The comatose state, the mania, and the furious delirium of belladonna are removed by hyoscyamus; but the intoxications is only cured by wine. Lachrymose humour, chilliness, and headache, caused by belladonna, are cured by pulsatilla. When a quantity of belladonna has been swallowed, we should make the patient drink large quantities of strong coffee, which removes antipathically the insensibility and tetanic convulsions; and we should like wise promote vomiting. The erysipelatous swellings caused by belladonna are soon removed by hepar sulphuris. Camphor acts as an antidote to some of the morbid symptoms of belladonna. Thus it is evident that although in some instances Hahnemann was guided in the selection of an antidote by the symptoms of the medicine actually present, in others he did not follow this rule, but was led by something else, probably experiment and observation, to give substances as antidotes, the homoeopathicity of which to the symptoms sought to be remove could not be proved. This is especially the case with camphor,, sweet spirits of nitre, and mesmerism, which the recommends (Organon, Aphorism ccxiii., none, and Chr. Kr., i.159) for cases where the life of the patient has been endangered by the too rapid administration of many different homoeopathic medicines.
The necessity for the administration of an antidotes in consequence of the two violent effects of an infinitesimal dose is, I apprehend, very rare. Some timid practitioners do occasionally talk about the advantage of Homoeopathic antidotes; but most homoeopathic writers, who have touched on the subject, de facto deny the occasion for their employment when they, as I have in former lectures shown, naively assert that a fresh dose of the same medicine is its best antidote. The rationale of the administration of camphor, sweet spirits of nitre, wine, etc., in case of he over-action of a drug, seems to be treat thereby a stronger by transient and different effect is produced upon the nerves, whereby the feebler impression of the medicine previously given is effected, and the new action being evanescent, the nervous system is speedily restored to its former equilibrium- a dynamic neutralization, so to speak, is effected.
The next subject I have to bring before you is one peculiar to Homoeopathy, to wit the employment of medicinal agents to prevent disease. Such medicines are termed prophylactics.
From the very earliest periods of the history of medicine until the most recent times, the search for absolute preventives of disease and for preservative against poisoning has always occupied a large share of the attention of those who occupied themselves with the medical art.
It would be tedious and unprofitable to enumerate all the varieties of preservatives that have been vaunted in one age, to be despised and neglected in the next, but, for the curiosity of the thing, and to show you the attention this subject excited, I may merely allude to a few of them.
The amulets that used to she so much sought after and so highly valued in remove times, and which are still esteemed by the Orientals, are the most ancient form of prophylactics. Some of these amulets cannot fail to excite our ridicule at their absurd character. Thus, a dried toad worn next to the skin was held to be a preservative from the plague; the wearing of a red thread was deemed capable of warding off nasal hemorrhages and cramps; a portion of a human skull powdered was a febrifuge of great power. Coral worn by infants was supposed to preserve them from all these disease apt to accompany teething. Many of the precious gems were supposed to preserve their wearers from the effects of poisons, and some of them were said to betray the presence of poison, by changing colour.
The diamond and amethyst were reputed as preservative against drunkenness. The word reputed as preservatives against drunkenness., the word Abracadabra written on as many lines a sit contains letters, cutting off the last letter from each successive line, so that the word thus written represented and inverted triangle, was held by Serenus Sammonicus to be a preservative from fever if suspended from the neck by means of a linen thread. The febrifuge virtues of this charm Franck von Franckenau seriously attempted to refute, in a special treatise in one volume quarto. (Franck v. Franckenau, de Abracadabra; heidelberg, 1679.)
Every one has heard of the supposed virtues of the bezoar-stones, concretions found in the stomachs of certain herbivorous animals, which were, and still are in some countries, firmly believed to be preservatives and antidotes against all manner of diseases and poisons. So lately as 1808 the Shah of Persia thought he could not send a more acceptable present to Bonaparte than a few of these precious bezoar-stones, which that great man, however, did not appreciate at their oriental value, for, it is said, he contemptuously threw them all into the fire.
Serapion (De Dimpl., 398) recommends the gem hyacinth as an excellent amulet to protect the body during thunder-storms. The ancients made much use of the lapis lazuli as an amulet, and schroder held it to be an admirable charm for driving away frights from children.
I might multiply instances of these and similar absurdities, but the above are sufficient to show the prevalence of an idea that preservatives against diseases and other calamities were to be discovered and the universality of this notion seems to foreshadow the actual discovery of such agents.
In heathen ages the symbols or images of one or other of the gods were worn as amulets. When Christianity became triumphant, the representation of its Founder on the cross, and passages from Scripture, were used as charms to ward off the attacks of disease and the devil; and even at the present day the Roman Catholic Church arrogates for herself a monopoly in the manufacture of amulets and charms, in the shape of crucifixes, imagines of saints, medals, and rosaries.
In recent times attempts have been made, with more or less success, to discover prophylactics. one of the most noted and successful of these is the introduction of vaccination by Jenner, in 1798, as the prophylactic of smallpox, which it is to a marvellous extends. It was preceded by a somewhat similar means, to wit, the inoculation of small-pox itself, where by a milder disease was usually produced than when it attacked the patient in the natural way, and the preservation from a second attack of smallpox was equally certain. This bears a resemblance to the plan adopted by Dr. Home of Edinburgh, in 1770, (Principal. med., lib. ii.12.) for anticipating measles by inducing a mild attack of the disease by inoculation with the blood of a measly child.
Another instance of prophylaxis occurs to me as proceeding from the allopathic school, viz., Dr. Mason Good’s suggestion for the prevention of hydrophobia in those who had been bitten by a rabid dog. He states, (Study of Medorrhinum, iii) as a matter of common belief, that dogs which have had the distemper never become rabid, and he proposes that any one who has the misfortune to be bitten by a rabid dog should be inoculated with the morbid discharge from, a distempered dog’s nose. I know not if this recommendation has ever been carried into effect, it has certainly the character of plausibility to recommended it. Beyond vaccination, however, the allopathic school of the present day doe so concern itself much with medicinal prophylactics, though a great deal of attention has been paid, and that particularly in our own time, to hygienic prophylactics; but this is not the kind of prophylactics I am engaged in considering at this time, though I am very far from undervaluing its importance, or from ignoring the great advances that have recently been made in this direction.
The search for medicinal prophylactics is, I may say, almost exclusively limited to homoeopathists, indeed, the vast majority of allopathists will not hesitate to avow that they have no medicinal prophylactics. The a priori discovery of such prophylactics is scarcely possible to the allopathist; but the same rule that guides the homoeopathists to the selection of a remedy, should also lead him to the discovery of a prophylactics.
The first and most celebrated of the prophylactics discovered by Hahnemann, as the preventive of scarlet fever, belladonna, and the mode of its discovery is interesting, and bears some resemblance to that of the protective power of vaccinia against small-pox by Jenner. Hahnemann’s discovery differs from Jenner’s in this: that a priori reasoning had more to do with the former, whereas the latter was almost entirely a deduction a posteriori from observed facts. The following is the history of the discovery of the prophylactic virtues of belladonna by Hahnemann (Vide Lesser Writings, p. 434 et seq.) The scarlet- fever invaded a family of four children; three of them took it, but the fourth, who was generally the first of the family to take any epidemic disease, escaped it. This child had been taking belladonna for some times previously for an affection of the finger-joints., Now, Hahnemann’s knowledge of the pathogenetic action of belladonna had caught him that this virulent vegetable poison threw the healthy organism into a state bearing a marked resemblance to the early stage of scarlet-fever, and he had, in accordance with his therapeutic rule, employed it with most encouraging success for that stage. Being very anxious to preserve the numerous members of a family from the scarlet-fever, which had already seized on three of their number, he set himself to think whether or no it were possible to discover a prophylactic and thus he reasoned:- “A remedy that is capable
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.