Is it not wise and right that we should look into the sheaves of the rich harvest garnered by our late beloved colleague for our own instructions, and that we should examine into the principles that governed him in the profession and practice to which he devoted his life, and in which he stood out so eminently the acknowledged leader?
Dr. Hering made this the essential point of doctrine and practice to cure the sick easily and permanently, by medicines capable in themselves of producing in a healthy person morbid symptoms similar to those of the sick. He sought no other cure, nor recognized it as one, unless it was under the law proclaimed by Hahnemann. He sought no palliation, except under this law, believing that it hindered and endangered a perfect cure. He believed that the morbid condition of tissues are the result of th dynamic disturbance, and not the cause of disease. He was therefore a Vitalist-believing the disease to be the disturbance of the vital force, and its equalization the state of health. He believed that the totality of symptoms, subjective and objective, are the only indications for the choice of a remedy. He did not believe that prescribing on the pathological states, were sufficient to effect a cure. The symptoms in their totality alone were the only guide for a cure to him.
He believed that the only proper way to ascertain the disturbing properties of medicine upon the vital force is to prove them on the healthy; that thereby only the true expression of that disturbance can be observed. And he believed that in order to obtain and secure the highest curative results, medicines must be administered singly, and in a dose just sufficient to cure, because he knew that all action is followed by reaction there is no exception to this law; that all action on the vital powers is by an inherent law, followed sooner or later by reaction, which terminates in cure and health. Hence an overdose must, by its intensity of action, delay or prevent reaction and cure.
I remember on a certain occasion, early in my practice. I told Dr. Hering of my suffering. He asked me the remedy I had taken, and seemed to think it well chosen. He then asked the dilution. I told him the third. Ah, said he, you have stopped it; perhaps not made a cure. He shook his head and seemed disappointed. He said no more: but he caused me to reflect that it might well be so-that I had thrown an obstacle before the diverted vital force- that I had stayed its forward movement by a shock which had injured its reactive powers- as a boulder thrown in front of a carriage wheel in motion not only stops it, but also cripples the wheel.
Dr. Hering believed that when he produced the impression at the right point, and in the right direction, the force must be permitted to be exhausted: therefore he waited. Shorter or longer the time he waited, his eyes wide open, and his observation on a stretch, looking for that action which is to end in equalization.
Dr. Constantine Hering was a true Homoeopathist. He believed in Homoeopathy and lived up to it. He believed that the highest results in his art were obtained by close individualization alone: not by generalization.
I loved him for his simplicity and directness of character; for his large brilliant inquiry after truth, and for his resting on principles derived from a patient examination of facts.
He enriched our Materia Medica by his severe labors. I will not name the many remedies he has proven, arranged and published. You know them all. The diligent student of our Materia Medica must have observed how full, exact and characteristic. He took his great master, Hahnemann, as his model, and we only hope that those who have the direction of arranging and publishing his writings will give them to us just as he set them down. Then we shall feel that the seal of reliability is placed upon them.
When some patient astronomer, who night after night has been watching the stars, brings to light some unknown planet, to do him honor the newborn world is called after his name, and the discoverer is never to be forgotten. If the astronomer is worthy of distinction, what shall we say of the man who brings to light a new remedial agent to relieve suffering humanity, ward off death and bring back health? He, methinks, has done a greater work. And so the great discovered of Lachesis will be gratefully remembered by those who know how to apply this remedy in all its varied forms, for which in the provings he suffered: and his only suffering was from the seal set by Lachesis from which he never fully recovered. That suffering was a crown of glory for him.
Constantine Hering showed in his death his medical principles, and showed that if the homoeopathic law, the law proclaimed by Hahnemann, was followed, a man would live longer and die easier than under any other practice; for he that is filled with disturbing drugs must die as the hunted fox, torn and rent by the bloody mouths of a pack of hounds. But he that follows the practice of our beloved colleague, will have sleep rather than death. The forces equalized, he has rest. He ceases to exist, by the withdrawal of his life by the Giver of life, like some locomotive running smoothly upon the track, after exhausting her fuel, slows down and stops-not thrown from the rails by broken machinery and rushing to ruin with terrible violence.
At six o’clock in the evening he made his last prescription to a patient, observing to his wife with great animation and interest, that this patient had been prescribed for by many physicians, and he believed he should help him. Then he went, as he was accustomed, to take his evening meal with his family, which he greatly enjoyed in that social circle under an arbor in his garden. At eight o’clock, the meal being over, Dr. Hering said he would retire to his study and his couch. His devoted wife went with him to aid him in preparing for bed. He said to her: I believe I shall sleep. She left him to his repose. At nine-thirty he touched his bell, which summoned her at once to his side. He remarked that his breathing was embarrassed; accompanied by constant yawning. He asked her to get a book in his office that he might examine this symptom. She did as directed; but, being alarmed, sent for a physician. He tried to select a remedy, but too late; a short time after his last words, I am dying now, were spoken, he passed into that sleep which knows no waking. The great physician demonstrated the benign, gentle, but controlling influence of the action of the great law to which he devoted his life. Thus died Constantine Hering, dear to Homoeopathy, and to be forever honoured by its true practitioners.
Dr. Samuel Lilienthal said:
For the little that I am, the little I ever accomplished, the little reputation I have gained, I have to thank two men, who have gone home to do more precious work in higher spheres-I mean Carroll Dunham and Constantine Hering.
The day I made the personal acquaintance of Father Hering will never be forgotten, as long as I live. In the beginning of the year 1870, I had received an invitation from the faculty of the Hahnemann College, in Philadelphia, to deliver a lecture during the preliminary course. Our mutual friend. Dr. Raue, introduced me to the Father of Homoeopathy in America. With that even, cheerful smile on his face, he looked at me attentively, and then, with a sonorous laugh, he addressed Raue: I thought I would see a young man before me, and now that hardworking Lilienthal is as grey as I am. I soon found myself at home, in the full sense of the word, in his company, and when after that lecture we met at Raue’s house to spend a few hours in convivial conversation, Constantine Hering was the life of the whole company.
It is just ten years ago, perhaps eleven, when the firm of Boericke & Tafel bought out Mr. Radde, in New York, and seriously intended to give up the North American Journal of Homoeopathy. Hering would not listen to it. There is your editor, he said pointing to me; and we must support him. Relying on this great support, not in words but in deeds, I accepted the trust and Hering never disappointed the readers of the Quarterly. In fact, this was one of the great traits of this great and good man, that his word was as good as his bond, and as number after number appeared for the last ten years, he kept on cheering to the last; and now that he has departed. I consider it my duty to collect from the old German literature the writings of our Father, and give them to you in that old Quarterly of mine.
During the Centennial World’s Convention in Philadelphia, friend Raue was again my host, and one day, visiting Papa Hering, he requested me to invite some congenial spirits and meet that night, quietly, at Raue’s. Though it was the night of the big ball Street according to promise, and I can never forget the happy hours passed there. Hering and Dunham were sitting on the sofa together, Dunham asking and Hering answering, and we, a dozen or so, listening to that interesting conversation. The rain had stopped: it was a clear night, and when we broke up Hering was so happy he would not ride home, and invited us as his body- guard, to accompany him the short distance. The next morning Dunham and myself compared notes at the Continental Hotel, and, Dunham said: We felt better for having spent such an evening, with such a master, and we envied the physicians who could (night after night) enjoy such a privilege.
In 1878 and 1879 he published 2 editions of his book, Sunstroke and Its Homeopathic Treatment.
Upon Hering's death in 1880 Knerr became responsible for the completion of the 10-volume Guiding Symptoms.
Dr. Knerr wrote 2-volume Repertory to the Guiding Symptoms,