DISCUSSION OF THE THEORY AND PRINCIPLES OF HOMOEOTHERAPEUTICS AND RELATED MEDICAL TOPICS



Dr. E. hears the patient say he has a toothache. His mind accepts that as a staring point and begins to act subconsciously. He observes, for example, that the patient has a flushed face and a countenance which expressed pain, anxiety or excitement; or it may be pale and drawn. Perhaps the face is swollen on one side or the other. The mouth may be open or closed, revealing the kind of reaction of inspired air upon the painful tooth, or to pressure. The lips may be dry, moist or wet from deficiency or excess or saliva.

The position and status of the head and the bodily attitude are significant. The effects of of rest, position and motion are deducible from attitude, gait and movement. The state of mind and mood are revealed by the manner and tone of speaking and address, etc.

All of these and other sings and symptoms will be perceived almost instantly by the experienced observer without conscious effort of the mind, and these are the real basis of this homoeopathic prescription, whether it be made offhand or by the longer process of systematic study. Simultaneously a process of reflection and reasoning goes on. The homoeopathic mind compares the symptoms thus observed and rapidly makes a choice between remedies known to be similar.

So-called “snap-shot,” “off-had,” or intuitional prescriptions are made in this manner whether the prescriber realizes or not. There is always a background of knowledge and experience, a subconscious memory of previous teaching which becomes active on occasion and sets the mental machinery in motion.

Doubtless this is the “why” and “how” of DR. Ekholms cures, even if the does use only two remedies for toothache. Perhaps he has a better mind than he thinks he has. If so, he should not set such narrow limits to its operation. He should set it free and enlarge the scope of its operations in materia medica. He may be able to handle a hundred remedies as well as two if he tries, and so gain something which he now lacks-the ability to cure that embarrassing ten per cent. of cases in which he modestly admits he now fails.

But to return to the “many remedies” about which the Doctor complains:.

From the common point of view DR. E. may be justified in his strictures. Apparently there are too many medicines in the materia medica. But no one is compelled to use or even pretend to use them all-a point which is overlooked by those how calmor for “elimination.” Anyone is free to choose and use such as he likes, and every one does so. Listening to the hue and cry one might think the occupants of the materia medica were a bad of blood- thirsty desperados, lying in wait to pounce upon unwary doctors and slay them. On the contrary, they are a host of gentle spirits patiently waiting to be evoked by the physician for the cure and mitigation of human ills.

By the same token there are too many words in the unabridged dictionary. The well-educated man does not ordinarily use a hundredth part of them. But he may want to use more of them and he likes to feel and know that they are all there, perhaps because he is interested in the origin and development of language, or because he takes pleasure in the thought that they afford material for enlarging his vocabulary if he wishes to do so. A very small dictionary that he can slip in his pocket will serve his ordinary purposes. The unabridged dictionary is for his library table, always at hand when needed.

So with the homoeopathic material medica. It embodies and preserves the records of the laudable labors of many men who have contributed their shares to the general encyclopedia of therapeutics, now available to all students and investigators, to use, select from, or let alone as they choose.

The homoeopathic materia medica, like the unabridged dictionary, thus becomes very good reading for one who brings to it a little knowledge and imagination. For ordinary or personal use it may and several times has been condensed into a very small volume, both as to the number of remedies treated and the amount of space assigned to each. Dr. Ekholm mentions forty (including Schusslers twelve-which leaves twenty-eight others) as his ideal number of remedies. Why not fifteen?.

We shall not quarrel about the number. I venture to say that the major part of the cures by our best prescriber are performed with about forty remedies and that, on a pinch, they could get along pretty well with less than that number. I know I could. Individual lists would differ, but there would be a pretty general agreement among them. They would all include a majority of the “Old Reliables,” our friends the polychrests. With these an expert can perform miracles. The point is, that every man may and does make his own working materia medica-even Dr. Ekholm- without diminishing the source of supply nor depriving others of the same privilege.

But note: I said “the major part of the cures.” With only forty remedies there would be some cases we could not cure. Toothache, for example, may be incidental to many strange and peculiar cases and its cure depends upon finding a remedy for the individual. There are no specifics for “toothache,” Dr. E. and his apparent assumption to the contrary notwithstanding. Aconite and Belladonna in the “4 D” or “200 C,” will not cure all cases, although they may cure the the majority. What is to be done for the remainder they may cure the majority. What is to be done for the remainder- the peculiar, unusual, puzzling cases?.

Here come in the “hundreds of remedies,” the encyclopedic materia medica, the “bewildering repertory” which Dr. E. does not know how to use, having never been taught. Confronted by such a case and recognizing its character, the competent homoeopathician supplements his first, perhaps cursory, inspection with a thorough, systematic examination of the patient.

With the written record of his observation he sits down with his rich materia medica and repertory and calmly works out the case, finding the indicated remedy among the less frequently or rarely used medicines. He gives it and cures his patient-not only of toothache, but of the general or local morbid process of which it was an incident or a product. Dr. E., on the contrary, would be “stumped.” Failing with his Acon. and Bella. he must resort to palliatives, blindly experiment, or send his patient to the dentist with orders to sacrifice what may be a perfectly good tooth.

What would you, my Children? With the worlds market at our doors, would you have us cut down your larder to the “Hog and Hominy” which many of our pioneer ancestors had to subsist upon? Would you sacrifice all the luxuries and refinements of life and live like anchorites? Would you deprive yourselves of all the comforts and conveniences of civilization? Would you abolish literature, art and science-everything that makes for and represents culture, progress and development?.

If that is your spirit and purpose, then, as homoeopathic physicians, abolish the great materia medica and its repertories and substitute for it a meager little digest of fifteen or twenty medicines and a list of the diseases they are “good for,” like the old-fashioned “Domestic Physician.” But if not, keep the materia medica as it is-a record and repository of the facts of experimentation with drugs-and learn how to appreciate and use it, Improve it, correct it, clarify it, develop it, condense or abstract it for personal, practical purposes, verify it by clinical experience, but cherish it as a precious heritage. If destroyed it will never be replaced nor reproduced, for the men who made it have passed on. “And there were giants in those days”.

What has been said of remedies and the method of using them is in principle equally applicable to high potencies. No one is compelled to use them. But there is as great an advantage in having a large scale of potencies as there is in having a large number of remedies. Different potencies, or developments of drug powers, act differently in different cases and individuals at different times and under different conditions.

All are or may be needed. No one potency, high or low, will meet the requirements of all case at all times. The exclusive devotee of one or the other stamps himself as a narrow minded individual who deprives himself and his patients of benefits which might accrue if he broadened his mind and learned how and when to use the agents which he now neglects.

Proof of the efficiency and sometimes superiority of high potencies, which our Swedish friend asks for, exists in reams and volumes in homoeopathic literature-the accumulation of a century and a quarter. Proof for the individual waits only upon his willingness to put high potency of individual medicine to the test of experience. The next time Dr. Ekholm meets a case which indubitably calls for Aconite or Belladonna let him give a dose or two of the 200th or 1000th potency and watch the result. Unless he is like the Scotchman who was “willing to be convinced, but where is the man who can convince me,” he will not need many such illustration to bring him to a better mind on the subject of high potencies.

Stuart Close
Stuart M. Close (1860-1929)
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.