On the subject of auxiliaries to homoeopathic treatment I would refer you to an excellent paper published by Dr. Madden, in the seventh volume of the British Journal of Homoeopathy, where you find many points treated of much more thoroughly than I am able to do on this occasion.
In a course of lectures especially devoted to an exposition of the homoeopathic doctrines and practice, I cannot but feel that I should scarcely be justified in occupying your time with a detail of matters that do not strictly belong to my subject, but at the same time I could not omit all allusion to the use of auxiliaries, more especially as it is of great importance to the homoeopathic practitioner to be made aware of any means whereby the cure of his patients may be advanced and the action of his patients may be advanced and the action of his written by certain homoeopathic purists on the subject of non-homoeopathic auxiliaries, as well in this country, as abroad, which I think we might have been spared, had the writers allowed their common sense to guide them instead of their prejudices. It seems as though they held it to be a species of high treason towards Hahnemann to cure patients in any other way than by homoeopathic medicines; but it should be remembered that the mission of the physician is to investigate every method of treatment that seems likely to benefit his patients, and that when any new method is presented to him is first inquiry should be not-Is this homoeopathic? but-Is this useful in this treatment of disease? The most rigid self-styled Hahnemannian can scarcely fail to employ on his practice many remedial means for the cure of his patients which the wildest imagination could not pronounce homoeopathic; such as a regulated diet, air, exercise, fomentations, poultices, cold compresses, cold bathing, pavements, etc., besides the multifarious operations or surgery; and having thereby conceded the principle that something besides homoeopathic medicines is necessary for the cure of diseases, it is difficult to see why he should express such alarm, and so loudly condemn other means which have the same object, viz., the promotion of the cure of diseases without interfering with the action of the specific remedy, far less superseding it. Of such a character are the non-homoeopathic auxiliaries I have just alluded to, and I have no hesitation in saying that the practitioner who, from a bigoted notion of consistency of homoeopathy, should refuse to employ other means in cases where homoeopathic medicines are not applicable, would be highly culpable, and would be sacrificing his patients for the pursuit of a whim.
Cases in which it necessary to resort to other than homoeopathic means for their cure and undoubtedly rare, but we cannot shut our our eyes, to the fact that they do occur, and he is the best practitioner who knows how and when to avail himself of all the aids and appliances nature and art have placed at our disposal for the cure of diseases, or its palliation when incurable.
Robert Ellis Dudgeon practiced at the London Homeopathic Hospital and specialised in Optics.
Robert Ellis Dudgeon wrote Pathogenetic Cyclopaedia 1839, Cure of Pannus by Innoculation, London and Edinburgh Journal of Medical Science 1844, Hahnemann’s Organon, 1849, Lectures on the Theory & Practice of Homeopathy, 1853, Homeopathic Treatment and Prevention of Asiatic Cholera 1847, Hahnemann’s Therapeutic Hints 1847, On Subaqueous Vision, Philosophical Magazine, 1871, The Influence of Homeopathy on General Medical Practice Since the Death of Hahnemann 1874, Repertory of the Homeopathic Materia Medica, 2 vols 1878-81, The Human Eye Its Optical Construction, 1878, Hahnemann’s Materia Medica Pura, 1880, The Sphygmograph, 1882, Materia Medica: Physiological and Applied 1884, Hahnemann the Founder of Scientific Therapeutics 1882, Hahnemann’s Organon 1893 5th Edition, Prolongation of Life 1900, Hahnemann’s Lesser Writing.