Dr. Rau believes that the medicinal powers can be transferred to other non-medicinal substances, but he give us no proofs that such a transference takes place, and only a few vague analogies from other departments of nature, which, in my opinion, are not at all to the purpose.
Some years later (Hyg., iv. 299.) Dr. Rau again recurred to this subject. He then referred the whole mystery of the dynamization- theory back to the old and well-known fact that substances become more efficacious by minute subdivision, because they than offer a greater number of points of contact. He regards as purely imaginary the doctrine of the progressive development of slumbering powers by means of continued attenuation.
Dr. Schron, (Hauptsatze der Hahn. Lehre, 66.) in his work upon the chief maxims of Hahnemann’s system, has given some attention to the dynamization-theory. Potentizing or dynamizing means, he contends, increase of power; dilution or attenuation diminution of power: the two are mutually incompatible. The first, or increase of power, is contrary to the object desired in homoeopathic practice, which, in consequence of the increase of the susceptibility of the diseased part for its specific stimulus, requires a smaller in place of a greater power to act upon it. It is only in appearance he says, that dynamization- theory is true, not in fact. Many things speak against its truth, and nothing for the idea that trituration and diminution can produce an alteration of qualities in a substance He refers the whole doctrine of dynamization to the following two circumstances: a, to the necessity for diminishing a substance that is hurtful in large doses; b, to the fact that not all medicinal substances, as they exist in nature, are in the proper state for acting beneficially upon the organism. The great susceptibility of the organism for even very minute quantities he believes to the contributed greatly to the notion of an increase of power from the homoeopathic therapeutic processes. Some years later (Die Heilpr, und die Heilm, ii. 236.) he expresses himself in similar language in another work, and he there asks the following pertinent questions, in allusion to the allegation that the homoeopathic processes developed new and undreamt-of powers in the medicine: “How can the quale of a thing be altered (i.e., how can it become something else) by rubbing or shaking it with an indifferent substance? How can the remedies detailed by Hahnemann in the six volumes of the Pure Materia Medica cure, in small doses, those cases to which they correspond when proved in the large doses used in allopathic practice? With what dilution does a substance commence to become another substance, and does it become something else with every new dilution? How is it possible that one homoeopathic practitioner can avail himself of the observations of another practitioner, seeing that no two practitioners can expect to have medicaments identical in quality; for either one movement must cause a change in the quality of the substance,-or else all movements must cause none.
Dr. Kretschmar (Arch. xii., 2, 76.) afterwards distinguished, unenviably in the opinion of some homoeopathic puritans, for certain suggestions relative to a co-operation or conjunction of the good that is in the allopathic system with homoeopathy, was infected to a certain degree with Count Korsakoff’s infection- theory, and wrote a little article on the subject. He contends that the amount of succussions given has nothing to do with any development of the power of a medicine; that one succussion is as good as two or more, and is equally efficient in infecting the whole mass of non-medicinal vehicle. Also, that one trituration is just as good as three for substances not soluble in the crude state. These views he subsequently modified in the essay I have just alluded to, and he there looks upon the attenuations simply as diminutions of the mass as well as as of the power of the remedy.
Dr. Trinks (Prakt. Erfahr. im Geb. d. Hom.; Allg. hom. Ztg., vi. No.3, and xxv. No.2.) of Dresden, in a criticism he wrote on the works of the pseudonyme Heyne, afterwards known as the notorious scoundrel Fickel, says: “The power of a medicine is only capable of being developed, but not of being increased or potentized by the technical operations to which it is subjected.” In the preface to his Materia Medica (page 1.) Dr. Trinks has the following passage, which I cannot help thinking involves a contradiction:- “We are not able,” he says, “to comprehend the wonderful process that effects the transference of the power of the medicine to an indifferent substance (milk-sugar or alcohol); we must take for granted that it occurs. It is clear that the original substance undergoes an atomic division; we must, however, doubt that it is quite annihilated and disappears.”
An anonymous writer, who took the letters H-nn (Allg. h. Ztg., vi. No. 12, and viii, No.2.) as his initials, says, in opposition to Hahnemann, that he saw no difference in the action of drosera, whether it was shaken twice or ten times; subsequently he stated that even such substances as sepia and natrum muriaticum do not require to be potentized, for that one grain of these remedies dissolved in half or a whole ounce of water displays its full action.
Dr. Werber (Hyg., i. 184.) declared himself an opponent of Hahnemann’s dynamization-theory. He says that some substances such as earths, metals, etc., require, in order to have their powers developed, that their superficies be increased; this is effected most readily by the homoeopathic pharmaceutic processes. It is probable, he says,- and this opinion is borne out by the microscopical investigations of Mayrhofer, which I described to you in the last lecture-that many of these substances acquire a greater adaptation to the living organism, by their combination with oxygen during their trituration; and he believes that the electricity developed in that processes promotes this results. With regard to other substances, however, such as the narcotics, ethereal medicines, etc., there exists no necessity for this development, as in their natural state their medicinal powers are already sufficiently developed.
Dr. P. Wolf (Achtzen Thesen.) entertains similar views. He denies that any spiritualization of medicines is produced by their trituration on succession, and he contends that Hahnemann originally intended only to diminish the dose of the medicine by his diluting processes, an opinion which e have seen to be well founded in the historical exposition I have you in my last lecture of Hahnemann’s views and doctrines on the subject.
Drs. Fielitz, (Allg. h. Ztg., ix. 8.) Georg Schmid, (Hyg., iv. 535.) Leitzau, (Medorrhinum Jahrb. v. Vehsemeyer, ix. i.) Strecker, (Ibid., 3.4.) and Shneider (Allg. h. Ztg., xxv. 282.) alleged the term dynamization, as applied to Hahnemann’s pharmaceutic processes, to be false and mischievous. They all look upon the homoeopathic attenuations as mere diminutions of the mass of the medicine. That last named, Dr. Schneider, says, “the belief in this mystic theory no longer exists;” a statement not quite consistent with fact.
Dr. Aegidi (Ibid., xxvii. 136.) objects to both the terms dilution and dynamization. There is no proof, he says, that by the farther subdivision of the medicine any increased development of potency takes place. He speaks of the 3rd, 6th, 12th, 30th degree of division, and insists that this term should be employed, if we would avoid all dubiety of expression.
An anonymous writer (Allg. h. Ztg. xxvii. 265.) favours as with his opinion on the subject, and he dashes at the subject in a bold and original fashion. He says “he will have noting but distinctly cognizable, clear principles, and won’t bear of analogies similarities, dynamizations, high potencies, arithmetical calculations, millionths, billionths, and the like, which serve but to wrap the subject in a veil of mystery.” The gist of the whole question is, he says, whether homoeopathy introduces dead or living matter into the organism. He alleges, without proof, however, that the process of trituration produces in the substance so triturated a lively molecular movement; this he calls vivifying, it, and substances so vivified acts upon the living organism by virtue of its vivified state. Hence, he says, the peculiar efficacy of homoeopathic preparations consists in this, that life is made to act on life. However, he shows his ignorance of the technicalities of the system, for he refers only to the trituration of substances in water, a procedure which was never been adopted with regard to our medicaments, and would be totally inapplicable to some of our remedies, on chemical grounds. Moreover, this supposition of his, granted it were so far correct, does not explain the powerful action of untriturated substances, such as pure tinctures, solutions of salts, etc. It may, however, remind you that in the account I gave you in my last lecture of Mayrhofer’s microscopical investigations, a lively molecular motion was noticed in the atoms of one of the subjects of his observations. This view of the dynamization- theory may be placed in the same category with that broached in the ninth volume of the British Journal of Homoeopathy by another dilettante, where the homoeopathic processes are said to the develop the od-force, and that it is by means of this mysterious agency that the homoeopathic medicines act.
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.