The varieties of toothache are rendered still more numerous by the symptoms with which it is connected. I counted eighteen of these. Among them are coldness of the ears, twitching of the feet and fingers, and a necessity to run about.
An aversion to different things is produced by different remedies. Thus colchicum causes an aversion to pork—zinc to veal and fish—selenium to salt food—hellebore to sour crout—arnica to broth—assafœtida to beer—sabadilla to wine[16]—belladonna to vegetables—sulphur to washing one’s self—tartarized antimony to tobacco smoking—spigelia to tobacco-snuffing, &c. Nothing is mentioned as causing an aversion to tobacco chewing. Some Homœopathists had better extend the line of discovery in that direction.
Jahr has some singular grouping of symptoms. Under the effects of colchicum we have “mental exertion, touch, bright light, smell of pork, and improper behavior of others, exacerbates the case excessively.” In relation to the pork, he does not say whether it is cooked or uncooked—there is certainly a failure in the nicety of his discrimination here.
These Homœopathists sometimes make wonderful discoveries. In the notice of the effects of stramonium, I find this. “Air passes out of the ears.” Does stramonium, I would ask Mr. Jahr, or his translator, Mr. Hering, set up the manufacture of air in the ears, or does it punch a hole through the drum of the ear, and thus let the patient blow air from his mouth through the ears? Our allopathic mind cannot divine how air can come from the ears except in one or the other of these two ways.
But enough of this. The reader, I trust, has had a sufficient insight into Homœopathic observation, to see that it proves nothing. If it proves what it professes to do, then anything may be made to prove anything that may be desired. We laugh at the folly of the fly on the coach, that supposed itself to be the cause of all the dust made by the prancing horses, and the whirling wheels; but the folly of the fly is as nothing, compared with his, who considers all symptoms, bodily and mental, for fifty days as resulting from a few decillionths of a grain of sulphur, or salt, or oystershell. And yet it is upon such ridiculous assumptions as these, falsely called “observations,” that the system of Homœopathy is based. The results of these observations, we are informed in Dr. Hering’s introduction, “have, through the zeal of the Homœopathists, already filled more than fifteen octavo volumes.” The Materia Medica of Hahneman himself fills six volumes. It is spoken of by his followers as “a rich arsenal, from which Homœopathy may arm itself against every known disease; it contains at present nearly 80,000 combinations of symptoms, with the corresponding substances which shall produce their counterparts; and it goes on every day to be still farther enriched, and to such an extent, as to leave it utterly impossible to assign any limits to the future developments of Homœopathy.” What a stupendous monument of human folly is this confused mass of rubbish! It is no wonder that a man who could invent such a system as Homœopathy is, should at last place as a cap stone upon this monument the grand discovery, which he says it cost him twelve years of research to make, viz. that seven eighths of all chronic diseases come from a psoric virus, of which psora (vulgarly called itch) is only the simplest development!
But it is said that, laugh as we may at the ridiculousness of Homœopathy, as a system, it is really successful in practice. If we are to take the testimony of such observers as Mr. Jahr, and his brother compilers of the fifteen octavo volumes of “observations” to this point, I must beg leave to demur. But the doctors who practice according to these same fifteen octavo volumes, and the multitudes, especially the female multitudes, who practice in their families with their little boxes filled with little phials of little globules, with a little pamphlet of directions, testify, that Homœopathy is eminently successful. Such was the testimony also in regard to the success of Perkins’ Tractors, Dr. Beddoes’ Gases, and St. John Long’s Liniment. That testimony does not avail just now, and I suspect that some years hence, when some other delusion shall succeed in supplanting Homœopathy, the present testimony of Homœopathists to its success will avail as little.
But it is true, I most cheerfully allow, that Homœopathy is more successful than any exclusive system of practice, which is characterized by positive medication. It is so, simply because it leaves the curative power of nature to act freely, undisturbed by any officious interference. It is also true, that Homœopathy is more successful than any over dosing practice of any kind. But it is not true that it is anything like as successful as a cautious eclectic practice. I mean by this a practice which selects its remedies from every source where they are to be found, governing its choice by the actual effects ascertained by careful observation, without regard to any theory or any exclusive system of doctrines. This is the only proper mode of practice, (if it can be called a mode,) and though it makes no such loud pretensions as are made by the different exclusive modes of practice, in their strife for popularity, it is pre-eminently successful. I mean successful in curing disease. I do not refer at all to success in obtaining the public favor—that is quite another thing.
The success which Homœopathy has realized, in obtaining its hold upon the community, results from several causes which I will briefly notice.
1. Mental influence. This system of practice is especially calculated to produce a great effect in this way. The very idea, that there is a peculiar power imparted to the little globules by their preparation, acts upon the imagination of the patient. It gratifies too the love of mystery, so common, and so ready to respond to the appeals which are made to it. The minute examination of symptoms, of which such display is made by Homœopathic physicians, adds to this influence upon the mind, by its imposing air of deep and patient research.
2. A strict regard to diet and regimen. This I need not dwell upon.