BY tumours I understand all lumps and swellings whatsoever, the same being more or less growth on or in the breast, and also such as are usually called cancer. This work is not intended to deal with the causes of tumours beyond the merest outlines, as this subject I reserve to be dealt with by itself. I have great faith in “one thing at a time”.
Nor shall I dwell at very great length on my reasons for giving this or that remedy, because otherwise I should have to omit many of the details of the course of the cures related, and because most of the indications are homoeopathic, and can be deduced from the proper pharmacological sources by any competent practitioner who will take the trouble; and these sources are medical literature in general-the literature of the homoeopaths more particularly and, specifically, the records of drug pathogenesy by Hahnemann and by his followers, going back nearly to the beginning of this century. Some of the indications are, of course, empiric or hypothetic.
Neither shall I make any attempt to give the pathology of any given case further than shall be necessary to make its name justifiable and its nature comprehensible; but I distinctly state that cancer is included by me in the term tumour. It will thus be seen that the position I take is essentially clinical.
It may be asked, What do I give if I limit my indications to a few remedies, and say so little of the pathology of the tumours ? I reply, that my object is principally to show. TO PROVE BEYOND ANY POSSIBILITY OF DOUBT, THAT TUMOURS CAN BE CURED BY MEDICINES. And I do not travel all through literature to prove this proposition, but just content myself throughout the first clinical part with setting forth the outcome of my own experience thereon in as few words as I can.
Had I some new prompt and painless mode of excising tumours of the breast to bring forward, I should probably be hailed as a benefactor of the human race, yet without being anything of the kind; but as I advocate the divine art of real healing (and that mostly on heterodox lines), I must be content with my work as its own reward, and, all things considered, not a bad reward either.
Often when I have saved a breast, I have vividly before my mind the pregnant exclamation of the lady (Diary of a Physician) in regard to her ablated breast–“Ah, doctor, but my husband !” A greater reward than to prevent this anguish of soul in some of my sisters, the world cannot offer me.
I declare that the knife is no cure for tumours, and that tumours can be cured by medicines, the requisite knowledge and patience being given. In order to be able to excise a tumour successfully, a man must first learn how to do it; it is the work of a skilled mechanic merely, in which there are many masters.
In order to be able to cure a tumour by medicines, a man must also first learn how to do it, but it is the work of the patient chess player, in which there are but few masters. Still, without being a master, the art of curing tumours by medicines can –thanks to Hahnemann and others–be learned and practised by all in direct proportion to their ability and industry.
The great art in curing tumours by medicines may be thus summarized–keep on pegging away! Only, of course, we must peg away with the right remedies. Any medical person who reads this book attentively will have a good idea of how to set to work.
I do not attempt or pretend to be in any sense apologetic or diffident on the question of the amenability of tumours to drug treatment, for the good and sufficient reason that I have been curing tumours by remedies for the past dozen years, and, therefore, I am discoursing only of what I know and have seen; that I have attained to my present certain position with much difficulty, endless gropings, and, I fear, some bunglings, goes without saying–Ca, va sans dire, in fact.
The “Vicar of Wakefield,” of glorious memory, says: “I was ever of opinion that the honest man who married and brought up a large family, did more service than he who continued single and only talked of population”.
In like manner I am of opinion that the physician who sets about trying to cure tumours by means of medicines does more service to mankind and to medicine than he who only talks of how to cut them out, and of the microscopic and macroscopic characters and peculiarities of such growths after he has cut them out. Accordingly, I had not been in practice very long before I occupied myself with the question of the curability or non- curability by medicines of quite a number of diseases commonly called incurable, and amongst them Tumours.
Burnett was one of the first to speak about vaccination triggering illness. This was discussed in his book, Vaccinosis, published in 1884. He introduced the remedy Bacillinum. He authored twenty books, including the much loved "Fifty Reason for Being a Homeopath." He was the editor of The Homoeopathic World.