Psora = Flora
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Organon Of Medicine
Samuel Hahnemann, MD
Psora
§ 80
Incalculably greater and more important than the two chronic miasms
just named, however, is the chronic miasm of psora, which, while those
two reveal their specific internal dyscrasia, the one by the venereal
chancre, the other by the cauliflower-like growths, does also, after
the completion of the internal infection of the whole organism,
announce by a peculiar cutaneous eruption, sometimes consisting only
of a few vesicles accompanied by intolerable voluptuous tickling
itching (and a peculiar odor), the monstrous internal chronic miasm -
the psora, the only real fundamental cause and producer of all the
other numerous, I may say innumerable, forms of disease1, which, under
the names of nervous debility, hysteria, hypochondriasis, mania,
melancholia, imbecility, madness, epilepsy and convulsions of all
sorts, softening of the bones (rachitis), scoliosis and cyphosis,
caries, cancer, fungus nematodes, neoplasms, gout, haemorrhoids,
jaundice, cyanosis, dropsy, amenorrhoea, haemorrhage from the stomach,
nose, lungs, bladder and womb, of asthma and ulceration of the lungs,
of impotence and barrenness, of megrim, deafness, cataract, amaurosis,
urinary calculus, paralysis, defects of the senses and pains of
thousands of kinds, etc., figure in systematic works on pathology as
peculiar, independent diseases.
1 I spent twelve years in investigating the source of this incredibly
large number of chronic affections, in ascertaining and collecting
certain proofs of this great truth, which had remained unknown to all
former or contemporary observers, and in discovering at the same time
the principal (antipsoric) remedies, which collectively are nearly a
match for this thousand-headed monster of disease in all its different
developments and forms. I have published my observations on this
subject in the book entitled The Chronic Diseases (4 vols., Dresden,
Arnold. [2nd edit., Dusseldorf, Schaub.]) before I had obtained this
knowledge I could only treat the whole number of chronic diseases as
isolated, individual maladies, with those medicinal substances whose
pure effects had been tested on healthy persons up to that period, so
that every case of chronic disease was treated by my disciples
according to the group of symptoms it presented, just like an
idiopathic disease, and it was often so for cured that sick mankind
rejoiced at the extensive remedial treasures already amassed by the
new healing art. How much greater cause is there now for rejoicing
that the desired goal has been so much more nearly attained, inasmuch
as the recently discovered and far more specific homoeopathic remedies
for chronic affections arising from psora (properly termed antipsoric
remedies) and the special instructions for their preparation and
employment have been published; and from among them the true physician
can now select for his curative agents those whose medicinal symptoms
correspond in the most similar (homoeopathic) manner to the chronic
disease he has to cure; and thus, by the employment of (antipsoric)
medicines more suitable for this miasm, he is enabled to render more
essential service and almost invariably to effect a perfect cure.
§ 81
The fact that this extremely ancient infecting agent has gradually
passed, in some hundreds of generations, through many millions of
human organisms and has thus attained an incredible development,
renders it in some measure conceivable how it can now display such
innumerable morbid forms in the great family of mankind, particularly
when we consider what a number of circumstances1 contribute to the
production of these great varieties of chronic diseases (secondary
symptoms of psora), besides the indescribable diversity of men in
respect of their congenital corporeal constitutions, so that it is no
wonder if such a variety of injurious agencies, acting from within and
from without and sometimes continually, on such a variety of organisms
permeated with the psoric miasm, should produce an innumerable variety
of defects, injuries, derangements and sufferings, which have hitherto
been treated of in the old pathological works2, under a number of
special names, as diseases of an independent character.
1 Some of these causes that exercise a modifying influence on the
transformation of psora into chronic diseases manifestly depend
sometimes on the climate and the peculiar physical character of the
place of abode, sometimes on the very great varieties in the physical
and mental training of youth, both of which may have been neglected,
delayed or carried to excess, or on their abuse in the business or
conditions of life, in the matter of diet and regimen, passions,
manners, habits and customs of various kinds.
2 How many improper ambiguous names do not these works contain, under
each of which are included excessively different morbid conditions,
which often resemble each other in one single symptom only, as ague,
jaundice, dropsy, consumption, leucorrhoea, haemorrhoids, rheumatism,
apoplexy, convulsions, hysteria, hypochondriasis, melancholia, mania,
quinsy, palsy, etc., which are represented as diseases of a fixed and
unvarying character, and are treated, on account of their name,
according to a determinate plan! How can the bestowal of such a name
justify an identical medical treatment? And if the treatment is not
always to be the same, why make use of an identical name which
postulates an identity of treatment? Nihil sane in artem medicam
pestiferum magis unquam irrepsit malum, quam generalia quaedam
medicinam, says Huxham, a man as clear-sighted as he was estimable on
account of his conscientiousness (Op. phys. med., tom. I.). And in
like manner Frittze laments (Annalen, I, p.80) that essentially
different diseases are designated by the same name. Even those
epidemic diseases, which undoubtedly may be propagated in every
separate epidemic by a peculiar contagious principle which remains
unknown to us, are designated, in the old school of medicine by
particular names, just as if they were well-known fixed diseases that
invariably recurred under the same form, as hospital fever, goal
fever, camp fever, putrid fever, bilious fever, nervous fever, mucous
fever, although each epidemic of such roving fevers exhibits itself at
every occurrence as another, a new disease, such as it has never
before appeared in exactly the same form, differing very much, in
every instance, in its course, as well as in many of its most striking
symptoms and its whole appearance. Each is so for dissimilar to all
previous epidemics, whatever names they may bear, that it would be
dereliction of all logical accuracy in our ideas of things were we to
give to these maladies, that differ so much among themselves, one of
those names we meet with in pathological writings, and treat them all
medicinally in conformity with this misused name. The candid Sydenham
alone perceived this, when he (Obs. med., cap. ii, De morb, epid.)
insists upon the necessity of not considering any epidemic disease as
having occurred before and treating it in the same way as another,
since all that occur successively, be they ever so numerous, differ
from one another: Nihil quicquam (opinor,) animum universae qua patet
medicinae pomoeria perlustrantem, tanta admiratione percellet, quam
discolor illa et sui plane dissimilis morborum Epidemicorum facies;
non tam qua varias ejusdem anni tempestates, quam qua discrepantes
divewrsorum ab invicem annorum constitutiones referunt, ab iisque
dependent. Quae tam aperta praedictorum morborum diversitas tum
propriis ac sibi peculiaribus symptomatis, tum etiam medendi ratione,
quam hi ab illis disparem prorsus sibi vendicant, satis illucescit. Ex
quibus constat morbus hosce, ut ut externa quadantenus specie, er
symptomatis aliquot utrisque pariter super venientibus, convenire
paulo incautioribus videantur, re tamen ipsa (si bene adverteris
animum), alienae admondum esse indolis, et distare ut aera lupinis.
From all this it is clear that these useless and misused names of
diseases ought to have no influence on the practice of the true
physician, who knows that he has to judge of and to cure diseases, not
according to the similarity of the name of a single one of their
symptoms, but according to the totality of the signs of the individual
state of each particular patient, whose affection it is his duty
carefully to investigate, but never to give a hypothetical guess at
it.
If, however, it is deemed necessary sometimes to make use of names of
diseases, in order, when talking about a patient to ordinary persons,
to render ourselves intelligible in few words, we ought only to employ
them as collective names, and tell them, eg., the patient has a kind
of St. Vitus's dance, a kind of dropsy, a kind of typhus, a kind of
ague; but (in order to do away once and for all with the mistaken
notions these names give rise to) we should never say he has the St.
Vitus's dance, the typhus, the dropsy, the ague, as there are
certainly no disease of these and similar names of fixed unvarying
character.
§ 82
Although, by the discovery of that great source of chronic diseases,
as also by the discovery of the specific homoeopathic remedies for the
psora, medicine has advanced some steps nearer to a knowledge of the
nature of the majority of diseases it has to cure, yet, for settling
the indication in each case of chronic (psoric) disease he is called
on to cure, the duty of a careful apprehension of its ascertainable
symptoms and characteristics is as indispensable for the homoeopathic
physician as it was before that discovery, as no real cure of this or
of other diseases can take place without a strict particular treatment
(individualization) of each case of disease - only that in this
investigation some difference is to be made when the affection is an
acute and rapidly developed disease, and when it is a chronic one;
seeing that, in acute disease, the chief symptoms strike us and become
evident to the senses more quickly, and hence much less time is
requisite for tracing the picture of the disease and much fewer
questions are required to be asked1, as almost everything is self-
evident, than in a chronic disease which has been gradually
progressing for several years, in which the symptoms are much more
difficult to be ascertained.
1 Hence the following directions for investigating the symptoms are
only partially applicable for acute diseases.
§ 83
This individualizing examination of a case of disease, for which I
shall only give in this place general directions, of which the
practitioner will bear in mind only what is applicable for each
individual case, demands of the physician nothing but freedom from
prejudice and sound senses, attention in observing and fidelity in
tracing the picture of the disease.
§ 84
The patient details the history of his sufferings; those about him
tell what they heard him complain of, how he has behaved and what they
have noticed in him; the physician sees, hears, and remarks by his
other senses what there is of an altered or unusual character about
him. He writes down accurately all that the patient and his friends
have told him in the very expressions used by them. Keeping silence
himself he allows them to say all they have to say, and refrains from
interrupting them1 unless they wander off to other matters. The
physician advises them at the beginning of the examination to speak
slowly, in order that he may take down in writing the important parts
of what the speakers say.
1 Every interruption breaks the train of thought of the narrators, and
all they would have said at first does not again occur to them in
precisely the same manner after that.
§ 85
He begins a fresh line with every new circumstance mentioned by the
patient or his friends, so that the symptoms shall be all ranged
separately one below the other. He can thus add to any one, that may
at first have been related in too vague a manner, but subsequently
more explicitly explained.
§ 86
When the narrators have finished what they would say of their own
accord, the physician then reverts to each particular symptom and
elicits more precise information respecting it in the following
manner; he reads over the symptoms as they were related to him one by
one, and about each of them he inquires for further particulars, e.g.,
at what period did this symptom occur? Was it previous to taking the
medicine he had hitherto been using? While taking the medicine? Or
only some days after leaving off the medicine? What kind of pain, what
sensation exactly, was it that occurred on this spot? Where was the
precise spot? Did the pain occur in fits and by itself, at various
times? Or was it continued, without intermission? How long did it
last? At what time of the day or night, and in what position of the
body was it worst, or ceased entirely? What was the exact nature of
this or that event or circumstance mentioned - described in plain
words?
§ 87
And thus the physician obtains more precise information respecting
each particular detail, but without ever framing his questions so as
to suggest the answer to the patient1, so that he shall only have to
answer yes or no; else he will be misled to answer in the affirmative
or negative something untrue, half true, or not strictly correct,
either from indolence or in order to please his interrogator, from
which a false picture of the disease and an unsuitable mode of
treatment must result.
1 For instance the physician should not ask, Was not this or that
circumstance present? He should never be guilty of making such
suggestions, which tend to seduce the patient into giving a false
answer and a false account of his symptoms.
§ 88
If in these voluntary details nothing has been mentioned respecting
several parts or functions of the body or his metal state, the
physician asks what more can be told in regard to these parts and
these functions, or the state of his disposition or mind1, but in
doing this he only makes use of general expressions, in order that his
informants may be obliged to enter into special details concerning
them.
1 For example what was the character of his stools? How does he pass
his water? How is it with his day and night sleep? What is the state
of his disposition, his humor, his memory? How about the thirst? What
sort of taste has he in his mouth? What kinds of food and drink are
most relished? What are most repugnant to him? Has each its full
natural taste, or some other unusual taste? How does he feel after
eating or drinking? Has he anything to tell about the head, the limbs
or the abdomen?
§ 89
When the patient (for it is on him we have chiefly to rely for a
description of his sensations, except in the case of feigned diseases)
has by these details, given of his own accord and in answer to
inquiries, furnished the requisite information and traced a tolerably
perfect picture of the disease, the physician is at liberty and
obliged (if he feels he has not yet gained all the information he
needs) to ask more precise, more special questions.1
1 For example, how often are his bowels moved? What is the exact
character of the stools? Did the whitish evacuation consist of mucus
or faeces? Had he or had he not pains during the evacuation? What was
their exact character, and where were they seated? What did the
patient vomit? Is the bad taste in the mouth putrid, or bitter, or
sour, or what? before or after eating, or during the repast? At what
period of the day was it worst? What is the taste of what is
eructated? Does the urine only become turbid on standing, or is it
turbid when first discharged? What is its color when first emitted? Of
what color is the sediment? How does he behave during sleep? Does he
whine, moan, talk or cry out in his sleep? Does he start during sleep?
Does he snore during inspiration, or during expiration? Does he lie
only on his back, or on which side? Does he cover himself well up, or
can he not bear the clothes on him? Does he easily awake, or does he
sleep too soundly? How often does this or that symptom occur? What is
the cause that produces it each time it occurs? does it come on whilst
sitting, lying, standing, or when in motion? only when fasting, or in
the morning, or only in the evening, or only after a meal, or when
does it usually appear? When did the rigor come on? was it merely a
chilly sensation, or was he actually cold at the same time? if so, in
what parts? or while feeling chilly, was he actually warm to the
touch? was it merely a sensation of cold, without shivering? was he
hot without redness of the face? what parts of him were hot to the
touch? or did he complain of heat without being hot to the touch? How
long did the chilliness last? how long the hot stage? When did the
thirst come on - during the cold stage? during the heat? or previous
to it? or subsequent to it? How great was the thirst, and what was the
beverage desired? When did the sweat come on - at the beginning or the
end of the heat? or how many hours after the heat? when asleep or when
awake? How great was the sweat? was it warm or cold? on what parts?
how did it smell? What does he complain of before or during the cold
stage? what during the hot stage? what after it? what during or after
the sweating stage?
(Added to the Sixth Edition)
In women, note the character of menstruation and other discharges,
etc.
§ 90
When the physician has finished writing down these particulars, he
then makes a note of what he himself observes in the patient1, and
ascertains how much of that was peculiar to the patient in his healthy
state.
1 For example, how the patient behaved during the visit - whether he
was morose, quarrelsome, hasty, lachrymose, anxious, despairing or
sad, or hopeful, calm etc. Whether he was in a drowsy state or in any
way dull of comprehension; whether he spoke hoarsely, or in a low
tone, or incoherently, or how other wise did he talk? what was the
color of his face and eyes, and of his skin generally? what degree of
liveliness and power was there in his expression and eyes? what was
the state of his tongue, his breathing, the smell from his mouth, and
his hearing? were his pupils dilated or contracted? how rapidly and to
what extent did they alter in the dark and in the light? what was the
character of the pulse? what was the condition of the abdomen? how
moist or hot, how cold or dry to the touch, was the skin of this or
that part or generally? whether he lay with head thrown back, with
mouth half or wholly open, with the arms placed above the head, on his
back, or in what other position? what effort did he make to raise
himself? and anything else in him that may strike the physician as
being remarkable.
§ 91
The symptoms and feelings of the patient during a previous course of
medicine do not furnish the pure picture of the disease; but on the
other hand, those symptoms and ailments which he suffered from before
the use of the medicines, or after they had been discontinued for
several days, give the true fundamental idea of the original form of
the disease, and these especially the physician must take note of.
When the disease is of a chronic character, and the patient has been
taking medicine up to the time he is seen, the physician may with
advantage leave him some days quite without medicine, or in the
meantime administer something of an unmedicinal nature and defer to a
subsequent period the more precise scrutiny of the morbid symptoms, in
order to be able to grasp in their purity the permanent uncontaminated
symptoms of the old affection and to form a faithful picture of the
disease.
§ 92
But if it be a disease of a rapid course, and if its serious character
admit of no delay, the physician must content himself with observing
the morbid condition, altered though it may be by medicines, if he
cannot ascertain what symptoms were present before the employment of
the medicines, - in order that he may at least form a just
apprehension of the complete picture of the disease in its actual
condition, that is to say, of the conjoint malady formed by the
medicinal and original diseases, which from the use of inappropriate
drugs is generally more serious and dangerous than was the original
disease, and hence demands prompt and efficient aid; and by thus
tracing out the complete picture of the disease he will be enabled to
combat it with a suitable homoeopathic remedy, so that the patient
shall not fall a sacrifice to the injurious drugs he was swallowed.
§ 93
If the disease has been brought on a short time or, in the case of a
chronic affection, a considerable time previously, by some obvious
cause, then the patient - or his friends when questioned privately -
will mention it either spontaneously or when carefully interrogated.1
1 Any causes of a disgraceful character, which the patient or his
friends do not like to confess, at least not voluntarily, the
physician must endeavor to elicit by skilfully framing his questions,
or by private information. To these belong poisoning or attempted
suicide, onanism, indulgence in ordinary or unnatural debauchery,
excess in wine, cordials, punch and other ardent beverages, or coffee,
- over-indulgence in eating generally, or in some particular food of a
hurtful character, - infection with venereal disease or itch,
unfortunate love, jealousy, domestic infelicity, worry, grief on
account of some family misfortune, ill-usage, balked revenge, injured
pride, embarrassment of a pecuniary nature, superstitious fear, -
hunger, - or an imperfection in the private parts, a rupture, a
prolapse, and so forth.
§ 94
While inquiring into the state of chronic disease, the particular
circumstances of the patient with regard to his ordinary occupations,
his usual mode of living and diet, his domestic situation, and so
forth, must be well considered and scrutinized, to ascertain what
there is in them that may tend to produce or to maintain disease, in
order that by their removal the recovery may by prompted.1
1 In chronic diseases of females it is specially necessary to pay
attention to pregnancy, sterility, sexual desire, accouchements,
miscarriages, suckling, and the state of the menstrual discharge. With
respect to the last-named more particularly, we should not neglect to
ascertain if it recurs at too short intervals, or is delayed beyond
the proper time, how many days it lasts, whether its flow is
continuous or interrupted, what is its general quality, how dark is
its color, whether there is leucorrhoea before its appearance or after
its termination, but especially by what bodily or mental ailments,
what sensations and pains, it is preceded, accompanied or followed; if
there is leucorrhoea, what is its nature, what sensations attend its
flow, in what quantity it is, and what are the conditions and
occasions under which it occurs?
§ 95
In chronic disease the investigation of the signs of disease above
mentioned, and of all others, must be pursued as carefully and
circumstantially as possible, and the most minute peculiarities must
be attended to, partly because in these diseases they are the most
characteristic and least resemble those of acute diseases, and if a
cure is to be affected they cannot be too accurately noted; partly
because the patients become so used to their long sufferings that they
pay little or no heed to the lesser accessory symptoms, which are
often very pregnant with meaning (characteristic) - often very useful
in determining the choice of the remedy - and regard them almost as a
necessary part of their condition, almost as health, the real feeling
of which they have well-nigh forgotten in the sometimes fifteen or
twenty years of suffering, and they can scarcely bring themselves to
believe that these accessory symptoms, these greater or less
deviations from the healthy state, can have any connection with their
principal malady.
§ 96
Besides this, patients themselves differ so much in their
dispositions, that some, especially the so-called hypochondriacs and
other persons of great sensitiveness and impatient of suffering,
portray their symptoms in too vivid colors and, in order to induce the
physician to give them relief, describe their ailments in exaggerated
expression.1
1 A pure fabrication of symptoms and sufferings will never be met with
in hypochondriacs, even in the most impatient of them - a comparison
of the sufferings they complain of at various times when the physician
gives them nothing at all, or something quite unmedical, proves this
plainly; - but we must deduct something from their exaggeration, at
all events ascribe the strong character of their expressions to their
expressions when talking of their ailments becomes of itself an
important symptom in the list of features of which the portrait of the
disease is composed. The case is different with insane persons and
rascally feigners of disease.
§ 97
Other individuals of an opposite character, however, partly from
indolence, partly from false modesty, partly from a kind of mildness
of disposition or weakness of mind, refrain from mentioning a number
of their symptoms, describe them in vague terms, or allege some of
them to be of no consequence.
§ 98
Now, as certainly as we should listen particularly to the patient's
description of his sufferings and sensations, and attach credence
especially to his own expressions wherewith he endeavors to make us
understand his ailments - because in the mouths of his friends and
attendants they are usually altered and erroneously stated, - so
certainly, on the other hand, in all diseases, but especially in the
chronic ones, the investigation of the true, complete picture and its
peculiarities demands especial circumspection, tact, knowledge of
human nature, caution in conducting the inquiry and patience in an
eminent degree.
§ 99
On the whole, the investigation of acute diseases, or of such as have
existed but a short time, is much the easiest for the physician,
because all the phenomena and deviations from the health that has been
put recently lost are still fresh in the memory of the patient and his
friends, still continue to be novel and striking. The physician
certainly requires to know everything in such cases also; but he has
much less to inquire into; they are for the most part spontaneously
detailed to him.
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Post by Dr. AR WingnutteHomeopathy - Obstacles To Cure
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Homeopathy
Organon
Chronic Disease
Drug Disease
§ 260 Sixth Edition
Hence the careful investigation into such obstacles to cure is so much
the more necessary in the case of patients affected by chronic
diseases, as their diseases are usually aggravated by such noxious
influences and other disease-causing errors in the diet and regimen,
which often pass unnoticed.1
1 Coffee; fine Chinese and other herb teas; beer prepared with
medicinal vegetable substances unsuitable for the patient's state; so-
called fine liquors made with medicinal spices; all kinds of punch;
spiced chocolate; odorous waters and perfumes of many kinds; strong-
scented flowers in the apartment; tooth powders and essences and
perfumed sachets compounded of drugs; highly spiced dishes and sauces;
spiced cakes and ices; crude medicinal vegetables for soups; dishes of
herbs, roots and stalks of plants possessing medicinal qualities;
asparagus with long green tips, hops, and all vegetables possessing
medicinal properties, celery, onions; old cheese, and meats that are
in a state of decomposition, or that passes medicinal properties (as
the flesh and fat of pork, ducks and geese, or veal that is too young
and sour viands), ought just as certainly to be kept from patients as
they should avoid all excesses in food, and in the use of sugar and
salt, as also spirituous drinks, undiluted with water, heated rooms,
woollen clothing next the skin, a sedentary life in close apartments,
or the frequent indulgence in mere passive exercise (such as riding,
driving or swinging), prolonged suckling, taking a long siesta in a
recumbent posture in bed, sitting up long at night, uncleanliness,
unnatural debauchery, enervation by reading obscene books, reading
while lying down, Onanism or imperfect or suppressed intercourse in
order to prevent conception, subjects of anger, grief or vexation, a
passion for play, over-exertion of the mind or body, especially after
meals, dwelling in marshy districts, damp rooms, penurious living,
etc. All these things must be as far as possible avoided or removed,
in order that the cure may not be obstructed or rendered impossible.
Some of my disciples seem needlessly to increase the difficulties of
the patient's dietary by forbidding the use of many more, tolerably
indifferent things, which is not to be commended.
§ 261
The most appropriate regimen during the employment of medicine in
chronic diseases consists in the removal of such obstacles to
recovery, and in supplying where necessary the reverse: innocent moral
and intellectual recreation, active exercise in the open air in almost
all kinds of weather (daily walks, slight manual labor), suitable,
nutritious, unmedicinal food and drink, etc.
§ 262
In acute diseases, on the other hand - except in cases of mental
alienation - the subtle, unerring internal sense of the awakened life-
preserving faculty determines so clearly and precisely, that the
physician only requires to counsel the friends and attendants to put
no obstacles in the way of this voice of nature by refusing anything
the patient urgently desires in the way of food, or by trying to
persuade him to partake of anything injurious.
§ 263
The desire of the patient affected by an acute disease with regard to
food and drink is certainly chiefly for things that give palliative
relief: they are, however, not strictly speaking of a medicinal
character, and merely supply a sort of want. The slight hindrances
that the gratification of this desire, within moderate bounds, could
oppose to the radical removal of the disease1 will be amply
counteracted and overcome by the power of the homoeopathically suited
medicine and the vital force set free by it, as also by the
refreshment that follows from taking what has been so ardently longed
for. In like manner, in acute diseases the temperature of the room and
the heat or coolness of the bed-coverings must also be arranged
entirely in conformity with the patients' wish. He must be kept free
from all over-exertion of mind and exciting emotions.
1 This is, however, rare. Thus, for instance, in pure inflammatory
diseases, where aconite is so indispensable, whose action would be
destroyed by partaking of vegetable acids, the desire of the patient
is almost always for pure cold water only.
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