In managing a chronic sickness the remedy that conforms to an acute experience of the illness is worth knowing, as very often its chronic may be just the one that conforms to its symptoms.
Calcarea is the natural chronic of Belladonna and Rhus;
Natrum mur. sustains the same relation to Apis and Ignatia;
Silicea to Pulsatilla;
Sulphur to Aconite.
When Pulsatilla has been of great service in a given case and finally cures no more, while the symptoms now point to Silicea, the latter will be given with confidence as its complementary relation has long been established.
On the other hand Causticum and Phosphorus do, not like to work after each other, nor will Apis do well after Rhus.
How physicians can make the second prescription without regard to the experience of nearly a century, is more than man know.
These things are not written to instruct men of experience in the right way, but for the young men who have asked so often for the above notes of our present practice.
I am told almost daily that this kind of practice is splitting hairs, but I am convinced of the necessity of obeying every injunction.