§ 47
Nothing could teach the physician in a plainer and more convincing
manner than the above what kind of artificial morbific agent (medicine) he ought to choose
in order to cure in a sure, rapid and permanent manner, conformably with the process that
takes place in nature.
Neither in the course of nature, as we see from all the above examples,
nor by the physician’s art, can an existing affection or malady in any one instance
be removed by a dissimilar morbific agent, be it ever so strong, but solely by one
that is similar in symptoms and is somewhat stronger, according to eternal,
irrevocable laws of nature, which have not hitherto been recognized.
We should have been able to meet with many more real, natural
homœopathic cures of this kind if, on the one hand, the attention of observers had
been more directed to them, and, on the other hand, if nature had not been so deficient in
helpful homœopathic diseases.
Mighty Nature herself has, as we see, at her command, as instruments for effecting homœopathic cures, little besides the miasmatic diseases of constant character, (the itch) measles and smallpox
1, morbific agents which2, as remedies, are either more dangerous to life and more to be dreaded than the disease they are to cure, they themselves require curing, in order to be eradicated in their turn - both circumstances that make their employment, as homœopathic remedies, difficult, uncertain and dangerous. And how few diseases are there to which man is subject that find their similar remedy in smallpox, measles or itch! Hence, in the course of nature, very few maladies can be cured by these uncertain and hazardous homœopathic remedies, and the cure by their instrumentality is also attended with danger and much difficulty, for this reason that the doses of these morbific powers cannot be diminished according to circumstances, as doses of medicine can; but the patient afflicted with an analogous malady of long standing must be subjected to the entire dangerous and tedious disease, to the entire disease of smallpox, measles (or itch), which in its turn has to be cured. And yet, as is seen, we can point to some striking homœopathic cures effected by this lucky concurrence, all so many incontrovertible proofs of the great, the sole therapeutic law of nature that obtains in them: Cure by symptom similarity!This therapeutic law is rendered obvious to all intelligent minds by these instances, and they are amply sufficient for this end. But, on the other hand, see what advantages man has over crude Nature in her happy-go-lucky operations. How many thousands more of homœopathic morbific agents has not man at his disposal for the relief of his suffering fellow-creatures in the medicinal substances universally distributed throughout creation! In them he has producers of disease of all possible varieties of action, for all the innumerable, for all conceivable and inconceivable natural diseases, to which they can render homœopathic aid - morbific agents (medicinal substances), whose power, when their remedial employment is completed, being overcome by the vital force, disappears spontaneously without requiring a second course of treatment for its extirpation, like the itch - artificial morbific agents, which the physician can attenuate, subdivide and potentize almost to an infinite extent, and the dose of which he can diminish to such a degree that they shall remain only slightly stronger than the similar natural disease they are employed to cure; so that in this incomparable method of cure, there is no necessity for any violent attack upon the organism for the eradication of even an inveterate disease of old standing; the cure by this method takes place by only a gentle, imperceptible and yet often rapid transition from the tormenting natural disease to the desired state of permanent health.