Abandon Homoeopathy! – In perusing the editorials in the April, 1910 issue of THE HOMOEOPATHIC RECORDER, the July issue of the Drugless Phlebotomist and a copy of the transactions of the I.H.A., we find three indisputable reasons why every Hahnemannian homoeopath should renounce his faith in “moonshine” and embrace all that is modern and scientific. The following three reasons are incontrovertible and final:.
FIRST:
“The Materia MEdica of the Elder Brother – The editor of the Review of Reviews – credits the following warm stuff concerning the allopathic materia medica to Dr. Spence L. Davis, in the Albany Medical Annals: Born of Ignorance – Begotten by Superstition out of Chicanery – Suckled by Blind Faith, the half- sister of Fanaticism – Wedded to Commercialism, the daughter of Cupidity – The parent of a motley brood of nondescripts whose main virtues consists in their fecundity – this is our present- day materia medica.
“This is respectfully referred to all who have a grouch against our own splendid homoeopathic materia medica”.
SECOND:
“It (medicine) learned from a monk how to use antimony, from a Jesuit how to cure agues, from a friar how to cut for stone, from a soldier how to cure gout, from a sailor how to keep off scurvy, from a postmaster how to sound the Eustachian tube, from a dairy maid how to prevent smallpox and from an old market- woman how to catch the itch insect. It borrowed acupuncture and the moxa from the Japanese heathen, and was taught the use of lobelia by the American savage.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes.
THIRD:
“Today the barn, the sheep-pen and the hog-pen are ransacked for material to appease the aesthetic scientific taste and skill”.
We have often wondered what there was about Allopathy that caused the dominant and ruling element of our school to turn pan therapists. There is no accounting for tastes. There is one redeeming feature, however, in that he who can acquire such tastes can serve both God and Mammon and still be purely godly as witness a former president of the I.H.A. who promised in his report to do so much for Homoeopathy, or was it a misprint? Should it not have been : “To Homoeopathy” Beware of the Greeks (A.M.A.) bearing gifts”?.
In contra-distinction to the above Homoeopathy was conceived in an intelligent, enlightened brain and born of a natural law. As to whether we are intelligent or otherwise is shown by our choice between the two.
A. PULFORD, M.D.
The New Homoeopathy. – Two articles appear in this issue that are of special significance as indicating in a striking manner the present tendencies and status of the homoeopathic school in its efforts to “modernize” homoeopathy. These articles are entitled “The Development of Bodily Resistance,” by Daniel E.S. Coleman, M.D., and “Studies of the Pathogenetic Effects of Drugs – Abrotanum,” by Linn J. Boyd, M.D., both of New York City.
Dr. Colemans article was written and delivered as his presidential address before the International Hahnemannian Association at its annual meeting held last June on board the SS. Lapland. He, speaking in his official and representative capacity, was probably voicing more or less fully the views of at least an electing majority of the members of that hitherto highly conservative organization, since his personal views on the subject had been freely expressed prior to his election.
It should be stated that the title of Dr. Colemans article has been supplied by the editor, as it was without title other than “Presidential Address.” For the greater part the editor has contented himself with italicizing certain words, lines and paragraphs in it which he regards as peculiarly significant, and inserting in parenthesis a few modest interrogation points – all clearly indicated.
His object is not only to call the attention of readers to that which is expressed, but to suggest that there are implications in these statements, and in the article as a whole, that should receive the thoughtful consideration of members of the I.H.A. (and others) who have at heart not only the preservation of homoeopathy in its integrity of spirit and principle, but of that special technique of proving and prescribing medicines upon which it is based.
The editor is among those, in and out of the School, who believe that this technique, invented and applied by Hahnemann as the logical and necessary corollary of the vital-dynamical philosophy which underlies homoeopathy, is his greatest and most original contribution to medicine, co-equal in value and importance with the “Law of similars,” of which Hahnemann, by the way, never pretended to the discoverer.
Dr. Close was born November 24, 1860 and came to study homeopathy after the death of his father in 1879. His mother remarried a homoeopathic physician who turned Close's interests from law to medicine.
His stepfather helped him study the Organon and he attended medical school in California for two years. Finishing his studies at New York Homeopathic College he graduated in 1885. Completing his homeopathic education. Close preceptored with B. Fincke and P. P. Wells.
Setting up practice in Brooklyn, Dr. Close went on to found the Brooklyn Homoeopathic Union in 1897. This group devoted itself to the study of pure Hahnemannian homeopathy.
In 1905 Dr. Close was elected president of the International Hahnemannian Association. He was also the editor of the Department of Homeopathic Philosophy for the Homeopathic Recorder. Dr. Close taught homeopathic philosophy at New York Homeopathic Medical College from 1909-1913.
Dr. Close's lectures at New York Homeopathic were first published in the Homeopathic Recorder and later formed the basis for his masterpiece on homeopathic philosophy, The Genius of Homeopathy.
Dr. Close passed away on June 26, 1929 after a full and productive career in homeopathy.