INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS by the British Editors

The fact that there are already fourteen journals in the English language professedly devoted to Homoeopathy, demands a reason for our adding to the number. We purpose, therefore, in this Introductory Address to give (1) Our reasons for the publication of “THE ORGANON “; (2) Our reasons for choosing this particular time; and (3) The objects we have in view.

I. Our reasons for publication.

Original text. 1878.

It cannot be too earnestly or too early impressed upon the mind of the student that there is a false as well as a true Homoeopathy. There are now two distinct parties in the (so-called) Homoeopathic camp; and though the doctrine and practice of each party differ essentially from those of the other, yet there is so much apparent- similarity (of a superficial kind) to an uninstructed eye, that it is only by his attention being directed to the points of radical difference between them, that the young student can, by being enabled to institute a comparison, make up his mind intelligently which path to follow. Our experience teaches us that it is of great importance that an inquirer should have both aspects of what is called Homoeopathy put clearly before him at the commencement of his career, as it may save him much after-trouble and disappointment.

HAHNEMANN discovered, founded, and elaborated a system of healing by medicines; to this system he gave the name Homoeopathy; in his Organon he gives the plainest and most minute rules for the practical application of his teachings; and he challenges the medical profession to put his teaching to the test. It would seem, therefore, a very simple matter to define Homoeopathy; it would seem also self-evident that, while every physician has the right to practice that system of medicine which he deems best, on the other hand, no one has the right to call himself a Homoeopathician who does not firmly believe in all HAHNEMANN’S practical rules, and strive in every case to carry them out to the best of his ability; and it would seem only consistent that the name of Homoeopathy should not be appropriated to any other system than that to which HAHNEMANN gave it. Yet that which would appear to be self-evidently just and true has not been followed; and HAHNEMANN’S fundamental rules are daily violated by those who falsely call themselves his disciples. These same professed disciples generally succeed in first raising clouds of dust, and then complain that they cannot see.

HAHNEMANN, besides giving us several rules which apply only to certain forms of disease (e.g., his directions to give the remedy, in a case of ague, after, or in some specified cases, towards the close of the paroxysms—Organon 236, 237), has given us three principal and fundamental rules, which are of universal application; they are

1-    The law of similars,

2-    The law of the single remedy, and

3-    The law of the dynamization of medicines.

In the first place, HAHNEMANN teaches that the remedy to be given is always the one which has been proved to be capable of producing on healthy persons symptoms as like as possible to those of the individual patient; understanding by “symptoms “all those deviations from health, with their conditions and concomitant circumstances, which can be perceived as facts by any of our senses; the similarity, let it be observed, being not only that of quantity (number of corresponding symptoms), but quality also.

But from this law of symptom-correspondence, which approaches the mathematical sciences in its certainty, there have been various “departures”, all of them based upon a desire to clothe the teachings of Homoeopathy with the livery of Allopathic theorizing; but all of them far inferior to the system on which they profess to be an improvement.

The re-edition of THE ORGANON. 2012.

Firstly, we have the Pathological School, frequently called (though incorrectly) the Physiological School.[1] One of the champions of this school—Dr. Richard Hughes, the lecturer on Materia Medica at the new London School of Homoeopathy —thus avows his faith : —”I quite admit that there is many a terra incognita as yet in disease, and many a case which as yet we can treat only symptomatically. I am most thankful that the law of similars enables us to fit drug to disease, even when we are unable to say what the phenomena of either mean. But not the less do I reckon the other mode [the pathological] of applying the law as the more satisfying, and, in most hands, successful; and believe that a scientific pharmaco-dynamics, linked to a scientific pathology by the band of the homoeopathic method, will constitute the therapeutics of the future.”—(United States Medical Investigator, Nov., 1876, p. 408.) Thus the adherents of this departure from HAHNEMANN make the pathology of the disease and the remedy the basis of treatment, the minute symptomatology being held to be quite secondary in importance, and to be resorted to only when the former fails; [2]whereas the followers of HAHNEMANN make the minute symptomatology the basis of treatment, pathology and everything else being subservient to it. In other words, the Pathological School prefer to select their remedies according to the theory which each may happen to hold concerning the nature of the disease and the action of the remedy, while the Homoeopathic

School select their remedies according to the facts (symptoms) observed in each individual case. Which treatment is a priori most likely to be successful is obvious.[3]

Another departure may be called the School of Morbid Anatomy. In the Monthly Homoeopathic Review, 1869, p. 295, the reviewer of Dr. Richard Hughes’ essay, “On the Various Forms of Paralysis and their Treatment”, says, the author” endeavors to base his selection on the analogy subsisting between the organic changes involved in paralysis and the morbid appearances found (postmortem)in cases of poison. This is undoubtedly the correct line to take. But at the same time we must remember that it is as yet far from possible of adoption in all cases.” Here it would seem, at first, that we were treading on firm ground, inasmuch as we are dealing with the facts observable after death; yet, on examination, these hopes prove illusive. The post-mortem appearances are not the end of the disease, but the end of the patient, and manifest a condition necessarily incurable. Moreover, this mode of selecting the remedy, like the former one, is necessarily imperfect and inferior, inasmuch as our knowledge of Pathology and Morbid Anatomy is neither certain nor complete (the most advanced Allopathic authorities being witnesses), nor has it advanced so far, and been developed so minutely, as that of symptomatology. Let us suppose two cases of pneumonia; one

patient complains of a pain shooting across the chest from right to left, the other of a similar pain from left to right. This difference in direction would (caeteris paribus)indicate a different medicine in each case, the former case requiring petroleum, and the latter calcarea. But, we ask, what is the pathology of these two symptoms, and, in the event of death, with what post-mortem change would each be found to be connected? Doubtless a difference exists; there must be a _reason for the difference of direction, and there must be some difference of lesion in the lung-tissue to cause this difference of symptom manifestation; but what is this difference If the pathologists cannot answer our question, then they must admit that the Homoeopathic method is superior to their own; if they can, let them do so, but let them also show how, even in that case, their method would be more accurate or more successful than that of HAHNEMANN; it certainly would not be more simple or easy.[4]

Another departure is Organopathy. This departure was introduced into our ranks by Dr. Sharp, who now proclaims that HAHNEMANN “has done so much good that one does not like to blame him, and he has done so much harm that one does not know how to praise him “! The author of this departure evidently considers both the name and the teaching to be superior to that of Homoeopathy. He informs us that “drugs, to be remedies, must affect the same organs as the disease affects “; and again, “If it be objected that there are many cases in which we cannot find out the seat of the symptoms, I reply that this is mere than the objector knows till he has tried; but, I admit, till v4e have found this out, there is no better way of prescribing than for the symptoms themselves.” (Organopathy, or Medical Progress, 180.) In this departure from Homoeopathy we find the same fatal error, neglect of symptomatology; and the objections to the Pathological and

Morbid Anatomy Schools apply with equal force to this one. It is imperfect. HAHNEMANN’S law does indeed require that the remedy should act on the same organ as is affected in the patient, when that can be with certainty demonstrated; but it requires much more, viz., that it should be affected in the same way; in a word, that the totality of the symptoms should be the indication for the selection of the remedy. Thus HAHNEMANN’S law is applicable to all cases, whereas Organopathy breaks down for two reasons, (1) that we often cannot diagnose what organ is primarily affected, as Dr. Sharp admits, and (2) that every well-proved medicine acts on every organ of the body so far as can be ascertained from the symptoms produced by it on the living organism, and the postmortem appearances in cases of poisoning, limited and therefore indecisive though they be, point to the same conclusion[5].

The fourth and latest departure was that of Schüssler, who invented a new system of curing all diseases with twelve “tissue remedies”, the indications for these being based on certain pathological theories of his own. This new system, having suddenly sprung up like a fungus, has already perished from inanition; the only good ever derived from it being a collection of clinical symptoms cured by potencies of these twelve drugs, which we can use, as Bönninghausen used clinical symptoms in his repertories with HAHNEMANN’S approval, to fill up the gaps in our Materia Medica.[6]

In the second place, HAHNEMANN teaches us, that having selected the simillimum, we should give that remedy solely, not mixing or alternating it with any other remedy, or using any other remedy externally, and should allow it to act undisturbed until its full curative action is exhausted. It has been asserted by the Anti-Hahnemannians, that HAHNEMANN at times speaks with approval of “alternation “; a careful examination and comparison of the passages where he uses the word will show that the “alternation “which he approved of in treating the sick was invariably an alternation ‘or change of medicine according to a corresponding alternation or change in the symptoms of the patient, and not otherwise. Our Master says (Organon 272), “In no case is it requisite to administer more than one single simple medicinal substance at one time “; and in the note thereto, “Some Homoeopathists have made the experiment, in cases where they deemed one remedy suitable for one portion of the symptoms of a case of disease, and a second for another portion, of administering both remedies at once, or almost at once; but I earnestly deprecate such hazardous experiments, that can never be necessary, though they may sometimes seem to be of use.” This law of the single remedy has been observed even by some of the leading Allopaths both before and after HAHNEMANN’S time, among whom we may mention Cullen, Elliotson, and Simpson; and not only does it result in a surer knowledge of the curative power of medicines than could otherwise be obtained, but it is also the only way in which medicines can be given according to the law of The effect of two drugs combined (and alternation is merely mixing them in the patient’s organism instead of in the medicine bottle) is not merely that of one plus the other, but a tertius quid, differing from each, as may be seen by comparing the action of Dover’s Powder with that of its constituents, ipecacuanha and opium. Hence, unless our remedies are proved on healthy persons in combination or alternation, they cannot be prescribed homoeopathically in like manner for the sick, because we know not what their combined or alternated action on the healthy would be.

Yet this law, perfectly in accordance with reason, and so plainly stated by HAHNEMANN, is broken by many of his professed followers. We have not a word to say against neophytes whose imperfect knowledge of Homoeopathy may at times compel them to fall back upon other means, the employment of which they more thoroughly understand, always provided that they really do their best, and strive to advance; but we do most emphatically protest against the practice of professed Homœopathicians, of many years’ standing, some of them writers and teachers, who habitually violate this law of HAHNEMANN without even testing it first. We know of professed Homoeopathicians who habitually give two remedies in alternation; and we know of others who use leeches and blisters. We have now lying before us the following prescriptions by professed Homœopathicians : —Hydrarg. Biniodidi gr. -rig Pot. Iodidi gr. ij., Fiat pilula et mitte tales xij. i. ter die sumendus; compound decoction of sarsaparilla [containing sarsaparilla, guaiacum, sassafras, mezereum and glycyrrhiza] mixed with iodide of potassium; Donovan’s solution [consisting of Arsenic, Iodine and Mercury], with the application of caustic to the throat; a liniment of aconite, chloroform, capsicum, and alcohol, with a mixture of chlorate of potash and hydrochloric acid internally; and, to crown all, the following most remarkable Homoeopathic (!?) prescription : —Tinct. acon. 50 m, tinct. nucis. vom. 40 m, aqua chloroformi, ad. uncias, 6, one teaspoonful undiluted half-hourly for 8 doses, then hourly; with the following pill Hydrarg.subchlor.gr —. 1, extract bellad.gr, pil.coloc.co. gr. 8, ft. pil. ii. h.s.s. Nor is this evil confined to private practice; we know as a fact that similar practices exist in certain so-called Homoeopathic institutions for the relief of the sick. In the Monthly Homoeopathic Review, 1875, p. 420, we find the following record, without a word of adverse comment: “In Nov., 1874, I took the patient to Mr. —, a well-known surgeon in our ranks, for the benefit of consultation. He cauterized the urethra with stick nitrate of silver. Unfortunately, this procedure set up an acute cystitis, utterly uncontrollable by remedies. Incessant enuresis was superadded to the patient’s sufferings, who from this time gravitated downwards till she finally sank, on April 21st, 1875.” (The italics are ours.) Lastly, in a lecture on Follicular Pharyngitis, recently given at the new London School of Homoeopathy, we find the lecturer saying, “In certain cases you may require to assist the internal treatment by local applications, which may be either applied by swabbing the parts or by the atomizing apparatus. The best of these applications is the pure tincture of hamamelis, a drug which I shall afterwards mention as a remedy of great value in chronic varicose states, and as having a special affinity for the venous system. Or you may use nitrate of silver, gr. 20 to oz. 1, or tinct. ferri perchlor, or alum, in solution of gr. 5 to 10 to oz. 1. You will understand, however, that I do not advise you to use these local stimulants except in such obstinate cases as resist internal treatment.” (Monthly Homœopathic Review, 1877, pp. 541-2).[7]

With every feeling of sympathy for the difficulties of the lecturer, who not many years ago occupied a high position in the Allopathic ranks (and we know how difficult it is to shake off old associations), we must most strongly protest against such teaching in a school to which Allopathic students and practitioners are invited to learn the principles of Homoeopathy. Such teaching is entirely at variance with that of HAHNEMANN; it is unnecessary, because known to every Allopath before; and it is pernicious, inasmuch as it tends to make them believe that where are cases where Allopathy will cure after Homoeopathy has failed; hence they will naturally conclude that, in obstinate or severe cases, if their first application of the law of Similia fails, they had better fall back upon Allopathy at once, without searching the Materia Medica further to find out the truly Homoeopathic remedy.

In the third place, HAHNEMANN teaches us the law of the dynamization of medicines. He says (Organon 269), “The Homoeopathic system. of medicine develops for its use, to an unheard of degree, the spiritual medicinal powers of the crude substances by means of a process peculiar to it, and which has hitherto never been tried,[8] whereby only they all become penetratingly efficacious and serviceable, even those that, in the crude state, gave no evidence of the slightest medicinal power on the human body.” Again, he says (Preface to part 5 of the Chronic Diseases), “Homoeopathic dynamizations are real awakenings of the medicinal properties that lie dormant in natural bodies during their crude state, which then become capable of acting in an almost spiritual manner upon our life, that is to say, on our percipient (sensible) and excitable (irritable) fibers. These developments of properties (dynamizations) in crude medicinal substances, which were unknown before my time, are not accomplished, as I first taught, by the trituration of dry substances in a mortar, but by the succussion of liquid substances, which is nothing less than a trituration of them. These preparations, therefore, cannot have the term ‘dilutions’ applied to them, although every preparation of the sort, in order to potentize it higher, that is to say, in order to awaken and develop still further the medicinal properties that still lie latent in it, must first be again yet more attenuated, to allow the trituration or succussion to penetrate more deeply into the essential nature of the medicinal substance, and thus to liberate and bring to light the more subtle part of the medicinal power that lies still deeper, which were impossible to be effected by the greatest amount of trituration and succussion of substances in a concentrated state.” Again, he says (Organon 246, note), “It holds good, and will continue to hold good as a homoeopathic therapeutic maxim, not to be refuted by any experience in the world, that the best dose of the properly-selected remedy is always the very smallest one in one of the high dynamizations (30), as well for chronic as for acute diseases; —a truth that is the inestimable property of pure homoeopathy, and which, as long as allopathy (and the new mongrel-system, made up of a mixture of allopathic and homœopathic processes, is not much better) continues to gnaw like a cancer at the life of sick human beings, and to ruin them by large and ever larger doses of drugs, will keep pure homoeopathy separated from these spurious arts as by an impassable gulf.” Again, he says (Organon 287, note), “The higher we carry the attenuations accompanied by dynamization (by two succussion ‑ strokes), with so much the more rapid and penetrating action does the preparation seem to affect the vital force and to alter the health, with but slight diminution of strength, even when this operation is carried very far—in place, as is usual (and generally sufficient), to 30, when it is carried to 60, 150, 300, and higher.” Further, he says (Organon 276, note), “The praise bestowed, of late years, by some few homoeopathists, on the larger doses, depends on this, either that they chose low dynamizations of the medicine to be administered, as I myself used to do twenty years ago, from not knowing any better, or that the medicines selected were not perfectly homœopathic.” Lastly, he says (Organon 276), “A medicine, even though it may be homoeopathically suited to the case of disease, does harm in every dose that is too large, the more harm the larger the dose, and by the magnitude of the dose it does more harm the greater its homœopathicity and the higher the potency selected.” From these statements we deduce this law, that the more homoeopathic the medicine, the higher should be the potency, and the smaller the dose.[9]

This third law of HAHNEMANN has found as many opponents as the other two. While some are content with saying that in practice they have found the low potencies act best (and we cannot blame them for giving the potencies with which they achieve most success, though we think the solution of this difficulty is given by HAHNEMANN himself in one of the passages just quoted), there are others who totally repudiate the use of the high potencies, asserting them to be “nonentities.” This we entirely deny. While we admit, with HAHNEMANN, that unless a simillimum is found, the highest potencies will be of little avail, so that the whole scale of potencies should be open to the use of the Homoeopathician, yet we believe that there are very few, if any, cases of disease for which a remedy cannot be found sufficiently similar to cure in a high potency, which potencies we prefer as being more rapidly and permanently curative.

Having thus pointed out the principal rules of HAHNEMANN’S Homoeopathy, and how his professed followers are divided into two camps, the Hahnemannians and the Anti-Hahnemannians, the question arises, Are the Hahnemannians truly and sufficiently represented in the journals which profess to advocate Homoeopathic principles? While we acknowledge the services to our cause which many of these journals have rendered, yet we cannot be blind to the fact that not only are some of these journals openly hostile to the Hahnemannian School, but that of the rest there is not one at the present day which is devoted solely to the teaching and illustration of the Hahnemannian method, as we believe it must be continually taught and illustrated, if we are to advance. This want we hope to supply; and this is our reason for the publication of “THE ORGANON.”

II. The present time most suitable for such an undertaking.

A truth generally passes through three stages; first, it is received by a few earnest men; it is then unpopular, and meets with opposition, therefore none adhere to it who are not sincere : next comes the stage of popularity; at this period, a number of half-adherents arise, either for the sake of the emoluments attending it, or, because, having been unsuccessful in the old state of things, they think they may succeed better in the new : this necessarily results in truth being corrupted and perverted, till, at last—for magna est veritas et prævalebit— a storm arises, and the overclouded sky is cleared, and truth once more shines forth, appearing all the brighter after her temporary eclipse,

This has been the case with Homoeopathy, on both sides of the Atlantic. Up to the year 1867, the Hahnemannians successfully defended and advanced their cause. Here our principles were maintained, first in the Homoeopathic Times, and afterwards in the Monthly Homoeopathic Review, by Drs. David Wilson, Fenton Cameron, Hewitt, and others. In the United States, we were well represented, first by the American Homoeopathic Review, and afterwards by the Hahnemannian Monthly; in addition to which the old Philadelphia College was recognized, and a staff of Hahnemannian teachers appointed.

Then came the second period, that of eclipse. Here the journals were closed as far as possible to the Hahnemannians, whose teaching was misrepresented, and whose writings were excluded, or, if inserted, frequently mutilated; while the leaders of the Pathological School were permitted every opportunity of promulgating their own tenets. In the States an unhappy dispute arose between two of the leading Hahnemannians, really based upon the question whether we should give up our uncompromising attitude towards the Anti-Hahnemannians in the hope of converting them. This divided our ranks, and even caused a disruption in the Philadelphia College; since which another Hahnemannian of eminence followed in the same mistaken path, and after announcing the principle of freedom of medical opinion for Homoeopathic physicians (i.e., that whatever principles they held they might still retain the name), at last enunciated the startling fallacy that the Organon should be placed “for frequent perusal, and as a trusted guide, in the hands, not perhaps of the student, but of the educated earnest practitioner.” Owing to the fact that Homoeopathy had taken deeper root in the States than with us, it did not suffer so much as here, and though under a cloud, was still sustained by some few Hahnemannians, among whom, besides our own American co-editors, we must mention Dr. Rollin R. Gregg, of Buffalo, whose Homoeopathic Quarterly was one of the most valuable periodicals over published, and had not the ill-health of the author caused its cessation, would probably have occupied the ground now assumed by “THE ORGANON.”

The third period, that of resuscitation, commenced in 1876.

Here, at the close of the preceding year, an Allopathic physician, who for many years had been one of the most determined opponents of Homoeopathy, announced his conversion to HAHNEMANN’S practical teaching in all its details; a sufficiently rare occurrence in this conservative land to give an impetus thereto. The World’s Homoeopathic Congress was held- at Philadelphia in 1876, and was noted, not only for the strong advocacy of Hahnemannian principles thereat, but for the long-desired reconciliation of the two Hahnemannians before referred to, who henceforth worked together in harmony as before; and we cannot but believe that had our other colleague lived, he too would have seen the fatal error of compromise into which he had fallen, and devoted his splendid talents solely and uncompromisingly to the cause of HAHNEMANN.

While, on the one hand, the Hahnemannians were thus consolidated and strengthened, and the Anti-Hahnemannians weakened by the loss of the two illustrious names on which they had depended so much, some of the latter betrayed their real aims and belief. Here several professed Homoeopathicians applied for re-admission to the privileges (so-called) of the main body of the medical profession, only to be contemptuously rejected; while, on the establishment of the “London School of Homoeopathy”, a strong effort was made, by some of the oldest and most influential men among the ranks of professed Homoeopathicians, to eliminate the name of “Homoeopathy.” In the United States a series of resolutions were passed at meetings of the Homoeopathic Medical Society of Northern New York, July 10th, 1877, and of the Albany County Homoeopathic Medical Society, July 17th, 1877, in which, among other absurdities, we find, “The use of remedies in Inappreciable Doses Non-Homoeopathic”, and “Provings of High Potencies useless and discreditable to Homœopathy.” These facts clearly show what the Anti-Hahnemannians would do with Homoeopathy if they had their own way, and that the time has come for making a firm stand against them.

III. The Objects of “THE ORGANON.”

It is perfectly plain to us that so far from an amalgamation between the Homoeopaths and the Allopaths being possible, a separation in the ranks of the former (so-called) between the Hahnemannians and Anti-Hahnemannians must sooner or later take place. We have here a “Homoeopathic Directory”, to distinguish us from the Allopaths; but when we find in that Directory the names of physicians who frequently prescribe leeches, blisters, and Allopathic mixtures such as those we have already quoted, side by side with those who adhere to all Hahnemann’s practical rules, the utility of such an index is not very apparent; indeed, we know of Allopaths who are far nearer our principles than some of these men. As a preparatory measure, and in order to test our strength in the United States, Dr. Lippe sent out a “Declaration of Homoeopathic Principles”, which has been signed more extensively than we could have hoped. It now remains only to instruct those who are wavering, and bring them over to our side. We know (from what has been told us) that in the ranks of the Anti-Hahnemannians there are many who know no better; who have been deceived by their teachers, from whom they have received stones instead of bread; and who, being dissatisfied with their present state, would gladly adopt a better way if they only knew it, and were taught how to walk in it. For the incorrigibly stupid and lazy, who resort to Allopathic means to save themselves trouble, while they dishonestly assume the honored name of Homœopathician for the sake of the gain it may bring, we have no sympathy; but to those who acknowledge their error, and are willing to learn, we desire to render all the assistance available.

We therefore “unfurl the banner of the prophet”, and summon all true believers to our standard; and with our “quadrilateral” of editors, and hosts of true soldiers and recruit arming for the struggle and flocking to our ranks, we hope to repulse the advancing stream of Anti-Hahnemannian “Muscovites” which assail us. But while we feel it to be our duty to uphold what we believe to be the truth, and to combat error, we desire it to be understood that we oppose principles, not individuals; we wish to keep “THE ORGANON” free from all angry personalities—no “atrocities” to be perpetrated—and show by illustration what Homoeopathy can do, rather than

“Prove our doctrine orthodox

By Apostolic blows and knocks”,

We shall, therefore, in the first place, strenuously uphold the practical teachings of HAHNEMANN, as elaborated by him for the period of fifty years. We shall maintain that his Organon, so far from being superseded, or being suitable not to the “student”, but only to the “educated earnest practitioner”, is the very first book which the student should read; nay, more, that he cannot possibly become an “educated earnest practitioner” till he has made himself thoroughly master of that wonderful work, which is the foundation of all our teaching, a perfect sine qua non; and we shall endeavor to prove that there is not a single practical doctrine taught by HAHNEMANN which is not thoroughly and essentially true.

We shall maintain, that so long as we assume the honored name of Homœopathicians, we are bound to be true to our colors; that while we may build yet higher on the foundation which HAHNEMANN laid, adding new symptoms and remedies to our Materia Medica, discovering new characteristics, developing still further the science of dynamization, and even discovering fresh laws (if there be any) additional to, but yet in harmony with, those which our Master has given us; yet that we cannot, without deceiving the public, call ourselves by that name, and yet persistently ignore HAHNEMANN’S own rules, and substitute other methods which are diametrically opposed to them, which methods, after careful trial, he had already rejected.

The vexed question of the potency and dose, and that of the selection of the remedy, will be thoroughly investigated; and we shall endeavor to show that the dose and potency are always subservient to the mode of selecting the Simillimum; that the latter and not the former is the fons et origo of all our differences; the accurate selection of the Simillimum according to HAHNEMANN’S rules being followed as a matter of course by the single remedy and the small dose of the dynamited medicine, as practically the best and simplest treatment.

A series of papers is also being prepared on Potencies, in which will be given not only all we know about the preparations of the various high potencies now in use, but also the best and newest modes of potentizing, grafting, preparing, and preserving medicines, so that every physician may know how to make his own potencies, as HAHNEMANN did, and meant us all to do.

We shall devote much space to Materia Medica, for on its continuous enlargement, combined with its earnest study and accurate employment, depends our progressively increasing power of healing the sick. To this end we shall welcome all carefully-made provings, whether with massive doses or the highest potencies. Under the name of the “Pathogenetic Record”, a complete collection of provings and poisonings from all accessible Allopathic works in the English language will be published.

Clinical cases will be plentifully given, not only to show what Homoeopathy can do, and to confirm the pathogenetic symptoms in our Materia Medica, but especially to illustrate the method of selecting the remedy, and why, out of two or more Similia, we select one as the Simillimum. As we cannot in many cases cover the totality of the symptoms, and are thus obliged to select our remedies according to those which are the most characteristic (see Organon 153)—these symptoms being often our starting-point, even when the totality can be covered—it is obvious that there are many ways of arriving at the Simillimum; thus the specific character of a symptom may be the most important feature in one case, the locality in another, the direction in a third, the general character in a fourth, the conditions or causes in a fifth, or the concomitants and sequences in a sixth. Every case, therefore, may have special points of interest and instruction, and we ask our colleagues, from whom we invite clinical contributions, to remember this, and make their reports as useful as possible.

While we do not hold ourselves responsible for any of the opinions of our contributors, yet we shall strive to keep the pages of “THE ORGANON” free from all eclecticism; we shall admit all good. cases, with whatever potency they have been cured, though we ourselves prefer those cured by the high potencies, for the simple reason that they are less believed in, and therefore more required; but we shall under no circumstances admit cases where two or more medicines have been employed at a time, or alternated without a corresponding alternation or change on the part of the symptoms; or have been given, except as chemical or evacuant antidotes to poisons (see Organon 67, note), on any other law than that of Similia Similibus Curentur.

We also intend occasionally to republish monographs by Bönninghausen and other departed worthies, which have long since been out of print.”THE ORGANON” is not intended solely for the medical profession, but also for those among the public who desire really to understand Homoeopathy. Some of the Anti-Hahnemannians, as we are aware, are averse to this; they do not like the public to know too much, and object to discussions on true and false Homoeopathy in the daily press. With what reason they think thus let others judge; we, on the contrary, have nothing to conceal or be ashamed of; our practice agrees with our profession; and we look forward to the time when the intelligent public will so understand the genius of Homoeopathy, that they will at once detect and repudiate any physician who does not follow the Organon, whether he calls himself Homœopathician or not.

With full faith in the justice and eventual triumph of our sacred cause, we now launch our bark on the troubled waters, and with confidence appeal to all true followers of HAHNEMANN to support us in our arduous undertaking.

[1] Strictly speaking, Physiology is the science or theory of the functions and changes of the healthy body; Pathology that of the same when diseased, whether by drugs or otherwise; hence the Pathological action of drugs is the theory that we may form as to their mode of action on the organism, while their Pathogenetic action signifies the facts which we observe concerning their action (symptoms), irrespective of theory.

[2] In the Monthly Homeopathic Review, March, 1867, there is an editorial paper entitled, “Hahnemannians and Physicians practicing Homoeopathy”, in which we find the following identical teaching : “There are, however, many oases where diagnosis is difficult and simply conjectural; and we concede that, in these cases, we must continue to resort to ‘symptom treatment’ until Our pathological knowledge is more complete.” That this teaching is not in accordance with that of HAHNEMANN is suggested by the very title of the editorial.

[3] The opponents of Homoeopathy have frequently asserted, that while HAHNEMANN rejected the uncertain and vague pathology of the old school of his time, as an indication for treatment, yet he himself invented a new and improved pathology of chronic diseases, basing a special treatment thereon; hence they argue, We may also base our treatment on the “new and improved pathology “of the present day. Without stopping to show that the pathology of to-day is no more certain than that of fifty years ago, we deny their statement concerning HAHNEMANN. His doctrine of the nature of chronic diseases is not a mere pathological theory, but a well-established fact, acknowledged by the leading Allopaths, viz., that external manifestations of disease are not local but constitutional, internal disorders resulting from their suppression. His teaching with regard to their treatment is based upon this fact of sequence of symptoms, and simply amounts to this, that in the treatment of chronic diseases, in order to eradicate the constitutional taint, we must sooner or later employ those remedies which are homoeopathic, not only to the present symptoms but also to the past, in other words, which are indicated by the entire constitutional state of the patient. Thus here again the totality of the symptoms, with the utmost minuteness of detail, is the sole indication for the choice of the remedy.

[4] In Hahnemannian Monthly, vol. xi., p. 259, Dr. Lilienthal is reported to have said, at a meeting of the Hahnemann Academy of Medicine, “Paralysis Agitans, for example, has no head symptoms; the brain is perfectly clear. I will first select the remedies having no head symptoms.” If this is the result of the teaching of the Pathological School, it is indeed deplorable, for it hag actually made our learned friend overlook the fact that every well-proved medicine in the Materia Medica has head symptoms!

[5] We lately saw a tract in which this departure was served up in a popular dress. The writer thereof informed the public that belladonna would cure inflammation of the eyes, because it had a marked action on them; but that ipecacuanha would not, because it had not any such action. Nevertheless, we find in Allen’s Materia Medica, symptom 55, that ipecacuanha has produced one of the most severe eye symptoms on record, which we trust this would-be teacher of Homoeopathy will never experience, unless it be from a proving of some medicine for the sake of suffering humanity.

[6] Some professed Homœopathicians, whose own practice is by no means in accordance with the Organon, have raised an outcry against the use of clinical symptoms, alleging, first, that their use is contrary to the law of Homoeopathy, and, secondly, that the errors of Allopathy have chiefly arisen from its being based on clinical observations. The fact that HAHNEMANN preferred Bönninghausen’s repertory to all others, is a proof that he approved of the cautious use of well-established clinical symptoms for the purpose above named; besides which, to base a system on clinical experience with large doses which may act homeopathically, allopathically, enantiopathically, chemically, or in other ways, as the Allopaths do, is a very different matter from first selecting symptoms cured by doses so small that no other action than the homoeopathic seems possible, and then using these solely to supply the deficiencies of our provings, which every year become less.

[7] Two of the employers of some of the above Allopathic measures are on the Council of the London School of Homoeopathy. The Council has the power to appoint lecturers, and we now see what treatment is taught in the lectures. Can the promoters of the School (which might be made of incalculable value) wonder that the leading Hahnemannians have refused to join it till these matters are altered? In Dr. Richard Hughes’s Introductory Lecture at the above School, delivered Oct. 2nd, 1877, we read (p. 8), “We cannot indeed conciliate such opponents by pledging ourselves to an unquestioning discipleship of HAHNEMANN.””We may sometimes have to modify his system in detail.” We would ask whether the Allopathic treatment of swabbing the throat with alum, perchloride of iron, or nitrate of silver is a “modification in detail” or whether it is not rather a direct violation of the rules of Homoeopathy. The phrase reminds us of the general who, after being utterly defeated, retired precipitately “for strategic reasons.”

[8] HAHNEMANN is historically in error about the discovery of dynamization, which was known to the alchemists.

[9] The fact that HAHNEMANN, when he wrote the Organon (1833), chiefly used the 30th potency, is no proof that higher ones were not to be given; he states, in a letter to Korsakoff, written about this time, that he recommended an adherence to this potency for the sake of uniformity, but, in his later days, he gave higher potencies himself.