Editorial

HOMOEOPATHIC SYMPTOMS.

The business of a Homoeopath is entirely different from that of an allopath. The old school physician is always a hasty man ; he comes in haste, examines his patient in haste and goes away in haste. He has no time to hear what the patient has got to say. He deals with objective symptoms or pathological ones. He often takes a single symptom and seeks to combat or if possible to suppress it by medicine. Dr. Hahnemann says ” A single one of the symptoms present is no more the disease itself than a single foot is the man himself.” Hahnemann advises his followers to examine a case of disease with utmost care and patience.

He wants that the whole group of symptoms should be taken down in writing. The Homoeopathic physician is to write down accurately all that the patient and his friends tell him in the very expression used by them. He is to examine his patient calmly and for doing this important part of his work he is to allow sufficient time to his patient. There cannot be any haste about his work.

Haste kills the possibility of a cure. The consideration of the totality of symptoms is of immense value and it is a distinguishing peculiarity of Homoeopathy. His very method of approach to the disease is different. The symptoms or signs are the representation of the disease. The symptoms are, in other words, the very voice of the disease. Homoeopaths recognize the disease through symptoms. This is why a Homoeopath sets so much value to an examination of symptoms. The symptoms lead us to the very remedy which the patient requires for his cure.

The spiritual being or the vial force produces the disease and hence it is not possible for a physician to discover the alteration that occurs in the “invisible interior” without paying due attention to the symptoms. How can naked eyes of physicians reach the “Hidden and unknown interior” of man. Allopaths despise the symptoms which the Homoeopaths worship. They follow this difficult path because they find it the only possible means of knowing what is to be cured. It is a supreme path and an unchallengeable truth.

In the organon we notice the following quotation. “The physician whose researches are directed towards the hidden relations in the interior of the organism, may daily err, but the Homoeopaths who grasps with requisite carefulness the whole group of symptoms, possesses a sure guide, and if he succeed in removing the whole group of symptoms he has likewise most assuredly destroyed the internal hidden cause of disease.” By the symptoms the disease makes itself known to us and symptoms or the totality of the symptoms are our sole guide to the remedy which the disease requires.

Removal of symptoms is the removal of the disease or cure of the disease. It is wrong to suppose that “Homoeopathy can remove thee symptoms, but the disease remains.” Homoeopaths are never misguided when they follow symptoms with extreme carefulness. It is a very difficult job but it ultimately pays the laborious worker. It leads to health and not to ruin.

Symptoms may be divided into two main classes, subjective and objective symptoms. “An objective symptom is one which may be recognized by an observer who has the use of all his senses, e.g., color, a murmur, an odor, a taste, heat, coldness, smoothness, roughness etc.”

Royal. The objective (symptoms) are those which apply directly to your senses. They are such as you may seen, hear touch, taste or smell.” Farrington. “A subjective symptom is one which is perceived or imagined only by the patient himself. e.g., a pain, an illusion or delusion in regard to sight, hearing or sensation.” Royal. “The subjective symptoms are those which the prover himself experiences and which he has to express to you in certain language.” Farrington.

“A mental symptom is always a subjective symptom.” Royal.

“As I have stated above, we Homoeopaths individualize and in this process the mental symptom should be given the highest rank.” Royal.

“The state of the disposition of the patient often chiefly determines the selection of Homoeopathic remedy.”Hahnemann.

“We shall, therefore, never be able to cure conformably to nature, that it is to say, homoeopathically, if we do not, in every case of disease, even in such as are acute, observe, along with the other symptoms, those relating to the changes in the state of the mind and disposition.” Hahnemann.

Objective and subjective symptoms always make the Homoeopathic totality. No true Homoeopath can do without proper consideration of both classes of symptoms. No one can give an accurate prescription only with the objective symptoms. and it is also not possible to give a good prescription by considering the subjective symptoms only. It is never true that a master prescriber of the Homoeopathic school takes only the subjective symptoms into consideration while he prescribes a medicine for his patient.

Of course Homoeopathic prescriptions are often made without any reference to the name of the disease. Hahnemann says “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.” To an allopath the name of the disease is absolutely necessary for a prescription. But for a Homoeopath it is quite useless while he considers his medicine. It is never safe to give Homoeopathic medicines on the strength of a single symptom or of one class of symptoms or with the name of the disease.

A Homoeopath forgets the name of the disease when he considers his prescription. He can know the name of the disease for all other purposes but he should never remember it when he thinks of his medicine. Those who asset that consideration of subjective symptoms is dangerous for patients are quite mistaken. The mental symptoms are subjective symptoms and according to Hahnemann mental symptoms should be given the highest rank in an examination of a disease. No prescription is accurate when mental symptoms are disregarded. Mind or moral symptoms are our chief guide to the selection of a remedy.

We Homoeopaths do always follow the objective as well as subjective symptom when we consider a medicine for a patient. It is unjust to declare that a pure Homoeopath follows subjective symptoms only and that he is a danger to society. A pure Homoeopath knows well the value of both objective and subjective symptoms and he follows the path shown him by the founder of Homoeopathy.

A pure homoeopath never mixes allopathic drugs and Homoeopathic dilutions in his prescription. He aims at one kind of medicine which he thinks is the only rational medicine on earth. A careful study of the Homoeopathic organon will show that Hahnemann has instructed his disciples to examine with care both the subjective and objective symptoms for the purpose of an accurate prescription.