UNPUBLISHED MATERIAL FROM THE WRITINGS OF CONSTANTINE HERING



I consulted Dr. Hering on one occasion with references to a patient in whom I had an especial interest (it being my other and better half), and after making a careful and critical examination, he invited me to his private study to review the case further, and proceeded to make an exhaustive investigation.

His manner of study, his thoroughness in analysing a case (so in contrast with many whom I have met in the profession possessed with more of assumption than wisdom, who would deign to study a case only as a marked exception) impressed my mind forcibly as to the necessity of a thorough and accurate knowledge of pathological condition, symptoms, and remedy, before prescribing. In the course of that investigation, he remarked to me:.

“Let us apply the triangular test, and if we find three important or characteristic symptoms, pointing to one remedy, let me assure you that we can prescribe it with almost unerring certainty. I have tested its application in hundreds of cases, and when clearly defined, it seldom fails to fulfil its mission.

As an aid to my investigations, I have kept faithfully in view the illustration of the triangle, the trinity of symptoms, in the selection of a remedy, with the motto inscribed within the boundaries of its lines, and angles, so appropriately expressed: “By this sign we conquer”.

Friends it requires the highest order of both physical and moral courage, to risk life calmly in trying to succour others. Witness the heroic act of a man alone in a room, whence all the attendants have fled, with a box he has just opened containing the most venomous serpent, the largest of its species, form whose glands after the most mature deliberation, he is about to extract the deadly poison.

See the nerve of the man, who, alert as is the snake, seizes it just below the head with a firm grasp, when its folds uncoiled, with reared head and flaming eye, forked tongue and naked fang, it is anxious to strike the intrepid soul, who, at the risk of his life, seeks from its venom the healing balm of earths sufferers. Watch him adjust the pointed stick between the opened jaws of the serpent whose bite is certain death, and whose impotent rage secretes the deadly saliva, while he tantalizes it can distil no more poison, when into a jar of alcohol he thrusts the monster, nor relaxes his grip of steel till life is extinct.

The poison, caught still the life is extent. The poison, caught on a watch-glass, is transferred to a mortar and rubbed with sugar of milk, till his purple and bloated face, and swimming brain, suspend his eager operation. he swallows the preparation with measured regularity to produce upon himself the effects of the venom.

Observe him toss in his fever, note the loquacious delirium as he flits from subject to subject, note the suffocation, the frantic struggle for breath, while he clutches and tears, from throat and breast, all clothing: mark his mental condition, the anguish and apprehension, and ask yourselves for whom, for what purpose he does this and then the answer – is he not a hero?.

The lines, just read, from the eulogy by Dr. Boyce, deserve to be remembered, and because there are many more golden opinions, reminiscent of incidents in the life of Dr. Hering, which were presented at that Memorial meeting, of which I believe there is no parallel in history (at least I know of none to equal it) I intend to incorporate this and other eulogies in my book, so that posterity may keep in mind that a man like Hering, incomparable, eminent, totally unselfish, lived and laboured to the last breath of his life to establish a safer and a better system of medicine for which science must forever be beholden to him.

I will close with a question which possibly few, or none, of us present will be able to answer offhand.

Hering asks, “Who were the first homoeopaths mentioned in the New Testament?” The answer is given by St. Paul who in Acts, Chapter 14, verse 15, says, “We are homoeopatois,” the Greek word signifying of like passions; in German aehnlich leidende; of like suffering.

Hering laughs and says, “That is something the Old Man (meaning Hahnemann, whom he adored) did not know.”.

Philadelphia, Penna.

Calvin B Knerr