In a comparison of the constructive role of these substances (as determined by laboratory technique) with their more subtle manifestations (demonstrated through provings of the homoeopathic potentiations), let us look again at manganese:.
Reiman and Minot (J. Biological Chemistry) “found it to be present in practically all human tissue, the liver carrying more than any other”; J.H. Clarke (Dictionary of the Materia Medica) cites its ability to produce inflammation and fatty degeneration of the liver. We have seen its association with iron in the blood, and homoeopathically, it has its place in anaemic conditions when indicated. We have noted the laboratory observations of the loss of maternal instinct. Clarke gives as the first mental symptom: “Peevishness and taciturnity, with concentration in self.” Sterility has not been a proven symptom, yet Clarke gives: “Sensation of weakness in (male) genital organs”.
Speaking of the necessity for carbohydrates in the diet, McCollum (Food, Nutrition and Health) says:.
During digestion and absorption through the intestinal walls all of these (forms of carbohydrates) are converted into glucose. Glucose is the one sugar which always occurs in the blood. Although it is present in blood only to the extent of one part per thousand of blood, this sugar is the principal fuel which is burned by the muscles for providing energy for keeping the body warm and for muscular work.
Carbohydrates are the usual form in which carbon, the element, is found in the system and in which it is ingested. This is the physiological sphere; now let us turn to the role the carbons occupy in the list of antipsoric remedies. In Boenninghausens list we find Ammonium carb., Baryta carb., Calcarea carb., Carbo animalis, Carbo veg., Graphites, Kali carb., Magnesium carb., Natrum carb., Sepia; all these have the characteristic carbon influence, even though associated with another element. It may seem strange to the casual student of materia medica to include Sepia in this list, but to the homoeopathician Sepia is the animal carbon.
In spite of our belief that Barium belongs preeminently to the antisyphilitic group, Baryta carb. bears the family relationship of the carbons, which admits it to the antipsoric, or deficiency, group as well. Carbo an. and Carbo veg. manifest most markedly the characteristic homoeopathic indications for their use: “burned out” defines the condition in one word. This burned out energy and its end results of lack of body heat and muscular strength extends even into the mental sphere; and whether it comes from excesses, loss of animal fluids, from emotional, mental or physical stress, it is the red thread that runs all through the proven symptoms of the carbon combinations. This symptomatic thread runs all through the various spheres of action of each individual remedy of the carbon family, mental, moral, and all the varying physical fields in which it is applicable – and in as much as it is found in its physiological form throughout the system, so we find its symptomatology running through every part.
Calcium is an essential of bony structure and is a necessary, small but constant, essential of the blood. The homoeopathic materia medica indicates the Calcarea group in “scrofulous” conditions; rickety children; large heads with open fontanelles; and a host of symptoms we have already described in those conditions traceable to psora. McCollum tells us that calcium in the food is not enough: “Human infants often develop rickets when receiving a sufficiency of calcium and phosphorus provided they are deprived of sunlight and vitamin D”.
This last comment, provided they are deprived of sunlight leads us to meditate upon that comment of Hahnemann in relation to psora, to the effect that unnatural or unhappy surroundings are extremely dangerous to the vital energy.
It is not necessary to compare the symptomatology of many of our remedies with the body elements to bear out our contention that the problems of psora and deficiency are closely related. Any thoughtful student may verify further comparisons in the homoeopathic materia medica.
In these days one rarely has the opportunity to see a patient released from emotional and economic stress into simple and natural surroundings, with much out-door life and a simple, natural food supply free form adulterations and replete with the stored elements direct from Natures lavish supply. However, if such a case is observed, one learns many things about the resilience of the human economy under the proper conditions. It leads one to a different out-look upon psora and its relation to the undue stress of modern life and economic conditions.
We have stated repeatedly that emotional strain was an important factor in developing psoric conditions: the inability to relax for the natural and important functions demanded by Nature. Hustle and bustle take away our rhythmic, full, deep breathing; the hurry for trains and time clocks interferes too often with the excretory functions; the demands of society lead us to suppress natural perspiration; anxiety over almost every item of our lives gets in its dangerous work and often deprives us to necessary rest – certainly of chance moments of relaxation.
All these circumstances pressing upon a delicate adjustment of spirit, mind and body (especially if this be predisposed by inheritance to maladjustment) cannot but make confusion worse confounded. And at this point, if we pass on to our unborn children our inhibitions and suppression of the spirit, mind and flesh, what can we expect but to build for them a future lacking the ability to receive from natural sources these elements – not always measurable nor as yet defined – that are essential to health? And when we ponder that wrong living conditions and appalling plagues and seasons of famine have been cyclic since history began, we cannot wonder at an inherited tendency to disease that Hahnemann called psoric.
Whether this tendency to the psoric manifestations develops because of inability to assimilate or inability to relax to the point of assimilation, the end results are the same, and will continue to be until corrected through more healthy and natural ways of living plus the power of the potentized remedy to release suppressions and tune the maladjustments to order.
DERBY, CONN.
DISCUSSION.
DR. UNDERHILL, JR.: Psora has been a Pandoras box, and we never found a key to it until now this illumination has unlocked it.
Dr. Roberts refers to the various elements present in the human body. Every now and again some scientist discovers something else that heretofore was not thought to be present. Probably there is no substance existing in nature but what is present also in our being. Some of them may be in such high potency that they have not yet been discovered, perhaps 200th or 10M.
Heredity many times causes structural weakness, and we are born with tendencies due to that structural weakness. Every one of us has the strongest link in our physiological chain, and also the weakest link. It is heart with some, lung with some, and nerves with others. When a chronic disease attacks us, from whatever cause, it will affect, naturally, the portions of the body where the structure is the weakest and the function the poorest. Everyone has defects, and they reflect themselves on every plane of being, mental and moral and physical.
Then there is the question of deficiency, which Dr. Roberts brought out, that is, vitamin deficiency, mineral salt deficiency, and glandular deficiency. Which is prior? Probably some times structural and glandular may be prior to the mineral salt deficiencies; again the organic mineral salt deficiencies, but deficiencies probably exist where less expected and perhaps in varying combinations. For example, in vitamin deficiency we know in beriberi the patients are deficient in vitamin B, and so on; but they exist in every possible grade and shade, so mild that we cant recognize them, so mixed that we couldnt possibly identify them.
One other angle I want to bring out and that is according to Hahnemanns psora theory, psora must have been an infectious proposition; according to his viewpoint, something entered the body from without.
It may be looked upon as an infection or deficiency or as a fault of some kind inherited or acquired, perhaps a toxemia. Hahnemann in his chronic diseases gives a vast list of symptoms due to latent psora or the flaring up of latent psora. One proof can be very nicely brought on by just starting in with almost any patient, ourselves or anybody else, and feeding them enough times a day and you will get a beautiful picture of what is a perfect psoric group.
There are those who advocate eating six or seven times a day, providing we dont eat any more than we do in two or three meals. In my observation, I believe that eating too often is just as bad as, if not worse than, eating too much. There is one advantage in eating too much, we finally get too full for utterance, but you can eat too often and keep nibbling any number of times a day.
