MOST diseases are general and constitutional. Therefore organ testing is not illuminating. These general and constitutional diseases produce a local outbreak in liver, in kidneys, tonsils, skin, etc., and the local manifestation is considered by orthodox medicine as the whole of the disease and treatment is given for the local condition. Organ examination is a useless convention, a mere formality and, occasionally, a solemn farce.
While orthodox physicians declare that a patient suffers from a disease of this or that organ, homoeopaths try to diagnose not the disease but the remedy, following Paracelsus, who taught that there were diseases such as Arsenic disease, Mercury disease, Sulphur disease, diseases which cried out for Arsenic, Mercury, Sulphur, etc. There are, indeed, patients of the Mercury type, of the Arsenic type, of the Sulphur type, of the Nux vomica type, Lycopodium type, etc.
On July 7th, 1932, Mrs. C.B. wrote to me from the town of Rye:-.
I am a widow, sixty years of age, I have had nasal catarrh since childhood, am hard of hearing, and my nerves leave much to be desired. During the War I slipped on the stairs, fell backwards, and injured myself by striking my back under the left shoulder blade. I was bruised and felt stiff and sore for days, and ever since I have had a dull aching pain all over, particularly down the left side.
The leg feels weak and numb. Besides I have what I can best describe as thrills all over my body. When out walking, I feel fairly fit. There is indigestion at times. I have had prescriptions containing Digitalis, Bromide, Iron, etc., but all to no avail.
“I am well proportioned but rather thin in the neck and, no matter how much clothing I wear, I am chilly, and feel cold, particularly between my shoulders. My face has a greasy appearance, I have frequent flushing, a headache on waking, am often feverish, breathless, have a surging in the ears when stooping, fits of sneezing without apparent cause, detest stuffy rooms and sympathy, urine is muddy, and I have a dread of paralysis.”.
If an orthodox medical man had received that letter he might have prescribe a tonic or a sedative, or a mixture of both, with perhaps a laxative thrown in. The lady had been given the inevitable Digitalis for the heart, Bromide as a sedative and Iron for anaemia, without benefit.
If a number of doctors had examined Mrs. C. B., each might have arrived a different diagnosis and every one of them might have prescribed a different remedy, even if all of them had made the identical diagnosis. If twenty competent homoeopaths had received the above letter, all of them would have made the identical prescription. They would have said: “The thing is perfectly obvious: Mrs. C. B. needs Natrum muriaticum and Arnica”.
She needed Arnica because of the ancient fall which had injured her body permanently, but all her symptoms , apart from the after-effects of the fall, called for Natrum muriaticum, ordinary table salt. Readers can test this assertion by asking competent homoeopathic doctors what they would prescribe. Chilliness, greasy face, headache on waking, sneezing, fits, hatred of sympathy, are keynotes of Natrum muriaticum.
I replied: “I much hope to get you into better condition. I imagine that you are fond of salt (this is another Natrum muriaticum symptom). Please tell me about this point. Meanwhile I enclose two boxes marked Natrum muriaticum 3x, chilliness, weakness, constitutional; and Arnica 3x, old injury, fag. Take three pilules the three times a day and changes every two days from one medicine to the other”.
Her first report was dated July 23rd: “I am glad to inform you that I derived much benefit from the medicines you prescribed. Please send a further supply. I am filled with gratitude and I am convinced I shall be fully restored to health under the new treatment”.
Mrs. C.B. called on me on August IIth. I discovered that, indeed, she took far too much salt and she had many other Natrum muriaticum symptoms. She told me that she felt better since she had taken those two medicines, and was less irritable. I repeated Arnica and Natrum muriaticum. On August 21st she wrote “I am delightful to tell you that there is a remarkable improvement in my health. ” On September 3rd: “My morning headache is less severe and, best of all, I sleep better.
You are making a new woman in me and I can never thank you sufficiently.” On September with 11th she wrote: “My headache is dying away.” On September 17th she told me: “I feel remarkably well, sleep soundly, and headaches are a thing of the past.” On September 24th She wrote : “I am losing that drawn look I have had. I feel it is good to be alive”.
On Sept. 30th she called at my house, and I wrote to her:.
I am very pleased with our interview. It seems to me that your headache, pain about the body and leg, sleeplessness, etc., all emanated from your severe fall downstairs about fifteen years ago, and I believe that continuation of the treatment will finally eliminate all the consequences of that accident.
It is good news that you can now run up and down stairs, have no more “thrills,” sleep better than you have done for years, have no headaches on waking, have dreamless sleep, etc. The pain under the left shoulder has been replaced by a mere itching.
On December 13th she wrote: “I am grateful for the good you have done me. I used to feel weary an laden, now life seems a joy and a song”.
Before she came under my treatment Mrs. C.B. had always felt icy, and was apt to get the most fearful colds. She wrote on January 24th, 1933: “I am glad to say that I keep ever so well although influenza is rampant in Rye. The vicar and his curate are both laid aside and the church is closed for the daily service. I put on a short skirt and gaiters, wrap up warmly, and go for long daily walks in the high east wind and return all aglow.”
She wrote to me on February 11th: “The medicine which as done me the greatest amount of good constitutionally is Natrum muriaticum.” I then sent her Natrum muriaticum 200, a single dose to be taken once a week or less often. Shortly afterwards she referred to that medicine as “a splendid tonic”.
Homoeopathic prescribing according to symptoms, often without physical examinations, seems of course unspeakable quackery to orthodox medical men; they have learned by rote the ridiculous maxim, “Every diseases is seated in an organ.” Very likely examination of Mrs. C.B. s organs would not have shown any anomalies.
One doctor might have treated her with a sedative, another with a laxative, a third by a tonic, a fourth would have recommended glandular treatment, a fifth ultraviolet rays, a sixth the latest and the most scientific injection, the seventh psychological treatment, the eighth massage, the ninth radiant heat and high frequency electricity for her stiffness, but none of these treatments would have done more than give a little temporary relief. Mrs. C.B. suffered from Arnica disease and Natrum muriaticum disease, and a fraction of a grain of Arnica and a fraction of a grain of ordinary table salt duly potentized cured her. Natrum muriaticum was her constitutional remedy.
On September 11th, 1929, I was visited by a totally emaciated lady, a skeleton covered with a jaundiced skin, with deeply sunken eyes, a veritable famine picture. She told me that she was a missionary from West Africa, had always been anaemic, felt terribly weak, had malaria attacks daily, kept in check by Quinine taken in doses of thirty grains. Her liver, gall bladder and spleen were greatly enlarged, she had brutal vaccination marks, complained about bearing-down pains, had a sinking feeling about eleven oclock in the morning.
I gave her a diet sheet. She was to have a mixed diet, meat once or twice a day, an abundance of vegetables, vegetable water, wholemeal bread, up to three pints of milk, three eggs and three ounces of cheese per day and plenty of bitter vegetables, sultanas and raisins, because of their richness in iron.
I gave her for her chilliness, fever and Quinine poisoning Natrum muriaticum, potentized table salt, in the potency 30th potency, and Arsenicum 3. She was to take three doses a day, changing every day from one medicine to other. I told her not to take any Quinine unless she had an actual attack of malaria.
I have a photo of Mrs. C.L. taken on September 30th, on which she is picture of emaciation. She immediately started putting on weight at the rate of two or three pounds a week. She wrote on October 11th:.
I have gained 3 lbs. in weight again this week. I have felt much better and am eating and sleeping better. I have not had any fever until this week. After my sisters death, I felt very poorly knowing the liability to fever is greater when ones condition is low.
I had a sudden attack on Tuesday evening. So I took Quinine. This is the only Quinine I have taken since seeing you exactly a month ago. I have not had any return. Now that I have definitely begun to improve, I think fever is very unlikely again.
James Ellis Barker wrote a very large number of books, both under the name James Ellis Barker and under his real German name Otto Julius Eltzbacher, The Truth about Homœopathy; Rough Notes on Remedies with William Murray; Chronic Constipation; The Story of My Eyes; Miracles Of Healing and How They are Done; Good Health and Happiness; New Lives for Old: How to Cure the Incurable; My Testament of Healing; Cancer, the Surgeon and the Researcher; Cancer, how it is Caused, how it Can be Prevented with a foreward by William Arbuthnot Lane; Cancer and the Black Man etc.