Books: Nature Cure
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Henry Lindlahr >> Nature Cure
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Obviously, Nature does not intend that these mineral elements should
enter the organism in the inorganic form, and therefore the organs
of depuration are not able to neutralize and eliminate them.
Thus, for instance, any amount of iron may be taken in vegetable or
herb extracts, or in the vitochemical remedies, but this will not be
seen in the eye. Whatever is taken in excess of the needs of the
body will be promptly eliminated.
If, however, similar quantities of iron be taken for the same length
of time in the inorganic, mineral form, the iron will accumulate in
the tissues of stomach and bowels, and begin to show in the iris in
the form of a rust brown discoloration in the corresponding areas of
the digestive organs, directly around the pupil.
In similar manner sodium, which is one of the most important mineral
elements in the human body, if taken in the inorganic form, will
show in a heavy, white rim along the outer edge of the iris. Sulphur
will show in the form of yellowish discolorations in the area of
stomach and bowels. Iodine in the medicinal, inorganic form,
prepared from the ash of seaweeds, shows in the iris in well-defined
bright red spots. Phosphorus appears in whitish streaks and clouds
in the areas corresponding to the organs in which it has
accumulated.
An interesting exception to this rule is our common table salt
(sodium chloride), which is an inorganic mineral combination. So
far, diagnosticians from the eye have not discovered any sign in the
iris for it. There seems to be something in its nature that makes it
akin to organic substances or, like other inorganic minerals and
their combinations, it would show in the iris.
This might explain why salt is the only inorganic mineral substance
which is extensively used as food by humanity in general. Also
animals who, guided by their natural instincts, are the finest
discriminators in the selection of foods and medicines, do not
hesitate to take salt freely (salt licks) when they would not touch
any other inorganic mineral.
Nevertheless, we do not wish to encourage the excessive use of salt,
either in the cooking of food or at the table. Taken in considerable
quantities, it is undoubtedly injurious to the tissues of the body.
Before the days of canned goods, scurvy was a common disease among
mariners and other people who had to subsist for long periods of
time on salted meats and were deprived of fresh vegetables. The
disease manifested as a breaking down of the gums and other tissues
of the body, accompanied by bleeding and much soreness. As soon as
these people partook of fresh fruits and vegetables, the scurvy
disappeared.
The minerals contained in these organic salts foods furnished the
building-stones which imparted tensile strength to the tissues and
stopped the disintegration of the fleshy structures.
The Nature Cure regimen aims to provide sodium chloride as well as
the other mineral elements and salts required by the body in organic
form in foods and medicines.
When the use of inorganic minerals is discontinued and when the
proper methods of eliminative treatment, dietetic and otherwise, are
applied, these mineral substances are gradually dislodged and
carried out of the system. Simultaneously with their elimination
disappear their signs in the iris and the disease symptoms which
their presence had created in the organism.
In this connection it is a significant fact that those minerals
which are congenial to the system, that is, those which in their
organic form enter into the composition of the body, are much more
easily eliminated if they have been taken in the inorganic form,
than those substances which are naturally foreign and poisonous to
the human organism, such as mercury, arsenic, iodine, the bromides,
the different coal-tar preparations, etc.
This is proved by the fact that the signs of the minerals which are
normal constituents of the human body disappear from the iris of the
eye much more quickly than the signs of those minerals which are
foreign and naturally poisonous to the system.
The difficulty we experience in eliminating mineral poisons from the
body would seem to indicate that Nature never intended them to be
used as foods or medicines. The intestines, kidneys, skin, mucous
membranes and other organs of depuration are evidently not
constructed or prepared to cope with inorganic, poisonous substances
and to eliminate them completely. Accordingly, these poisons show
the tendency to accumulate in certain parts or organs of the body
for which they have a special affinity and then to act as irritants
and destructive corrodents.
The diseases which we find most difficult to cure, even by the most
radical application of natural methods, are cases of drug-poisoning.
Substances which are foreign to the human organism, and especially
the inorganic, mineral poisons, positively destroy tissues and
organs, and are much harder to eliminate from the system than the
encumbrances of morbid materials and waste matter produced in the
body by wrong habits of living only. The obvious reason for this is
that our organs of elimination are intended and constructed to
excrete only such waste products as are formed in the organism in
the processes of metabolism.
Tuberculosis or cancer may be caused in a scrofulous or psoriatic
constitution by overloading the system with meat, coffee, alcohol or
tobacco; but as soon as these bad habits are discontinued, and the
organs of elimination stimulated by natural methods, the
encumbrances will be eliminated, and the much-dreaded symptoms will
subside and disappear, often with surprising rapidity.
On the other hand, mercury, arsenic, quinine, strychnine, iodine,
etc., accumulate in the brain, the spinal cord, and the cells and
tissues of the vital organs, causing actual destruction and
disintegration. The tissues thus affected are not easily rebuilt,
and it is exceedingly difficult to stir up the destructive mineral
poisons and to eliminate them from the system.
Therefore it is an indisputable fact that many of the most stubborn,
so-called incurable diseases are drug diseases
The Importance of Natural Diet
While certain medicinal remedies in organic form may be very useful
in supplying quickly a deficiency of mineral elements in the system,
we should aim to keep our bodies in a normal, healthy condition by
proper food selection and combination. A brief description of the
scientific basis of "Natural Dietetics" will be found in the chapter
on Diet.
Undoubtedly, Nature has supplied all the elements which the human
organism needs in abundance and in the right proportions in the
natural foods, otherwise she would be a very ignorant organizer and
provider.
We should learn to select and combine food materials in such a
manner that they supply all the needs of the body in the best
possible way and thus insure perfect health and strength without the
use of medicines.
Why should we attempt to cure anemia with inorganic iron,
hyperacidity of the stomach with baking soda, swollen glands with
iodine, the itch with sulphur, ricket conditions in infants with
lime water, etc., when these mineral elements are contained in
abundance and in live, organic form in fruits and vegetables, herbs
and in the vitochemical remedies?
Unfortunately, however, a great many individuals, through wrong
habits of living and of treating their ailments, have ruined their
digestive organs to such an extent that they are incapable of
properly assimilating their food and require, at least temporarily,
stimulative treatment by natural methods and a supply of the
indispensable organic mineral salts through medicinal food
preparations.
In such cases the mineral elements must be provided in the most
easily assimilable form in vegetable extracts (which should be
prepared fresh every day), and in the vitochemical remedies.
What has been said is sufficient, I believe, to justify the attitude
of the Nature Cure school toward medicines in general. It explains
why we avoid the use of inorganic minerals and poisonous substances,
while on the other hand we find a wide and useful field for
medicinal remedies in the form of blood and tissue foods.
Chapter XV
Homeopathy
When we recommend the use of homeopathic remedies, the medical
nihilist says: "Don't talk homeopathy to me! I didn't come to you
for drugs; I have had enough of them."
When we explain that these remedies are so highly refined that they
cannot possibly do any harm, he becomes still more indignant. "I
don't need any of your mental therapeutics in homeopathic form," he
exclaims. "I, too, believe in the power of mind over matter, but I
have no faith in your sugar of milk pellets; they are poor
substitutes for the real article. That kind of sugar-coated
suggestion might work on some people, but it doesn't on me."
When I first entered upon the study of medicine, I, too, did not
believe in the curative power of homeopathic doses; but experience
caused me to change my mind. The well-selected remedy administered
at the right time often works wonders.
True homeopathic medicines in high-potency doses are so highly
refined and rarefied that they cannot possibly produce harmful
results or suppress Nature's cleansing and healing efforts; on the
contrary, if employed according to the Law of Homeopathy: "like
cures like," they assist in producing acute reactions or healing
crises, thus aiding Nature in the work of purification and repair.
Homeopathy Works with the Laws of Cure, Not Against Them. ~Similia
similibus curantur~ (like cures like) translated into practice means
that a drug capable of producing a certain set of disease symptoms
in a healthy body, when given in large, physiological doses, will
relieve or cure a similar set of symptoms in the diseased organism
if the drug be given in small, homeopathic doses.
For instance, ~belladonna,~ given in large, poisonous doses to a
healthy person, will cause a peculiar headache with sharp, stabbing
pains in forehead and temples, high fever, violent delirium,
dilation of the pupils, dryness and rawness of the throat, scarlet
redness of the skin and extreme sensitiveness to light, jars and
noises.
It will be observed that this is a fair picture of a typical case of
scarlet fever. A homeopathic prescriber, when called to a scarlet
fever patient exhibiting in a marked degree three or more of the
above-described symptoms, would give a trituration of belladonna,
say 6x. In numberless cases the fever has subsided and its symptoms
have rapidly disappeared under such treatment.
The reader may say: "I do not see any difference between this and
the allopathic suppression of disease by drugs."
There is a great difference. The allopathic physician may use the
same remedy, belladonna, in the same case, but he will give from ten
to twenty drops of tincture of belladonna, repeated every three or
four hours. These doses are from twenty to forty thousand times
stronger than the homeopathic 3x or 6x.
Herein lies the difference. The allopathic dose allays the fever
symptoms by paralyzing the organism as a whole and the different
vital organs and their functions in particular. This is frankly
admitted in every allopathic materia medica. But by such dosing
Nature is forcibly interrupted in her efforts of cleansing and
healing; the acute reaction is suppressed, but not cured.
If fever is a healing effort of Nature, it may be controlled and
modified, but must not be suppressed. A minute dose of homeopathic
belladonna, acting on the innermost cells of the organism which the
coarser allopathic doses would paralyze, stimulates these cells to
effort in the right direction. It brings about conditions similar to
those produced by Nature, and thus assists her; it is cooperation
instead of counteroperation.
After this brief discussion of the practical application of
homeopathy, let us now ascertain in how far its laws and theories
agree with and corroborate the laws and principles of the Nature
Cure school.
Hahnemann discovered the Law of ~similia similibus curantur
~accidentally, while investigating the effects of quinine on the
human organism. Ever since then it has been applied successfully by
him and his followers in treating human ailments.
However, this law has been used empirically. Neither in the Organon
nor in any other writings or teachings of Hahnemann and the
homeopathic school can be found a clear and concise explanation of
why like cures like. The proof offered has been negative rather than
positive.
Therefore the allopath says: "You tell me that ~'like cures like,'
~and that you can prove it at the sickbed; but unless you can give
me good and valid reasons why it should be so, I cannot and will not
believe that it is your 'similar' which cures the patient. How do I
know it is your 'potency'? The patient might recover just as well
without it."
With the aid of the three laws of cure, I shall endeavor to give the
reasons and furnish the proofs for our contentions. The laws alluded
to are: The Law of Cure, the Law of Dual Effect and the Law of
Crises.
~Similia similibus curantur~ is only another way of stating the
fundamental Law of Nature Cure: "Every acute disease is the result
of a cleansing and healing effort of Nature."
If a certain set of disease symptoms are the result of a healing
effort of Nature, and if I give a remedy which produces the same or
similar symptoms in the system, am I not aiding Nature in her
attempt to overcome the abnormal conditions?
In such a case, the indicated homeopathic remedy will not suppress
the acute reaction, but it will help it along, thus accelerating and
hastening the curative process.
In the last analysis, disease resides in the cell. The well-being of
the organism as a whole is dependent upon the health of the
individual cells of which it is composed. This has been explained
more fully in connection with the action of stimulants.
In order to cure the man, we must free the cell of its encumbrances.
Elimination must begin in the cell, not in the organs of depuration.
Laxatives and cathartics, by irritating the digestive tract, may
cause a forced evacuation of the contents of the intestinal canal,
but they do not eliminate the poisons which clog cells and tissues.
In stubborn chronic diseases, when the cells are too weak to throw
off the latent encumbrances of their own accord, a well-chosen
homeopathic remedy is often of great service in arousing them to
acute reaction.
For instance, if the system is heavily encumbered with scrofulous
taints and if its vitality is lowered to such an extent that the
individual cell cannot of itself throw off the morbid encumbrances
by means of a vigorous, acute effort, sulphur, if administered in
doses sufficiently triturated and refined to affect the minute cells
composing the organism, will start disease vibrations similar to
those of acute scrofulosis, and thus give the needed impetus to
acute eliminative activity on the part of the individual cell.
The acute reaction, once started, may develop into vigorous forms of
scrofulous elimination, such as skin eruptions, glandular swellings,
abscesses, catarrhal discharges, etc.
Are High-Potency Doses Effective?
The question now arises: How large or how small must the dose be in
order to affect the minute cells?
In the administration of medicines, the size of the dose is adjusted
to the size of the patient. If half a grain of a certain drug is the
normal dose for an adult, the proper dose of the same drug for a
small infant, say, less than a year old, may be about one
twenty-fifth of the adult dose. How small, in proportion, should
then be the dose given to a cell a billion times as small as the
infant?
The dose given to an adult would paralyze or perhaps kill an infant.
In like manner the minute cell would be benumbed and paralyzed by
the drug suited to the infant's organism.
But this is how allopathy effects its fictitious cures. It
suppresses inflammatory processes by paralyzing the cells and organs
and their vital activities.
Homeopathy adapts the smallness of the dose to the smallness of the
cell which is to be treated. Herein lies the reasonableness of the
high-potency dose.
The Personal Responsibility of the Cell
The cell resembles Man not only in physical and physiological
aspects, but also in regard to the moral law.
Elimination must commence in the cell and by virtue of the cell's
personal effort. Its work cannot be done vicariously by drugs or the
knife. Large, allopathic doses of medicine may be given with the
idea of doing the work for the cell by violently stimulating or else
paralyzing the organism as a whole or certain ones of the vital
organs; but this is demoralizing and destructive to the cell. The
powerful doses calculated to affect the body and its organs as a
whole make superfluous or paralyze the individual efforts of the
cells and thus intensify the chronic disease conditions in cells and
tissues.
Alms-giving, prison sentences and capital punishment have a similar
allopathic effect upon Man, the individual cell of the social body.
Instead of providing for him the proper environment and the
opportunity for natural development and for working out his own
salvation, they take this opportunity away from him and weaken his
personal effort or make it impossible.
The Efficacy of Small Doses
The late revelations of chemistry, Roentgen rays, x-rays,
radio-activity of metals, etc., throw an interesting light upon the
seemingly infinite divisibility of matter. A small particle of a
given substance may for many years throw off a continuous shower of
corpuscles without perceptibly diminishing its volume.
For an illustration we may take the odoriferous musk. A few grains
of this substance will fill a room with its penetrating aroma for
years. When we smell musk or any other perfume, minute particles of
it bombard the end filaments of the nerves of smell in the nose.
Therefore the musk must be casting off such minute particles
continually without apparent loss of substance.
With the aid of this recent knowledge of the true nature of matter,
of the minuteness and complexity of the atom, we can now understand
how the highly triturated and refined (attenuated) homeopathic
remedy may still retain the dynamic force of the element, as
Hahnemann has expressed it, and how a remedy so attenuated may still
be capable of exerting an influence upon the minute cell. Since
chemistry and physiology have acquainted us with the finer forces of
Nature, demonstrating that they are mightier than the things we can
apprehend by weight and measure, the claims of homeopathy do not
appear so absurd as they did a generation ago.
Undoubtedly, the good effect produced by a well-chosen remedy is
heightened and strengthened by the mental and magnetic influence of
the prescriber. The positive faith of the physician in the efficacy
of the remedy, his sympathy and his indomitable will to assist the
sufferer affect both the physical substance of the remedy and the
mind of the patient.
The varying mental and magnetic qualities of prescribers have
undoubtedly much to do with the varying degrees of efficaciousness
of the same remedy when administered by different physicians.
The true Hahnemannian homeopath, who believes in his remedies as in
his God, will concentrate his intellectual and spiritual forces on a
certain remedy in order to accomplish certain well-defined results.
The bottle is not allowed to become empty. Whenever the graft runs
low, it is replenished with distilled water, alcohol, milk sugar, or
another "vehicle." Every time he takes the medicine bottle into his
hands, these potent thought forms are projected into it: "You are
the element sulphur. You produce in the human body a certain set of
symptoms. You will produce these symptoms in the body of this
patient."
If there is any virtue at all in magnetic, mental and spiritual
healing, the homeopathic remedy must be an effective agency for
transmitting magnetic, mental and psychic healing forces from
prescriber to patient.
Transmission of these higher and finer forces, whether directly,
telepathically or by means of some physical agent, such as
magnetized water, a charm or simile, etc., is the modus operandi in
all the different forms of ancient and modern magic, white or black.
It is the active principle in mental healing, Christian Science,
sympathy healing, voodooism, witchcraft, etc.
Homeopathy and the Law of Dual Effect
I have formulated the Law of Action and Reaction in its application
to the treatment of diseases as follows:
"Every agent affecting the human organism has two effects: a first,
apparent, temporary one and a second, lasting one. The second effect
is directly opposite to the first."
Allopathy, in giving large, physiological doses, takes into
consideration only the first, apparent effect of the drug, and
thereby accomplishes in the long run results directly opposite to
those which it desires to bring about. It produces the very
conditions it tries to cure. As an example, note the permanent
effects of laxatives, stimulants and sedatives upon the system. This
has been explained more fully in Chapter Six.
On the other hand, the homeopathic physician may use the same
remedies as the allopath, provided they produce symptoms similar to
those of the disease, but he administers the different drugs in such
minute doses that their first effect is noticed only as a slight
"homeopathic aggravation," while their second and lasting effect is
relied upon to relieve and cure the disease.
In other words, homeopathy produces as the first effect the
condition like the disease, and counts on the second and lasting
effect of the drug to bring about a permanent change.
If, in accordance with the Law of Dual Effect as applied to drugs,
the primary, temporary effect of the homeopathic remedy is equal to
the disease, it is self-evident that the secondary, lasting effect
of the remedy must be equal to the cure.
This law has been proved by homeopathy for over a hundred years. An
experienced homeopathic prescriber would no more doubt it than he
would doubt the Law of Gravitation.
Homeopathy and the Law of Crises
Therefore, if the remedy be well chosen in accord with the Law of
~similia similibus curantur,~ the first homeopathic aggravation,
which corresponds to the crisis of Nature Cure, will be followed by
speedy and perfect readjustment. Nature has her way, the disorder
runs its course, and the return to normal conditions will be quicker
and more perfect than if the homeopathic remedy had not been
employed or if Nature's healing processes had been forcibly
interrupted and suppressed by large, poisonous allopathic doses.
Homeopathy assists Nature in removing the old encumbrances, whereas
allopathy changes the acute, inflammatory healing effort into
chronic, destructive disease.
The Economics of Homeopathy
The Law of ~like cures like~ is of great practical importance from
another point of view, namely, that of economics.
The best engineer is the one who accomplishes the maximum of results
with the minimum of expenditure of force and with the least
friction. The same is true of the physician and his remedies.
We have learned that drugs given in the coarse allopathic doses
attack and affect the organism as a whole. If, for instance, there
is a catarrhal affection of the serous and mucous membranes of the
respiratory tract accompanied by fever, the allopath will give
quinine in large doses to change this condition. He may accomplish
his aim; but if so, he does it by paralyzing the heart, the
respiratory centers, the red and white blood corpuscles and the
excreting cells of the mucous membranes. The body as a whole and
certain parts in particular are saturated with the drug poison and
correspondingly weakened. As allopathy itself states it: "Quinine
reduces fever by depressing the metabolism" (the vital functions).
Homeopathic materia medica teaches that ~Bryonia~ has a special
affinity for the mucous and serous membranes of the respiratory
tract and that its symptomatic effects correspond closely to those
described in the preceding paragraph.
If, in accordance with the Law of ~similia similibus curantur,~ a
homeopathic dose of Bryonia be given to a patient exhibiting these
symptoms, the remedy, as has been demonstrated, will assist Nature
in her work of cure; and in doing this, it will not attack and
affect the entire organism, but only those serous and mucous tissues
for which it has a special affinity and which, as in the case of
this patient, are the most seriously affected.
To state it in another way: the large, allopathic dose paralyzes the
whole organism in order to produce its fictitious cure. The small,
homeopathic dose, on the other hand, goes right to the spot where it
is needed, and by mild and harmless stimulation of the affected
parts, assists and supports the cells in their acute eliminative
efforts.
Homeopathic medication, therefore, is not only curative in its
effects, but also conservative and in the highest degree economic.
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