years of age, received in the morning on ac-
count of  slight indisposition, from a professed female mesmeriser, several
very powerful  passes with the  points  of both thumbs, from the pit of the
stomach  along the lower edge  of the  ribs, and  he instantly grew deathly
pale, and fell into such a state  of unconsciousness and immobility that no
effort could arouse him, and he was almost given up for  dead. I made his
eldest brother  give him a very rapid  negative  pass from the crown of the
head over the  body to the feet, and  in one instant ho recovered his con-
sciousness and became lively  and well. 
 
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