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 a.s.sist 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 fict.i.tious 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, a.s.sists 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.
Homeopathy, a Complement of Nature Cure
Having proved the accuracy of Hahnemann"s Law of ~similia similibus curantur,~ and having occasion daily to observe its practical results in the treatment of acute and chronic diseases, we should not be justified in omitting homeopathy from our system of treatment. The attenuated homeopathic doses of certain drugs may be of great service in bringing about the acute reactions which we so earnestly desire, especially in the treatment of chronic diseases of long standing.
I am aware of the fact that in severe and obstinate conditions homeopathy is often apparently of no avail. But when the system has been purified and strengthened by our natural methods, by a rational vegetarian diet, hydrotherapy, chiropractic or osteopathy, ma.s.sage, corrective exercise, air and sun baths, normal suggestion, etc., the homeopathic remedies will work with much greater prompt.i.tude and effectiveness.
It is the combination of all the different healing factors which const.i.tutes the perfect system of treatment.
No disease condition, whether apparently hopeless or not, can be called incurable unless all these different healing factors, properly combined and applied, have been given a thorough trial. It is no charlatanic boasting, but the simple truth, when we affirm that the different natural methods of treatment, as we of the Nature Cure school apply them, can and do cure so-called incurable diseases, such as tuberculosis, cancer, locomotor ataxy, epilepsy, eczema, neurasthenia, insanity and the worst forms of chronic dyspepsia and constipation, always providing that the patient possesses sufficient vitality to react to the treatment and that the destruction of vital parts and organs has not advanced too far.
Chapter XVI
The Diphtheria Ant.i.toxin
In this country the ant.i.toxin treatment for diplitheria is still in high favor, while in Germany, where it originated, many of the best medical authorities are abandoning its use on account of its doubtful curative results and certain destructive after-effects.
According to the enthusiastic advocates of this treatment among the "regular" physicians in this country, the ant.i.toxin is a "certain cure" for diphtheria; but how is this claim borne out by actual facts?
The Health Bulletins sent regularly to every physician in the City of Chicago by the City Health Department show an average of from fifteen to twenty deaths every week from diphtheria treated with ant.i.toxin.
I do not deny that the ant.i.toxin treatment may have reduced somewhat the mortality percentage of this disease, allowing even for the great uncertainty of medical statistics. But we of the Nature Cure school claim and can prove that the hydropathic treatment of diphtheria shows a much lower percentage of mortality than the ant.i.toxin treatment.
The crucial point to be considered in this connection is: What are the after-effects of the different methods of treatment?
This is a very important matter. I make the following claims: that the ant.i.toxin, being itself a most powerful poison, may be and often is the direct cause of paralysis, or of death due to heart-failure. That diphtheria treated with ant.i.toxin may be and often is followed by paralysis, heart-failure, or lifelong invalidism of some kind after the patient has apparently recovered from the disease. That these undesirable after-effects of diphtheria do not occur when the disease is treated by natural methods, but that they are the result of the ant.i.toxin treatment and of its suppressive effect upon. the disease.
To prove my claims, I submit the following facts: I have in my possession clippings from newspapers from different parts of the country stating that death had followed the administration of the diphtheria ant.i.toxin for prevention or "immunization," that is, where the individual had been in good health at the time the ant.i.toxin was given.
Several cases of this kind created quite a sensation in Germany about fifteen years ago. Dr. Robert Langerhans, superintendent of the Moabit Hospital in Berlin, a strong advocate of the ant.i.toxin treatment and also of vaccination, had been one of a committee of three appointed by the munic.i.p.al government of the German metropolis to investigate the efficiency of the diphtheria ant.i.toxin. As a result of his findings, he had recommended its free distribution to the poor of the City of Berlin.
Not long thereafter the doctor"s cook was suddenly taken ill with severe pains in the throat and sent to the hospital. It was thought to be a case of diphtheria, and the doctor, to protect his little son, one and one-half years old, against possible infection, administered an injection of ant.i.toxin. Shortly afterward the child developed symptoms of blood-poisoning and died of heart-failure within twenty-four hours.
It is customary in Germany to insert a death-notice in one of the local newspapers and to invite the friends of the family to the funeral. In his announcement in the columns of the "Lokalanzeiger,"
Dr. Langerhans stated explicitly that his little son had died after an injection of diphtheria ant.i.toxin for immunization.
Another similar case is that of Dr. Pistor, a prominent Berlin physician, whose little daughter contracted a slight inflammation of the throat. The child was given an injection of ant.i.toxin, and this was followed by a severe and protracted illness.
Very significant, in this connection, are certain utterances of Dr.
William Osler in his "Practice of Medicine." He says, on page 150:
" Of the sequelae of diphtheria, paralysis is by far the most important. This can be experimentally produced in animals by the inoculation of the toxic material produced by the bacilli. [This is the active principle in the ant.i.toxin. Author"s note] The paralysis occurs in a variable proportion of the cases, ranging from 10 to 15 and even to 20 per cent. It is strictly a sequel of the disease [of the disease treated with ant.i.toxin?--Author"s note], coming on usually in the second or third week of convalescence. . . . It may follow very mild cases; indeed, the local lesion may be so trifling that the onset of the paralysis alone calls attention to the true nature of the disease. . . .
"The disease is a toxic neuritis, due to the absorption of the poison. . . .
"Of the local paralysis the most common is that which affects the palate. . . . Of other local forms perhaps the most common are paralysis of the eye muscles. . . . Heart symptoms are not uncommon.
. . . Heart-failure and fatal syncope (death) may occur at the height of the disease or during convalescence, even as late as the sixth or seventh week after apparent recovery."
It appears to me that the mystery of these "sequelae" can easily be explained. It is certain that a mere "sore throat," not serious enough to be diagnosed as diphtheria, cannot produce paralysis or heart-failure; but we know positively that the ant.i.toxin can do it and does do it. The cases that Dr. Osler refers to undoubtedly received the ant.i.toxin treatment, because it is administered on the slightest suspicion of diphtheria, nay, even to perfectly healthy persons "for purposes of immunization."
Then is it not most likely that these "mysterious after-effects" are caused rather by the highly poisonous ant.i.toxin than by the "sore throat?"
In my own practice, I am frequently consulted by chronic patients whose troubles date back to diphtheria "cured" by ant.i.toxin. Among these I have met with several cases of idiocy and insanity, with many cases of partial paralysis, infantile paralysis, and nervous disorders of a most serious nature, also with various other forms of chronic destructive diseases.
In the iris of the eye, the effect of the ant.i.toxin on the system shows as a darkening of the color. In many instances, the formerly blue or light-brown iris a.s.sumes an ashy-gray or brownish-gray hue.
My secretary who is taking this dictation and who has brown eyes, tells me that her mother informed her that up to her tenth year her eyes had been of a clear blue. About that time she had several attacks of diphtheria and a severe "second" attack of scarlet fever, which were treated and "cured" under the care of an allopathic physician. She does not remember whether she was given ant.i.toxin, but recalls that her throat was painted and her body rubbed with oil, and that she had to take a great deal of medicine. Since that time her eyes have turned brown. They show plainly the rust-brown spots of iodine in the areas of the brain, the throat, and other parts of the body.
The effect upon the iris of the eye would be very much the same whether the attacks of diphtheria had been suppressed by ant.i.toxin or by the old-time drug treatment. A significant fact in this connection is that, since Mrs. C. is with us, following natural methods of living and under the effects of the treatments which she has been taking regularly for several months, her eyes have become much lighter and in places the original blue is visible under the brown. The nerve rings in the region of the brain, which were very marked when she came to us, have become less defined. There is a corresponding improvement in her general health, and especially in the condition of her nerves.
In regard to my claim that undesirable after-effects do not occur under treatment by natural methods, I wish again to call attention to the fact that for fifty years the Nature Cure physicians in Germany have proved that hydropathic treatment of diphtheria is not followed by paralysis, heart-failure, or the different forms of chronic, destructive diseases.
This has been confirmed by my own experience in the treatment of diphtheria and other serious acute ailments.
A Reply to My Critics
My discussions of the germ-theory of disease and of the vaccine, serum, and ant.i.toxin treatment in a series of articles ent.i.tled: "Harmonies of the Physical" and published in "Life and Action"
called forth a great deal of adverse criticism from physicians of the regular school of medicine. The following paragraphs are extracts from a letter sent by one of these critics to the editor of the above-named magazine:
" . . . I am convinced that some statements have been published in this particular issue [October-Decemher, 1912] which have no proper place in this magazine, the earnest champion of the cause of Truth and the official organ of expression of the U. S. headquarters of the movement which you evidently have at heart."
Dr. E. then refers to certain pa.s.sages in my article in the October-December, 1912, number of "Life and Action," and comments upon them by quoting Drs. Osler and Andrews in favor of the ant.i.toxin treatment in diphtheria and by giving his own opinion on the subject. He concludes his arguments as follows:
"I am a subscriber to this magazine and have also had my sister"s name put on the mailing list. She has a little boy about two years old. Now, suppose she should read that article of Dr. Lindlahr"s, and as a result, refuse to permit the use of ant.i.toxin, and if the boy should get diphtheria, with a fatal issue as a result, I could hardly feel gratified over the fact that I had placed that reading-matter at her disposal. I fully appreciate the fact that such an unhappy result might easily ensue in some one or more of the families who read "Life and Action" and look upon its columns as a source of the truly higher light."
Perhaps Dr. E. has not read one of Dr. Osler"s latest and strongest utterances, his unqualified endors.e.m.e.nt of natural methods of healing in the Encyclopedia Americana, quoted on page 154 of this volume.
Nature Cure in Germany
That it is possible to cure all kinds of serious acute diseases by drugless methods of healing, has been proved by the Nature Cure pract.i.tioners in Germany, nearly all of whom were laymen who had never visited a medical school. For over half a century, many thousands of them have been practicing the art of healing in all parts of Germany. With hydrotherapy and the other natural methods they have treated successfully typhoid fever. diphtheria, smallpox, appendicitis, cerebro-spinal meningitis and all other acute diseases.
It is a significant fact that, in spite of the most strenuous opposition and appeal to the law-making powers on the part of the regular school of medicine, the lay doctors could not be prevented from practicing the natural methods of treatment in law-and police-ridden Germany.
On the contrary, during the last few generations there have been practicing in Germany at all times an ever increasing number of Nature Cure physicians, most of them laymen.
This freedom of Nature Cure practice in Germany is entirely due to the success of its methods.
And this success has been demonstrated in spite of all kinds of opposition and attempted restriction. While the Nature Cure pract.i.tioner is permitted to treat those who come to him for relief, he does not have the right to cover his mistakes with six feet of earth. If one of his patients dies, a doctor of the regular school of medicine has to be called in to testify to the fact and issue the death-certificate.
Thus the "lay doctors," the "Nature Cure physicians," were and are at present constantly exposed to the strictest critical supervision by the "regulars," and if the latter can prove that a patient has died because the natural methods were inefficient or harmful, the lay pract.i.tioner can be prosecuted for and convicted of malpractice or man-slaughter.