PHOSPHORICUM ACIDUM


Hahnemann’s proving symptoms of homeopathy remedy Phosphoricum Acidum from Materia Medica Pura, which Samuel Hahnemann wrote between 1811 to 1821…


(Phosphoric acid.)

(From vol. v, 2nd edit., 1826.)

(To prepare it, we take one pound of bones calcined white and broken into small pieces, place them in a porcelain jar, and pour over them one pound of the strongest sulphuric acid. The mixture is to be stirred with a glass rod several times during twenty-four hours, then well mixed and diluted with two pounds of good brandy, and the whole tied up in linen bag and pressed out between two smooth boards loaded with weights. What remains in the bag may be again diluted with two pounds of brandy, and the expressed fluid added to the first quantity. The whole is to be allowed to stand for two days, so that the cloudiness may settle down. The clear fluid is now to be decanted off, evaporated in a porcelain dish over the fire, and melted at a red heat. The melted phosphoric acid should be as clear as crystal, and while still warm it is to be broken into small fragments and preserved in a wellcorked bottle, because when exposed to the sir it soon completely deliquesces into a thickish fluid as clear as water.)

A grain of this crystalline acid id dissolved in 100 drops of a mixture of nine parts of water with one part of alcohol (the alcohol being added in order to make it drop easily). The solution is succussed twice (with two strokes of the arm). A drop of this is again succussed with 100 drops of alcohol by means of succussion with two strokes of the arm. This is 1. And the process is repeated up to the trillion-fold dilution (III). A sugar globule the size of a poppy seed, and moistened with this trillion-fold dilution, is administered for a homoeopathic dose.

The following remarkable, pure, artificial morbid symptoms produced by phosphoric acid on the healthy body indicate of them selves the natural morbid states in which it is specifically curative by reason of homoeopathic similarity.

Every dose acts for more than two weeks in chronic diseases.

The over violent action of phosphoric acid is diminished by camphor.

[HAHNEMANN was aided in this proving by BECHER, FRANZ, GROSS, GUTMANN, FRIEDRICH HAHNEMANN, HARTMANN, HERRMANN, LANGHAMMER, MEYER, STAPF, TEUTHORN, WISLICENUS.

No old school authorities are cited.

The 1st edit has 571 symptoms, this 2nd edit 679; the Chr. Kr. has 818, 55 of the new symptoms being contributed by Dr C. Hering.]

PHOSPHORICUM ACIDUM

Vertigo all day.

Vertigo towards evening, when standing and walking, as if intoxicated; he staggers; no vertigo when sitting (several evenings).

Vertigo in the morning, making him fall, when standing.

Several mornings vertigo on rising from bed.

5. Heat in the head, which often caused vertigo, even when sitting; when writing he must often nod involuntarily; objects seemed to turn round; the table seemed as if falling; when he clutched hold of it in walking, and when he looked on ground when standing, he was like to fall forwards, and must make a step forwards in order to keep himself erect. [Myr.]

Vertigo; the head tends to sink forwards and backwards (aft. some m.) [Hrr.]

Vertigo; in the morning in bed, when he shut his eyes, he felt as if the feet rose up and he was standing on his head. [Bch.]

In the morning after rising from bed weakness of the head, as if he should stagger.

10. He cannot rid himself of a thought, and the connecting ideas, do not come.

He dare not be alone without falling into absence of thought and unconsciousness (in the morning) [Fz.]

He cannot reflect on anything properly in account of want of ideas and weakness of mind; he became giddy on attempting to think about anything. [Hrr.]

Lazy, obtuse, inactive mind, without imagination, indisposed for even agreeable mental work. [Stf.]

In the evening when sitting he sees nothing by ciphers before the eyes, for an hour; at the same time he was very stupid and bad in the head – at last very hot.

15. He cannot bring his thoughts into proper connexion.

When reading there came a thousand other thoughts into his head, and he could not rightly comprehend anything; what he had read became as if dark in his head, and he immediately forgot all (for 48 h.); what he had long known, he can only recall with difficulty. [Myr.]

Illusion of the senses; he imagines he hears a bell pealing and sees things lying near him (outside the sphere of vision) moving. [Fz.]

His reason is affected. [Fr.H-n.]

Emptiness in the head, for three hours. [Fz.]

20. In the forenoon his head is cloudy, as if he had sat up all night or as if after a nocturnal debauch.

Dulness of the head (aft. 4 d.).

In the evening when he comes into the warm room, he is dazed in his head.

Samuel Hahnemann
Samuel Hahnemann (1755-1843) was the founder of Homoeopathy. He is called the Father of Experimental Pharmacology because he was the first physician to prepare medicines in a specialized way; proving them on healthy human beings, to determine how the medicines acted to cure diseases.

Hahnemann's three major publications chart the development of homeopathy. In the Organon of Medicine, we see the fundamentals laid out. Materia Medica Pura records the exact symptoms of the remedy provings. In his book, The Chronic Diseases, Their Peculiar Nature and Their Homoeopathic Cure, he showed us how natural diseases become chronic in nature when suppressed by improper treatment.