Trousseau and Pidoux, the famous allopathic writers, in their late work on therapeutics, admit the homoeopathic principle as a method of cure, and call it the :’substitutive method,” imagining that when we give medicines according to this law we set up a medicinal in place of the natural disease, and thus expel the latter. How this is effected they do not pretend to tell us, nor do they make it clear how the substitution of he medicinal disease is to effect a cure. The most interesting part of their observations upon homoeopathy is that they admit it as a method of cure, which title is scornfully denied to it by a host of medical authors who are as far behind MM. Trousseau and Pidoux in science as they excel them in illiberality.
One of the latest writers on homoeopathy, Dr. Hirschel, has, in his work on the homoeopathic system, (Die homoeopathie, p. 7p, etc. seq.) entered at some length on a consideration of the homoeopathic curative process. So long ago as 1841, before he was thoroughly convinced of the truth of homoeopathy, he wrote some critical letters upon it (Hacker’s medic Argos, iii.2, 186), in one of which he offers the following explanation:- “The correspondence of the symptoms of the medicine with the disease, and the cure thence resulting, may perhaps be explained by identical excitation of the vitality, which at one time cures by stimulation, at another induces disease by the same.” This does not certainly explain much, nor is he content with this attempt in his recent work. He there says: “In spite of the simile being always required (in the selection of the drug), the physiological processes themselves by which the cure is actually performed may be of various kinds.” Thus he says that the cure may be supposed to be effected-1. By the removal of the cause of the disease; for example, the proximate cause of the catarrhal and rheumatic morbid processes is the suppressed cutaneous function. If by means of aconite we succeed in restoring this suppressed function, inducing diaphoresis, we cut short the catarrh or the rheumatism; 2, by the solution of a retained morbid product; example-hepar sulphuris promotes the formation and consequently hastens the departure of abscesses; 3, by the artificial production of excessive performance of certain functions; example aconite and ipecacuanha produce diaphoresis in diseases the result of a chill, nux and ipecacuanha promote vomiting in gastric affections, the cause of which is an overloaded stomach, etc.’ 4, by the artificial production of states the opposites of the morbid affection. The examples of this are, however, quite hypothetical.
In all these pretended explanations it is impossible not or perceive that effect and cause are confounded, or rather the effect merely is described, but the process by which this effect is produced is not explained, consequently Dr. Hirschel does not assist us much in obtaining a plausible explanation of the curative process; and he seems to have been mainly influenced by a desire to assimilate the homoeopathic curative action to the various methods of cure described by the allopathic Wunderlich, who, in his Manual of Pathology and Therapeutics, says (p.76) that the cure may be effected-1, by the destruction of the morbific cause that is in the system; 2, by the artificial promotion of certain function in excess; 3, by the artificial depression of the whole organism by diminishing its quantity of blood, or by the enforcement of rest; 4, by the artificial increase and quicker development of the local morbid process; 6, by the artificial production of states the opposite of the morbid one’s 7, by specific -empirical neutralization; 8, by the artificial production of changes in a part previously healthy, whereby the diseased part is acted on sympathetically or antagonistically. But this, it must be seen at once, is a mere list of the supposed means of cure, and not an explanation of the curative process.
My sketch of the various theories that have been broached in order to explain the homoeopathic curative process would be incomplete were I to omit mentioning another one that has been promulgated by Dr. Curie, and has been adapted by a lay disciple of his, who is distinguished as one of the most successful popular exponents of homoeopathy. By this theory the morbid state or symptoms are supposed to be the signs of the organism acting against a morbific cause-struggles of the organism to expel this morbific cause-curative efforts of nature-the voice by which the vital power gives utterance to its conflict with the morbific cause; and to this voice the physician must listen, and he must endeavor to assist the struggle he witnesses, which we are told he can best do by giving a medicine that is capable of producing similar symptoms exciting similar struggles-and by so doing he will enable the organism to free itself from its dire enemy and come off triumphantly the conqueror (In order to show that I state fairly the author’s theory, i subjoin his exact words: – “If then,” he says, “The morbid state be only a revolt of he vital or moving principle, exciting the organism to act more strongly against a morbific cause, can the physician do better than listen with attention to the vital power expressing itself by the voice of the symptoms, and send it an aid, which, acting in co-operation with it, strengthens it and prevents it being exhausted by efforts which always hasten its decay? -Jahrs Manual, 2nd edit., m preface by Dr. Curie, p.ix.) Now this attempt at an explanation seems to me to imply a marvelous confusion of ideas, and to involve as many fallacies as there are steps in the supposed process. It is evident that the symptoms of the disease cannot be the struggles of the organism against a morbific cause, for in nine cases out of ten the morbific cause that created the disease has long ceased to exist, while the morbid symptoms are going on in their full violence. I need only refer to such morbific causes as a chill, a burn, a mental emotion, etc., and yet all these and many other causes equally transient may light up a disease that goes steadily on increasing and only terminates with death, and the most ardent admirer of this theory will not surely contend there is anything curative in that, or that the physician would be doing his duty by assisting the organism to adopt that method of getting rid of the morbific cause. But admitting for the sake of argument that the morbid symptoms were really the expression of the effort of the organism to overcome the morbific cause, and that it was desirable to assist this effort, how could we doing so by giving a medicine whose inherent property is to act in the same sense as the morbific cause? By so doing, we should only give the organism more to do, we should only be hastening the catastrophe I have just alluded to.
I ought not to omit allusion to another theory of medicinal action, proposed by an anonymous writer in the ninth volume of the British Journal of Homoeopathy. The author regards disease as a derangement or inversion of the normal vitallodyllic current in the diseased part, and says that, in order to restore to the normal direction the inverted current, all we have to do is to present to it a substance whose currents are also inverted, whereupon the normal direction will be restored. The homoeopathic medicinal agent must, from the circumstance of its producing effects similar to those of the nature morbific agent, have similar poles, and therefore it effects the cure on the principles just mentioned. You will agree with me in thinking it rather premature to offer an explanation of the mode of action of remedial agents on the supposed laws that regulate a force, the existence of the which is by no means satisfactorily proved, and even if it were, our author offers no proof, but only far-fetched conjecture, that the cure of disease by medicine has anything to do with odyle.
I have thus presented to you a briefs sketch of the most prominent explanation that have been offered of the mode of action of the homoeopathic remedy when employed to combat disease, and I think I have shown that none of them are satisfactory. Since I have objected to all, you will doubtless expect That I should offer something in their stead that will be free from the objections that I have brought against the others; that, in fact, I should not content myself with being destructive of the theories of others, but should display some constructive tendencies. I shall therefore, before concluding the present lecture, offer to your consideration what I believe to be a plausible explanation of the curative process. I am fully aware of the difficulties of my task, but while I feel the truth, I would wish to avoid the reproach contained in the poet’s lines-
Leichter ist, als selber dichten
Hamisch uber And’re richte.
‘Tis easier far, let critics know it,
To cut up, than to be, a poet.
Accordingly, having freely criticised the opinions of my predecessors, I do not hesitate to take my turn on the oracular tripod, and to submit my theoretical views to the judgment of my colleagues; for I am not of opinion, as some are, (Among these, I see is the most popular of our homoeopathic tractarians, Dr. Sharp of Rughy, in his recent tract, “The Difficulties of Homoeopathy.”) that Hahnemann was in error in attempting an explanation of the curative process, but only that his explanation was erroneous, and I believe that a successful theory of the process of cure, in accordance with known pathological facts, would be of great advantage to the progress of homoeopathy among the profession. The public of course care nothing about theory, but look only to results.
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.