As it was not till a very late period of his career that Hahnemann proposed the trituration of soluble as well as of insoluble substances, and as those of the former class of substance, with which he performed both his proving and his cures, were, at all events up to the period of publication of the last edition of the Organon (1833), prepared throughout by the fluid plan, there seems no need for making any alteration on that plan, as far as the general principle of making tincture so the soluble drugs-I allude especially to the vegetable medicine-is concerned. All we can do is to ascertain if Hahnemann’s mode of obtaining the tincture is the best possible one for extracting all the medicinal virtues of the plant, and obtaining a tincture of a uniform strength; if it is not, then we are justified in employing any other method that will ensure these desiderata.
Now I would refer you to an able article in the British Journal of Homoeopathy (Vol.7. p.353) for a careful examination of this question. the paper I may state, without breath of confidence, is from the pen of dr. Madden, one of the best qualified among us to write on such a subject, from his former studies in toxicology and pharmaceutical chemistry. You will find it there stated, on most respectable authority, that Hahnemann’s method of expressing the juice of plants does, in many instances, not exact all their medicinal principles. The process of percolation is preferred by Dr. Madden for making all tincture of plants, as by it a more certain, uniform and powerfully medicinal tincture is obtained than by Hahnemann’s method. But I must refer you to the paper itself for further details and suggestions relative to Homoeopathic pharmacy, and content myself with reproducing an epitome of the suggestions it contains.
1. That all tincture should be prepared by percolation.
2. That all mother-tinctures should be concentrated.
3. That alcohols of the following strengths, viz., 910 850, 830 and 790, should be used in preparing he tinctures; the proper strength for each substance being decided by direct experiment.
4. That the tinctures should be preserved in their undiluted stated and the attentions prepared only in very small quantities, so as to be frequently renewed.
5. All substances soluble in water, and whose solutions are not decomposed by keeping, should be prepared by aqueous solution, unless they are also soluble in alcohol, in which case the latter fluid is preferable.
6. The strength of the aqueous solutions should be regulated by the strength of the medicinal properties, of the drug, but should always be in decimal proportion, in order that the dilutions may be easily prepared from them.
7. The dilutions of the aqueous solutions should be made with water whenever the original substance is insoluble both in strong and dilute alcohol, or capable of acting chemically upon or combining chemically with it
8. Substances which are either totally insoluble in alcohol and water, or which give up their soluble ingredients to those menstrua very imperfectly, must undergo trituration (and, per contra, no substance soluble in alcohol or water requires to be triturated).
9. The dilution of of substances which cannot be proved to possess some slight degree of solubility should be prepared by trituration not only to the third but even to the thirtieth attenuation.
Dr. madden suggests, that in order to diminish as much as possible the list of substances requiring trituration-
A. That earths and metals capable of combining with acetic acid may be used in a hydrated state, in which case it would de soluble in water after the third trituration.
These suggestions are very valuable, and are in consonance with the chemical science of the day, whereas many of Hahnemann’s pharmaceutical technicalities owe the origin to some fanciful chemical notions of his own, Thus he considered caustic alkalies to be compound bodies, owing their causticity to a certain principle which he called causticum, and which he imagined he was able to separate from the alkali. (Chr. Kr., iii. 84) Again, he considered sulphur to be also a compound substance, and believing that alcohol only took up a portion of its constituent parts, he latterly described his previous plan of making a tincture of sulphur, and advised that it should be triturated for the first three attentions. (Ibid., v. 324.)
In revising our pharmaceutical processes we must be suffer ourselves to be biased by the imperfect and erroneous chemical notions Hahnemann held, but we must seek to put them upon a level with the actual state of chemical knowledge. A new and revised homoeopathic pharmacopoeia is urgently demanded, and I hope it will not be long before such a work appears.
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.