At a regular monthly meeting of the Society held on May 11th, 1876, A.R. Thomas, M.D., President, being in the Chair, the following, interesting Papers were read by E.A.Farrington, M.D.: “Do medicines make functional changes”? being a reply to an Article of Dr. Lippe in the May number of the Medical Advance, entitled, “The Last Departure of Homoeopathy in the Physiological Livery”, and by Pemberton Dudley, MD., On the Cimex Question”.
In the May number of the Medical Advance, Dr. Lippe contributed an article entitled, “The Last Departure of Homoeopathy in the Physiological Livery”.
So far as the charges preferred in this article apply to me personally, they demand no reply. But so far as they compromise the integrity of the College in which I hold my professorship, I am bound to enter the contest in her defence.
In the early part of the winter, I issued a syllabus see page 161. containing some questions, arranged in sections. These questions comprised a goodly portion of the Materia Medica, certainly such portions as the beginning practitioner ought to thoroughly understand before he commences the practice of medicine.
To this syllabus Dr. Lippe raises several objections, viz.:- First, he considers that it reaches Schusslerism; Secondly, that it is contrary to the teachings of Hahnemann; Thirdly, that it is false, because the answers to many of the proposed questions are impossible cannot be true.
The words which seem especially obnoxious to him are these: “The intelligent application of Materia Medica requires a knowledge of the changes medicines make in functions and nutrition”. For example, I asked, “What changes does Lachesis make in the blood? This Dr. Lippe terms Schusslerism. He asserts, and misapplies Hahnemann to confirm his argument, that it is impossible to know what change medicines make in function and nutrition.
The reply to his argument comprises three questions:
First, what is Schusslerism?
Secondly, can we learn what changes medicines make in function and nutrition?
Thirdly, if he can of what use is such information in the application of drugs?
First, if Schusslerism means the law which Dr. Hering discovered some thirty years ago, then I plead guilty to the charge. If it means floundering about with untried remedies, basing their symptomatology on their supposed physiological action, making a cure all of twelve substances-then I most emphatically deny the charge. Every question propounded in the syllabus is answered either from provings or from clinical experience. If Schusslerism means that medical substances act on tissues producing changes in function and nutrition, then again must I plead guilty.
And this brings us to the second question, upon the solution of which depends the maintenance of my position. A function is, literally, an act, a performance, and applied to Physiology, “is the action of an organ or set of organs”- (Dunglison). If I take a drug and symptoms result, are not these the expression of altered functions-altered in degree of quality? If, for instance, Lachesis causes haemorrhages with a settling like charred straw (Guernsey), or if it causes profuse bleeding, the blood will not coagulate (Lippe); is this not a nutritive change? And will this altered blood perform its normal functions? Let the answer be found in the Gangrene, the Erysipelas, or the impending Typhoid state.
Were Dr. Lippe to ask how are the changes made, I would be compelled to answer, I know not. The secret workings of vital force are under infinite surveillance. Just how it works, mortal man may never know. We live in a world of effects, and it is only of these we can become cognizant.
The blood propelled by the heart, sweeps over the aortic arch and down the aorta, never dispensing its gifts until it reaches its ultimata in the capillaries. Nerves run to and from centres, giving no impressions until their termini are reached. The ulna, irritated at the elbow, tingles at its termination in little and outer side of ring-fingers. So with every vital effort, it is in its fullness only when terminated in its appointed organ or organs.
Organs are made of tissues, tissues of molecules, and herein are consummated the complex vital phenomena which make up life. As Hahnemann says, the internal changes we cannot determine. But their effects, which appear normally in conscious sensation and motion, and abnormally in symptoms, are determinable. Whether these symptoms, are subjective or objective they express a change in function or nutrition, and bespeak the tissue or tissues involved.
If a function is truly defined above, will not the symptoms show “a changed action of an organ or set of organs?”
If I take a remedy, say Rhus, and it produces a vesicular eruption, will it be denied that a change in nutrition has taken place? And cannot we perceive what change has taken place? Or, still more to the point, if for a non-uniting fracture we prescribe Calcarea phos. and the callus quickly forms-a callus containing a hundred-fold more lime than we give -can we deny a tissue and a nutritive action?
We know that tearing, boring pains indicate an affection of bones or periosteum; that sharp, shooting pains indicate an affection of serous membranes. We know that Aconite acts on serous sacs, increasing in their suction; while Sepia, Iodine, etc. relax serous and synovial sacs.
Equally sure are we that Hypericum acts on nerve tissue, Arnica on the capillaries, Mercury in the production and Silicea in the prevention of pus formation, Conium on adenoid tissue, Graphites in the dissolution of cicatricial tissue, Creosote on the mucous lining of the stomach, Silicea, Chamomilla, Bryonia, on connective tissue, Ferrum on the haematin, Phosphorus on the blood-cells, and so on through the Materia Medica.
But thirdly; Are such facts of use in the application of Materia Medica? True, a physician may cure the Lachesis-haemorrhage without any other information than the mere words of the symptoms. But so long as man finds delight in the exercise of his God-given reason, he will demand the why the why which anticipates every new truth the why which led to Hahnemann’s Quinine experiments, and to every succeeding step in his discovery of Homoeopathy.
No physician can intelligently apply medicines with simply a memorized Materia Medica. He is then like the industrious student who, in his attempt to learn French, memorized the dictionary, but learned nothing of grammatical construction. Neither can the physician always succeed in obtaining the necessary totality of symptoms without an intimate knowledge of functional perversions.
He must know from Physiology what are the normal relations of organ with organ; from Pathology what changes diseases cause; from the history of diseases what are their probable course, duration and result. For example, delirium, photomania, singing praying, making verses, will yield to Stramonium; but the same symptoms with retained placenta, demand Secale. Neuralgia in and over the left eye, may yield to spigelia, but if a tilted uterus exist, even though there are no subjective pelvic symptoms, the remedy will Actea Racemosa.
Gross in his “Comparative Materia Medica”, gives as a symptom of Apis, “suppurations do not occur” Why? Virchow tells us that the production of pus demands an inflammation of the parenchyma. Apis only attacks surfaces, hence it seldom forms pus. The utility of this characteristic is evident in contrasting the remedy with Belladonna, which does attack the parenchyma; Apis, tonsils bright-red, swollen, threatening suppuration.
If patient passes urine depositing a reddish sand, are we damaging Homoeopathy if we search for the cause of this defective oxygenation of nitrogenous matter? On the contrary, will not the revealed symptoms help to complete the totality, and so help us to diagnose between Lycopod, Natrum Mur. Ant., Crud., etc. all of which have such a urinary deposit?
If a newly proved drug causes white, flocculent urine are, we violating the precepts of the Master, if we analyze this excretion and, finding phosphates in excess trace thence. the relation of other symptoms produced? Let it be remembered, however, that symptoms have a relative value: and although we may make use of every known means in analyzing a case and collecting the totality of its symptoms we must arrange our picture according to the well-tried rules of the Organon.
The true physician, while he holds fast to the precepts of Hahnemann, neglects no fact which a progressive science might utilize, no discovery which bears the stamp of truth. If the new discovery contradicts his well-confirmed laws-his creed it may be called, it must be false, for truth cannot invalidate truth.
DISCUSSION.
Dr. Jeanes agreed with Dr.Farrington, than in order to understand that which is abnormal, it is necessary to be acquainted with what is normal; and with Dr. Dudley, that disgusting remedies, should not be introduced into our Materia Medica. The individual physician may experiment with them if he wishes, but they need not be put into our Works. He had no doubt that may uncertain symptoms had crept into our materia medica, but he thought these could generally be traced to the recording of clinical symptoms with the results of provings; especially in the case of alterations in nutrition. Graphites for example, was said to exert an influence on cicatricial tissue, but it had never produced it. As to the twelve tissue remedies, he was opposed to them as being against the principles of Homoeopathy.
