Sepia’s participation in the oyster-Calcarea family is expressed in a tendency to formlessness and a lack of resistance. The patient is puffed, flabby, slow and indolent, of a soft, placid, mild, easy, even, lazy, disposition, incapable of any exertion; “lymphatic”; “scrophulous” types or, as well call it now, suffering from an exudative, allergic diathesis with a tendency to asthma, hayfever, urticaria, food allergies (worse strawberries, milk); sensitivity to cold air, lacking resistance against colds, and venereal infections.
The antithesis, again, of the quiet Calcarea principle is found in the general, almost obsessive, restlessness and amelioration from vigorous motion and the general erethismus with flashes of heat. Also, the extreme tendency to spasticity with globus and “ball” sensations in various parts is explained by the suppression of the psychic and sexual impulses.
With Phosphor, the light carrier, Sepia shares the aggravation in the afternoon, evening and before thunderstorms, the fear of being alone, the amelioration from eating and cold drinks and the affinity for the left (unconscious) side, as well as the lack of stamina and the tendency to anemia.
Like Phosphor and Sulfur, we have a hypersensitivity to odors and a desire for stimulating food.
The subtle shades of difference in these last mentioned hypersensitivities are noteworthy since they shed a light on the universality of the formative idea inherent in the metamorphosis of the drug personality.
Sulfur’s hypersensitivity is against body odors, the result of a faulty body and heat metabolism; Phosphor’s is against the odor of flowers and perfumes, namely the end products of the heatless light metabolism of plants. Actually, the smell of flowers which promotes pollination by attracting insects corresponds to the body odor of animals which performs an equally attractive function as sexual odor (thus the role of perfumes and flowers in courtship and romance).
In eating and digesting, the plant substance is transferred into the animal substance. Thus, eating and digesting (also cooking) are processes of predigestion, that carry over the plant (light) into the animal (heat) metabolism. Sepia, which integrates the Phosphor light with the fire-darkness of Sulphur, is oversensitive to the odor of food.
We find a similar situation in respect to food preferences. The highly seasoned, spicy foods which Sulfur craves are popularly called “hot” foods; they are prevalent in Southern hot climates where people also have “hot temperaments. The stimulative effect of their ethereal oils is primarily upon the digestive processes. The salty food of the Phosphor craving awakens mind and consciousness (salt herring for the morning after; proverbially, “to rake it with a grain of salt,” meaning with careful deliberation). Salty foods are prevalent in the more deliberate and intellectual, colder northern countries. The sour taste which is craved by Sepia, in comparison, appears of a more emotional nature (compare “sourpus,” sourface” and the German saying. to give him “sour,” meaning to upset his feelings).
The state of general ptosis, to a particular extent, makes itself felt in a slowing down of the abdominal venous circulation. We find abdominal plethora with portal and pelvic congestion resulting in a tendency to haemorrhoids and varicose veins; bilious and dyspeptic disorders with a hypersensitivity to fats and intolerance to the pressure of clothes, particularly around the waist. The systemic effects of hepatic stasis are rheumatic and gouty disorders with the thick offensive urine of high specific gravity with adherent red sediment (probably phosphates and uric acid).
Inasmuch as the pull of gravity increases the venous engorgement, standing aggravates while lying down give comparative relief. On the other hand, since exercise stimulates the circulation while rest encourages stasis, we also find the opposite modalities of better from vigorous exercise and worse from rest, worse during and after sleep.
The general venous stasis with incomplete oxidation and elimination Sepia shares with the complementary Sulfur. Thus we can account for the desire for fresh air and the lack of vital heat (insufficient metabolic compensatory heat production) as well as for the disturbed skin function manifesting itself an increased perspiration and the wide array of dermatological disorders with the Sulfur modality of worse from washing and bathing (fire and water do not mix).
Also the respiratory symptoms are of a predominantly congestive nature as the result of stasis (hypostatic pleuritis, cough apparently coming from the stomach, with a rather egg-like taste, worse evening and at night after sleep, better from rapid motion). The tubercular diathesis is a part of the Calcarea and Phosphor dynamism inherent in Sepia.
The technique which was used for the interpretation of the pathogenesis of a drug is in many respects similar to the way in which analytical psychology unravels the symbolic context of the unconscious material of patients as found in dreams, visions and associations. In succeeding in the “analysis” of a drug we bear out the hypothesis of a probable identical basic entity underlying the different levels of manifestation in symbol formation, morphology and psychologic, as well as biologic, evolution. The creative spirit in nature, as well as in man, expresses itself through the metamorphosis of basic archetypes.
“In the fact that which is of similar concept may appear in its manifestations as like or similar, yet even as totally unlike and dissimilar, in this fact consists the ever changing life of nature”.
