It would be alike impossible and unsuitable in a paper of this character to include the whole range of action of the remedies proposed for study. Their contrasts in many respects are so marked as hardly to be better expressed than by saying that one has that which the other has not. But there are certain points of resemblance, if not lines of parallelism, and it is not seldom, I believe, that in prescribing we have to say mentally why one is more suitable to the case than the other. And then I believe the study by comparison is the most effective way of approaching the mastery of the multitude of medicines which the law of homoeopathy makes available for cure.
It is, perhaps, needless to say what will so soon be evident that I have attempted little more than a complication from various accredited sources of the knowledge already in our hands. The beneficent works of Gross and of Boenninghausen have so often made clear the course through a maze of symptoms that I would indulge the hope that the guide to the student, but also humbly serve for trustworthy reference in the presence of disease and pain.
BELLADONNA
Upper left, lower right.
BELLADONNA
Upper left, lower right (Sulph. has the same)
Dark hair
Obesity predominant
Rending pain upwards
Constriction internal
Moist eruptions
Induration of cellular tissue
Sweat lessened indoors
Chill generally without thirst
Drinks often, without at once
Changeable mood
Anxiety and fretfulness
Delirium and activity of mind
Memory active or weak
Vertigo falling to left side or backward
Averse especially to candle light
Eruption on upper lip
Averse to acids; craves lemonade
Nausea more in throat
Nausea in abdomen
Odorless flatus
Diarrhoea generally painless
Complaints most in upper chest
Complaints most on shin of leg
Generally better bending diseased limb
Worse at the full moon
Worse in the twilight
Worse sitting erect
Generally better stooping
Generally better sitting bent forward
Generally better sitting bent forward
Generally better stretching out diseased limb
Generally better from change of position.
Cough with constriction and redness in throat
In eyes superficial inflammations, suddenness of attack, violence of symptoms
Uterine flow bright, or it dark offensive, with sudden pains and sense as if all would come out of the forehead
In fever startings, delirium violent
Meningitis as primary disease
Intense cerebral pain and irritation
Mastitis, with redness in radii from central point and throbbing pains
In measles sweat attends the heat
Scarlatina with smooth skin and hallucinations
Tongue red at tip
Peritonitis with sthenic symptoms
In typhoid in beginning, with violence of symptoms, as delirium, headache, startings and jerkings
Fluent coryza
Alternating color of face
Eruption in corners of mouth and on upper lip
Tongue white with red edges, striped with white
Acid taste in mouth; acid vomiting
Eructations, spasmodic or incomplete
Constipation with distended abdomen
Stool small in size
Painful affections of the kidney
Sexual desire diminished or sometimes increased
Urine turbid when passed
Breathing oppressed, irregular
Cough with sneezing and fluent coryza
Expectoration of bright blood
Affections of the larynx
Acts on external throat more than on the nape
Acts especially on the patella and hollow of the knee
Generally relief while standing
Tenesmus after stool
Relief from walking.
BRYONIA
Upper right, lower left (Calc.carb. has the same)
Light hair
Emaciation predominant
Rending pain downward
Constriction external
Dry eruptions
Suppuration of cellular tissue
Sweat increased indoors
Thirst predominant, not constant
Drinks rarely, much at once
Peevish, sad
Anxiety and mistrust
Delirium and difficult comprehension
Memory weak
Vertigo falling backward
Averse especially to sunlight
Eruption on lower lip
Desire for acids
Nausea more in the stomach
Also nausea in the abdomen
Foetid flatus
Diarrhoea generally painful
Complaints most in lower chest
Complaints most in calf of leg
Worse bending diseased limb
Worse before a thunder storm
Better in the twilight
Better sitting erect
Generally worse stooping
Generally worse sitting bent forward
Generally worse bending head backward
Generally worse stretching out diseased limb
Generally worse from change of position
Cough with irritation in the epigastrium and sharp, stitching and aching pains
In eyes the deeper affections and from metastasis of rheumatism
Uterine flow dark or suppressed with vicarious haemorrhages
In fever lies quiet, delirium mild
Meningitis from suppressed eruption
Shrieking from pain at slightest movement, benumbed sensorium, the face alternately red and pale-after Belladonna.
Mastitis with pale redness, tension and sticking pains
In measles when suppressed or delayed and meningitis follows
Scarlet fever with roughness of eruption, drowsiness and chest symptoms
Tongue coated white down middle, especially in meningitis
Peritonitis after exudation and with sharp pains, especially on moving
Typhoid with symptoms of depression or in later stage
Stopped nose
More fixed red and bluish red face
Eruption around mouth and on lower lip
Tongue coated white bitter or nauseous taste; bitter vomiting
Eructations tasteless or mostly tasting of the food, and waterbrash
Constipation from inactivity of the bowels or from hardened faeces
Stool large in size
Painful affections of the urethra
Sexual desire increased
Urine becomes turbid on standing
Breathing oppressed and deep Cough with sneezing and dry coryza
Expectoration blood-streaked or rusty
Affections of the trachea
Acts on the nape more than on the external throat
Acts on joints of the lower extremities in general
Generally relief while sitting
Generally relief after stool
Relief from warmth of bed.
Symptoms or modalities common to both remedies have been intentionally omitted as serving but little the purpose of discrimination which has been the end in view.
The writer is aware that many distinctions must have been overlooked in this inquiry made in limited time and in hours of weariness, and he hopes that they will be supplied and any errors he may have fallen into corrected by this friendly critics.
MEET MRS. KALI CARBONICUM.
A. PULFORD, M.D.
She is peevish and irritable and has great aversion to being alone. She is easily frightened and starts if touched, especially on the soles of her feet. She is especially troubled with weak eyes after abortion or coition, or after she has had measles. Her face is swollen, with sac-like swellings between eyebrows and lids. Whenever she becomes cold she has sticking pains in her pharynx with difficulty in swallowing. Her food descends slowly and easily gets into her windpipe. She is extremely sensitive about her epigastrium; her stomach distended as if it would burst from wind. Everything seems to be converted into gas. If old and rather inclined to obesity, she is inclined to become dyspeptic, her food becomes repugnant, is constantly chilly, her hands and feet cold, and no matter how great the heat she does not sweat.
Immediately after eating her abdomen becomes hot, full, and greatly distended, with cutting, stitching pains. She is subject to anal fistula, and to piles which are inflamed, sore, stitch and tingle as from ascarides. Whenever she menstruates her menses are too early, scanty, and of a pungent odor, acrid, and are apt to cover thighs with an itching eruption, are preceded by colicky pains in abdomen, and accompanied by constipation. If she should be so unfortunate as to have an impending abortion, she has pains in her back to her buttocks and thighs.
If she has children her labors are accompanied by pains which are either insufficient, or stitching and shooting, in her back shooting down into her glutei muscles or buttocks and nates, or they may pass off down th thighs, or she has bearing down from her back to her pelvis. She is often subject to terrible attacks of asthma at 3 a.m. during which she must lean forward with her head on her knees. She is also subject to a cough at 3 a.m., which is repeated every half hour, and to attacks of pleurisy and pleuro-pneumonia with cutting, sticking pains in chest, evening on lying down. She does not know how to lie, she is worse lying on right side, in the morning, if left chest especially in lower part leaving a stinging sensation.
She also has a tendency to fatty degeneration of the heart and to insufficiency of the mitral valves. Her back is so weak while walking that she feels that she must give up and lie down. She is very subject to lumbago with sharp, shooting, stitching pains shooting downward, from loins to glutei, coming on at 3 a.m. Her legs jerk on falling to sleep. She is so exhausted that she must either sit or lie down. She either wakes at 1 or 2 a.m. and cannot sleep again, or else at 2 to 4 a.m. with nearly all her troubles, but especially with her chest and throat troubles.
Her pains are mostly darting, stitching, worse during rest and lying on her painful side. With most all her complaints she has oppressed respiration. She is apt to become anaemic after loss of blood, fluids and vitality, and her old age very subject to dropsy and paralysis.