Nature being the Universe is one, and its origin can only be one eternal Unity. It is an organism in which all natural things harmonize and sympathize with each other. It is the Macrocosm. Everything is the product of one universal effort; the Macrocosm and man (the Microcosm) are one. They are one constellation, one influence, one breath, one harmony, one time, one metal, one fruit.
There is nothing corporeal which does not possess a soul hidden in it. The form may be destroyed; but the spirit remains and is living, for it is the subjective life.. therefore there are celestial, infernal and human spirits, spirits of metals, stones, plants, etc. (Vita Rerum IV).
What Paracelsus calls the “spirits of metals, stones, plants etc” the modern homoeopathic physician has captured in his high- potency homoeopathic remedies. Truly they are no longer metal, stone or plant but the spirit like essence, the in-dwelling, formative intelligence of these substances. The teaching that Life is Electricity and that Electricity is Life endowed with intelligence, and that all our bodily functions are the result of electrical and magnetic energy, seems to explain the dynamized energy of the potentized drug in restoring harmony in a body disturbed by a diseased conditions.
Homoeopathy shows us the interdependence, correlations and correspondences existing throughout all Nature. It opens up avenues of thought that explain our close relationship with the three kingdoms below us. A most fascinating subject with varied implications is the study of the different remedies that present a picture of the type of person they will cure, and the tendencies mental, psychical and physical they will produce in a healthy person when administered to him in a crude form.
Let us consider Apis (one of the jealous remedies) as discussed by Dr. H. A. Roberts. We are told that the queen bee is the most jealous thing in Nature. In its provings Apis has developed two entirely different manifestations. One is a profound indifference, the other an overwhelming jealousy, but this jealousy has been noted only in the female. The indifference is not only an emotional reaction; it extends into the mental sphere and affects the nervous control of the body so that the patient cannot walk or handle things without awkwardness.
When the jealous phase is active there is nothing of this passivity or indifference about them; there is anger and the desire to kill. In Calcarea Phos. the jealousy arises from misunderstandings or unrequited love. The Arsenicum child is jealous and greedy; he will not share his toys. Hyoscyamus has picture of jealousy associated with grief. Ignatia has jealousy arising from disappointed love.
Nux Vomica jealousy is often the jealousy of disappointed ambition; he vents his feeling in quarrelings, reproaches, scolding and insults. Pulsatillas jealousy is more of an envious type, although she rather expects to be slighted. Gallic Acid has the type of jealousy that permits no diversion of attention from himself. Consider well emotional outbursts or hysterical tendencies that have quantities of gas, usually pent up sometimes to the point where they cannot breathe. Raphanus may relieve the patient and doctor as well.
This discussion of jealous remedies shows how closely we are interlinked and connected with every part of nature, affected by an affecting mentally, psychically and physically sentient and insentient life. It cannot help but awaken a sense of personal responsibility for how we think, feel and act when we see everything we do reflected in manifesting nature. By our thoughts, feelings and emotions we impress the infinitesimal lives that constantly come into our bodies and pass back into Nature.
Throughout the ages we have impregnated nature, influencing it either for good or evil. How natural then, that we should meet those same influences through magnetic affinity as we contact them in new forms. What new importance attaches itself to the admonitions of the ethical Teachers on the importance of controlling our thoughts and emotions so that the “Lives” will receive a beneficent impress and influence as they leave our bodies. In this connection let us consider a statement made by Dr. Farrington in commenting on Dr. Roberts talk on the Jealous remedies:.
“If you will stop a moment and consider it, you will find there is core of our remedies and their symptoms that starts in the forces of the universe and descends all the way into the soil the plant grows in or the habitat that the animal seeks, and the characteristics of the plant of animal itself correspond to a certain degree to the nature of the remedy when it is potentized, and this is true not only as to the constituents of the soil, the texture of the plant itself, or the character of the animal, but even as to colors of the flowers of a plant”.
DR. Kent in his book on Materia Medica under the remedy “Naja” mentions the fact that Mure, of Brazil, thought that the snake family presented curative powers for the healing of the nations.
“In the mineral kingdom, man may find his remedy when sick, so in the vegetable and animal kingdom. It is possible that the product of the serpent may be everything needed for the healing of man. Extend this to the whole animal kingdom and it is probably so. There seems to be everything existing in one kingdom that exists in another. The lowest is the mineral, the next the vegetable and last the animal kingdom. If we had a correct knowledge of nay one kingdom, we could probably cover the entire scope of curative possibilities. But we have only a knowledge of a few remedies in each kingdom.
“Another ideas has been advanced that in any particular region the vegetable kingdom provides all that is necessary for curing in that region. If we were acquainted with all the vegetable growth, how much we would know in comparison with what we do know! It is highly probably that there is a throwing off from the sick human race of something that is absorbed by the plants. The evils that are thrown off by man may be absorbed by the vegetable kingdom.
It seems that when good Homoeopathic books were written for the Laymen teaching him the philosophy of Homoeopathy, how to prescribe for common ailments by becoming acquainted with some of the more important Polychrest remedies and their use, considerably more interest was shown and more known about Homoeopathy by the public than today. It might be interesting to make some comparisons to see what the change in attitude of homoeopathic physicians towards self-medication has meant to the prestige and respect accorded to Homoeopathy thirty or forty years ago.
Harmless self-medication is now replaced by really harmful self-medication condoned by the dominant medical Pharmacies. We all know the tragic results unrecognized by the victims who buy the vicious preparations advertised by radio and press. How often we hear radio announcers call their product a multiple medicine containing not one, but eight important medical ingredients compounded like a doctors prescription and acting in so many different ways! And what can we say about the many synthetic vitamins and all the other coal tar derivatives; the sulpha drugs and what not?.
It may be helpful to discuss this subject of Homoeopathic self- medication on which all homoeopathic doctors are not of one accord. Let us read a paragraph from the preface of Materia Medica and Therapeutic by Hempel and Arndt (p.7).
“It might perhaps be better and would certainly be more agreeable to the professional vanity of Physicians, if the practice of Homoeopathy were rendered less accessible to mere amateur practitioners of Homoeopathy among laymen. Yet all truly great and humane physicians have considered it all all times as the glory of their achievements to enlighten their lay-brother on the principles of true hygiene and diet, and to acquaint him with the means of a successful treatment of all ordinary diseases.
The science of Therapeutics has been rendered accessible to non- professional people by works commonly known under the title of “domestic Physician. Hahnemann himself has set the profession a glorious example in his Materia Medica by divesting it of all scientific pedantry and giving it to the world in the plain and unvarnished language of the people.”.
Although I have been keenly interested in the higher potencies for many years I did not start using them until I had made a careful study of the subject and knew how to find the remedy covering the totality of the symptoms. Very few laymen have the opportunity, the time or energy to really study Homoeopathy. But they can learn enough about the subject to select a doctor who practice pure Homoeopathy. If he finds that you are sufficiently interested he may instruct you in the use of some of the more common remedies which can be used in an emergency for minor ailments.
The Homoeopathic Laymens League affords a rare opportunity to learn the rudiments of Homoeopathy and acquire information how to treat slight troubles. To be able to appreciate more fully the fundamental principles of Homoeopathy we should acquaint ourselves with the aphorisms of the Organon and the philosophical writings of Kent and Close. Then, when we listen to the various doctors speak to us here each month, we will have a true basis as a premise to evaluate what they tell us. In the words of Dr. Stuart Close:.
