The above for the single or isolated symptom. For the group; Burt’s Materia Medica which helps me determine what tissue or organ is affected and for the purpose of learning the order in which the symptoms appeared in the provings. In addition to the above I look up the clinical cases, given in their books and the journals, of our specialists like Ludlam, Wood and Southwick in diseases of women; Norton, Vilas, Moffatt, Bellows and Suffa in eye, ear and nose; Dearborn and Douglas, in disease of the skin; Ward and Gilchrist, in surgery; Talcott, O’Connor and Wilson, in mental and nervous diseases; Carleton and Mitchell, in genito- urinary diseases, and last, but by no means least, my experience which has been greatly directed and moulded by working for many years with that grand old man whose two greatest qualities were a most remarkable memory and an unusually large fund of common sense, Professor W.H. Dickinson.
For a good idea of the value of the latter quality read the article by my old friend, Clarence Bartlett, in the May, 1929, Journal of the A.I.H. Bartlett fully and forcibly expresses my opinion in that article.
There is another division, which for the past decade has come more and more into use, viz., a pathological symptom. This symptom bears the same relation to the structure of tissues or organs that physiological bears to the function of tissues or organs i.e., whether hypertrophy or atrophy exists as against vomiting of diarrhoea. To me, a through knowledge of the changes which have taken place in structure of any tissue or organ is very important in helping determine the rank of a symptom. This subject is referred to in another chapter of the book.
