Dear Mr. Lappe,
Referring to your kind offer, I would ask you to prepare the following for money and kind words. Immerse a piece of freshly burnt lime of approximately one pound in weight, in tepid distilled water for one minute, then place it on a dry dish, and let it disintegrate into powder. Mix one ounce of this fine powder, with a solution of one ounce of double Sulphuric acid kali (bisulphas kali) which has been heated almost to a red heat, and which has been added to one ounce of hot distilled water; mid it in the porcelain mortar for several minutes, and put the magna into a retort and lute both the caul and the receiving vessel, then distil over a sandbath until dry, and send the finished product on to me.
This later contains Causticum in a concentrated form. I shall give instructions how to prepare this, in the fourth volume of Chronic Diseases which is about to appear-it is a great antipsoric remedy, which you will now require to keep in readiness in order to attenuate and potentise it a decillion times. You will do well to prepare at once a double quantity, as you will then keep much of the superfluous ounce for your own use.
Please write to me at the same time how you proceeded with it, and what you have noticed. Do taste the distilled fluid, or let someone taste it, and write and let me know what it tastes like, and I shall be obliged to you. See also if a small piece of meat which has been steeped in this fluid will not undergo putrefaction much sooner than a piece which has been steeped in clear water? Also what other chronic indications you have noticed.
Yours faithfully, SAM. HAHNEMANN.
Cothen, October 22nd, 1829.
Thank you for the powder trituration of antipsoric, which I have received.
Dr. Griesselich of Karlsruhe, visited Lappe at Neudietendorf, during his travels; he describes his impressions in “sketches from the notes of a travelling homoeopath” (Karlsruhe, 1832). He writes as follows:
The traveller was no visiting a physician but a chemist, in this friendly settlement of Herrnhuters. Mr. Lappe’s occupation was that of preparing homoeopathic medicines, and selling them in small medicine chests. The traveller wished to ascertain what kind of arrangement Mr. Lappe had made. He found a part completely isolated from the general chemist’s shop, which itself made a good impression from its extremely clean appearance. The traveller was able to convince himself that Mr. Lappe was conscientiously following the homoeopathic instructions, and openly affirms that the modest bearing of Mr. Lappe himself convinced him to his accurate mode of procedure. The homoeopathic medicines prepared by him must be quite reliable.
Hahnemann wrote to his “dearest friend and sponsor” (date missing):
Thank you for kindly instructing Mr. Lappe how to prepare medicines for sending a long distance away. I have recommended him to two physicians who live a considerable distance away; with their order they will send enough money, or a money order, to satisfy him.
Dr. H. Goullon, of Weimar, who published this letter in the Zeitschr. d. Berl. Verbascum hom.” Arzte,” 1897, Vol. 16, page 384, says in a footnote:
The above mentioned Mr. Lappe has placed himself entirely at the services of homoeopathic pharmacy, and Hahnemann thought a great deal of him. The writer called on him and found an amiable old gentleman, who reminded him of Hahnemann in his manners, when he saw him sitting in a comfortable armchair with a long pipe in his mouth. He worked very conscientiously, and the homoeopathic medicines from Neudietendorf enjoyed a wide distribution for a long time.
SUPPLEMENT 103 THE HIGHER RANKS OF SOCIETY BECOME FAVOURABLY INCLINED TO HOMOEOPATHY.
Dr. Aegidi, the well known and much sought after homoeopathic physician of Tilsit-see the description of his life in Chapter 27-was recommended by Hahnemann to the Princess Friedrich to Prussia, who lived in Dusseldorf at the time. She had induced him to give up his practice in Tilsit with the prospect of becoming Regimental Medical Officer at her own place of residence.
But as there could be no question of his occupying this post on account of the law of seniority, the Princess, who was always ailing-she suffered from nerve trouble-made him her physician-in- ordinary with a stipend of 800 Reichsthaler; she produced for him, at the same time, from the authorities a certificate of authorisation:
The undersigned reigning President accords herewith to the medical practitioner, physician and surgeon, Dr. Aegidi, who has proved that he is authorised to practise in the Prussian States, and has now been appointed homoeopathic physician to Her Royal Highness the Princess Friedrich of Prussia, the legal right to prepare and dispense such medicines as he deems necessary for his own use.
(L.S.) signed the reigning President, V. PESTEL.
Dusseldorf, April 2nd, 1831.
The right to dispense his own medicines soon brought Dr. Aegidi into conflict with the chemists, and although his position as physician-in-ordinary to the Princess was not to be envied, it caused hostility of his colleagues. what he wrote to his patron Hahnemann on the subject is very significant:
Dusseldorf, September 10th, 1831.
I have also succeeded in winning the Prince’s interest in homoeopathy, so that he too has now become my patient….Now the Prince himself wishes that I should treat his eldest son Prince Alexander, a boy of 11 years of age, who has been subject to nervous attacks from early childhood, and has never been out f the hands of the allopaths. This has also been the wish of the Princess for a long time, but even people in such high position are so very dependent upon the will and opinion of those surrounding them (it is hardly credible, if it were not that it is daily brought to our notice) that this noble lady has until now always feared to follow her own convictions and assert her will in spite of opposition. That I have contributed by my firm demeanour, and fearless exposition of the truth, which has aroused disapproval on many sides.
I have found in Neuwied among the community of brethren who live there, a good many friends and people who are initiated in our doctrine, and have at their request undertaken the treatment of many patients.
Dusseldorf, September 21st, 1831.
I think that they mean to accomplish nothing less than the return of the Princess to allopathic hands, but they need time for that, as on account of her decided character, they cannot possibly precipitate matters with the Princess. The consideration which people in high authority have to take of their subordinates goes so far, that the Prince recommended me to treat him secretly so that Dr. Nieland (an ordinary routine man under the allopaths) should not hear of it! They prefer to put Prince Alexander under the treatment of Dr. Prieger of Kreutznach, who applies against these dynamic disturbances of the nervous system the Moxa (a cone or cylinder made of readily combustible material, which is burnt on the skin in order to draw to the surface deeper-lying affections-R.H.) on the delicate spine to the eleven year old boy every 8 days-and (as he writes verbatim) suggest that if this experiment (!) should have no result, even to trephine (!!!), (chisel out a part of the skull-R.H.) sooner than trust him to a circumspect homoeopathic treatment, from which no damaging consequences are to be feared, but only good results might be expected, for the only reason that the Governor of the Prince thinks nothing of homoeopathy any does not with to do so.
Dusseldorf, 1st, October, 1831.
Some little time ago the Duke of Sachsen-Meiningen, on his return from the coronation in London, arrived here indisposed and asked for homoeopathic help from me, which was given him.
Dusseldorf, November 30th, 1831.
The cholera greatly stimulates the taking for homoeopathy. Most of the better classes here have relations in Vienna, or wives who come from there and are therefore in direct communication with that city; they have been informed of the surprising results which have been achieved by homoeopathy in regard to cholera there; they have generally decided in favour of this treatment for that disease, and I have been asked for help on all sides if this epidemic should spread as far as this town. People here are now extremely interested in homoeopathy, especially the upper and educated classes, since a few cases of mine have made a great sensation.
Especially the treatment of the Director of the Academy of Art, the famous Wilhelm Schadow has given much opportunity for talk on this important subject. He had been suffering for the last 20 years from an obstinate affection of the abdomen, which had made him almost despair; he sought in vain for a cure in many spas, and baths, and for several years tried the Italian climate which was described to him as much more healthy. Schadow was suffering during the summer of this year, in addition to many other discomforts which he had learned to bear with great patience, from amblyopia amaurotica, which if unchecked tended to develop i not glaucoma, and this reduced the poor sufferer to a state of melancholia. Severe nerve attacks intervened which threatened to end his days (so that he had already made his will- R.H.) The interest taken in this man was general. He was advised to try homoeopathy, and the Prince especially urged Schadow to do so, but believing in the opinion of his own physician who said that homoeopathy was nothing but a chimera, he would not agree to it for a long time, but at last he unwillingly followed by advice of his friends, who themselves uncertain of the value of this method of treatment, only spoke in its favour out of curiosity of water might result from such an experiment. Never in my life have I seen such striking results from homoeopathy. (Aegidi gives here the remedies used and then proceeds): The eyes have already so much improved with it that the patient is again correcting at the Academy; he is really glad to be alive, is naturally a faithful admirer of homoeopathy. (Schadow’s eye troubles were kept in abeyance so long by the homoeopathic treatment, that he could still paint at the end of the forties, and it was only in the fifties that the he had to give up his art; he died in 1862-R.H.)
Richard Haehl was also an editor and publisher of the homeopathic journal Allgemcine, and other homeopathic publications.
Haehl was responsible for saving many of the valuable artifacts of Samuel Hahnemann and retrieving the 6th edition of the Organon and publishing it in 1921.
Richard Haehl was the author of - Life and Work of Samuel Hahnemann