Though developed and codified by 1796 by Samuel Hahnemann (1755-1845), homeopathy didn’t find its way to America until 1825.
Homeopathy was a reaction to “heroic” medicine. Its foundation was nutrition, exercise, minimal medicine, and, interestingly enough, human relationships. You might say that this was America’s first foray into holistic medicine.
For every disorder there was just one medicine needed. Mixing two together made no sense, because no one could know what the two would do together inside the human body (unlike today when we put our seniors on a slew of medicines, and despite the fact that no one could possibly tell us what will happen with the various combinations; yet we are told that today’s medical practice is highly scientific).
Diet meant a “mixed and varied” diet, and exercise was simply movement. Walking was encouraged.
One of the basic foundations of Homeopathy is that the human body, if given a bit of help, can heal itself. Nature was not an enemy to the homeopath as it was to the regular physician. Hahnemann created homeopathy as “the instrument of total reform in therapeutics.”
During the early 1800s the Thomsonians, many of whom practiced with botanicals too, were regular medicine’s greatest competition. In the 1840’s the Thomsonians joined forces with the botanical physicians and formed the Eclectic school of medicine. But by this time, it was Homeopathy that had become traditional medicine’s greatest competition.
One reason that Homeopathy was so successful was that it did not kill the patient. Another reason was that the theory was integrated and coherent. The average citizen of this period could attend lectures at a regular medical school and walk away having learned nothing, whereas the bulk of homeopathy theory was, in comparison, easily comprehended.
There was hardly a visitor to the US during the early 1800s who did not return to Europe with horror stories about the state of the average American’s health. They reported that we had crooked jaws, teeth missing, a grey pallor, a lazy gate, and our overall health dilapidated. Their reports were not good; our cities were filled with weak and tired people. Historians today tend to agree mercury poisoning (from traditional medicine) would be one good explanation for the state of our health.
Dr Rush, being open-minded, would have probably been a proponent of homeopathy, had he lived long enough. His career was exemplary, and he was even called upon by President Jefferson in 1803 to work with Lewis and Clark prior to their expedition. Rush furnished them with questions they would ask the natives concerning their remedies, sweats, purges and bleeding. [http://www.geocities.com/bobarnebeck/ch18.html]
Rush had treated patients through a slew of epidemics and fevers. The epidemic of 1804 that affected farmers living in the outskirts brought food shortages to the city dwellers. A nationwide flu epidemic broke out in 1807, and what was called the “Winter Epidemic” lasted from 1812 to 1814; one long winter, wouldn’t you say?
It was at this time, according to historian Bob Arnebeck, that, “Medical science achieved a tone, which it has maintained to the present day, challenging any complacency about health and death.” This was the advent of heroic medicine. Nature was an enemy, and sometimes, even our Creator was the enemy.
Rush, however, did not partake in this philosophy. He kept an open mind and felt that research would eventually find answers. This is why I feel, that had he lived long enough, he would have been a proponent of homeopathy. Rush, though, did have his detractors. (And they might have been right; for Rush's brand of medicine, and the way he practiced it, killed many and helped few, very few.)
It was at this time that the first “germ theory” of medicine had been first proposed, by a Dr John Crawford, who “suggested in 1807 that ‘amiculae’ caused fevers. He even associated insects with the process. Remarking on the incredible ability of insects to multiply over swamps, he drew the analogy with smaller pests multiplying inside the body.” [Arnebeck]
Amiculae were the little creatures discovered in water through the invention of the microscope.
Rush was excited about these new theories, although he was a regular, charged with “remorseless bleeding” by some of his contemporaries, and even challenged to a dual by another physician. Rush, however, believed in empiricism, and in this respect, he was a true scientist bent on learning as much as he could. Ironically, in the end it was regular medicine that eventually caught up with Dr Rush when he became ill and required a physician. He died shortly after being bled and fed calomel.
Homeopathy had no quarrel with nature or with the Creator. This was homeopathy’s greatest philosophical distinction from the heroic tradition of medicine. The next distinguishing facet was that the regulars felt that everything could be known, eventually; that all disease was mechanical. To Hahnemann, disease was not logical, and not always material; that there was a spiritual aspect to disease.
In Chinese medicine, the spiritual aspect to disease is a given. To modern science, if it cannot be measured, it does not play into the equation. The spirit cannot be measured. This is where biophysics separates from biochemistry. It is also where homeopathy separates from allopathy. The only things a homeopath knows are the symptoms. Homeopathy treats according to the symptoms.
We often come down hard on allopathy for treating symptoms, however, there is a distinction here, between homeopathy’s treatment of symptoms and allopathy’s. Take cancer as an example. Modern allopathy treats cancer as a disease, when in fact it is a symptom. The actual disease is a toxic, acidic terrain whose immune system has been so bogged down as to allow flagrantly nasty cells to continue to replicate. Allopathy treats the symptom of this “systemic” problem by attacking the cancer. Outside of allopathy, cancer is a symptom and localized; the disease is systemic. To the homeopathy, the distinction, though seemingly slight, is that it treats "according to the symptoms" (cancer in this case), but not by attacking them. The homeopath gives the body a minute quantity of substance that would normally cause the same symptoms, or, in this case, the cancer.
If you have arthritis, allopathy treats the pain, but the arthritis doesn’t go away. If you have high blood pressure, drugs are given that lower your blood pressure, but the problem does not go away. If you go off the blood pressure drugs, your blood pressure shoots up again. Treating symptoms allopathically is different from treating according to the symptoms homeopathically, but to understand thoroughly this exotic theory, it is best to read the article What is Homeopathy?
Hahnemann accepted that we cannot know the body, we cannot know the disease, we cannot know the human spirit, but what we can know are the symptoms. “When the physician has discovered all the observable symptoms of the disease that exist, he has discovered the disease itself, he has attained the complete conception of it requisite to enable him to effect a cure.” [Coulter]
By 1845, homeopathy had become regular medicine’s greatest competition. Its ranks began to swell from regulars leaving behind their educations and taking up this less toxic brand of medicine. Humorists of the latter half of the 19th century, when discussing the subject of medicine were sure to give the standard patter that regular medicine would kill you, but at least with homeopathy, you’d die of the disease.
Hahnemann was attacked for treating symptoms and not the cause of illnesses (not that regular medicine had ever treated the cause of illness, though I’m sure many had thought they had). Hahnemann responded to his critics claiming that, in treating the symptoms with homeopathy, nothing was left to do. The person was off the drug, and the disease was gone.
By discovering all the symptoms exhibited, Hahnemann could find the “exact” medicine to deliver, while the orthodoxy wasted far too much time speculating on the various causes that oftentimes got them enwrapped in contradictions and inconsistencies. “It is safe to say that the Solodist [orthodox] doctrine of diseased, causes, and symptoms was never worked out in detail.” [Coulter]
Hahnemann felt that since there were no criteria for distinguishing the unimportant symptoms from the important ones, that all symptoms must be considered.
Orthodox physicians of that time arrived on the scene with a shotgun full of remedies. They bled, purged, blistered, applied mercury, administered bark, etc. For Hahnemann, after determining all the symptoms, there was one and only one medicine to administer:
Funny, but this was known way back when: “even though the simple medicines were thoroughly proved with respect to their pure peculiar effects on the unimpaired healthy state of man, it is impossible to foresee how two and more medicinal substances might, when compounded, hinder and alter each other’s actions on the human body…” [Organon of the Medical Art, section 274]
The orthodoxy had few medicines. As stated above, their pharmacopoeia was small and most physicians preferred to administer just a handful of medicines (calomel being their favorite). It was the homeopaths (and herbalists, see below) who employed a greater number of medicines at that time, since, according to the tenets of homeopathy; there was only one possible medicine for any disease (considering all the symptoms). Homeopaths were constantly looking for more medicines to classify, prove, and apply.
The rise of homeopathy was not without constraints. In Austria, it was banned by imperial decree shortly after its introduction in 1819, but was still used underground to treat the cholera epidemic of 1831. Statistics published in The Logic of Figures or Comparative Results of Homoeopathic and Other Treatments in 1900 show that cholera patients treated with conventional medicine had a 50% death rate, while those treated homeopathically had less than a 22% rate of death. Understandably, the decree was revoked in 1837.
In Great Britain homeopathy got a similar welcome, was quickly outlawed after its introduction, and then courageously contested, resulting in a repeal of the prohibition and by the 1880s homeopathy prospered handsomely. A homeopathic dispensary had been opened in 1841, a second in 1867, and by 1885 fifteen hundred people a week were being treated with homeopathy.
In France a medical student was expelled for merely expressing interest in homeopathy. According to Coulter’s book, Divided Legacy, when a conventional physician in France evaluated the results of a homeopathy study in a favorable light, no orthodox medical journal would publish the results. So, he published his work in an Homeopathy journal, and was summarily expelled by his medical society.
What few people realize today, is that “the history of nineteenth-century therapeutics is essentially one of the progressive adoption by allopathic physicians of a numerous medicines originally introduced by homeopathy.” [Coulter]
Homeopathy today is cursed, laughed at, and derided by orthodox medicine, and ironically, if the orthodoxy had not adopted many of the medicines along with the rule that less is more, orthodox medicine would not even be close to what it is today. When they are through attacking homeopathy, perhaps some orthodox physicians will open a history book and rediscover their roots.
Homeopathy was a reaction to “heroic” medicine. Its foundation was nutrition, exercise, minimal medicine, and, interestingly enough, human relationships. You might say that this was America’s first foray into holistic medicine.
For every disorder there was just one medicine needed. Mixing two together made no sense, because no one could know what the two would do together inside the human body (unlike today when we put our seniors on a slew of medicines, and despite the fact that no one could possibly tell us what will happen with the various combinations; yet we are told that today’s medical practice is highly scientific).
Diet meant a “mixed and varied” diet, and exercise was simply movement. Walking was encouraged.
One of the basic foundations of Homeopathy is that the human body, if given a bit of help, can heal itself. Nature was not an enemy to the homeopath as it was to the regular physician. Hahnemann created homeopathy as “the instrument of total reform in therapeutics.”
During the early 1800s the Thomsonians, many of whom practiced with botanicals too, were regular medicine’s greatest competition. In the 1840’s the Thomsonians joined forces with the botanical physicians and formed the Eclectic school of medicine. But by this time, it was Homeopathy that had become traditional medicine’s greatest competition.
One reason that Homeopathy was so successful was that it did not kill the patient. Another reason was that the theory was integrated and coherent. The average citizen of this period could attend lectures at a regular medical school and walk away having learned nothing, whereas the bulk of homeopathy theory was, in comparison, easily comprehended.
There was hardly a visitor to the US during the early 1800s who did not return to Europe with horror stories about the state of the average American’s health. They reported that we had crooked jaws, teeth missing, a grey pallor, a lazy gate, and our overall health dilapidated. Their reports were not good; our cities were filled with weak and tired people. Historians today tend to agree mercury poisoning (from traditional medicine) would be one good explanation for the state of our health.
Dr Rush, being open-minded, would have probably been a proponent of homeopathy, had he lived long enough. His career was exemplary, and he was even called upon by President Jefferson in 1803 to work with Lewis and Clark prior to their expedition. Rush furnished them with questions they would ask the natives concerning their remedies, sweats, purges and bleeding. [http://www.geocities.com/bobarnebeck/ch18.html]
Rush had treated patients through a slew of epidemics and fevers. The epidemic of 1804 that affected farmers living in the outskirts brought food shortages to the city dwellers. A nationwide flu epidemic broke out in 1807, and what was called the “Winter Epidemic” lasted from 1812 to 1814; one long winter, wouldn’t you say?
It was at this time, according to historian Bob Arnebeck, that, “Medical science achieved a tone, which it has maintained to the present day, challenging any complacency about health and death.” This was the advent of heroic medicine. Nature was an enemy, and sometimes, even our Creator was the enemy.
Rush, however, did not partake in this philosophy. He kept an open mind and felt that research would eventually find answers. This is why I feel, that had he lived long enough, he would have been a proponent of homeopathy. Rush, though, did have his detractors. (And they might have been right; for Rush's brand of medicine, and the way he practiced it, killed many and helped few, very few.)
It was at this time that the first “germ theory” of medicine had been first proposed, by a Dr John Crawford, who “suggested in 1807 that ‘amiculae’ caused fevers. He even associated insects with the process. Remarking on the incredible ability of insects to multiply over swamps, he drew the analogy with smaller pests multiplying inside the body.” [Arnebeck]
Amiculae were the little creatures discovered in water through the invention of the microscope.
Rush was excited about these new theories, although he was a regular, charged with “remorseless bleeding” by some of his contemporaries, and even challenged to a dual by another physician. Rush, however, believed in empiricism, and in this respect, he was a true scientist bent on learning as much as he could. Ironically, in the end it was regular medicine that eventually caught up with Dr Rush when he became ill and required a physician. He died shortly after being bled and fed calomel.
Homeopathy had no quarrel with nature or with the Creator. This was homeopathy’s greatest philosophical distinction from the heroic tradition of medicine. The next distinguishing facet was that the regulars felt that everything could be known, eventually; that all disease was mechanical. To Hahnemann, disease was not logical, and not always material; that there was a spiritual aspect to disease.
In Chinese medicine, the spiritual aspect to disease is a given. To modern science, if it cannot be measured, it does not play into the equation. The spirit cannot be measured. This is where biophysics separates from biochemistry. It is also where homeopathy separates from allopathy. The only things a homeopath knows are the symptoms. Homeopathy treats according to the symptoms.
We often come down hard on allopathy for treating symptoms, however, there is a distinction here, between homeopathy’s treatment of symptoms and allopathy’s. Take cancer as an example. Modern allopathy treats cancer as a disease, when in fact it is a symptom. The actual disease is a toxic, acidic terrain whose immune system has been so bogged down as to allow flagrantly nasty cells to continue to replicate. Allopathy treats the symptom of this “systemic” problem by attacking the cancer. Outside of allopathy, cancer is a symptom and localized; the disease is systemic. To the homeopathy, the distinction, though seemingly slight, is that it treats "according to the symptoms" (cancer in this case), but not by attacking them. The homeopath gives the body a minute quantity of substance that would normally cause the same symptoms, or, in this case, the cancer.
If you have arthritis, allopathy treats the pain, but the arthritis doesn’t go away. If you have high blood pressure, drugs are given that lower your blood pressure, but the problem does not go away. If you go off the blood pressure drugs, your blood pressure shoots up again. Treating symptoms allopathically is different from treating according to the symptoms homeopathically, but to understand thoroughly this exotic theory, it is best to read the article What is Homeopathy?
Hahnemann accepted that we cannot know the body, we cannot know the disease, we cannot know the human spirit, but what we can know are the symptoms. “When the physician has discovered all the observable symptoms of the disease that exist, he has discovered the disease itself, he has attained the complete conception of it requisite to enable him to effect a cure.” [Coulter]
By 1845, homeopathy had become regular medicine’s greatest competition. Its ranks began to swell from regulars leaving behind their educations and taking up this less toxic brand of medicine. Humorists of the latter half of the 19th century, when discussing the subject of medicine were sure to give the standard patter that regular medicine would kill you, but at least with homeopathy, you’d die of the disease.
Hahnemann was attacked for treating symptoms and not the cause of illnesses (not that regular medicine had ever treated the cause of illness, though I’m sure many had thought they had). Hahnemann responded to his critics claiming that, in treating the symptoms with homeopathy, nothing was left to do. The person was off the drug, and the disease was gone.
There was then, and is today, a difference between treating symptoms to get symptomatic relief, and treating “according to the symptoms” so that the body will repair itself. However, this distinction is often lost on the narrow-minded.It is not conceivable, nor can it be proved by any experience in the world, that, after removal of all the symptoms of a disease, and of the entire collection of perceptible phenomena, there should or could remain anything else besides health, or that the morbid alteration of the interior could remain uneradicated. [Organon of the Medical Art, section 8]
By discovering all the symptoms exhibited, Hahnemann could find the “exact” medicine to deliver, while the orthodoxy wasted far too much time speculating on the various causes that oftentimes got them enwrapped in contradictions and inconsistencies. “It is safe to say that the Solodist [orthodox] doctrine of diseased, causes, and symptoms was never worked out in detail.” [Coulter]
Hahnemann felt that since there were no criteria for distinguishing the unimportant symptoms from the important ones, that all symptoms must be considered.
Orthodox physicians of that time arrived on the scene with a shotgun full of remedies. They bled, purged, blistered, applied mercury, administered bark, etc. For Hahnemann, after determining all the symptoms, there was one and only one medicine to administer:
Today, it is hard to find an elderly patient who is on fewer than 3 or 4 medications. No one can tell you what the overall, cumulative effect of those drugs will be. However, we’re beginning to suspect what can happen as cancer, heart disease, osteoporosis, and Alzheimer’s disease seem to be the main diseases suffered by our overly-drugged elderly population. A few renegade physicians are beginning to point to the treatments (drugs) as being the causes of these many illnesses.In no case under treatment is it necessary and therefore not permissible to administer to a patient more than one single, simple medicinal substance at one time…. As the true physician finds in simple medicines, administered singly and uncombined, all that he can be possibly desire … he will, mindful of the wise maxim that “ it is wrong to attempt to employ a complex means when simple means suffice”, never think of giving as a remedy any but a single, simple substance…. [Coulter]
Funny, but this was known way back when: “even though the simple medicines were thoroughly proved with respect to their pure peculiar effects on the unimpaired healthy state of man, it is impossible to foresee how two and more medicinal substances might, when compounded, hinder and alter each other’s actions on the human body…” [Organon of the Medical Art, section 274]
The orthodoxy had few medicines. As stated above, their pharmacopoeia was small and most physicians preferred to administer just a handful of medicines (calomel being their favorite). It was the homeopaths (and herbalists, see below) who employed a greater number of medicines at that time, since, according to the tenets of homeopathy; there was only one possible medicine for any disease (considering all the symptoms). Homeopaths were constantly looking for more medicines to classify, prove, and apply.
The rise of homeopathy was not without constraints. In Austria, it was banned by imperial decree shortly after its introduction in 1819, but was still used underground to treat the cholera epidemic of 1831. Statistics published in The Logic of Figures or Comparative Results of Homoeopathic and Other Treatments in 1900 show that cholera patients treated with conventional medicine had a 50% death rate, while those treated homeopathically had less than a 22% rate of death. Understandably, the decree was revoked in 1837.
In Great Britain homeopathy got a similar welcome, was quickly outlawed after its introduction, and then courageously contested, resulting in a repeal of the prohibition and by the 1880s homeopathy prospered handsomely. A homeopathic dispensary had been opened in 1841, a second in 1867, and by 1885 fifteen hundred people a week were being treated with homeopathy.
In France a medical student was expelled for merely expressing interest in homeopathy. According to Coulter’s book, Divided Legacy, when a conventional physician in France evaluated the results of a homeopathy study in a favorable light, no orthodox medical journal would publish the results. So, he published his work in an Homeopathy journal, and was summarily expelled by his medical society.
What few people realize today, is that “the history of nineteenth-century therapeutics is essentially one of the progressive adoption by allopathic physicians of a numerous medicines originally introduced by homeopathy.” [Coulter]
Homeopathy today is cursed, laughed at, and derided by orthodox medicine, and ironically, if the orthodoxy had not adopted many of the medicines along with the rule that less is more, orthodox medicine would not even be close to what it is today. When they are through attacking homeopathy, perhaps some orthodox physicians will open a history book and rediscover their roots.
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